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ATI Talks Game Support, Future Of Graphics Cards
Sergio writes "Slo-Tech have posted an interview with ATI's representative in game developer support, Richard Huddy. He touched on many subjects, including the evolution of DirectX and OpenGL, why ATI doesn't provide much information to Linux driver developers, and the most common mistakes of game developers ('Nine out of ten games under-use the graphics card. That's amazing, and it's been true for the last three or four years.')"
...because I don't play 3D games on PC. For the price of a high-end graphics card I can buy an Xbox or PS2 already, and they provide better gaming experiences. On the Windows desktop, 3D acceleration is completely unused, and many people spend money on expensive graphics cards for no reason. I am looking forward to seeing how Longhorn utilizes 3D acceleration for the next generation Windows UI.
To hear an ATI engineer criticize NVIDIA drivers?
... my NVIDIA card works at nearly the same performance in both Windows AND linux. Kind of hard to critize NVIDIA when you're drivers barely work, on ANY OS.
... I can't count how many ATI users try linux just to find that their brand new shiny Radeon is worthless in the OS. In the meantime nvidia users are enjoying full support from their manufacturer.
I read it as a blatant attempt to persuade buyers that NVIDIA hardware is better than it actually is.
Well gee Rich
when they should be producing better drivers which could enhance the value of all their existing hardware in the market.
Maybe ATI should be the ones doing a little "enhancement of value"
Keep whining about IP issues with linux and trumpeting DirectX 9 compliance. What good is a card with horrible drivers?
That is true. However, if you install the newest DirectX (which will install no matter how shitty your pc is), and you try to play a game written for say a GeForce4 and you have a TNT2, then your pc can figure out what the card should do and what the cpu should do. So, there is no reason for game designers to code to the least common denominator, they just have to code for the newest DirectX/OpenGL and the user's pc turns on available options for their card, and disables the others.
The reason that the graphics card is under-used is for two reasons. The first is that game designers, as you said, want the game to work well on lower end platforms. If your cpu is good enough you can add better graphical features even if your video card doesn't support it. For example Descent 3 adds motion blur if your cpu is L33t enough. However, the main reason that video cards are underused is that it's a fucking pain in the ass.
Let's say for instance that your name is not John Carmack, and you want to make a 3d game. You code it in C++, Cg, Objective C, Visual C++, OpenGL, DirectX9, whatever. You have all these different layers of 3d graphics you have to deal with, unless you just use someone else's engine. You've got shadows, lighting, colors, textures, mip mapping, bump mapping, shading, animating, it goes on and on with the insane number of things you have to do. When new apis emerge that let you use the video card to do more stuff it is very difficult to learn that much more crap.
It happens all the time no matter what you are coding. Ohhh, there's a function in that library that does that for me! I just wasted my time! Ohhh, there's a way that I can make the video card do that really easily and I will save some cpu and some ram! Nobody, sans Carmack, knows this stuff well enough that they can use the graphics card 100% of the time it is possible and better to do so. Except of course in the most graphically simple of programs. However, I do urge game developers to try to use the GPU more than the CPU. It results in many advantages for the gamer.
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