Why was Chaos Field, Ikaruga etc never released on the PS2?

visuatrox · Post by **visuatrox** » Sat May 07, 2005 1:00 pm

This puzzles me, especially considering they got released on GameCube. I mean these games should not have been that hard to port for the PS2 too. And I'm sure they would have sold enough to be worth the effort, if not for the original developers then some routined lowbudget porthouse.

Maybe I'm going to end up with buying a dreamcast eventually, but many of the games I want on it are so expensive now it does not feel like it is worth it. Or is there still a possibility we will see PS2 ports?

CMoon · Post by **CMoon** » Sat May 07, 2005 1:28 pm

Chaos Field coming out on the PS2 was just a rumor started by NCSX--an oversight on their part that many people interpreted as inside knowledge.

Honestly, I'm surprised we're even getting a GC port of Chaos Field while Border Down is apparently going to remain in obscurity.

SheSaidDutch · Post by **SheSaidDutch** » Sat May 07, 2005 1:29 pm

Good Question visuatrox, I too also wondered about this also.

visuatrox · Post by **visuatrox** » Sat May 07, 2005 1:41 pm

CMoon wrote:Honestly, I'm surprised we're even getting a GC port of Chaos Field while Border Down is apparently going to remain in obscurity.

Hmm true that is even wierder, if anything they should have ported Border Down already. It also appears strange to me that we still see re-releases of obscure and not even particularly good shmups that have been released on a multitude of platforms already.

I just don't see the logic they use for choosing the titles worth porting, it all appears completely random.

BenT · Post by **BenT** » Sat May 07, 2005 1:42 pm

I always thought it was because PS2's terrible texture memory limitation would have made Naomi ports annoying to create or less than perfect.

visuatrox · Post by **visuatrox** » Sat May 07, 2005 1:50 pm

Well the PS2 sucks at textures, but seriously it is not that bad it could not handle these games. I mean developers used to manage porting arcade games to far less powerful hardware, just look at R-type on the C64 for example

. Maybe the difficulty of porting and consoles capabilities has something to do with it, but then again it has not stopped developers from porting other games. So there must be something fishy going on here (no not Darius

).

CMoon · Post by **CMoon** » Sat May 07, 2005 1:57 pm

visuatrox wrote:
CMoon wrote:Honestly, I'm surprised we're even getting a GC port of Chaos Field while Border Down is apparently going to remain in obscurity.
Hmm true that is even wierder, if anything they should have ported Border Down already. It also appears strange to me that we still see re-releases of obscure and not even particularly good shmups that have been released on a multitude of platforms already.

I just don't see the logic they use for choosing the titles worth porting, it all appears completely random.

It probably has more to do with what rights can be secured cheaply.

If the rights are cheap, it does't even matter how good the game is, you won't need to sell many to turn a profit.

jp · Post by jp » Sat May 07, 2005 2:01 pm

Border Down is DC exclusive because G.Rev is a small team and porting to the DC from Naomi was super easy and cheap. Porting it too another console would probably take up too much of their time/money.

And I believe Treasure stated that same reason for not going through with the Ikaruga port to PS2... because I know at one point they were talking about it.

serge · Post by **serge** » Sat May 07, 2005 3:28 pm

I just don't see the logic they use for choosing the titles worth porting, it all appears completely random.

Just curious, who are those "they" you're referring to?
I mean, it's not like there is some party that decides between porting BorderDown vs. ChaosFiled.
CF port is done by the original devs themselves, they're a small group that needs more exposure for their game, stuff like that.
While G.Rev appears to be more focused on the arcade market anyway.
Seems perfectly logical.

One more point is that developing for any of the consoles is quite expensive: licenses, equipment and probably some middleware, just to get started. So such decisions are obviously not easy for a small group.

Vexorg · Post by **Vexorg** » Sat May 07, 2005 4:35 pm

From what I've heard in the past, the PS2 is not a particularly easy system to program for, and getting decent ports of Naomi games in particular has proven very difficult. Thus few Naomi games have made it to the PS2 (DOA2 is about the only one I can think of, but I'm probably missing some.)

visuatrox · Post by **visuatrox** » Sat May 07, 2005 5:11 pm

serge wrote:Just curious, who are those "they" you're referring to?
I mean, it's not like there is some party that decides between porting BorderDown vs. ChaosFiled.

They = Publishers

Looking at all kinds of crap that gets released, someone somewhere must have decided that awesome games like these did not deserve a port

I mean even when the developer is small and has no resources, some publisher/porthouse should have bought up the rights to make a port.

I bet a Borderdown port had been easier to make than that awful Gigawing Generations

(some other naomi ports for PS2 are for example Ferrari F-335, Guilty Gear, Crazy Taxi, 18 Wheeler)

Kiken · Post by **Kiken** » Sat May 07, 2005 5:30 pm

visuatrox wrote:This puzzles me, especially considering they got released on GameCube. I mean these games should not have been that hard to port for the PS2 too. And I'm sure they would have sold enough to be worth the effort, if not for the original developers then some routined lowbudget porthouse.

