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What is the most visually stunning game on the Nintendo 64?

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SiG

SiG

Member
Oct 25, 2017
6,485
Prof Bathtub said:
To be fair, most people who say that phrase are either being disingenuous or needlessly hyperbolic.
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That's like half, if not 60-80% of the internet most of the time!

I wanted to add most of Eurocom's ports and developed games have been pretty amazing in terms of performance and visuals compared to their contemporaries (who are not Rare/Factor 5/EAD). Their port of Cruisn' World is much better than Midway's own port of Cruisn' USA, but their other titles like The World Is Not Enough can almost run toe-to-toe with Rare's own Goldeneye.

Also Probe Entertainment and their Acclain IP contributions have gotten better over the years. My favorite might have to be Forsaken 64 and its real-time lighting effects, which managed to cram almost all of the effects from the PC version while custom-tuning the assets and level design to the system's strengths.

It makes me wonder how woud a Tomb Raider port might have faired if it were in capable hands such as Eurocom's or Factor 5's.
 
Opa-Opa

Opa-Opa

Attempted to circumvent ban with alt account
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Oct 16, 2018
1,766
Paper Mario takes the cake.

Runner up: Banjo Tooie
 
Dolobill

Dolobill

Member
Oct 25, 2017
1,077
giphy.gif
 
JahIthBer

JahIthBer

Member
Jan 27, 2018
10,382
Conker, since it didn't require an expansion pack, but funny enough a lot of people seem to think it did.
 
AztecComplex

AztecComplex

Banned
Oct 25, 2017
10,371
K' Dash said:
Maybe he's confused thinking about the Xbox remake? I mean, it looks as good as an end of gen first party game could look.
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Maybe he is that's the only explanation.

The biggest jump in graphics we've ever seen in our lives was the jump from N64/PS1 to GC/PS2. It was a gigantic leap in 5 short years. I can honestly point out some late NES games that can look like very early SNES games. Or late PS3 games that looked better than early PS4 games. But an N64 passing for a PS2 game is fucking ridiculous.
TaySan said:
Conkers bad fur day legit could pass as a gamecube game.
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Jfc no it does not. You sure you're not thinking of the Xbox remake?
 
Host Samurai

Host Samurai

Member
Oct 27, 2017
12,167
Gotta go with Sin & Punishment. Has lots of shit going on with a great aesthetic that even make the graphics hold up.
 
Salarians

Salarians

Knights of Favonius World Tour '21
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Oct 25, 2017
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Perfect Dark is the first one that came to mind, I remember going back to it years after it came out (and we were into the PS2/GCN/XBOX era) and being surprised at how good it still looked

those lens flare effects are probably why lol

 
AztecComplex

AztecComplex

Banned
Oct 25, 2017
10,371
TaySan said:
Maybe my memory is a little foggy since it's been a while since I played the N64 version, remember that game looking so much better than any N64 game. Not counting performance or anything just graphics.
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Oh it did look better than most N64 games out there but there was still a Grand Canyon of difference between that and a GC game. There has never been a bigger graphical jump from one generation to another (and probably never will) as we did from N64 to GC (or PS1 to PS2).
 
AztecComplex

AztecComplex

Banned
Oct 25, 2017
10,371
Salarians said:
Perfect Dark is the first one that came to mind, I remember going back to it years after it came out (and we were into the PS2/GCN/XBOX era) and being surprised at how good it still looked

those lens flare effects are probably why lol

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OMG what the hell happened to Joanna's face? Did they change it for the JP release? Hahaha why would they do that?!
 
Hella

Hella

Member
Oct 27, 2017
23,405
Ogre Battle 64. It uses 3D graphics sparingly, instead opting for a lot of sprites and 2D backgrounds.

The battles in particular look great, even today.
telegraphogre_trans_NvBQzQNjv4BqEDjTm7JpzhSGR1_8ApEWQA1vLvhkMtVb21dMmpQBfEs.jpg


Looks something like this.
 
ThisOne

ThisOne

Member
Oct 27, 2017
1,938
If framerate is excluded from the conversation, I think Perfect Dark (in high res mode) easily has the best graphics on the system. Runner up pregnant goes to Rogue Squadron.
 
sora bora

sora bora

Member
Oct 27, 2017
1,572
AztecComplex said:
I can honestly point out some late NES games that can look like very early SNES games. Or late PS3 games that looked better than early PS4 games. But an N64 passing for a PS2 game is fucking ridiculous.
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Curious as to what examples you'd use to buttress these claims. I'm trying to think of some but coming up empty.
 

