Path: chuka.playstation.co.uk!news From: sosman@terratron.com (Steven Osman) Newsgroups: scee.yaroze.freetalk.english Subject: Re: Yaroze dev continuing Date: Wed, 08 Aug 2001 18:23:42 GMT Organization: PlayStation Net Yaroze (SCEE) Lines: 92 Message-ID: <3b71802a.2684379@www.netyaroze-europe.com> References: <9hq70s$odf4@www.netyaroze-europe.com> <9hqc3f$odf6@www.netyaroze-europe.com> <9hqda2$p4m2@www.netyaroze-europe.com> <9kn06t$qtb1@www.netyaroze-europe.com> <9kn0ts$qtb3@www.netyaroze-europe.com> <9kp379$qtb10@www.netyaroze-europe.com> <9kpm6i$qtb20@www.netyaroze-europe.com> <9krbmu$3h37@www.netyaroze-europe.com> <9krf4t$3h39@www.netyaroze-europe.com> <9krl1v$3h315@www.netyaroze-europe.com> <3b796603.1552801720@www.netyaroze-europe.com> <9krsdt$4at1@www.netyaroze-europe.com> NNTP-Posting-Host: dsl092-099-074.nyc2.dsl.speakeasy.net Mime-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: text/plain; charset=us-ascii Content-Transfer-Encoding: 7bit X-Newsreader: Forte Agent 1.5/32.452 I'll buy your argument, but to a point... You were talking about the greatness of the old machines in that they were all homogeneous, then saying that you also appreciate the upward compatibility you get by writing to them. In effect, what you're doing is setting a starting point and assuming that people who end up getting the better machines will also be able to run your software. How is that different from picking a "very undemanding" environment as a starting point? What I'm saying is that, if you choose (like way too many games out there do) to require a supercomputer with a video card that has half a gig of texture memory alone, you're asking for trouble. I can't believe that setting your standards to last year's model isn't acceptable for most games... That's how you end up in the trap: "Should I program for *everyone* and risk losing some hard-core gamers, or should I program for hard-core gamers who will have the latest and greatest..." Or... should you try to use those clever tricks that you were talking about... So who is really to blame? Is it the problem really due to the environment and the hardware, or are the hard-core gamers to blame who go out and buy everything the second it comes out -- and thus make the industry have to sell-out just to make it that much sexier. Is that a choice that people in the industry aren't making today? I mean, isn't it part of the decision of what consoles you want to target? Perhaps where you want to set your lowest common denominator? (I am well aware of the politics involved in this decision too, though... It's not a sheer machine power thing -- from the demos of Munch's Oddyssee, I really cannot believe that the PS2 couldn't handle it). And is that really the issue? Let's compare the launch PSX titles to the games that are coming out on the exact same hardware today? Perhaps it's just that the developers bothered to work a little harder with the same hardware instead of just being lazy and making sure you always had hardware that was 10 times more powerful than their games required -- so that they could avoid the extra effort of doing it right. One of my "software engineering" professors jokingly said once, that if you software isn't fast enough nowadays, don't worry -- wait a few months and buy a faster computer. The scary part is, under the joke, I honestly believe that she meant it, she just didn't want to go on record. All that being said, there are two things that I should admit: 1. I never play PC games. I work on my PC's, and that's about all. I have a 36" tv and prefer using it, sitting on my couch to sitting on my desk. 2. I'm very glad that the console life cycle is a 5 year one. I think it's great that new hardware comes out only once in 5 years, and you don't find developers requiring you to always buy a new piece of hardware for each game. Every time I look at a PC game, I find that I have to upgrade this or that to get it working. In summary, I really don't know what I'm talking about, . Sauce On Wed, 8 Aug 2001 18:21:14 +0100, "Jon Prestidge (Jon@surfed.to)" wrote: >> Isn't that the whole point of using DirectX in MS platforms anyway? > >even if you have libraries that sort-out all the hardware differences, you >still don't know if it will run fast-enough on some peoples' PCs. >You have to decide whether to write a prog very undemanding on system >resource so that it'll run on most PCs or whether to take avantage of the >power of the faster ones and exclude many users, or try some clever >switching-in of extra poly detail and frames per second depending the power >of the PC it happens to be run on. > >... and DirectX is by MS so I'm reluctant to use it unless I'm getting paid >to do so (i.e. as a job). > >Last time I checked PCs didn't even have a contiguous address space...if >that's still true that's good enough reason to avaid the whole sorry PC mess >(unless you're paid to work on them). > >> Anyway, that being said, I personally don't feel that the "other" >> console developer belongs in the industry... > >... the 'other' developer need not be in any industry ... they can free from >industry, happy in the ham sector. > > >Jon >