Maybe I'm going to end up with buying a dreamcast eventually, but many of the games I want on it are so expensive now it does not feel like it is worth it. Or is there still a possibility we will see PS2 ports?

Treasure stated that innitially, they had been working on a PS2 port of Ikaruga. However, they were finding it an absolute bear to port, so they canned the project.

Remember, back in May of 2002? What was Treasure's official announcement as to the likelihood of a home console port of Ikaruga?

"We will not be porting Ikaruga to the PS2."

And as for Naomi to PS2 ports... don't forget Shiki 2 and Psyvariar 2.

futurespa · Post by **futurespa** » Sat May 07, 2005 5:32 pm

Very simple, Naomi is far worse then the PS2 hardware, therefor porting from crap hardware to better hardware shows the age of the crap hardware (in this case Naomi 1/2)

Btw, Treasure did Gradius 5 wich blows away everything they did before in terms of gfx.
Unless Konami or another company gives them a couple of million to produce a shooter again. Treasure is rather sitting on their lazy arses instead of building a shmup from the ground up for PS2.

jp · Post by jp » Sat May 07, 2005 5:57 pm

futurespa wrote:Very simple, Naomi is far worse then the PS2 hardware, therefor porting from crap hardware to better hardware shows the age of the crap hardware (in this case Naomi 1/2)

Btw, Treasure did Gradius 5 wich blows away everything they did before in terms of gfx.
Unless Konami or another company gives them a couple of million to produce a shooter again. Treasure is rather sitting on their lazy arses instead of building a shmup from the ground up for PS2.

Um.... right.

jiji · Post by **jiji** » Sat May 07, 2005 6:04 pm

futurespa wrote:Very simple, Naomi is far worse then the PS2 hardware, therefor porting from crap hardware to better hardware shows the age of the crap hardware (in this case Naomi 1/2)

Your statements have some truth, but they do not explain this situation. As said before, Naomi games are difficult to port properly to PS2 and often small companies find it easier and cheaper to simply go with a Gamecube port. Games backed by larger publishers (Shikigami 1/2, Psyvariar 2 -> Taito; Crazy Taxi, F355 -> Acclaim/Sega) found their way to PS2 because the resources were available. Most of the time, shooters aren't financially viable enough for companies to put up the resources to port them to multiple platforms.

Btw, Treasure did Gradius 5 wich blows away everything they did before in terms of gfx.
Unless Konami or another company gives them a couple of million to produce a shooter again. Treasure is rather sitting on their lazy arses instead of building a shmup from the ground up for PS2.

Bitter much? But this helps to illustrate the point. PS2 development is expensive, and not many shooter devs have the kind of budget necessary to produce something like Gra5 or PS2 ports of other games.

visuatrox · Post by **visuatrox** » Sat May 07, 2005 6:19 pm

futurespa wrote:Very simple, Naomi is far worse then the PS2 hardware, therefor porting from crap hardware to better hardware shows the age of the crap hardware (in this case Naomi 1/2)

Btw, Treasure did Gradius 5 wich blows away everything they did before in terms of gfx.
Unless Konami or another company gives them a couple of million to produce a shooter again. Treasure is rather sitting on their lazy arses instead of building a shmup from the ground up for PS2.

Well I guess there is some truth to this.. Without the involvement of Konami we probably would never even seen a Gradius 5. And PS2 games really show how much effort and talent it takes from the developers to push out a good looking game.

Games without large financial backing, often end up half-assed on such an technically challenging hardware. It's almost sad how many games there are on the PS2 that could have been so much better, if the developers had just had the resources to make them run smoothly (Seriously they should make a R-Type Final v2.0, without slowdown the game would be so much better).

serge · Post by **serge** » Sat May 07, 2005 6:28 pm

some publisher/porthouse should have bought up the rights to make a port.

That's the point, nobody's interested. So in most cases porting decision is up to original devs, and for those GC or XBOX are cheaper/easier platforms (maybe).
So publishers like O3 just pick up what's already out there.
That's all just speculations of course.
I have experience with PS2 programming, it's difficult to program, not THAT difficult, but still must be a factor.

BTW, about NAOMI to PS2 conversions, while in Psyvariar2 there're some visual artifacts, Shikigami2 on PS2 looks very smooth.
I think there are even more NAOMI ports on PS2, obscure stuff like "King of Route 66", ExZeus, plus some NAOMI2 stuff (VF4).

serge · Post by **serge** » Sat May 07, 2005 6:50 pm

Some random facts about GradiusV:
Main program and some of the BG graphics were done by G.Rev people;
GradiusV is "Powered by Intrinsic Alchemy" which removes many/most of the difficulties with PS2 programming but it's not cheap;

Kron · Post by **Kron** » Sat May 07, 2005 7:11 pm

futurespa wrote:Very simple, Naomi is far worse then the PS2 hardware, therefor porting from crap hardware to better hardware shows the age of the crap hardware (in this case Naomi 1/2)

Naomi is crap hardware now?, What is it with this site and attracting bitter PS2 zealots?

visuatrox · Post by **visuatrox** » Sat May 07, 2005 7:23 pm

Oh no my thread turned out into system war

Just for the record, personally I think the PS2 is a pretty weak piece of hardware, just that it is the only recent console I own and therefore would be happy to see more ports on it (and that I would prefer not having to go through the trouble of trying hunting down out of print Dreamcast games)..

velocity7 · Post by **velocity7** » Sat May 07, 2005 7:29 pm

PS2 and Dreamcast are strong in their own areas, but in the end it's up to the programmer to come up with something that works out well.

