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Gamers Don't Need Vista or DX 10 Says Carmack
Freshly Exhumed writes "In an interview with Marcus Yam at Daily Tech legendary PC/Console game creator John Carmack holds forth on DirectX 10: 'Personally, I wouldn't jump at something like DX10 right now. I would let things settle out a little bit and wait until there's a really strong need for it.' and then zings Microsoft's marketers over DX10's mandatory use of the Vista OS: 'Carmack then said that he's quite satisfied with Windows XP, going as far to say that Microsoft is artificially forcing gamers to move to Windows Vista for DX10.' There are a few good tidbits on Xbox 360 vs. PS3 development, and a fairly clear disinterest in Wii as a platform for his company's products is shown."
Considering that he's got a long history of doing incredible graphics on relatively garbage hardware, e.g., real scrolling, platformer style on a PC that just couldn't do it using conventional means, using ray tracing to render a 3d looking scene in 2d, I'd think that pushing out gorgeous graphics on the Wii would be a nice challenge for him. Then again, why tackle that problem for the third (fourth, fifth?) time. It gets old hat after a while.
Not only does he make kick arse engines, he's a straight talker in a world a spin merchants. He's helped Microsoft improve Direct X (while supporting OpenGL), praised them for their Xbox 360 development tools, but can call a spade a spade. Objectivity. Love it, live it.
All I know for sure is Linux / OpenGL wont have an opportunity like they have now for at least 5-10 years. No DX10 on WinXP could be a real killer for DX, if developers feel the need to target both Vista and XP users, OpenGL could be the way to go.... Which AFAIK makes portability to Linux easier.
You need to keep in mind that Id Software has made a business out of driving better graphical performance out of more and more advanced hardware, generally planning their engines to target the hardware available in the future rather than at the time of engine creation. So for them, the Wii is 90 degrees offset from their core competency while the XBox 360 and PS3 are more along the lines of what Id has long been interested in. To that end, the Wii is going to seem like too simplistic a device to be of interest to Id.
I think you'll find that it will take quite a while before the industry as a whole gets used to the idea of the Wii. It was a somewhat unexpected development (in comparison to the years of advance notice they're used to), leaving developers wondering what exactly should they be doing with this thing? If the Wii continues to deliver in the long term, however, you may see Id warm up to the idea a lot more. Not to mention that the next generation of consoles will be fought without a gamepad in sight.
Javascript + Nintendo DSi = DSiCade
Not really, Carmack is a polygon guru. The Wii is decidedly not about the graphics and more about the gameplay and usability. Thus, Carmack is not interested because his skills lay in making games that use traditional interaction methods.
I sincerely doubt that. For one thing, we talking about something that happened over a decade ago. For another, Carmack strikes me as having too much character to hold a grudge that long. Nintendo got their comeupance during the N64 and Gamecube generations. As a result, they reinvented themselves into a very different company. A company that is a bit more tolerant of Id's brand of gaming than they were in the past.
I'm sure that Mr. Carmack is still *wary* of dealing with them (they're still the most "family friendly" of the console makers), but I sincerely doubt that he's being childish in his dealings with them.
Javascript + Nintendo DSi = DSiCade
The video game landscape has changed. Nintendo has plenty of games with blood now, and probably wouldn't stop you from killing Nazis in a game, which I fail to see anything wrong with.
Evidence - Wii Launch title: Call of Duty 3.
and there's no good reason to not use it in favor of XP. Well.... aside from the $400 price tag for the non-crippleware version?
...... trial period where they work the kinks out.
Or perhaps it's because they've finally managed to copy the Macintosh's interface design more closely with Aero? Not to say that it dosen't make sense since every major and minor player out there has been offering better alt-tab and/or 3d functions on their desktop for some time. The only -touted- difference is the new driver model (which is why DX10 can't work on XP), but I'm going to go out on a limb here and bet that once DX10 cards actually start coming out there's going to be a bit of a
In either case, getting eye candy, a questionable update in the driver/kernel and a higher price tag don't exactly make an 'upgrade' to Vista an obvious choice, at least right now.
