Evolution of FPS Renderers

[neliz]

I would like to add Midwinter ('89) to the list of old FPS engines, after all it did have huge fractal landscape and freedom of movement.

Midwinter.. I got a really big "The Sentinel" feelling about it. I remember playing Flames of Freedom and feeling it really related to that classic.

So, yes 1986's the Sentinel created a true 3D environment where the player could (walk/)Look around and as such is half a decade earlier than other FPS attempts.

I played it on C64

 

[Jawed]

Battlezone?

Jawed

 

[neliz]

Battlezone?

Jawed

the playing field is rather flat in that one isn't it?

 

[Jawed]

There are obstacles/cover. Not many, true.

Jawed

 

[Npl]

Hmm, wasnt exactly a pure shooter, but how about Corporation?
Had no textures on Walls/Floors but scaled "bitmap-enemies".

 

[Simon F]

How about Mazewars (and here )for a networked, multi-player 3D game from ~1973?

This video shows a remake on Xerox machines.

.

We used to have a version of it on the Mac network at my first job and then I wrote one for X-windows on the sun system at a later job.

 

[neliz]

There are obstacles/cover. Not many, true.

Jawed

True, true. it's still a 2d map with the only definition of "height" being given by the vector objects (hovering) over the landscape.

 

[swaaye]

Why aren't LithTech games mentioned? Blood 2 graphics were incredible at the time and later games based on LithTech Jupiter were no different (NOLF, AvP2).

The only games using Lithtech that impressed me were NOLF2 and Tron 2.0. AvP2 was very average, IMO. Some Lithtech games were behind the times at their release and some, like FEAR, did their thing slower than the competition.

 

[swaaye]

Battlezone?

Jawed

The 1998 Battlezone was pretty impressive. There's an article about its development somewhere out there on teh intarweb. They discussed their texture mapping of the lunar surface. Can't seem to find the article now....