The bottom line, like it or not, is the great majority of PC games are targeted for Windows, so the whole portability issue is very low on the priority list for most developers. Throw that away, and what does OpenGL have that makes it superior to DX 8? Carmack embraced OpenGL out of principle and because OpenGL at the time of the original Quake was far superior to DX 3.
Stop insulting developers, especially the succesful ones. If they've done well using Direct X, good for them. If they've done well using OpenGL, good for them again. I wish MS had done the right thing way back when and embraced OpenGL, but they went their usual way, saying BS like "OpenGL is meant for high-end graphic workstations, not games". This at the same time that Quake was kicking butt. Whatever.
Most developers just aren't concerned with Linux or the Mac, or if they are, it's after they have released their title on the PC, and only then if it's successful enough to be worth porting. I don't blame them one bit for focusing on the platform that is *by far* the one that is most used by their target audience. It's called maximizing profits, and they'll use whatever tools are the best to achieve that end.
Do your part to prevent the dumbing down of America by forcing people to have to screw with their PC just to get a game to work? Cut me a break. Good thing we're not short of auto mechanics, or you'd be saying it'd be nice if people would have to look under their hood every time they wanted to take a trip.
John,
Are you saying that Unreal required too much hardware at the time it was released or that it was the wrong thing even for the leading edge hardware at the time? Because while I agree that Quake 2 ran nicely on a Pentium 200 without MMX and Unreal didn't, the fact is that Unreal blew me away with it's graphics on a PII-400 with a Voodoo2, which was relatively leading edge at the time Unreal was released. But honestly I have to say that the large outdoor areas that Unreal offered seemed to me to justify the hardware, and a year later I had to go back and play the game again because it was so nice to run through the huge outdoor levels like Vortex Rikers and Sunspire. I enjoyed Quake 2 for it's multiplayer gaming goodness on mid-range machines, but its graphics just didn't drop my jaw the way Unreal's did. Also, it seemed that Quake 2 wasn't as scaleable for large outdoor levels the way Unreal was. I could make huge homemade levels without running vis and still have decent framerates - something I wasn't able to achieve with the Quake 2 engine, even after hours of vis'ing. So to me to say that what Tim did was wrong may be true if you're taking the view that a game should run well on mid-range machines at the time of its release, but isn't true if you're targeting a game for leading edge hardware and want to push the envelope more.
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The bottom line, like it or not, is the great majority of PC games are targeted for Windows, so the whole portability issue is very low on the priority list for most developers. Throw that away, and what does OpenGL have that makes it superior to DX 8? Carmack embraced OpenGL out of principle and because OpenGL at the time of the original Quake was far superior to DX 3.
Stop insulting developers, especially the succesful ones. If they've done well using Direct X, good for them. If they've done well using OpenGL, good for them again. I wish MS had done the right thing way back when and embraced OpenGL, but they went their usual way, saying BS like "OpenGL is meant for high-end graphic workstations, not games". This at the same time that Quake was kicking butt. Whatever.
Most developers just aren't concerned with Linux or the Mac, or if they are, it's after they have released their title on the PC, and only then if it's successful enough to be worth porting. I don't blame them one bit for focusing on the platform that is *by far* the one that is most used by their target audience. It's called maximizing profits, and they'll use whatever tools are the best to achieve that end.
Do your part to prevent the dumbing down of America by forcing people to have to screw with their PC just to get a game to work? Cut me a break. Good thing we're not short of auto mechanics, or you'd be saying it'd be nice if people would have to look under their hood every time they wanted to take a trip.
John, Are you saying that Unreal required too much hardware at the time it was released or that it was the wrong thing even for the leading edge hardware at the time? Because while I agree that Quake 2 ran nicely on a Pentium 200 without MMX and Unreal didn't, the fact is that Unreal blew me away with it's graphics on a PII-400 with a Voodoo2, which was relatively leading edge at the time Unreal was released. But honestly I have to say that the large outdoor areas that Unreal offered seemed to me to justify the hardware, and a year later I had to go back and play the game again because it was so nice to run through the huge outdoor levels like Vortex Rikers and Sunspire. I enjoyed Quake 2 for it's multiplayer gaming goodness on mid-range machines, but its graphics just didn't drop my jaw the way Unreal's did. Also, it seemed that Quake 2 wasn't as scaleable for large outdoor levels the way Unreal was. I could make huge homemade levels without running vis and still have decent framerates - something I wasn't able to achieve with the Quake 2 engine, even after hours of vis'ing. So to me to say that what Tim did was wrong may be true if you're taking the view that a game should run well on mid-range machines at the time of its release, but isn't true if you're targeting a game for leading edge hardware and want to push the envelope more.