NiGHTs Into Dreams

[Discoalucard]

www.hardcoregaming101.net/nights/nights.htm

This is still a work-in-progress so it won't be going up next update, but since I've been working on it for so long I figured I'd post it now.

It's hard for me to get a grasp on how this article comes off. I love NiGHTs. Love love love it. In this site ever goes a "top 50" or "top 100" series, it would be definitely be on there. It's sort of the game that whenever I'm pissed off or depressed, I can go to and just feel better about everything.

But man, any time I try to convince other people to try this game out, it just doesn't work out. I remember when I first got it in high school and tried to show it off to my other (also high school) friends, and they just couldn't get past the fact that you played as a purple flying androgynous jester. So strike one! More recently, when the re-release came out, I tried to explain how to play the game to my wife. And it's just so full of overcomplicated stuff and jargon and just things that make sense once you understand how the game is played, but it's just so unlike everything out there that it just ends up baffling to most people. Even the reviews of the XBLA/PSN re-release had the same problem, any review that fails to mention that it's basically a "score-attack" type game (like the awful Joystiq one) totally misses the point.

But at the same time, it's kind of the game's fault too - it never explains its mechanics, never really gives a reason for high scoring (at the time of its release, gaming was transitioning away from arcade-type games), and reading some magazines from the era, a lot of people were just kinda irritated that they wanted a new Sonic game (or Sonic-like game) and got this instead.

The sequel gets a lot of hate too, and most of it is justified - but at the same time it also feels like the developers were aware of the faults of the original and how the audience perceived it, and tried to fix address some of it. They really didn't go a great job though, so it ended up pissing off fans of the old games and failing to attract new fans at the same time.

Anyway, stuff to add includes: a bit about the Archie comic (it's not good), fixing up some stuff about the A-Life system and some of the bonuses of Christmas Nights, and some magazine scans I wanted to add, and some extra pics of Nights' cameos. One of the reasons this took so long was to get decent pics of the other games (and way too much time spent playing Sega Superstars Tennis), but by the time I hit Billy Hatcher, I just gave up and will just stick in some lower-quality pics I found elsewhere. Sorry!

[pseudo3d]

Wow! I've always heard good things about NiGHTS, but never really explored it.

[roushimsx]

"The 360/PS3/PC versions look the best of these, seeing how they run in the highest resolutions. They also run in 16:9 widescreen, giving a much wider view of the level and therefore making it easier to play."

FWIW, the Saturn version also supported widescreen if you manually enabled it through the option screen. I'd have to double check the PS2 version (never spent much time with it). Totally the preferred way to play (widescreen), even if you're not using a widescreen monitor/display. Looks a bit distorted and all, but you can adjust and having that extra FOV is super handy.

Loved the first game to bits and pieces, but like you said, it's a score attack game that wasn't marketed as such and released during a period when that kind of stuff was on the decline anyway. Most people just saw it as a super short disappointment (omg, you can't 3D your way into the stages like in Mario! How gay!) and with it going up against Crash Bandicoot and Mario 64, it didn't have the "next gen wow" to it.

Unfortunate, because I still love going back to it now and again, though I sure as hell can't chain and score like I once could

[muteKi]

Guess I've been beaten to this one. Agreed, lovely game, based around score attacking, and the game doesn't do a very good job of explaining itself.

Also kinda wish we could have gotten a couple more levels since the first couple are really simple and the last couple are really interesting and fun to play.

(PS: For SAASRT the GET LEVEL name you need ends up being Spring Valley, as a quick heads-up)

[Discoalucard]

Apr 28, 2013 12:33:38 GMT -5 roushimsx said:

FWIW, the Saturn version also supported widescreen if you manually enabled it through the option screen. I'd have to double check the PS2 version (never spent much time with it). Totally the preferred way to play (widescreen), even if you're not using a widescreen monitor/display. Looks a bit distorted and all, but you can adjust and having that extra FOV is super handy.

Yeah, I need to clarify this. It's a little difficult to do without going into the intracacies of displays and I'm not 100% sure of my technical knowledge.

As far as I know, the Saturn and PS2 version use "widescreen" by widening the field of view. Then, it depends on the scaler of the television to stretch the image into widescreen. The result looks like 16:9 (with a larger playing field) but it's still technically a 4:3 image. On the other hand, the HD versions run the game in true unstretched 16:9.

Interestingly, on the Wii DOES output a true 16:9 image too, but does it by running at a lower vertical resolution (you can see this in the emulator captures.) I don't think the Saturn or PS2 could support running games in that resolution.

I've been playing the Saturn and PS2 version on emulators (and my Saturn won't work on my HDTV) so it's hard for me to test on how it would work on proper displays. Emulators won't show it correctly since the resolution isn't actually being increased.

[roushimsx]

I'll try to fish out my Saturn this weekend and snap some raw captures (4:3/widescreen unstretched/widescreen). Haven't had a reason to hook that thing up in a dog's age

[nickz]

The TV commercial made me want to play this game when it first came out. It had this really deep voice telling you how cool "Sega Nights" is without telling you anything about the game except that you can fly and it had really loud techno music in the background (I can't find the video for it, if anyone can find it, thank you).

I was a little surprised when I actually got around to trying it out. Back then I thought all games were all about going from point A to point B while destroying anything in your way. The whole "non-confrontational" thing really did make boss fights feel kind of weird, like the article says. It's actually pretty refreshing if you were like me and went into it expecting Panzer Dragoon, but easier and with brighter colors.

