How was Ps2 thought to work ???

[marconelly!]

I know "bump mapping" is considered evil by many here (quite unjustifiably so IMO), but this along with other multi-texturing effects, forms of AA such as MS and aniso, and more accurate lighting/shading would surely have lead to a far bigger increase in viusal quality than simply nudging up the polygon count - an area where the DC couldn't hope to compete with the industry leader, the PS2.

Well, the 'problem' with this, is that despite having larger polycounts, PS2 games from day one had better multitexturing, lighting/shading than DC games did, and it just continued to be so untill the last days of DC.

 

[function]

Thanks Deepak, I seem to recollect much of that information, but no longer had it hand.

One of the most difficult areas of trying to discuss what the DC was capable of (and how it would be competing in this day and age against Xbox, PS2 and GC) is that many people seem to be under the impression that the DC was "maxxed out" by games like Shenmue 1 & 2 (mostly done around 98-99, first generation titles if you will).

Considering Shenmue was out on Nov '00, and Shenmue II in Sept '01, developed by Sega's own AM2, and arriving amidst much fanfare and BIG budgets, I have no problems with people thinking those games would have pushed the Dreamcast higher as far as they could manage. First generation? Hardly. Granted they had long development cycles, but they also had MASSIVE resources available to them and we being done in house. If you can't trust a premiere Sega unit to push as much out of their own console as possible to show off just what they could, who can you trust?

Do I know if either game DID push all the DC's tricks, or how far they went? Of course not. And I would LOVE to see utilization tests and any other measurement tools available to track just what certain titles did and just what the DC could push, but I have never heard of that kind of data available anywhere. So offhand, with the question still being asked even now...? I don't think I'd vote against Shenmue II. Do I know just how much it pushed? Nope. Can I think of something else that would have done more? Also nope.

Shenmue 1 came out in late 1999 in japan - the delay till Nov '00 in America was for translation. I saw parts of the second game (whole environments and unchanged characters) at the same time as I was seeing parts of the first, and that was before the DC's release in the US and Europe.

A big budget should mean a game looks good. And Shenmue 1 and 2 did look good. Great even. But even without delays a long development period can have implications for a game's appearance. A game being massively delayed to the point of being split up, and hugely over budget to boot doesn't mean that a game should look better. In fact, the former normally means that a title looks worse compared to the competition than it would at the time it was originally planned to be released.

You don't just create art assets like models and textures (even whole environements) to be used at some point in the future for a sequel - that's what happens when bits get cut or games get split up into separate releases. Just like programmers, artists get better at working with hardware too, and what they produce can age.

Just becuase the DC was Sega's console doesn't mean that they should instantly (or even quickly) be able to "max it out" or that their artists will have 100% experience with certain polygon budgets or taking best advantage of features they've never come across before. First party developers from SNK, Nintendo, Sony and Microsoft are no different.

Mip mapping, aniso, bump mapping et al aren't just features you can turn on when you've got enough programming experience (even under DX on the Xbox). They all require a certain amount of resources and have artistic considerations, and are better taken into account before most of the game has actually been made.

So Shenmue 2 quite blatantly didn't push many (or possibly any) of the DC's advanced features. It may not even have used mip mapping anywhere, just as the very first Naomi game I saw, House of the Dead from 1998 seemed to lack. Texture aliasing central. (I know mip maps take 33% more memory, but with experience this is obviously something that Sega's developers chose to use heavily).

And I'm not "voting against" Shenmue 1, 2 or anything else by the way. I really liked it, and thought it looked great. But was it proof of the limit of how good it was possible for DC games to look? Nope. And as evidence of what DC games would have looked like if developers hadn't just begun to "scratch the surface of what was possible" using the PVR2DC (to quote Simon F), I don't think it's particularly relevant.

While people are happy to accept PS2 and Xbox have got, and will continue to get better looking over time, it seems commonly accepted for some reason that the DC peaked around 2000 and improvements afterwards would have been negligible.

I know "bump mapping" is considered evil by many here (quite unjustifiably so IMO), but this along with other multi-texturing effects, forms of AA such as MS and aniso, and more accurate lighting/shading would surely have lead to a far bigger increase in viusal quality than simply nudging up the polygon count - an area where the DC couldn't hope to compete with the industry leader, the PS2.

Well, the 'problem' with this, is that despite having larger polycounts, PS2 games from day one had better multitexturing, lighting/shading than DC games did, and it just continued to be so untill the last days of DC.

The 'problem' with 'what'? How would ignoring the DC's more advanced texture operations - or any of the other strengths specific to or offered by the DC hardware - have helped the fact it couldn't match the PS2 for T&L or fillrate? Just what is the 'problem' in making the best use of your hardware?

 

[zidane1strife]

Memories of DC...

