🚀 go-pugleaf

On 15 Dec 1994, Animesh Karna wrote:

> Origin is constantly referred to as a company that likes to "push the 
> limits": they write games designed to take advantage of faster 
> processors, etc.  Whenever anyone complains about a game being slow, the 
> response seems to be <shake the head> "Well, we try to push the envelope".
> 
> My feeling . . .  Sometimes Origin needs to spot the difference between 
> taking advantage of faster processors and needing faster processors.
> 
> When I played "Ultima 8", I saw a "needing faster processors" but not 
> "taking advantage of . . ."  I look at that game, and I have to wonder: 
> WHAT is so amazing there?  It isn't particularly complex, it's animation 
> isn't that great (Flashback had super-smooth animation and ran nicely on 
> a '386), it's not a particularly big world, etc.  So, why was it so 
> slow?  Why was it so biiiig?  Why did it need 4-megs of RAM?  I don't get 
> it.  
> 
> To be fair to Origin, I just started playing "System Shock".  My machine 
> (a 486sx 33) is plenty fast enough for smooth performance with Doom.  I'm 
> getting really good performance with System Shock as well, but not as 
> smooth and fast as I had gotten with Doom (though it isn't bad either).  
> But, I get looking up and down, crouching and crawling, bridges I can go 
> over and under, etc.  This is a "take advantage of" game, as opposed to a 
> "needing" game.
> 
> 


AMEN, finally someone who feels the same about Origin as me!  Granted 
some of their games are "pushing the envelope like WCIII, other games 
like System Shock, while good seem to show laziness on the part of the 
programmers.  Soon I'm going to need a Pentium to even run their "updated 
version" of Pac Man.  Doom still kills System Shock for the simple reason 
that the you can enjoy it on the 486 that you bought a year.  Let's hope 
that Ultima 9 can run on a 486, without needing a Pentium to enjoy it.  
How many times have you read an article on a Origin game saying, "Well, 
it will work on a high end 486...with the graphics on super low, playing 
in a 1" window, without the sound on."?
SHEESH