I agree that many low-level programming methods aren't that necessary anyhow, but there is one big point where the compiler cannot help much, and that is data layout. Big hits come from all levels of cache misses, and it's good for the programmer to be aware of this and benchmark the memory access patterns and try to make them good (predictable, linear, clumping frequently used data, etc). Also on some hardwares, the Load-Hit-Stores are something to be aware as well. A reasonable thing to do, when optimizing something, is to fiddle with the code a bit and see what generates the best assembly. This usually is a good compromise (you still stay at a higher level and got portable code with some gained performance on at least one platform). Now still compilers aren't a magic wand everywhere, especially when going to deeply embededded or specialized hardware. One example is SPU programming. Since SPUs read&write everything from/to 16-aligned addresses, current GCC compiler lots of "align ptr, load, rotate, calculate, rotate, combine, store" sequences. If you want good SPU performance, going into ASM is indeed viable something. Though most of the times, staying at intrinsic functions gives you an adequate compromise. But since SPUs are basically fast DSPs, many of the tasks that are ran by them are in nature quite repetitive with short amount of work per item and millions of items (like doing vertex transforms, simulating some post processing effect, mixing audio etc). But a good programmer always benchmarks first, checks the compiler output etc before hitting the deck with raw assembly.
Actually there IS a need to install the CDs, as not all TBC content came with the patches (I suspect mainly the Outland regions). Don't know how it is in the US, but it's like this in the europe. It is true it will re-run a few patches after installing though.
And yes, you can play the non-TBC regions with a normal unupgraded client even if you have activated TBC.
Well I guess the actual point is that if you pay $140 a month, none of that goes to the content providers. As a web master, every hit I get costs me something. Of course it's not that much and I'm not that scared (and even want hits), but the cost is on the receiving end (of the query). If none of the pages you view were free, you'd soon stop using the internet or at the very least you'd contend that your $140 is not getting you enough.
And it is quite possible that you have your own website as well. Imagine it getting enough exposure. You surely would be got hit by a bill to pay for the traffic. So as you see, it's not enough if you personally pay for something. It's every deliverer, ISP and so on who need to fork up the cash to bring you the service you so enjoy.
That is so unfair. There is no way we're going to get the name back unless we frame the future author of StallmanFS for some hideous crime and get hit to loosen his hold over the trademark. That's the only way. Better to keep a few crimes "hot" while waiting for who to pin them on. Hey, if the govs do it, why not we?
So not only do I have to ask if I can REALLY use my phone for calling other people, I really have to ask now if my clock also show the time as well? This really does sound like the wave of future..;)
Well I can answer this one easily.. The Linux DOES have PL-2303 drivers (that's what I checked first; the source code I mean).. It has had those for quite some time. There have been some GPS software based on it. So yes, while I haven't tested it, I'd assume you can use it under linux.
After all, it only is USB to serial, nothing more..
I bought one for the gadget-nerdiness-factor (about 8 months ago:). Now about a month ago they gave away the software + programming APIs. I was kinda disappointed at the spot, since this is not really a USB device. Inside, it uses an USB to serial converter. This is why the display refresh rate is kinda low. The screens themselves are 96x96 per screen, 16bit color. They tend to "flash" a little (I guess that's the OLED for ya).
I've been programming this device for a weekends worth now. I checked the software they gave and it was ok. It does crash VERY often, though it's not the device that's causing the crashes. The USB to serial chip they use is made by Porlific and I think it's the PL-2303. Now googling for that seems to indicate prolific has had a bad history with working drivers.
Now being the nerdy hacker type, it seems that for me it only crashes when disconnecting by software. So my solution was to create a stub program in C# that connects to the device, stays connected all the time and listens for incoming TCP connections and routes those to the device. This way the computer stays connected to the device all the time and I can restart the controlling software as often as I like. Haven't had any problems with this approach yet. Still I hope Prolific fixes their serial drivers.
