DirectX9 Beta3 released
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Derek Smart [3000AD]
Regular
OK, one or two off-topic posts won't hurt I guess. 
Here's mine....
LOL!!! Actually, I've always had a sense of humor. Some people just couldn't figure out when to laugh, when to ignore and when to flame me
Actually, after lots and lots and lots of reading, PMs etc etc I've finally been able to separate the wheat from the chaff around here. So, I've decided to just stick to my normal method of posting, when in serious threads, so that the valuable info that I pass along, doesn't get lost. You'd be surprised how many forums on the Net I post to and which do not (contrary to popular belief) degenerate into all out food fights.
The calibre of folks around here is diverse, ecclectic - impressive even (with few exceptions - who know themselves) - no point in ruining the premise of the forums in the sniping of those you'd never convince that you actually finished high school (let alone get a bona fide and legal distance learning PH.D.), have an IQ on par with Einsteins (yes, it is), have developed and released three commercial games (with two more in development and on the way) for which you wrote 90% of the code and did 100% of the design, have a good and bad side, or have 18+ years of industry experience and notoriety (the kind of stuff legends are made of), have a daughter approaching three years old and that you will actually turn 40 next year.
I don't care if people like me or not. I never have - which is why I just continue doing what I bloody well feel like. If I was out to win a popularity contest, I'd be a politician. I'm a game developer and I'm not infallible by any stretch of the imagination, though from my posts, you'd think that I assumed I wasn't.
But some just like pointing out other people's flaws because its fun and also because its the best way of hiding their own shortcomings and feel good about themselves. I'm a contributor. Always have been. Always will be. Many, many years from now, when most are dying to get into the industry, I would probably be marking 30+ years in the industry and not with flames or inappropriate behavior, but with industry contributions which come from my heart and my brain. I'll have a history - colourful or otherwise - in an industry I got thrust into, seemingly by accident.
I've never submitted a resume or a game pitch to a game company. I've never tendered a resume to any game company (or any company since the mid 80s for that matter). I've never worked for any game company. Period. I upped, did it my way and using my own methods. Nobody gave me a Silver spoon or started me off in the testing room so that I could work my way up. I would guess that 90% of what I know about game development, is self-taught and comes from experience. I didn't sit in a lecture room, seminar or similar, to learn any of this stuff. Not unlike others in various fields who are self-taught in many disciplines outside the scope of their normal paths.
The point I'm making is that flaming and derogatory actions didn't get me here. Talent, dedication and comittment did.
On the subject of ATI...
I can't beat up ATI driver devs all day long, can I? I've always said that time will tell how it plays out. I am still of the opinion that the 9xxx series of cards were not ready for prime time and really could have waited until Q4. They just wanted a jump on nVidia. They succeeded in one regarded, but found themselves under the gun again with gamers and devs alike.
And no matter if they fix the drivers or not (as I expect that they will), I'm still seething from that W buffer decision. But, several ATI execs have sworn to me - on a stack of Bibles - that it isn't in fact in the HW - as I was told (and expected) by my sources that it was. My plan was to try and convince them to allow its use via the application preference in the compat section of the display properties. But they said that its just not present in the HW. I've contacted JC and a couple of other devs to see if we can lobby them to bring it back in future HW revisions. Especially since I really don't think the shader method is going to work. If it works, then there's no need for it in the HW (for newer games which support shaders). Legacy games (such as my 11/01 game BCM) are SOL - but then again, if we didn't have progress, we'd be stuck in legacy forever.
I'll get over it I suppose.
Anyway, back to the topic:
DX9 is not such a major leap as DX8 from DX7 was - but its still significant in some respects. I don't expect that even 5% of the games coming out in the next eighteen months will take advantage of most DX8 features, let alone DX9 or DX10. But the bottomline is (and I said this in an interview I did several years back on the first DX release) that MS upped and decided to establish a standard for game developers to abide by. Notwithstanding the OGL vs DX debate, this is a damn good thing. Say what you will about MS (and I'm not even close to a fanboi), but they made it possible for most of us to do what we like doing, with ease and derived experience. Imagine a game dev world without DX if you will. We'd all still be using home grown drivers, apis etc etc and it would be the same sorry old mess game development was, back when we were all writing to WIN32 libs
. Even OGL for games only even came close to this industry due to the proliferation of DX across games. JC and his band of merrymen, didn't help either.
XBox here I come!!!
Here's mine....jjayb said:Alright, who are you and what have you done with Derek Smart?
