As far as I was aware the only reason Sony are releasing this BASIC is for tax reasons. They're trying to get the UK authorities to classify the machine as a 'computer' and not a 'video-game' - as a computer has 0% import tax, and a video-game 2.2% import tax.
See this for a bit more detail - I can't find the original link I read a day or two ago which had more information, I'm afraid.
Apart from embossed bump-mapping (which doesn't look very good, IMHO) there are no other ways of doing bumpmapping in software without totally bypassing the graphics rendering hardware and plotting each triangle, pixel-by-pixel, totally in software.
Bear in mind most modern graphics chips can multisample more than one multi-textured pixel per clock cycle, whereas the most basic optimised software renderer can manage much less, before you've even considered bump-mapping. And remember your processor cost about the same as your entire graphics card too:) (At least mine did when I bought it!)
As a game engine developer, now that the processors, graphics cards and geometry engines are getting faster and faster, we have to concentrate on improving the graphics in order to stand up to the competition. This means putting all of the effects we can dream up into the game - some may add to the game itself while others are just eye candy, that's true.
However, all this increased grunt also leaves a lot more processor power left for the game itself; which we are still learning to use fully in terms of advanced AI, better physics and other such things.
All these things considered, it's true that a good game is a good game regardless of the beautiful graphics - how many people play Minesweeper, after all? I mean, my favourite game of all time is a old Sega Master System game. On the other hand, how cool was it in Zelda 64 when you got the lens of truth and used it for the first time, or in Aliens vs Predator when you first used the Predator's special vision - it all adds to the game as a whole.
Finally, and rant over, with regards to 'even "bad" code can hit 60fps with a smoking graphics card' - I'm not so convinced - in anything but the most graphics-hungry FPS the game logic itself takes up a good percentage of the processor's power, and it's very easy to let that slip too in a "badly" coded game too - giving you a slow frame rate even on a GeForce 2'd up machine.
Is hair just sharp bumps? Is there a limit how sharply convex a "bump" can be?
The bumps in hair are far too high-frequency for bumpmapping to work for it; at least not unless the camera is almost in the hair! Also bumpmapping tends to make things look a little more shiny than hair...well unless you take the 'because I'm worth it' effect in to play;) Are we moving toward fractal geometry? big brushes for big objects, smaller brushes to add definition to the large brushes, bumps on the smallest brushes.
Can't say much because of contractual obligations, but these kind of technologies will almost certainly be employed on the newer games consoles as polygon drawing ability far outstrips the RAM needed to store all the polys. Fractal and other procedurally generated geometry may well be the way out of this
I'm a big debian advocate...but I've never used the non-free section myself. Seeing as most of the time it requires a separate fetch of a tarball and placing in the appropriate directory, I never bother with the.deb madness and just install the tarball myself.
So for me, this isn't any great shakes; but I guess purists who want the thing configured 100% debianly will be a shade miffed.
I would rather have seen DOJ force Microsoft to open up the source code of Windows than to merely break it up into an OS and an Apps company.
Do people not think that there are two types of 'open' software...one where you can download the source and the other where legitamate third-party contributors around the world can modify and add to the source.
An 'open' windows would only be the first kind; so yeah, you can write DLLs but you can't enforce them back to m$ or change anything fundamental in the code - you may be able to cheat m$ of its alledged 'competitive advantage' from not making some APIs available but not much else.
Linux and other progs and apps fall into the second category and that, for me, is where their true power lies - no m$ product could ever come close.
My card is an NVidia TNT2, but I'm assured by NVidia that the AGP problem is a M$ one; they have a pre-release (and non-releasable) patch from M$ which solves all their problems.
Time for IPv6? Or do we just put every toaster, refrigerator and light bulb in the house on an unroutable domain and handle the translation in the router/firewall/proxy built into the fuse box?
Only if you want the outside world to be able to talk to your lightbulbs and fridge! All those kind of devices can live in a non-routed IP class; if they really need to be externally managed then only the 'main' control system would need a real IP.
Win2k is nice and stable, but I'd hand on for SP1 before any kind of speed benchmarking is done; I only found out a few days ago that the AGP bus isn't supported by W2k and so my luvverly gfx card is limping along...wahhhh!
How could MS have not gotten this sorted before release?
My apologies! It would appear that I've confused the space-contraction with the gravitational curving of space! All the press with the 'flat-universe' has left me addled - whoops:)
Afterall, if gravity is instantanious (sic) that means it interacts with every particle in the universe
No, if gravity is instantaneous it means its effect is felt by all particles simultaneously regardless of distance from the source. There's still some argument over whether all particles are influenced by gravity; I seem to remember recently that there is talk of the gravitational lens effect (ie light being affected by gravity) being disproved.
Correct me if I'm wrong; but if I read it right this is the format that has been shipping in some of M$'s 'Advanced Streaming Format' - in which case the latest Media player already deals with this; and I have seen pirate videos in this format already.