As for when it comes to the performance, I've noticed something weird. All of my software is currently in C# and has not been optimized. But when feeding the device with image data, the program that sends it to the device takes around 9%, while the program that generates the packets takes somwthing like 40%. This seems kinda weird and I do have some hope of fixing it.:)
As for the device itself, the reviews I've read have been pretty accurate. It always makes me feel bad to press a display. And the buttons are not as "solid" as I'd like.
But with enough work I hope to make even something good out of it. I was hoping of making an animated game, but no way of doing that with that serial adapter standing in between.
Not sure how far they've made it in their engine, but from a programmer point of view, there are SO many ways to make load lighter. Fade away the portals that are further (or are facing away) from the camera center, limit recursion, simplify shaders in each recursion and put a portal effect in front (probably after 2 portals you can render fairly small portions with very simple shaders). Plus the portal seems to be limited in size.
The things that REALLY bog things down are realtime shadows and such. As far as I remember the vide, there are not that complex shadows (some simple casting ones, at tops). So basically you're using that same power to render the portals.
So all in all, it's hard to see there's any inherit limit in the engine, but it is limited/simplified to run in the current hardware. And there are ways to bend the tech to work in multiplayer games well enough, though I'm not sure if they have done so or not.
As a side point, personally, I've been bored with FPS games for a long time. Prey didn't seem that cool and this seems too frantic. But man do I envy the guys who made up this concept:).
Sure, technically, this has never been done before.
Well actually, that sounds very much like in-game content streaming. Many console games already do this. Granted, may be there no FPS games as such, but still games with massive seamless areas into which the gameplay is fitted nicely.
Some of them DO have fake loading screens, but they are hidden well enough (or are so far apart) thet the player rarely even notices it. One example is the Jak&Daxter game for the PS2. The game streams the next "levels" while you play, and the whole game is integrated into one smoooth running/riding excersice. Pretty sweet. And GTA does this as well, though for example the GTA:VC is divided into two parts. As for PC games, there are some. World of Warcraft springs to mind first:).
So as far as I can see, this is nothing new (technically) and people have been doing this for well over 5 years. Heck even my personal engines have had this feature for quite some time. Haven't seen it in a lot of FPS games, but no reason why it wouldn't work directly in an FPS style game as well (cannot confirm this but I think the GameCube Metroid Prime has a streaming level structure?).
Personally, the labs at school were only a way for me to best the others. I knew from the start that this "logical thinking" thing that was apparent in computers was the one I'm good at. So I tried that. Soon all computer related tasks were easy as whatever for me.. Currently working as a games programmer. If it weren't for the computer labs, I would probably still be just a gamer and not trying to best myself over existing implementation.
So the horrible presentation actually pushed me "over the edge" in my youth. Been thanking it ever since.
Worst part is that just about all phone developers are very sloppy when it comes to implementing the J2ME standards and all models tend to have their own quirks. Sony Ericsson and Nokia are probably the best, but that is not saying much. So in this case, it really is "write once, debug everywhere" type java.
And this actually really says it all. Most of the effort of doing a J2ME game seems to go on making it work on various devices and conform to operator wishes (and they are plentiful and vary a lot). This is even more so if you really try to stretch the device (as making fun and good looking gameplay may take more power since you're likely doing more under the hood).
And it really doesn't help that many firmwares and phones really handle things differently. Both in performance and compliance. This is why these mobile gaming platforms have really emerged. Still a lot of effort to get a small game done. I'd much rather spend my time honing the game than using 30% of the budget just trying to get it to run on 30 different devices.
Actually does it really matter if the platform is open source or not? The point in this competition was that you'd get the best result. And by making all the competitors show their solutions to others, they are effectively helping each other out. In the competition. I think the term "open source" makes people jump too much sometimes and expect too much. It's still okay to use and make open source software for the Windows, right?
One thing that bugs me is that every publisher says that 'adventure games are dead', and makes it self-fulfilling by not releasing any.
