Well, on the flip side, they can wait for the rendering to be refined speedwise..and let the hardware/drivers catch up at the same time.
I see your point...but to me the hardware/driver logic just seems to me to be a reason to bloat things. Say, I program a nice freeware OpenGL graphics engine that isn't capable of running on today's hardware well. But instead, I say to the end users to wait until "the hardware catches up". How is that different to what Crytek/EA is doing now? Wouldn't it be better to optimize the code so it runs well and looks great, regardless of hardware, like Doom 3-engine based games? That's mainly my peeve. So to me, these marketing buzzwords of planning for the future are just excuses to bloat things, from my point of view.
I hear Crysis isn't selling as well as expected, either.
Same here, well that could be attributed to the SecuROM present, as well as the extremely high sys reqs...
why would they bloat things for no reason? I'm not saying they aren't, I'm asking why they would.
One reason I can see is because of their hardware partners such as Nvidia and Microsoft with DX10. (if you make the hardware necessary, some people will buy into it) Any other reasons?
I'm a little cynical but I don't find it to hard to believe that these developers are tech heads and want to push the software they are making to the limit of currently available hardware, I must admit it's appealing when you see what it's capable of (if you're rich)
[quote="byuu"]Seriously, what kind of asshole makes an old-school 2D emulator that requires a Core 2 to get full speed? [i]>:([/i] [/quote]
Panzer88 wrote:why would they bloat things for no reason? I'm not saying they aren't, I'm asking why they would.
One reason I can see is because of their hardware partners such as Nvidia and Microsoft with DX10. (if you make the hardware necessary, some people will buy into it) Any other reasons?
I'm a little cynical but I don't find it to hard to believe that these developers are tech heads and want to push the software they are making to the limit of currently available hardware, I must admit it's appealing when you see what it's capable of (if you're rich)
Laziness is the main reason. Or management pressures to make a game sooner/flashier.
Depends who you want to blame.
Why optimize your code to run on a current system when your target market will gladly spend another 100 bucks or so in hardware upgrades until they have a comp that DOES run your code playably?
This has gone on since long before the developers started signing sponsorships with nVidia and ATi/AMD.
It started back around the GeForce or GeForce 2, if I recall.
Well, on the flip side, they can wait for the rendering to be refined speedwise..and let the hardware/drivers catch up at the same time.
I see your point...but to me the hardware/driver logic just seems to me to be a reason to bloat things. Say, I program a nice freeware OpenGL graphics engine that isn't capable of running on today's hardware well. But instead, I say to the end users to wait until "the hardware catches up". How is that different to what Crytek/EA is doing now? Wouldn't it be better to optimize the code so it runs well and looks great, regardless of hardware, like Doom 3-engine based games? That's mainly my peeve. So to me, these marketing buzzwords of planning for the future are just excuses to bloat things, from my point of view.
I hear Crysis isn't selling as well as expected, either.
Same here, well that could be attributed to the SecuROM present, as well as the extremely high sys reqs...
Or the fact that its' only selling point was ZOMG TEH PRETTIES, despite the AI supposedly(Have not played the game myself, and I never plan on doing so. I suck at keyboard/mouse.) being much better than most games...
Also, need I remind people that the DX9 settings are perfectly playable even on somewhat slow hardware(8600 GTS) while still looking damn good?
Well, on the flip side, they can wait for the rendering to be refined speedwise..and let the hardware/drivers catch up at the same time.
I see your point...but to me the hardware/driver logic just seems to me to be a reason to bloat things. Say, I program a nice freeware OpenGL graphics engine that isn't capable of running on today's hardware well. But instead, I say to the end users to wait until "the hardware catches up". How is that different to what Crytek/EA is doing now? Wouldn't it be better to optimize the code so it runs well and looks great, regardless of hardware, like Doom 3-engine based games? That's mainly my peeve. So to me, these marketing buzzwords of planning for the future are just excuses to bloat things, from my point of view.
I'm not excusing them for being idiots.
I hear Crysis isn't selling as well as expected, either.
Same here, well that could be attributed to the SecuROM present, as well as the extremely high sys reqs...
why would they bloat things for no reason? I'm not saying they aren't, I'm asking why they would.
One reason I can see is because of their hardware partners such as Nvidia and Microsoft with DX10. (if you make the hardware necessary, some people will buy into it) Any other reasons?
Thats one main reason I feel. Helps stimulate hardware sales, which I think personally are getting more and more ridicilous over the years..Such as the insane practise of constantly upgrading hardware...
Why optimize your code to run on a current system when your target market will gladly spend another 100 bucks or so in hardware upgrades until they have a comp that DOES run your code playably?
that I agree with. Seems everything is profit-based these days, with no regard of artistic content. Like the recent emphasis on graphics over gameplay...
EA wants their own yearly Halo.