Well the one thing that really did it for me, with regards to DC gphx... was the draw distance, most games I played featured draw distance similar to that of previous gen systems...

It was as if we had beefed up the gphx of old gen. games...

 

[cthellis42]

bounds.) And ofhand

And I'm not "voting against" Shenmue 1, 2 or anything else by the way. I really liked it, and thought it looked great. But was it proof of the limit of how good it was possible for DC games to look? Nope. And as evidence of what DC games would have looked like if developers hadn't just begun to "scratch the surface of what was possible" using the PVR2DC (to quote Simon F), I don't think it's particularly relevant.

While people are happy to accept PS2 and Xbox have got, and will continue to get better looking over time, it seems commonly accepted for some reason that the DC peaked around 2000 and improvements afterwards would have been negligible.

No, I think most of us are of the same mind that all consoles will have developers improving uopn themselves and others over time on each particular platform. (Some more than others.) It's just we also balk at those who seem to claim a system barely touched (yeah, I know I'm over-exaggerating--it's fun ) with three years on the market and describing a game such as Shenmue II as "first-gen."

Thanks for the original Shenmue correction, by the way. Rather big of a brain fart to not account for the original Japanese release... Also after checking on Shenmue II, it had its japanese release in July of '01, and its US in November, yes? I would certainly have a problem calling a premiere title brought out on a platform 2.5 years after release "first-gen."

At that point the PS2 was already out a year, and vastly overshadowing the Dreamcast. A year's time was clearing out all the initial release problems, and games were starting to pick up and really show off the platform. In fact, THE game to show off the platform was released in July '01 as well--Gran Turismo 3. Games like Ico and Jak & Daxter and many more were right around the corner... A rocky start to be sure, but things were ramping up quite nicely. Sega HAD to show off the Dreamcast as much as they could, or else... well... what the heck were they waiting for otherwise? (And I believe Sega was INDEED the optimal developer for their platform, if only because other devs may have been seeing it on a downcycle after the PS2 launched and overshadowed it. It is certainly not always the way, but if developers saw too much waning of interest in the platform as compared to the PS2, they would probably not be so driven to invest the time and effort to tap the DC further than Sega would be inclined to.)

Offhand, what games would you say push the bounds of the DC more than Shenmue II? Or create a more stunning overall look? (Which, frankly, was quite stunning for its day and certainly is no embarrassment now.) It would certainly seem to have been a last major proving ground for them, if they were reading the forest through the trees previous to their decision to drop from the console hardware business.

The Dreamcast had about as long of a run before pulled as the PS2 has had from launch until now. Have we seen major advancements? Certainly! SH3 keeps making me lick my screen, in fact, which gets kinda gross after a while... But are we expecting huge leaps from the PS2 in the future? Not so much. Devs will continue to refine their processes and push new boundries, but it will rather likely be in small increments. (Though some developers may make major leaps as compared to themselves, those who are really tapping the system such as ND and Konami will continue to impress, but won't be leaping tall buildings in single bounds.) And offhand I expect a bit more stretch from the PS2 due to its complexity and unconventional design. Would we have seen more from the Dreamcast as well? Certainly. But would we be seeing huge strides...? If so, I'm left to wonder what developers were doing for the first three

 

[function]

Not getting the first couple of words I'm afraid ...

I think the comment about "scratching the surface" meant that there were unused (or largely unused) features that could have had a big impact on how games looked, rather than the DC actually being able to secretly outperform a PS2.

Desrcibing software in terms of generations is a bit dodgy, as everyone's experiences are different. It's just a general comment to indicate the level of developer experience and the kind of tools available when games are made. Generally games take a big step up once everyone has experience of making a game for a given system and refinements have been made to developer aids.

This is where my comment about Shenmue 2 being "first gen" comes from. Clearly much of the game didn't have the benefit of this having taken place as it dated back so far (some of it to before the DC was even released in Japan). Even after Shenmue 1 was out and there were a lot of experienced staff on the game, being tied to old assets (and probably an ageing and complicated engine) might have created limitations on new content.

There were definitely visual improvements in the second game, but so much of the game felt like it belonged in the first that I just don't consider it a "second gen" title. Though again, trying to define games by generation is dodgy.

In fact, THE game to show off the platform was released in July '01 as well--Gran Turismo 3. Games like Ico and Jak & Daxter and many more were right around the corner... A rocky start to be sure, but things were ramping up quite nicely.

I totally agree. The first game that really drove home (no pun intended, honestly) that the PS2 was a real step up in power from the DC was GT3. I still think it's impressive now (but I'm expecting GT4 to beat it). While there's nothing the DC could do to match it or many games that followed (especially with the likes of MGS3 and Final Fantasy X 2 coming up) I think that given time there would have been tricks that the DC could have used to lessen the impact of the gap. Especially to the casual punter.