Well when one DOES decide to publish an adventure game, the others watch closely. But no matter how hard they look, the sales figures are just not there. So who's to blame? (at least one adventure game was canned because Syberia II didn't sell)
On a similar note, it's always weird to see topics concerning adventure games get a lot less posts than other topics. Speaks something for itself, also.
Seamless world support isn't that hard. All you have to do is support it from the beginning. Streaming of content is the key here. Many console games already implement streaming, some even with almost 0 cpu hit (the PS2 can stream on the PS1 processor). Also looking at World of Warcraft, I've been pretty impressed. The only times you see a loading screen is when there are large jumps in the world. Most of the game is then streamed fluently and you can walk around as you wish.
Of course, designing content to a seamless world is another thing:).
Neither our admin. assistants or QA people had any restrictions either, but I don't know about the receptionists. They sure seemed to play a lot of those boring built-in Windows games, so maybe they weren't allowed to install other software. I never asked them.
Well knowing receptionists, I don't think they're usually that "into" computers (even at MS) to start tweaking them to their liking. I could be wrong. But how would they do their job then? "Hello sir, do you have an appointment or would you like to nibble on my control panel?"
I saw some videos about Unity at the last Assembly party where Jeff held a speech about the history (and future) of his company. Looked pretty wild and I was really intrigued. The guy seemed pretty.. experienced with colors'n'stuff:). But as Jeffs post says, the main reason is that Gamecube is dying and rather than rush an unfinished crap out they decided to can it. I think this is for the better. Better to make good unique IP games than mediocre. We have licences and sequels fed to us through our noses so every quality nonmass product is a boon.
But all the good to you Jeff; hope to see if you still have the energy to start a new project!
Re:I would consider it...
on
NYT on EA Games
·
· Score: 2, Insightful
Except that married or not married, >80h working weeks suck you mentally dry. You never get any actual free time. You start to find it hard to focus on you job and your work quality and speed will suffer badly. Many will come sick. You lose your friends (if any). And so on. There's a reason the weekends are off for most people; more than that is too much.
So yes, you get a little bit more money than you would from, say, McDonalds. I still say it's not worth your health (if you snap, you might be sick for many years). No amount of money is; I find the salary irrelevant in this respect.
And another thing, many people seem to think that EA is recruiting new (to the industry) folk. Because the industry is in the state that it is, there are many qualified people on the market; some will end up at EA (no need to hire rookies if you get the real deal). Also EAs recent strategy seems to be that EA buys any competition and merges the companies. Think about it. Maxis, Westwood, Criterion, DICE and so on. Those people will then be moved on to EA projects and be forced to EA habits. There goes the neighbourhood:).
Well sure, it isn't that hard if you plan it right from the start. Not many studios do that. In fact most of the games that sport some kind of co-op these days tend to be inehrently multiplayer (Star Wars Battlefront) or otherwise easily extendable (Dawn of War). But when developing a game, it's a harsh reality to face. You have only so little time to develop all the technology, content, gameplay and multiplayer. Not an easy undertaking. And when doing things like physics, AI and cutscenes, the developers usually take the road that gets the job done. And this means that co-op (not a priority feature) is left to no attention.
Actually I would prefer that all developers developed more co-op multiplayer modes for their games as co-op is the best form of multiplayer entertainment for me. I hate playing against other people (as they're too good:).
It might be intresting to see, as monos' Windows.Forms support advances, how #develop would succeed as an IDE. It's basically a GPL'd version of the VS.NET IDE.
Problem was that they got random rendering artefacts by rendering on different cards - different colors etc, and couldn't figure out why.
I have seen this problem in software renderers as well. The problem seemd to be that part of the rendering farm was running on different processors (some were Intel, some AMD and many different speeds and revs) and one of them supposedly had a little difficulty with high-precision floating points and it computed the images with a greenish tone. Took over a week to figure this one out.
