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The Expanded CRPG Book is out!
- Thread starter felipepepe
- Start date
If it makes you feel better, I'll probably only get mine in like 2-3 weeks lolFulfillment status: Unfulfilled
71 AUD is a no-brainer for this, just ordered my copy. Well, shipping was 53 AUD, so I chucked in The Secret History of Mac Gaming too for good measure.
This is a great achievement felipepepe and everyone who contributed with articles. Special award for presenting the screenshots in the correct aspect ratio for the most part.
This is a great achievement felipepepe and everyone who contributed with articles. Special award for presenting the screenshots in the correct aspect ratio for the most part.
Did I screw up some Amiga ones?
Yeah, generally Amiga games made by European studios primarily for the European market assume square pixels. They just restricted the graphics to a 320x200 area of the full 320x256 PAL screen so they could also easily sell the games in NTSC markets (with stretched graphics, but that's still extra sales). More info here.
So Perihelion, Amberstar, Ambermoon, and Fate — Gates of Dawn, for example, are erroneously stretched to 4:3 display aspect ratio—they should've stayed at 8:5 (320x200 with square pixels).
But you got Elvira right.
The Apple screenshots are consistently enlarged by a non-integer scaling ratio using nearest-neigbour interpolation which introduces really ugly artifacts in the form of uneven pixels. That is very apparent on the dither pattern on the trees in the below image (it's supposed to be an even checkerboard pattern, even if stretched by 20% vertically because these are NTSC games):
The colours are a bit off too in the latest PDF (haven't got the book yet), which is especially noticeable on 16-colour EGA games. It's as if the gamma was wrong, or maybe it's the result of some weird RGB -> CMYK -> RGB roundtrip, dunno. They don't look correct, that's for sure.
In any case, I'd still call these relatively minor issues compared to the excellent content of the book. 90% of people (at least) wouldn't care or notice. You don't really peruse this book for the images; the screenshots are only there for illustrative purposes and they serve their job well enough. It's still a unique, monumental achievement, don't get me wrong.
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Ok, ordered a copy. Will occupy a shelf place nicely next to the original print.
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If you bought the original with slipcovers, it will be slightly higher in the book shelve than the new edition. Think about it
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Well, I didn't. 
kurwa mać why is a book this expensive
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low print run coupled with high production quality usually end up in that range
absolutely not, don't even dare to claim otherwise
books of this caliber are around $30 here at most
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The only other explanation is to keep it out of your hands. Must be a conspiracy
I looked up and that stupid fucker intends to pay the money to some NGO for muh favela children
It's immoral to pay for this, you're directly supporting Jair Bolsonaro
Well, I think the book is pretty cheap, considering all of the above. But I guess not if you're used to $3 paperbacks...
Oh, zero offence taken, I deeply appreciate this kind of feedback.
The PDF Bitmap Books send is handled by them and is indeed RGB -> CMYK -> RGB, so the colors get a bit muted. Here's the free PDF versus the Bitmap Books one:
While I cannot fix the printed book or their PDF, I can now resume updating the free PDF on my website and fix these things. There's no integer option in InDesign, but I found a guide on how handle that: https://creativepro.com/export-selection-precise-size/
For the Amiga thing, I only used Amiga screenshots for 12 games: Bloodwych, B.A.T., The Immortal, Elvira, Fate: Gates of Dawn, Legend / Four Crystals of Trazere, Ishar, Black Crypt, Amberstar, Ambermoon, Perihelion and Hired Guns. Your guide is excellent and very detailed, but considering that Ishar is European but should be stretched, and that circles aren't a 100% surefire way to decide, is there a database or something to check? Besides the ones you mentioned, I think only B.A.T. and Legend are wrong, but I wanted to be sure.
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Well, yours are Poorfaghistani prices, tbf.
The Gates of Skeldal link is busted in the PDF - bad link, and the domain expired.