Intrinsic Alchemy is a very easy (albeit expensive!) way to deal with this problem... funny I haven't seen Gradius V ported to Xbox or Gamecube since the porting ability is (almost?) free.

NAOMI ports to Dreamcast are much easier than say NAOMI to Xbox, PS2, or Gamecube. However, there have been instances where the port to Gamecube was better than the port to DC (*cough*Chaos Field*cough*), in which I solely blame Milestone for the entire mess.

Guardians Knight · Post by **Guardians Knight** » Sat May 07, 2005 7:35 pm

you really ought to get a DC cos they are mint if like yer shooters, and its very easy to *ahem* get games for. most of them can be gotten for fairly cheap on ebay anyways.

altho the ps2 is starting to acquire quite a nice catalogue of shoot em ups too - but you must get it made import ready otherwise you might as well just use it as a doorstop.

Specineff · Post by **Specineff** » Sat May 07, 2005 8:03 pm

Ikar00ga didn't g3t p0rt3d to th3 PS-P00 c0z t3h syst3m i5 t3h suxx0rrzz!!!11!! LOL LOL ROFLMAO OMFGWTF BBQ KTHNX!!1!!!One!

Naomi isn't a crappy piece of hardware. The PS2, while not as powerful as they made it to be ("OMG! The PS2 will knock the DC out of the water!" Said someone at a gamecrazy once) isn't that weak either. Look at ICO and MGS3.

Valgar · Post by **Valgar** » Sat May 07, 2005 8:09 pm

It probably IS hard to port NAOMI to ps2 and ISN'T worth the effort.

alpha5099 · Post by **alpha5099** » Sat May 07, 2005 8:24 pm

What the fuck's Intrinsic Alchemy? It sounds like something out a bad fantasy movie.

Kiken · Post by **Kiken** » Sat May 07, 2005 9:05 pm

alpha5099 wrote:What the fuck's Intrinsic Alchemy? It sounds like something out a bad fantasy movie.

A programming library/tool.

Dartagnan1083 · Post by **Dartagnan1083** » Sat May 07, 2005 10:15 pm

Hey....
It's not like SCEA will EVER approve the release of a 2D game that isn't a compilation or a potentially lucrative mega-franchise sequel.
That's something else to consider.

Neon · Post by **Neon** » Sun May 08, 2005 1:25 am

It's an example of opportunity cost economics. Hurray for putting my scummy public-school education to work!

Basically you can think of it as...you're manufacturing two types of ice cream, for simplicity's sake A and B. If you want to make more of A, you only have so many resources available, so you'll obviously need to make less of ice cream B.

In the case of, for example, Ikaruga, Treasure would have had to put more resources towards a ps2 port, although it would have granted more sales. the Gamecube port was far easier to programme, so much so that the fewer sales the game would have were offput by the low cost of development/resources.

Someone currect me if I'm oversimplifying too much, please.

Though I'm far from a fanboy of Dreamcast or PS2, Futurespa's comments on the Naomi hardware are about as well informed as his statements in Recap's Cave emu thread. Don't listen to him.

IIRC, Gradius 5 was developed over 2 and a half years after Ikaruga, with being a PS2 game probably a much higher budget. It's just not a good comparison.

neorichieb1971 · Post by **neorichieb1971** » Sun May 08, 2005 3:04 am

It has nothing to do with the power of any system. Its just financial resources vs financial gain.

In the case of Ikaruga and Chaos field it was obviously more of a gain to port to GC.

If you took any current game from any system and wanted to port it to another current system from the ground up, it would probably look 90% accurate and would probably play 100% intact. But the fact is these teams don't want to work from the ground up, they want relative ease, middleware software to do around 95% of the work for them. Where that option does not exist, neither does the possibility of a port to another system.

This is the reason hardly any ps2 ports are being released.

highlandcattle · Post by **highlandcattle** » Sun May 08, 2005 3:57 pm

Actually I believe treasure simply asked around who would want to publish Ikaruga and Infogrammes said Oui and asked if they could do it on the cube.Mind back then the cube wasn't kiddy yet it was going hardcore.

I think Milestone chose the cube because they found a GC dev kit that had just being tossed out of Konami's window

shmups.system11.org

Why was Chaos Field, Ikaruga etc never released on the PS2?

Why was Chaos Field, Ikaruga etc never released on the PS2?

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