24 Mar
2017
24 Mar
'17
12:14 p.m.
Not sure how it worked on the Vectrex, but I am familiar with Atari vector
arcade games (used to own a Tempest and Asteroids machine). In them, they
used a display controller that utilized a display list of coordinates,
colors, etc and IIRC it even had the ability to do jumps, etc.... probably
similar in concept to how the CTIA/GTIA would work on the Atari home
computers with their display lists. Certainly a lot less data to write than
a framebuffer or pattern-generated display. In the case of the Asteroids
game, it's resolution was around 1024x800ish, pretty high res for the day.
I can imagine that they employed a similar vector generator on the Vectrex.
On Fri, Mar 24, 2017 at 1:47 PM, Chuck Guzis via cctalk <
cctalk at classiccmp.org> wrote:
On 03/24/2017 08:34 AM, Alexandre Souza via cctalk
wrote:
Well...there is some description in english,
google translate is a
very useful tool and the post has a pertinent video. I cannot view it
as spam. Anyway...sorry for bothering :)
I rather enjoyed the Vectrex story--and yes, Google translate works
pretty well.
I remember when the Vectrex came out--and I wondered how well an MPU of
the day could keep up with drawing relatively complex game displays,
since, unlike a raster display, the vector display has to be
continuously regenerated. It clearly worked.
Thanks for the narrative,
Chuck