I'm also glad to see more Saturn game articles lately. It really was a cool system. I'm probably in the minority here, but I think I liked it more than the PS1. It had some very interesting exclusive games that tend to slip through the cracks when talking about awesome 32-bit games.

[TheGunheart]

This is one of my all time favorites, too. I remember loving the hell out of the art direction when it first came out, though I'll admit it took me the longest to really "get" how the game itself was supposed to be played. But once I did, I played the hell out of it! I have to say the art direction and sound design have allowed it to age amazingly well despite the low-poly graphics.

But yeah, as someone who actually likes most of the modern Sonics with the exception of '06...I have to say I was greatly disappointed by Journey of Dreams. I actually didn't mind Nights' voice myself, but the new human characters jarred horribly with the other character designs, and the bloated attempt to pad out the game felt like it came at the expense of the actual levels. I also realize, in retrospect, that I can't remember a single boss fight...

[silvastarripper]

May 10, 2013 17:32:37 GMT -5 nickz said:

The TV commercial made me want to play this game when it first came out. It had this really deep voice telling you how cool "Sega Nights" is without telling you anything about the game except that you can fly and it had really loud techno music in the background (I can't find the video for it, if anyone can find it, thank you).

It wouldn't happen to be this one, would it?


I liked this one. One of the only Saturn commercials that I actually remember seeing on TV. Fly, plaything. Fly.

[nickz]

Yeah, that's the one! Thanks! I don't remember too many Saturn commercials either, but that one really stuck with me for some reason.

[sabbacc108]

May 10, 2013 15:51:50 GMT -5 Discoalucard said:

Apr 28, 2013 12:33:38 GMT -5 roushimsx said:

FWIW, the Saturn version also supported widescreen if you manually enabled it through the option screen. I'd have to double check the PS2 version (never spent much time with it). Totally the preferred way to play (widescreen), even if you're not using a widescreen monitor/display. Looks a bit distorted and all, but you can adjust and having that extra FOV is super handy.

Yeah, I need to clarify this. It's a little difficult to do without going into the intracacies of displays and I'm not 100% sure of my technical knowledge.
As far as I know, the Saturn and PS2 version use "widescreen" by widening the field of view. Then, it depends on the scaler of the television to stretch the image into widescreen. The result looks like 16:9 (with a larger playing field) but it's still technically a 4:3 image. On the other hand, the HD versions run the game in true unstretched 16:9.
I've been playing the Saturn and PS2 version on emulators (and my Saturn won't work on my HDTV) so it's hard for me to test on how it would work on proper displays. Emulators won't show it correctly since the resolution isn't actually being increased.

It's been a little while since I last played it, but if I recall correctly, the widescreen mode on the Saturn was a little weird in that the sprites on screen were rendered the same whether it was in widescreen mode or not---meaning that if you play the game in widescreen mode on a 16:9 television, the polygon portions of the image appear in "normal" proportions, but the sprites are all slightly stretched. This results in the unusual situation of the widescreen mode looking "wrong" no matter how your TV is set up. I understand why it probably works that way, but it came across as unsettling to someone who is really anal-retentive about images being displayed in the correct aspect ratio, so I had to play it in 4:3 windowboxed on my TV.

[Discoalucard]

That would definitely make sense. Polygons can easily be rescaled, but when it comes to sprites, they get distorted if you mess with the aspect ratio. The solution would've been to redraw entirely new sprites with the ratio in mind, so it would look correct when stretched, but it doesn't sound like they did that.

I did remember playing in widescreen with the PS2 version, which replaced all of the sprites with polygons, so that one looked fine.

[bakudon]

Nice! I wasn't really aware that there wasn't a Nights article in the site, though it certainly was a high time we got one. I remember how the major gaming magazine here used to love the hell out of it. I'd surely have gotten it, if only I had had the Saturn then. Well, no, actually, because I was a Nintendo hardliner back then, but I digress.

Still, this article was a bit typo-heavy for some reason. For instance...

• Paragraph 4: "...Mystic Forest amd Soft Museum" -> "and"
• Paragraph 5: "Each stage is comprises of..." -> "comprised"
• Paragraph 5: "...there's more enough time..." -> "there's more than enough time"
• Paragraph 5: "...rings you can fly though..." -> "through"
• Paragraph 5: "There are also rings you can fly though, which restores your "dash" power, and also adds to your link. " -> Not a typo as such, but my brain interprets the "which" to refer to the word "rings" and thus expects the verb "restores" to not have the s, which creates a clash... Though I guess you refer to the act of flying through them. Admitted, English isn't my first language, so someone may want to correct me on this, but I'd reword the sentence.
• Paragraph 6: "Running of out time" -> "out of"
• Paragraph 16: "NiGHTS one of those..." -> missing an "is"
• Paragraph 17: "Starting off alone one foot" -> "on"
• Paragraph 17: "propelled onto on isolated flating platform" -> "an", "floating"
• Paragraph 17: "Starting off alone one foot" -> "on"
• Paragraph 21: "which should have added for" -> missing a "been"?
• Paragraph 8: "...where you the first Mare of the stage while..." -> missing a verb, possibly "repeat"?
• Paragraph 12: "...and the dragon lets you resists..." -> "resist"

Sorry to sound nitpicky, but there were a few, which got to me. Anyway, thanks for writing the article!

[Discoalucard]

Thanks!

[pseudo3d]

Could the strange widescreen-ness be because of the way that the Saturn rendered polygons? Instead of dividing into triangles, it was done with quadrilaterals.