Just had to say that. I'm glad to see you have found your sense of humor. I for one, like the new attitude. Keep it up and you may actually become likeable.
LOL!!! Actually, I've always had a sense of humor. Some people just couldn't figure out when to laugh, when to ignore and when to flame me
Actually, after lots and lots and lots of reading, PMs etc etc I've finally been able to separate the wheat from the chaff around here. So, I've decided to just stick to my normal method of posting, when in serious threads, so that the valuable info that I pass along, doesn't get lost. You'd be surprised how many forums on the Net I post to and which do not (contrary to popular belief) degenerate into all out food fights.
The calibre of folks around here is diverse, ecclectic - impressive even (with few exceptions - who know themselves) - no point in ruining the premise of the forums in the sniping of those you'd never convince that you actually finished high school (let alone get a bona fide and legal distance learning PH.D.), have an IQ on par with Einsteins (yes, it is), have developed and released three commercial games (with two more in development and on the way) for which you wrote 90% of the code and did 100% of the design, have a good and bad side, or have 18+ years of industry experience and notoriety (the kind of stuff legends are made of), have a daughter approaching three years old and that you will actually turn 40 next year.
I don't care if people like me or not. I never have - which is why I just continue doing what I bloody well feel like. If I was out to win a popularity contest, I'd be a politician. I'm a game developer and I'm not infallible by any stretch of the imagination, though from my posts, you'd think that I assumed I wasn't.
But some just like pointing out other people's flaws because its fun and also because its the best way of hiding their own shortcomings and feel good about themselves. I'm a contributor. Always have been. Always will be. Many, many years from now, when most are dying to get into the industry, I would probably be marking 30+ years in the industry and not with flames or inappropriate behavior, but with industry contributions which come from my heart and my brain. I'll have a history - colourful or otherwise - in an industry I got thrust into, seemingly by accident.
I've never submitted a resume or a game pitch to a game company. I've never tendered a resume to any game company (or any company since the mid 80s for that matter). I've never worked for any game company. Period. I upped, did it my way and using my own methods. Nobody gave me a Silver spoon or started me off in the testing room so that I could work my way up. I would guess that 90% of what I know about game development, is self-taught and comes from experience. I didn't sit in a lecture room, seminar or similar, to learn any of this stuff. Not unlike others in various fields who are self-taught in many disciplines outside the scope of their normal paths.
The point I'm making is that flaming and derogatory actions didn't get me here. Talent, dedication and comittment did.
On the subject of ATI...
I can't beat up ATI driver devs all day long, can I? I've always said that time will tell how it plays out. I am still of the opinion that the 9xxx series of cards were not ready for prime time and really could have waited until Q4. They just wanted a jump on nVidia. They succeeded in one regarded, but found themselves under the gun again with gamers and devs alike.
And no matter if they fix the drivers or not (as I expect that they will), I'm still seething from that W buffer decision. But, several ATI execs have sworn to me - on a stack of Bibles - that it isn't in fact in the HW - as I was told (and expected) by my sources that it was. My plan was to try and convince them to allow its use via the application preference in the compat section of the display properties. But they said that its just not present in the HW. I've contacted JC and a couple of other devs to see if we can lobby them to bring it back in future HW revisions. Especially since I really don't think the shader method is going to work. If it works, then there's no need for it in the HW (for newer games which support shaders). Legacy games (such as my 11/01 game BCM) are SOL - but then again, if we didn't have progress, we'd be stuck in legacy forever.
I'll get over it I suppose.
Anyway, back to the topic:
DX9 is not such a major leap as DX8 from DX7 was - but its still significant in some respects. I don't expect that even 5% of the games coming out in the next eighteen months will take advantage of most DX8 features, let alone DX9 or DX10. But the bottomline is (and I said this in an interview I did several years back on the first DX release) that MS upped and decided to establish a standard for game developers to abide by. Notwithstanding the OGL vs DX debate, this is a damn good thing. Say what you will about MS (and I'm not even close to a fanboi), but they made it possible for most of us to do what we like doing, with ease and derived experience. Imagine a game dev world without DX if you will. We'd all still be using home grown drivers, apis etc etc and it would be the same sorry old mess game development was, back when we were all writing to WIN32 libs
. Even OGL for games only even came close to this industry due to the proliferation of DX across games. JC and his band of merrymen, didn't help either. XBox here I come!!!