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I agree that many low-level programming methods aren't that necessary anyhow, but there is one big point where the compiler cannot help much, and that is data layout. Big hits come from all levels of cache misses, and it's good for the programmer to be aware of this and benchmark the memory access patterns and try to make them good (predictable, linear, clumping frequently used data, etc). Also on some hardwares, the Load-Hit-Stores are something to be aware as well. A reasonable thing to do, when optimizing something, is to fiddle with the code a bit and see what generates the best assembly. This usually is a good compromise (you still stay at a higher level and got portable code with some gained performance on at least one platform). Now still compilers aren't a magic wand everywhere, especially when going to deeply embededded or specialized hardware. One example is SPU programming. Since SPUs read&write everything from/to 16-aligned addresses, current GCC compiler lots of "align ptr, load, rotate, calculate, rotate, combine, store" sequences. If you want good SPU performance, going into ASM is indeed viable something. Though most of the times, staying at intrinsic functions gives you an adequate compromise. But since SPUs are basically fast DSPs, many of the tasks that are ran by them are in nature quite repetitive with short amount of work per item and millions of items (like doing vertex transforms, simulating some post processing effect, mixing audio etc). But a good programmer always benchmarks first, checks the compiler output etc before hitting the deck with raw assembly.
Actually there IS a need to install the CDs, as not all TBC content came with the patches (I suspect mainly the Outland regions). Don't know how it is in the US, but it's like this in the europe. It is true it will re-run a few patches after installing though.
And yes, you can play the non-TBC regions with a normal unupgraded client even if you have activated TBC.
Well I guess the actual point is that if you pay $140 a month, none of that goes to the content providers. As a web master, every hit I get costs me something. Of course it's not that much and I'm not that scared (and even want hits), but the cost is on the receiving end (of the query). If none of the pages you view were free, you'd soon stop using the internet or at the very least you'd contend that your $140 is not getting you enough.
And it is quite possible that you have your own website as well. Imagine it getting enough exposure. You surely would be got hit by a bill to pay for the traffic. So as you see, it's not enough if you personally pay for something. It's every deliverer, ISP and so on who need to fork up the cash to bring you the service you so enjoy.
That is so unfair. There is no way we're going to get the name back unless we frame the future author of StallmanFS for some hideous crime and get hit to loosen his hold over the trademark. That's the only way. Better to keep a few crimes "hot" while waiting for who to pin them on. Hey, if the govs do it, why not we?
(ps. a lame joke attempt)
So not only do I have to ask if I can REALLY use my phone for calling other people, I really have to ask now if my clock also show the time as well? This really does sound like the wave of future.. ;)
Well I can answer this one easily.. The Linux DOES have PL-2303 drivers (that's what I checked first; the source code I mean).. It has had those for quite some time. There have been some GPS software based on it. So yes, while I haven't tested it, I'd assume you can use it under linux.
After all, it only is USB to serial, nothing more..
I bought one for the gadget-nerdiness-factor (about 8 months ago :). Now about a month ago they gave away the software + programming APIs. I was kinda disappointed at the spot, since this is not really a USB device. Inside, it uses an USB to serial converter. This is why the display refresh rate is kinda low. The screens themselves are 96x96 per screen, 16bit color. They tend to "flash" a little (I guess that's the OLED for ya).
:)
I've been programming this device for a weekends worth now. I checked the software they gave and it was ok. It does crash VERY often, though it's not the device that's causing the crashes. The USB to serial chip they use is made by Porlific and I think it's the PL-2303. Now googling for that seems to indicate prolific has had a bad history with working drivers.
Now being the nerdy hacker type, it seems that for me it only crashes when disconnecting by software. So my solution was to create a stub program in C# that connects to the device, stays connected all the time and listens for incoming TCP connections and routes those to the device. This way the computer stays connected to the device all the time and I can restart the controlling software as often as I like. Haven't had any problems with this approach yet. Still I hope Prolific fixes their serial drivers.
As for when it comes to the performance, I've noticed something weird. All of my software is currently in C# and has not been optimized. But when feeding the device with image data, the program that sends it to the device takes around 9%, while the program that generates the packets takes somwthing like 40%. This seems kinda weird and I do have some hope of fixing it.
