Additive Blending on the Nintendo 64

55 points by ibobev 13 hours ago on hackernews | 6 comments

  > Did you ever wonder why explosions and other effects looked so much cooler on the original PlayStation than they did on the Nintendo 64?

yes! fantastic article and now i finally know why ^^

1024bits | an hour ago

Discussed a bit more here in 2017-2018: https://forums.nesdev.org/viewtopic.php?t=16414

keyle | an hour ago

Interesting so the N64 had a more flexible color blending process, and in doing that no clamping.

So the 'good explosions' were possible on N64 if you did the blending+clamp by hand?

applfanboysbgon | an hour ago

> Did you ever wonder why explosions and other effects looked so much cooler on the original PlayStation than they did on the Nintendo 64?

Begging the question, aren't we?! Of the examples displayed, I much prefer Star Fox's fx to Silent Bomber's. They fit the game's style well, and the explosions when killing an enemy are just the right amount of rewarding, while not being so ostentatious as to be distracting. SF64 nailed the game feel of destroying enemies, those small little intangibles that make the game satisfying on a visceral level, as Nintendo is so good at doing.

omoikane | an hour ago