I think you're reading far too much into this - while Slashdot shows up the technical flaw I can't see any implication that 'censorware is unethical' in the write-up.
As for the association between the two; that's taking it even further.
For my money, it just shows that when you take two products with different end-goals and try to merge them, you may end up sacrificing some of each...just it seems the sacrifice has come from the wrong side.
...if only console creators actually gave us the low-level hardware specs at all...we generally don't get the whole picture, certainly not enough to write an emulator - having to rely on the supplied libraries instead.
I say rely, I mean rely on reverse engineering the libraries to the point where your game runs acceptably well using the knowledge gleaned from doing so!
Can't really say too much due to contractual obligations, but any multiprocessor system without proper debugging support on all processors can be a nightmare when a team of people code for it.
Slashdot Mirror
See this for a bit more detail - I can't find the original link I read a day or two ago which had more information, I'm afraid.
Wonderboy 3 - The Dragon's Trap :)
Bear in mind most modern graphics chips can multisample more than one multi-textured pixel per clock cycle, whereas the most basic optimised software renderer can manage much less, before you've even considered bump-mapping. And remember your processor cost about the same as your entire graphics card too :) (At least mine did when I bought it!)
However, all this increased grunt also leaves a lot more processor power left for the game itself; which we are still learning to use fully in terms of advanced AI, better physics and other such things.
All these things considered, it's true that a good game is a good game regardless of the beautiful graphics - how many people play Minesweeper, after all? I mean, my favourite game of all time is a old Sega Master System game. On the other hand, how cool was it in Zelda 64 when you got the lens of truth and used it for the first time, or in Aliens vs Predator when you first used the Predator's special vision - it all adds to the game as a whole.
Finally, and rant over, with regards to 'even "bad" code can hit 60fps with a smoking graphics card' - I'm not so convinced - in anything but the most graphics-hungry FPS the game logic itself takes up a good percentage of the processor's power, and it's very easy to let that slip too in a "badly" coded game too - giving you a slow frame rate even on a GeForce 2'd up machine.
I missed the closing italic tag - the last paragraph is mine and not quoted - apologies!!
The bumps in hair are far too high-frequency for bumpmapping to work for it; at least not unless the camera is almost in the hair! Also bumpmapping tends to make things look a little more shiny than hair...well unless you take the 'because I'm worth it' effect in to play ;) Are we moving toward fractal geometry? big brushes for big objects, smaller brushes to add definition to the large brushes, bumps on the smallest brushes.
Can't say much because of contractual obligations, but these kind of technologies will almost certainly be employed on the newer games consoles as polygon drawing ability far outstrips the RAM needed to store all the polys. Fractal and other procedurally generated geometry may well be the way out of this
urgle...no it's just too much coffee and work pressure :)
So for me, this isn't any great shakes; but I guess purists who want the thing configured 100% debianly will be a shade miffed.
Do people not think that there are two types of 'open' software...one where you can download the source and the other where legitamate third-party contributors around the world can modify and add to the source.
An 'open' windows would only be the first kind; so yeah, you can write DLLs but you can't enforce them back to m$ or change anything fundamental in the code - you may be able to cheat m$ of its alledged 'competitive advantage' from not making some APIs available but not much else.
Linux and other progs and apps fall into the second category and that, for me, is where their true power lies - no m$ product could ever come close.
Just my two pence...
My card is an NVidia TNT2, but I'm assured by NVidia that the AGP problem is a M$ one; they have a pre-release (and non-releasable) patch from M$ which solves all their problems.
Only if you want the outside world to be able to talk to your lightbulbs and fridge! All those kind of devices can live in a non-routed IP class; if they really need to be externally managed then only the 'main' control system would need a real IP.
They use that time signal to switch back and forth from 'Economy' rate overnight...I assume other countries use similar systems? Anyone?
How could MS have not gotten this sorted before release?
Thanks for the link - my Uni degree in Physics seems so distant in the past at the moment - and I never did get the relativity bit! :)
I sorted out my confusion on this FAQ web site.
No, if gravity is instantaneous it means its effect is felt by all particles simultaneously regardless of distance from the source. There's still some argument over whether all particles are influenced by gravity; I seem to remember recently that there is talk of the gravitational lens effect (ie light being affected by gravity) being disproved.
Impressive - thanks for clearing that up for me. :)
Correct me if I'm wrong; but if I read it right this is the format that has been shipping in some of M$'s 'Advanced Streaming Format' - in which case the latest Media player already deals with this; and I have seen pirate videos in this format already.
Anyone know for sure?
I think you're reading far too much into this - while Slashdot shows up the technical flaw I can't see any implication that 'censorware is unethical' in the write-up.
As for the association between the two; that's taking it even further.
For my money, it just shows that when you take two products with different end-goals and try to merge them, you may end up sacrificing some of each...just it seems the sacrifice has come from the wrong side.
I say rely, I mean rely on reverse engineering the libraries to the point where your game runs acceptably well using the knowledge gleaned from doing so!
Sorry can't be more specific :)