That's not going to stop Microsoft from REQUIRING it, though... Then we won't have a choice.
- Just my $0.02, take with a grain of salt, your mileage may vary.
...and suddenly, all users of Linux, Mac OS X, PS3, and whatever platform that isn't Windows or XBox started to scream "Oh noes !"
The Use of OpenGL is what have enabled games from Id to be ported to almost any powerful enough platform under the sun.
Should he switch to DX, fans will be stuck to Windows and XBox (and maybe a couple of WinCE compatible device).
"Sufficiently advanced satire is indistinguishable from reality." - [Tips: 1DrYakQDKCQ6y52z6QbnkxHXAocMZJE61o ]
As it stands, that's all irrelevant.
World of Warcraft IS the bulk of the MMORPG market. World of Warcraft has an active OS X user base. The OS X client uses OpenGL, exclusively.
World of Warcraft will never require DirectX 10 exclusively; it will always have an OpenGL client.
Ergo, the bulk of the MMORPG market will not require DirectX 10.
WhiteWolf666 an exBush supporter. All you new-school,compassionate,save the children Republicans can rot in hell
I'm not really sure what you mean by "Carmack's style of games" since he doesn't write games.. he writes game engines. I don't think even back in the days of the original Doom did he actually do much in the way of game design. His views of games and game systems has always been primarily focused on the graphical capabilities of a system and how to make a really good game engine that others can then place their own games inside of.
I'm sure he could probably find a way to pull a lot of power out of the Wii, but I doubt that's what he's interested in. Working with advanced graphical hardware and being able to pull out all of the power of the newer and underutilized systems is probably more in line with what he prefers to due, hence the focus on the 360 rather than the Wii.
If you want impressive hardware, you're going to go for a cutting edge PC, not a console at all. Buying a console is always about price, convenience, and game availability. The average person buying a console doesn't know what a gigahertz is, much less how many each console has.
I still have more fans than freaks. WTF is wrong with you people?
Actually, it's the other way around. If you've got enough mobility to use a gamepad, you've got enough mobility to use the small motions that the Wii requires. (The whole "standing up and jump around" thing is just for fun.) Since many games only require the Wiimote and not the Nunchuck, it represents the first time in history that one-armed players can use a video game console - with some footnote exceptions like light guns.
I forget exactly where I saw it, but there was a fellow doing charity work who saw a one-armed kid get a Wii to play with. He said that the kid enjoyed it immensely, and that it was the first time he had ever been able to actually play video games. The problem was that Gamepads and Joysticks had been inaccessable to him because they required two, fully functional arms and hands.
Something to think about, anyway.
Javascript + Nintendo DSi = DSiCade
Game makers who think they can't make good games without best available graphics and/or CPU power aren't giving very convincing image of their self esteem.
They may say that gamers won't buy their games without good graphics or that boobs sell and 1k poly boobs sell even more. Well... I don't know about other gamers but I have GC with GB adapter so that I can play modern 2D games and I'm buying Wii because it has the ability to surprise me positively. It doesn't even try that fake realism that supposedly sells so many games these days.
Take Gears of War on XBox360 as an example of typical teenager shoot'em up: its graphical realism is so high that I might as well be watching Platoon or Full Metal Jacket or Apocalypse now.. And you better believe I'm going to choose those movies any day over a game which targets teenagers as its main audience.
Why? Because its realism is sadly only graphical and the story is... uhhh, compare the story of any graphically realistic game to some classic war movie, let's say Saving Private Ryan, and you'll get what I'm after here. Graphics is all nice but unless the game has same level of realistic intensity as a classic war movie, forget it. Or try sell it to teenagers, they don't care if the story is crap as long as there is boobs, guns and monsters.
Preserve old classics: copy your collection onto all hard drives.
For the record, I never mentioned having the -best- hardware, just _basic_, functioning hardware. It's 2007, and we have hardware that _still_ doesn't support stencils?!
Supporting multiple platforms, all with features sets that vary, with little commonality, is a real PITA.
Cheers
You can turn data execution prevention off, you know. No Playstation emulators work with it turned on.