Seems that way, and considering EA does incremental updates on thier franchises instead of making new games with entirely new content, I have to agree.
Most motherboards only supply 24 lanes to expansion slots.
16+16=32. Not 24.
So if you use two pci-e x16 cards, the slots go down to x8 speeds.
I think that explains a lot.
Actually, in practice that has been proven to matter little.
Well, video cards never really saturate the PCI-E bus, let alone AGP (except when it was the jump from 1x to 2x). It's a non-issue for the most part unless you are using a PCI video card.
Most motherboards only supply 24 lanes to expansion slots.
16+16=32. Not 24.
So if you use two pci-e x16 cards, the slots go down to x8 speeds.
I think that explains a lot.
Actually, in practice that has been proven to matter little.
Well, video cards never really saturate the PCI-E bus, let alone AGP (except when it was the jump from 1x to 2x). It's a non-issue for the most part unless you are using a PCI video card.
Well, right now the AGP bus would be oversaturated... but it'll be years before we reach PCI-E 1.0a/1.1's limits. 2.0, which recently came out, has even higher limits. O_O
sweener2001 wrote:or one runs at 16 and the other 8
how much do you actually know about this stuff?
turns out i don't know that much, technically, either. what with all this talk of saturation and whatnot. rescinded
I don't know shit about hardware, but just by using context I'd venture that they're saying it'll be awhile before video cards will reach the point where they use the entire bandwidth of the PCI-Express card, let alone the 2.0
when you see saturation in this case, think traffic jam.
at least that's my uneducated educated guess.
[quote="byuu"]Seriously, what kind of asshole makes an old-school 2D emulator that requires a Core 2 to get full speed? [i]>:([/i] [/quote]
That's so sad that this game considers an 8600 'acceptable'.
Also. What about the engine? I assumed that they spent so much time on the engine that they didn't care too much about the game besides making it show off what the enghine can do. Now they can...
1 - Spend enough time on the sequels.
2 - Possibly make a shitload of money by licensing the engine?
Athlon XP 2800+
765MB DDR-333
AGP Geforce 6200
Took me, what, a year to update this info?
And meh, screw legs.
Oh... puns. I get it. Shame on me.
sweener2001 wrote:or one runs at 16 and the other 8
how much do you actually know about this stuff?
turns out i don't know that much, technically, either. what with all this talk of saturation and whatnot. rescinded
I don't know shit about hardware, but just by using context I'd venture that they're saying it'll be awhile before video cards will reach the point where they use the entire bandwidth of the PCI-Express card, let alone the 2.0
when you see saturation in this case, think traffic jam.
at least that's my uneducated educated guess.
deducing what saturation is wasn't so bad, it was the fact that i had no clue that the x16 isn't even being fully utilized yet, let alone the x8
That's so sad that this game considers an 8600 'acceptable'.
Also. What about the engine? I assumed that they spent so much time on the engine that they didn't care too much about the game besides making it show off what the enghine can do. Now they can...
1 - Spend enough time on the sequels.
2 - Possibly make a shitload of money by licensing the engine?
Actually, the 8600 series was not as big of an upgrade from the 7600 series as it should have been. >.>
it doesn't take years to make an fps. mass effect took four years. i'd think an fps wouldn't take near as long. unless you're duke nukem.
licensing it six months to a year from now makes sense. by the time the licensed game gets made, there might be a pc that can handle it. that's probably when crysis should have come out. six months to a year from now.
this game just came out too early. no one is buying it for two reasons. games for windows is a piece of crap, and nobody wants to buy a game so that it can stutter around on medium quality. it shouldn't be so hard to believe that this game would have been much better received had it waited a while longer.
sweener2001 wrote:it doesn't take years to make an fps. mass effect took four years. i'd think an fps wouldn't take near as long. unless you're duke nukem.
licensing it six months to a year from now makes sense. by the time the licensed game gets made, there might be a pc that can handle it. that's probably when crysis should have come out. six months to a year from now.
this game just came out too early. no one is buying it for two reasons. games for windows is a piece of crap, and nobody wants to buy a game so that it can stutter around on medium quality. it shouldn't be so hard to believe that this game would have been much better received had it waited a while longer.
Why do people keep ignoring DX9 mode? It's not like DX10 mode is such a huge fucking difference...
As for the engine, it can be be used for more than one type of game. I know of a turn based console style RPG on the PC that uses the Quake 2 engine(I don't recall how to spell the name, though.). The unreal 3.0 engine has been used on several non-FPS games. Even Halo 1's engine was used for a non-FPS game.
Ithink 6 month developement cycle is not normal, even for an FPS, closer to a full year is more average, maybe like 10 or 11 months, but 6, forget about it, maybe sometimes, but it's not the norm.
[quote="byuu"]Seriously, what kind of asshole makes an old-school 2D emulator that requires a Core 2 to get full speed? [i]>:([/i] [/quote]
