Screenshots Showing The Problem and Solutions
| Most illustrative of the problem were games pre-1987 that ignored attribute clash, such as shown here by the game Knight Tyme. Note how the central character (the small figure with a knight's helmet just to the right of the green plant) is almost hidden by the attribute clash that has occurred. Knight Tyme was one of the few games that let players select between two modes of attribute clash: one which ignored main character attributes (producing the shown effect), and one which applied main character attributes, turning any graphics surrounding the character white. | |
| One workaround was to simply render the graphics in two colors, otherwise known as monochrome, as shown here with the Spectrum version of Knight Lore in 1984. | |
| Many games used full-color backgrounds and "character scrolling" (where the environment was scrolled eight pixels at a time), but monochrome sprites that were effectively transparent, as displayed here in Double Dragon. The sprites in this case were drawn in such a way so they stand out, avoiding dependence on color. Many games used this method with smooth pixel-by-pixel scrolling, but the attribute clash as elements of one character block were "passed" to the next were clearly visible. | |
| A prominent (and less successful) example of the use of full-color graphics was the Spectrum conversion of Altered Beast. Note that the game suffers from considerable attribute clash. | |
| Programmer Don Priestley developed a distinctive style for several of his games by using large, cartoon-like sprites which were carefully designed to span whole character blocks without appearing unduly square. A disadvantage of this technique was that the gameplay had to be designed around the graphics, and so it was not useful for ports from other platforms. Games that used this technique included Popeye, The Trap Door (shown right), Through the Trapdoor, and Flunky. Other developers who used a similar technique included Mike Singleton, with Dark Sceptre, and Gang of Five, with Dan Dare: Pilot of the Future. | . |
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