As for the device itself, the reviews I've read have been pretty accurate. It always makes me feel bad to press a display. And the buttons are not as "solid" as I'd like.
But with enough work I hope to make even something good out of it. I was hoping of making an animated game, but no way of doing that with that serial adapter standing in between.
Not sure how far they've made it in their engine, but from a programmer point of view, there are SO many ways to make load lighter. Fade away the portals that are further (or are facing away) from the camera center, limit recursion, simplify shaders in each recursion and put a portal effect in front (probably after 2 portals you can render fairly small portions with very simple shaders). Plus the portal seems to be limited in size. The things that REALLY bog things down are realtime shadows and such. As far as I remember the vide, there are not that complex shadows (some simple casting ones, at tops). So basically you're using that same power to render the portals. So all in all, it's hard to see there's any inherit limit in the engine, but it is limited/simplified to run in the current hardware. And there are ways to bend the tech to work in multiplayer games well enough, though I'm not sure if they have done so or not. As a side point, personally, I've been bored with FPS games for a long time. Prey didn't seem that cool and this seems too frantic. But man do I envy the guys who made up this concept :).
Well microsoft you, ballmer lover!
This is simply called "Hot Coffee" modding. Better watch out for those law suits. :)
Sure, technically, this has never been done before.
:).
So as far as I can see, this is nothing new (technically) and people have been doing this for well over 5 years. Heck even my personal engines have had this feature for quite some time. Haven't seen it in a lot of FPS games, but no reason why it wouldn't work directly in an FPS style game as well (cannot confirm this but I think the GameCube Metroid Prime has a streaming level structure?).
Well actually, that sounds very much like in-game content streaming. Many console games already do this. Granted, may be there no FPS games as such, but still games with massive seamless areas into which the gameplay is fitted nicely.
Some of them DO have fake loading screens, but they are hidden well enough (or are so far apart) thet the player rarely even notices it. One example is the Jak&Daxter game for the PS2. The game streams the next "levels" while you play, and the whole game is integrated into one smoooth running/riding excersice. Pretty sweet. And GTA does this as well, though for example the GTA:VC is divided into two parts. As for PC games, there are some. World of Warcraft springs to mind first
Personally, the labs at school were only a way for me to best the others. I knew from the start that this "logical thinking" thing that was apparent in computers was the one I'm good at. So I tried that. Soon all computer related tasks were easy as whatever for me.. Currently working as a games programmer. If it weren't for the computer labs, I would probably still be just a gamer and not trying to best myself over existing implementation.
So the horrible presentation actually pushed me "over the edge" in my youth. Been thanking it ever since.
Worst part is that just about all phone developers are very sloppy when it comes to implementing the J2ME standards and all models tend to have their own quirks. Sony Ericsson and Nokia are probably the best, but that is not saying much. So in this case, it really is "write once, debug everywhere" type java.
And this actually really says it all. Most of the effort of doing a J2ME game seems to go on making it work on various devices and conform to operator wishes (and they are plentiful and vary a lot). This is even more so if you really try to stretch the device (as making fun and good looking gameplay may take more power since you're likely doing more under the hood).
And it really doesn't help that many firmwares and phones really handle things differently. Both in performance and compliance. This is why these mobile gaming platforms have really emerged. Still a lot of effort to get a small game done. I'd much rather spend my time honing the game than using 30% of the budget just trying to get it to run on 30 different devices.
Actually does it really matter if the platform is open source or not? The point in this competition was that you'd get the best result. And by making all the competitors show their solutions to others, they are effectively helping each other out. In the competition. I think the term "open source" makes people jump too much sometimes and expect too much. It's still okay to use and make open source software for the Windows, right?
Sadly, I have the same problem I'm sure he does: lack of friends who care about things that are important to me.
Heck I have the same problem too.. Why when I even say the name 'blugill' most of them go like "wtf have you been smoking man"..
And Microsofts PR machine has a history of successfully turning around 180 degress.
And they even did it twice for the XBox 360! That's some impressive marketing right there..
