AFAIK, the GCN'S first draft had an 8 stage combiner, but the first revision (introduced before the launch) introduced the 16 stages.
High Voltage Software's Quantum3 Engine for Wii
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AFAIK, the GCN'S first draft had an 8 stage combiner, but the first revision (introduced before the launch) introduced the 16 stages.
Color me Dan
Regular
After seeing the other images I will admit that my first comment was more based on art then perhaps it was technology. It's a good thing that someone sat down and set a goal to try and use the Wii hardware better, but wont it in the end come down to the tools and expandability of it like the Unreal 3 Engine has shown?
With some better art and design perhaps they could show the engine off to those of us who arn't devs
With some better art and design perhaps they could show the engine off to those of us who arn't devs
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DeadlyNinja
Veteran
Well now, it seems that these guys are at it again with another damn good looking game, this time for WiiWare. It's a sexy looking old school shooter mixed with Wipeout. The art actually looks pretty good, but probably not heavy in technology. Still, I can't resist a game with crazy colors. Can anyone tell if they're using 24 bit color or not? There doesn't appear to be any dithering (thank god) in the screen (or the FPS game). Now I'll just pray to the gaming gods that the gameplay is at least above average.
IGN Preview
IGN Preview
No, because there's no such thing as 24-bit color on the Wii
The screenshots could be from a PC build of the engine.
No, because there's no such thing as 24-bit color on the Wii
There is if you don't destination alpha channel. According to ERP, the Cube can run in either an 8:8:8 RGB or a 6:6:6:6 RGBA mode, the latter being responsible for those heavily dithered/banded games like Prince of Persia and Resident Evil 4. I don't see why it would have to be a PC build. Lots of Cube/Wii games looked that clean. F-Zero GX and all three Metroid Prime games come to mind.
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The_legend_of_drtre
Newcomer
I like how the article states the engine is handling vertex shaders. A feat many posters here claimed the Wii was not capable of.
Well it doesn't have vertex shaders so that would be pretty special indeed!
They're probably doing it in software (on the CPU).
I think it's more of a "shader" to TEV translator. I think many people come under the assumption that just because GC/Wii does not have any "programable shaders" under the traditional sense, it doesn't have the hardware equivalent.
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The term "shader" can refer to either hardware or software, e.g. "This chip has 32 vertex shaders" or "I wrote a vertex shader." Obviously, they mean the latter.
What I meant was, nobody is saying you couldn't run vertex shaders on the Wii - any system with a CPU is capable of that. If people said the Wii didn't have vertex shaders, they were most likely referring to the hardware implementation of them.
Obviously though if there are ways to perform similar feats on the GPU in hardware then its a moot point. Same with pixel shaders, Wii doesn't have them but the TEV can perform pretty similary to DX8 level shaders.
DeadlyNinja
Veteran
That reminds me, can someone explain vertex shaders in simple terms? What baffles me is the point of vertex shaders. I know what a vertex is and can grasp what a shader is, but I don't understand why you would want to use vertex shader when you have pixel shaders. I mean, to color each and every single pixel sound about as small as you can get. If you can control each and every single pixel, why the need to use vertex shaders?
I'm guessing there are effects that can only be done with vertex shaders then? How about some examples?
I'm guessing there are effects that can only be done with vertex shaders then? How about some examples?
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Flags wawing in the wind.
Nvidia said:
Vertex shaders basically replace the fixed-function T&L units of the DX7 era and are much, much more flexible and powerful. They're also used in conjunction with pixel shaders for per-pixel effects that require data bout the geometry, like normal mapping.
Simply vertex shader need to prepare the work for pixel shader.
Well even though its an early demo, I was blown away. The game isn't looking amazing at the moment but I'm sure the visual quality will improve dramatically over time, but the effects being shown in the demo are exactly what I've been wanting to see on Wii hardware. Much welcome and I hope they really do push for engine licensing.
If you look at the team's resume, they haven't done much noteworthy. I am guessing that they decided that it will be much easier for them to become a standout Wii developer than a top-tier 360/PS3 developer. Really, all you have to do on Wii is simply do two things: not make a mini-game collection and not use the PS2 or PSP as the lead platform, and you've already made one of the top 5 best looking Wii titles.
True that. (I've been saying this for quite a long time, it's just that devs don't want to commit and use the "2 GameCubes ducktaped together" as an excuse for their laziness.)
In case people didn't see, The Conduit game in action.
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