Does Battle Master Have 4x4 Tiles?

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So, I'm looking at games that scroll tile-by-tile and noticed Battle Master from Mirrorsoft / Arena.
www.gamefaqs.com/genesis/586050-battle-master/data
www.youtube.com/watch?v=EOoSpFTnIh0

It seems like the game is scrolling 4x4 tiles. I see the characters move by 4 pixels in any direction (up, down, left and right).

How is this possible? I thought the Genesis was limited to 8x8 tiles?

I just made a proof of concept that imitates 4x8 tiles by interleaving the 2 tile planes.. but, there simply isn't enough planes to fake 4x4 tiles.

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Just because a game runs at a low frame-rate and doesn't use smooth scrolling doesn't mean it's doing something "special". It's simply a ( garbage ) port of the Amiga / Atari original.

Here's a dump of some of the tiles from the first level ( not allot of action going on in the VRAM either ).

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Yuck. I had hoped to see some more evidence of 4x4 tiles but it looks like their scrolling technique just sucks. Thanks for clearing that up moon. I've actually been wondering about this for years.

I used to wonder how they handle so many enemies in one level too but now it just seems like they just let it lag.

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Jun 13, 2011 12:35:36 GMT -5 @theloon said:

Yuck. I had hoped to see some more evidence of 4x4 tiles but it looks like their scrolling technique just sucks.

Don't try to fight the hardware, instead go with it .. capitalize on its strengths.

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Jun 13, 2011 12:55:25 GMT -5 @moon said:

Jun 13, 2011 12:35:36 GMT -5 @theloon said:

Yuck. I had hoped to see some more evidence of 4x4 tiles but it looks like their scrolling technique just sucks.

Don't try to fight the hardware, instead go with it .. capitalize on its strengths.

Good advice. I'm really trying to keep that in mind despite all my whacky ideas.

So, I take it all the suggestions you got for 4x4 tiles didn't work?
devster.proboards.com/index.cgi?board=basiegaxorz&action=display&thread=478

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Jun 16, 2011 11:26:54 GMT -5 @theloon said:

So, I take it all the suggestions you got for 4x4 tiles didn't work?

On the contrary, even though jlf65's reply was the most sensible .. walker7's & Matrius's solution was exactly the thing I was looking for.

Keep in mind that I posted that question in my first week of developing for the Mega Drive, and that I knew virtually nothing about the hardware at that point ( or any other retro-console )!