One thing that bugs me is that every publisher says that 'adventure games are dead', and makes it self-fulfilling by not releasing any.
Well when one DOES decide to publish an adventure game, the others watch closely. But no matter how hard they look, the sales figures are just not there. So who's to blame? (at least one adventure game was canned because Syberia II didn't sell)
On a similar note, it's always weird to see topics concerning adventure games get a lot less posts than other topics. Speaks something for itself, also.
Seamless world support isn't that hard. All you have to do is support it from the beginning. Streaming of content is the key here. Many console games already implement streaming, some even with almost 0 cpu hit (the PS2 can stream on the PS1 processor). Also looking at World of Warcraft, I've been pretty impressed. The only times you see a loading screen is when there are large jumps in the world. Most of the game is then streamed fluently and you can walk around as you wish.
:).
Of course, designing content to a seamless world is another thing
Neither our admin. assistants or QA people had any restrictions either, but I don't know about the receptionists. They sure seemed to play a lot of those boring built-in Windows games, so maybe they weren't allowed to install other software. I never asked them.
Well knowing receptionists, I don't think they're usually that "into" computers (even at MS) to start tweaking them to their liking. I could be wrong. But how would they do their job then? "Hello sir, do you have an appointment or would you like to nibble on my control panel?"
Oh and the seminar video can be downloaded from here. It's the one named History_of_Llamasoft.avi (204mb).
I saw some videos about Unity at the last Assembly party where Jeff held a speech about the history (and future) of his company. Looked pretty wild and I was really intrigued. The guy seemed pretty.. experienced with colors'n'stuff :). But as Jeffs post says, the main reason is that Gamecube is dying and rather than rush an unfinished crap out they decided to can it. I think this is for the better. Better to make good unique IP games than mediocre. We have licences and sequels fed to us through our noses so every quality nonmass product is a boon.
But all the good to you Jeff; hope to see if you still have the energy to start a new project!
Except that married or not married, >80h working weeks suck you mentally dry. You never get any actual free time. You start to find it hard to focus on you job and your work quality and speed will suffer badly. Many will come sick. You lose your friends (if any). And so on. There's a reason the weekends are off for most people; more than that is too much.
:).
So yes, you get a little bit more money than you would from, say, McDonalds. I still say it's not worth your health (if you snap, you might be sick for many years). No amount of money is; I find the salary irrelevant in this respect.
And another thing, many people seem to think that EA is recruiting new (to the industry) folk. Because the industry is in the state that it is, there are many qualified people on the market; some will end up at EA (no need to hire rookies if you get the real deal). Also EAs recent strategy seems to be that EA buys any competition and merges the companies. Think about it. Maxis, Westwood, Criterion, DICE and so on. Those people will then be moved on to EA projects and be forced to EA habits. There goes the neighbourhood
Well sure, it isn't that hard if you plan it right from the start. Not many studios do that. In fact most of the games that sport some kind of co-op these days tend to be inehrently multiplayer (Star Wars Battlefront) or otherwise easily extendable (Dawn of War). But when developing a game, it's a harsh reality to face. You have only so little time to develop all the technology, content, gameplay and multiplayer. Not an easy undertaking. And when doing things like physics, AI and cutscenes, the developers usually take the road that gets the job done. And this means that co-op (not a priority feature) is left to no attention.
:).
Actually I would prefer that all developers developed more co-op multiplayer modes for their games as co-op is the best form of multiplayer entertainment for me. I hate playing against other people (as they're too good
It might be intresting to see, as monos' Windows.Forms support advances, how #develop would succeed as an IDE. It's basically a GPL'd version of the VS.NET IDE.
Problem was that they got random rendering artefacts by rendering on different cards - different colors etc, and couldn't figure out why.
I have seen this problem in software renderers as well. The problem seemd to be that part of the rendering farm was running on different processors (some were Intel, some AMD and many different speeds and revs) and one of them supposedly had a little difficulty with high-precision floating points and it computed the images with a greenish tone. Took over a week to figure this one out.