Deleted member 3815

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Oct 25, 2017
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For me it would be Majora's Mask, Kirby 64, Paper Mario and Sin and Punishment.

They all look good and still do to this day.
 
AztecComplex

AztecComplex

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Oct 25, 2017
10,371
sora bora said:
Curious as to what examples you'd use to buttress these claims. I'm trying to think of some but coming up empty.
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Kirby's Adventure or Wario's Woods on NES put them side by side with, say, Final Fantasy Mystic Quest or Dragon Quest V and tell me they don't look like they were on the same console.

As for PS3 to PS4 see The Last of Us on PS3 and tell me it didn't look better than many PS4 games. I know, budgets and all but TLoU on PS3 looks better than Nier Automata just to name one.
 

Ecotic

Banned
Oct 27, 2017
1,408
A lot of the best looking games didn't use the expansion pak, like Jet Force Gemini and Conker. I wish they had, so we could see the N64 maxed out (with those games at least).
 
eraFROMAN

eraFROMAN

One Winged Slayer
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Mar 12, 2019
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Basically all of Rare's output. They even had the foresight to add a true 16:9 mode to several games, and I've gotten use out of that in the past decade, despite how blurry it is. As mentioned, Kirby still looks really good (real time cutscenes at high frame rates!) and Majora's Mask did a lot with color that wasn't replicated by any other game on the system. I'd also mention Star Fox 64; it was simple, but its very well animated and each planet looks significantly different from the next. Plus, some nice lighting way back in 1997.
 

Celine

Member
Oct 26, 2017
5,030
Brock Reiher said:
Yoshi's Story
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The cool thing about Yoshi's Story is that Nintendo cracked up the effect possible due to a high speed CPU and 3D computation which were present in Yoshi's Island but less pronounced.
This made perfectly sense cause on console like PS1 and N64 sprites didn't really exist and to do 2D games they simply render textures with transparent background so in a sense they were already ready to do effects uncommon with past sprite based consoles (though not many developers tried to take advantage).

Note the real time generated lava waves (another example is the water distortion effect):
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Sub Boss

Sub Boss

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Nov 14, 2017
13,441
SiG said:
"This looks like an N64 game" is often a phrase I've seen people throw around in jest, as if muddy visuals, fog, and poor IQ are always synonymous with the system...

...but was it really?
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Yes, it really was.

They may be a few with a moody atmosphere.
Conkers Bad Fur day is a good example of pushing the system, can't believe ypu forgot Makora's Mask, and Sin and Punishment
All Rare games i think
 
UnNamed

UnNamed

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Oct 27, 2017
616
World Driving Champ manage something like 7000 polygons per scene. Best PSX games could handle 3500 poly max.
 
Detail

Detail

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Dec 30, 2018
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Waverace, Conker, Goldeneye, Perfect Dark.

Waverace Is underrated, that water tech was glorious.
 
nogoodnamesleft

nogoodnamesleft

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Oct 25, 2017
7,660
Crayolan said:
I can think of some Gamecube games that look worse than the best looking N64 games:
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Not to get into screenshot warz, and while those do indeed look like turd

non emulated conker does not look better than gamecube or ps2 games. Also, framerate. Also, compisite was the maximum native output of the system. Also, your screenshots are actually worse than they are especially stadium, since its stretched 4:3.
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39677-Conker's_Bad_Fur_Day_(USA)-8.jpg
also, conker running on OG hardware via scaling framemeister, so no emulation. I think people dont remember how bad n64 games actually looked.
 
Jobbs

Jobbs

Banned
Oct 25, 2017
5,639
Paper Mario by far. It's not even close. Paper Mario has characters that look like characters rather than blurry vaguely character shaped blobs. I'm trying to think of what other good looking 2D games were on the system but there really aren't any (or that many). Surprisingly few 2D games showed up on N64.

If I had to choose a 3D game I'd give it to Kirby 64
 
skeezx

skeezx

Member
Oct 27, 2017
20,164
after the "wow factor" of seeing games in 3D wore off i can't say i was impressed by any N64 game's visuals.

i do remember playing Conker at a friend's house circa 2001 and being like "hey, this looks surprisingly good" though
 
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