While I too am pleased with what MS have achieved with DX, I would contest that point. IMO the work that JC has carried out under OpenGL has been of benefit to DX (and hence DX games) because its given further impetous to MS to 'stick it to OpenGL' and has overshadowed OpenGL development paths since DX8. It seems that consequently we've now got the reverse situation whereby the OpenGL ARB are having to work closer together for the good of OpenGL (rather than looking out for number one) in order to get standard definitions for vertex and fragment programs pushed through OGL 1.x and accelerate OpenGL2.0 development.
Derek Smart [3000AD]
Regular
DaveBaumann said:
Good points and I quite agree.
But I think you misunderstand the statement I wrote above. What I was pointing out was that JC and crew sticking to OGL actually made it become a viable graphics SDK for games other than just rendering farm software. Hence
Even OGL for games only even came close to this industry due to the proliferation of DX across games
If it wasn't for them, OGL would never have taken off as a viable graphics SDK for games. And that notion was due in part to the pitiful first DX attempt by MS. Boy, did they pull up their bootstraps since then. I think it was back at DX5 that things started changing for the better.
DaveBaumann said:
All my opinion.
There's always going to be a push from IHVs to keep OGL up to par on the major feature aspects. Truth be told, the ext_ mechanism in OGL is a simple and usefull way for IHVs to "show off" their latest bells and whistles. It's not always the case that a new DX is introduced at the same time as new HW
As well, of course, there's other forces at work to keep OGL up to date. Certainly companies such as Apple and SGI have vested interests in making sure that OGL stays up to date.
The OGL 2.0 effort is an interesting one. It goes beyond the usual "standardize all the extensions" to "let's try to look forward and make something that will last a while". I do hope it works out, since the concepts being discussed there are rather interesting, and certainly seem to be more forward looking than usual. I do wish they had not attempted to make it completly backwards compatible, since there's a lot of "old" OGL that probably should be retired by now (index colors?), and the whole concept of "software fallback" while noble, is a pain. Of course, politics has a strong influence at this level, so it will be interesting to see what happens.
Bigus Dickus
Regular
Derek Smart [3000AD said:
Even if that is true, I'm glad they brought out the card early. Why? Well, my upgrade plans included a new card at or just after Christmas... I figure that the longer the R300 has been out when I get ready to buy, the cheaper it will be!
I'm hoping to have some NV30 reviews to look at by then as well, and even if the drivers do have problems now, that should be history by the time I'm ready to purchase. I hope the NV30 release drivers are quite good, in the case that its performance makes it attractive.Well, a biased opinion for sure, since I'm only thinking of myself, but let others suffer a premature card (if that is the case) so that I can get it cheaper!
Hellbinder
Banned
Thats great. I own a 9700 and it works awesome. So my *opinion* is that it is not a premature card. I am gald i own it.
Comparing IQs is kind of bogus. First, it really only matters for pre-adults since it is primarily used to judge your intelligence vs your age group. Secondly, there are many many "IQ" tests out there, so unless you took the same exact one as Einstein, it cannot be compared. Third, mensa-like IQ tests are even more frivilous. They test only a few pieces of our "intelligence" ability ("fill in the sequence", "complete the association", etc) These tests can be "learned" and people can easily obtain genius level scores even if they aren't a genius (e.g. Marilyn vos Savant supposedly, the smartest woman, and smartest human in history)
Finally, general "intelligence" is only one part of a person's personality makeup that is required for "genius" Integrity, wisdom, perseverance, willingness to learn from others, and I dare say, a little humbleness (e.g. You acknowledge that you DON'T KNOW EVERTYTHING and AREN'T ALWAYS RIGHT) Even so-called "geniuses" make mistakes and are often wrong, and trying to defend yourself too much, just because you are afraid of being seen as wrong will be counterproductive.
There are high-IQ slackers, and low-iq overachievers, but I dare say, history remembers those who were not just smart, but worked hard and communicated well with others. What got Andrew Wiles his Field's Metal for Fermat's Last Theorem? Was it uncanny intelligence, or was it his obsession since childhood for proving it, 10+ years of work, and a willingness to start over, drop unpromising avenues of proof, and adopt techniques from other fields?
Summary: Genius = 2% inspiration, 98% perspiration
Finally, general "intelligence" is only one part of a person's personality makeup that is required for "genius" Integrity, wisdom, perseverance, willingness to learn from others, and I dare say, a little humbleness (e.g. You acknowledge that you DON'T KNOW EVERTYTHING and AREN'T ALWAYS RIGHT) Even so-called "geniuses" make mistakes and are often wrong, and trying to defend yourself too much, just because you are afraid of being seen as wrong will be counterproductive.
