About 16-Bit Video Games
About 16-Bit Video Games
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Some features that distinguish fourth generation consoles from third generation consoles include:
- 16-bit microprocessors
- Multi-button game controllers with many buttons (3 to 8)
- Parallax scrolling of multi-layer tilemap backgrounds
- Large sprites (up to 64×64 or 16×512 pixels), 80–380 sprites on screen, though limited to a smaller number per scan line
- Elaborate color, 64 to 4096 colors on screen, from palettes of 512 (9-bit) to 65,536 (16-bit) colours
- Stereo audio, with multiple channels and digital audio playback (PCM, ADPCM, streaming CD-DA audio)
- Advanced music synthesis (FM synthesis and wavetable sample-based synthesis)
- Additionally, in specific cases, fourth generation hardware featured:
- Backgrounds with pseudo-3D scaling and rotation
- Sprites that can individually be scaled and rotated
- Flat-shaded 3D polygon graphics
- CD-ROM support via add-ons, allowing larger storage space and full motion video playback