English copy: https://mega.nz/#F!AENX1CZa!2zDeRq1CjDQ-XEwiY6nU-A
Thread regarding it: https://rpgwatch.com/forum/threads/gates-of-skeldal-brany-skeldalu.6619/page-2
English copy: https://mega.nz/#F!AENX1CZa!2zDeRq1CjDQ-XEwiY6nU-A
Thread regarding it: https://rpgwatch.com/forum/threads/gates-of-skeldal-brany-skeldalu.6619/page-2
My pleasure; I wrote it to further our collective understanding of these topics.
Yeah, that roundtrip will inevitably result in the restriction of the raw RGB colours to a much narrower gamut. You'll get desaturated colours with weird gamma, at best. In the ideal scenario, you want to avoid that roundtrip at all costs. I'm quite sure the printed book will look fine, though—they're no amateurs, after all.The PDF Bitmap Books send is handled by them and is indeed RGB -> CMYK -> RGB, so the colors get a bit muted. Here's the free PDF versus the Bitmap Books one:
Great, keep it pure RGB and just update the text or something, that would be the best.
Not quite sure how that's relevant here? If you're referring to the Apple screenshots, if are able to take captures from the emulator using square pixels, you can do your usual 5x horizontal & 6x vertical integer upscaling trick, then let InDesign scale it down to whatever size. That will yield sharp, even pixels. Just scale up 320x200 content to 1600x1200 using no interpolation, then let InDesign do the rest.
There's no such list—you need to investigate each game individually, look at the publisher first, then look at some images, especially human figures, and use your best judgement. Here's my take.
The easy ones (I'm 99% sure about these):
- Bloodwych – UK made PAL game, square pixels
- B.A.T. – Ubi Soft (France), PAL, square pixels
- Fate: Gates of Dawn – reLine (Germany), PAL, square pixels
- Legend – Mindscape (UK), PAL, square pixels
- Black Crypt – Raven Software (USA) -> NTSC, 20% stretch
- Hired Guns – DMA Design (UK), PAL, square pixels
- The Immortal – Will Harvey (US) did the original for the Apple IIgs, so most likely the Amiga port is for NTSC -> needs the 20% stretch
Slightly trickier ones (debatable and/or subjective, but I'm leaning towards square pixels):
- Ishar – Silmarils (France). Human figures and faces actually look correct with square pixels. I think the fact that the interface ovals look like circles with 20% stretch is more of a coincidence... or actually a trap
I'd vote for square pixels. But I'm not 100% sure, actually...- Elvira – Horror Soft (UK). This is an interesting one. I *think* (but have no proof) that they were very much anticipating the DOS & NTSC Amiga releases, so the artist kinda picked an in-between spot between 1:1 and 1:1.2 pixel aspect ratio and drew the human figures so they look OK on both PAL and NTSC. But the interface clearly assumes square pixels, so I have a slight bias towards square pixels, as it's really a game that originally comes from the Amiga.
One more observation: there are not enough C64 screenshots (e.g. I'd include C64 screenshots of Neuromancer and Wasteland). But C64 graphics with raw pixels looks pretty average; ideally, you'd run them through some CRT emulator like this:
https://www.colodore.com/
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I ordered it ealier than I said and got it today as well.
The Packaging of Bitmap Books is excellent btw. felipepepe It has arrived in perfect condition, great.
The Packaging of Bitmap Books is excellent btw. felipepepe It has arrived in perfect condition, great.
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My wife ordered a cookbook 1/6 the size of the CRPG book and it cost the same.
And of course the CRPG book has vastly more utility than a mere cookbook.
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I'm sure your wife spent as much money but whether it was on a cookbook is yet to be determined
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I checked it out and it was suprisingly arse as it was a cookbook about high protein low calorie food which is fine since I am training a lot and need the protein but I fail to see the merit of not eating what I always do (Which is quark, Whey protein, meat, and fruit) but I guess she wants to expand the range of available food that still aligns with my needs, which is appreciated.
That has gotten way to long, no more posts about cookbooks now.
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