There are high-IQ slackers, and low-iq overachievers, but I dare say, history remembers those who were not just smart, but worked hard and communicated well with others. What got Andrew Wiles his Field's Metal for Fermat's Last Theorem? Was it uncanny intelligence, or was it his obsession since childhood for proving it, 10+ years of work, and a willingness to start over, drop unpromising avenues of proof, and adopt techniques from other fields?
Summary: Genius = 2% inspiration, 98% perspiration
Derek Smart [3000AD]
Regular
Way OT: Ummm, you can't be 'on par' without comparing. So i'm not sure what you're getting at. They both come from the same latin root meaning equal.
But anyways, both you take this offline to PMs.
But anyways, both you take this offline to PMs.
Derek Smart [3000AD]
Regular
Humus said:lol @ myself, my brain has been damaged by read too many forums. I read the whole post of DemoCoder thinking he was talking about IQ as in Image Quality
LOL!!! Thats what glue sniffing will do to you
Sorry - DC's post sticks out a little since it was a reply to a post that I removed that wasn't really of any value to the thread itself.
Derek Smart [3000AD]
Regular
DaveBaumann said:
ah, OK. Sorry DC. Blame Dave
Derek Smart [3000AD]
Regular
..back on topic
As I said in a post on the previous page....
Looks like I was right in my assumption that changing the detail texturing to use lists instead of strips (to match the pre-stage), might fix it. Probably because I wasn't convinced, I didn't bother to touch the code.
Well, guess what? Just like the GTA3 and Mafia specific fixes which fixed some issues in my games on these boards, today I downloaded the NHL2003 bug fix (778 - 6.13.10.6193) and installed it. On a whim, I decided to check out my game's terrain engine to see if these drivers fixed anything.
Well, you can see the results here and here
Looks like it wasn't any of the issues that the devs pointed out, ended up being the problem. Whatever the problem was, it has been fixed in these latest drivers. God forbid if ATI ever releases a list of what their drivers actually fix so that at least us devs know wtf is going on. This hit or miss fix strategy is my #2 complaint (#1 being the piss poor drivers) with ATI driver dev.
Just imagine, I would have wasted quite a bit of time, changing my code to test out - yet another theory - which would have ended up being another dead-end.
I can't wait to hear the explanation for this one.
As I said in a post on the previous page....
Derek Smart [3000AD said:
Looks like I was right in my assumption that changing the detail texturing to use lists instead of strips (to match the pre-stage), might fix it. Probably because I wasn't convinced, I didn't bother to touch the code.
Well, guess what? Just like the GTA3 and Mafia specific fixes which fixed some issues in my games on these boards, today I downloaded the NHL2003 bug fix (778 - 6.13.10.6193) and installed it. On a whim, I decided to check out my game's terrain engine to see if these drivers fixed anything.
Well, you can see the results here and here
Looks like it wasn't any of the issues that the devs pointed out, ended up being the problem. Whatever the problem was, it has been fixed in these latest drivers. God forbid if ATI ever releases a list of what their drivers actually fix so that at least us devs know wtf is going on. This hit or miss fix strategy is my #2 complaint (#1 being the piss poor drivers) with ATI driver dev.
Just imagine, I would have wasted quite a bit of time, changing my code to test out - yet another theory - which would have ended up being another dead-end.
I can't wait to hear the explanation for this one.
Honestly from an end user perspective, i was quite impressed with my radeon 9700. The jump in speed (& iq) was like Voodoo & Voodoo2 and i havent had any problems over the last two weeks (not a single crash). In my opinion (i tend to always buy new generation(mystique, voodoo, voodoo2, (tnt2 ultra), geforce, geforce3) cards shortly after public availability) critic is bit too harsh with ati this time round. There are obviously issues (if you follow this board) but they tend to be fixed rapidly and they tend to be way overrated by public opinion (i was actually surprised seeing my computer boot after reading all these posts about the cards supposed instability). Imho geforce 1 was the onliest (of the above) gc that did not feel "ready for prime time".
Derek Smart [3000AD]
Regular
Althornin said:
Yep. And I just put my 9700PRO back in my primary dev machine, now that I can continue my work without staring at the crap that it had sunk my terrain engine to.
Famous last words, huh?
But I STILL want to know wtf they fixed in the 778 driver that fixed this problem. And I fully plan on pestering them until they break down and tell me.
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