CompuServe Messages

Victor, Whether AGA will help in porting an MS-DOS game to the Amiga or not really depends on the game. For something like The Perfect General, it wouldn't have helped a lot, as we were only using 16-color graphics, but it would have helped some due to the graphics speedup provided by both the AGA design and the software improvements that Commodore made in version 3.0 of the operating system. For games that were designed for 256-color 320 x 200 resolutions, it helps in that the graphics don't have to be converted down to 32-color or 64-color, which can affect the graphics quality. However, I personally don't think that this is much of an issue per-se, especially since there are graphics utilities available today that do an excellent job of remapping pics down, like ADPro and Imagemaster. The new A1200 may help a lot more because of the 68EC020 and 2 megs of memory standard than because of the AGA chipset, but that will only happen when and if the A1200 sells well enough that it can be considered the "base-level" Amiga, and publishers can afford to no longer support lesser machines. For that to happen (IMHO), Commodore must give up on the idea of creating the next generation C64, and work at establishing a powerful low-end machine, even if it means not having a $400 computer to sell. No more A500's, no more A600's, no more 68000's! I apologize if anyone takes offense at what I said. I am not insulting you or the computer you chose to purchase. I am merely pointing out the realities that I am having to face as an Entertainment Software developer. – BobR