Offhand, what games would you say push the bounds of the DC more than Shenmue II? Or create a more stunning overall look? (Which, frankly, was quite stunning for its day and certainly is no embarrassment now .) It would certainly seem to have been a last major proving ground for them, if they were reading the forest through the trees previous to their decision to drop from the console hardware business.

I dunno about pushing boundaries - I'm not a developer, and I dare say the answer would vary between developers (and their particular role in game production).

The issue here isn't about whether Shenmue pushed the machine (made efficient use of the hardware) but whether developers could have continued to make better looking games. And that's about using resources better as much as making the machine process more. I'm sure Sega would have liked Shenmue 2 to be the most impressive game possible on the machine, but that doesn't mean it was.

To answer the question, I can't think of any games on the DC that create a more stunning overall look. Maybe JSR, though it lacked the sense of scale of the Shenmues.

The Dreamcast had about as long of a run before pulled as the PS2 has had from launch until now.

To be picky for a moment, it didn't really. The PS2 has had just under 3 and a half years now, while the DC was scrapped after a little over 2. After Sega dumped it, lots of software got dumped too and resources for flagship titles like Sonic 2 and Shenmue 2 were cut. Sega wanted the games out the door as fast as possible, as cheap as possible. Even prior to the official dumping of the machine many devs were scaling back or stopping DC support, so it never actually got to the point where the PS2 is now (currently seeing games like Silent Hill 3 from a third party like Konami).

Silent Hill 3 is amazing BTW - got to be one of the best looking games ever, especially in the cutscenes. But I did laugh when I climbed out the toilet window at the start and saw massive and unmistakeable texture aliasing on the sides of the back alley. The ghost of Shenmue ...

Would we have seen more from the Dreamcast as well? Certainly. But would we be seeing huge strides...? If so, I'm left to wonder what developers were doing for the first three

I seriously suggest you go and look at VF3tb, Pen Pen Tricellon and Godzilla Generations. Then look at Soul Calibur, Shenmue 2 and F355. You certainly won't be saying the same thing then! Hell, even compare Sonic Adventure 1 with Sonic Adventure 2 (damn, I used Sonic Adventure 2 as an example after all ).

For what it's worth, I don't doubt that the PS2 has a harsher learning curve than the DC either. But again, I'd point out that the DC barely got past 2 years before it was scrapped, with everything that meant.

Oops, 5:37 am ...

 

[Fafalada]

No, 2 tris|passes for trilinear. The Aniso 'mode 1' was single pass but needed more cycles.

So I was right on this one after all Anyway, the question I wanted answered is whether or not you had to setup multiple triangles to draw multiple texture passes? What I'm getting at here, is that if you could really do single pass multitexture you could do quite a passable 'software' trilinear without messing with multiple triangle setup...

Now you have really got me intrigued. Can you explain that comment? To my knowledge the best the GS can offer is 4bpp palettised which (in general) is significantly worse in quality than both the 4bpp S3TC and 2bpp VQ. How does using this multiple times make it better than the compressed systems?

I believe he was referring to multitexturing tricks to increase perceived texture detail. After all, various ways of 'detail' texturing tend to be far more efficient (and usually better looking) then simply trying to increase base texture resoluton to no end.

I was refering to native compression but ignoring that, yes using multiple passes can emulate other texture compression schemes. What you describe sounds sort of YUV based; I could see that working to some extent.

One relatively simple method is to encode texture luminance as a high resolution 2-4bit map and combine it with low resolution high color map.
It tends to work best with maps with lots of colors (we use it for skymaps), and pretty handily beats straight quantization methods on those.
If I had somewhere to host I could give you samples of how it looks

That would be an impressive hack (I'm not sure how you would do it), but surely rather time consuming?

I've got it to work at 2ops/texel for decompression (but it must use an intermediate decompression buffer), which is basically same cost as the above luminance trick or what Blue Shift team claims for their compression.
I know of one team that got some kind of VQ derivative to work at a smaller cost then that, but I haven't been told enough to figure out exactly how it works yet. It goes to 4-2/bits/texel too, but unlike my method it's not the same as VQ encoding that DC used.

Can anyone explain what exactly is Scrach Pad RAM and what does it do?

Typically it's a small amount of on-chip ram rated at speeds of real cache memory, but with full programmer control - like any ordinary memory.
It's main purpose is for accelerating processing of data streams (stuff that you tend to quickly scratch on and off a lot ), an area where regular cache isn't nearly as efficient. Since it's just memory without the extra caching logic it usually isn't expensive to add either.
An extreme case of SPR memory is GS eDram

 

[archie4oz]

If I had somewhere to host I could give you samples of how it looks

Is that supposed to be a hint?

 

[cthellis42]

Not getting the first couple of words I'm afraid ...

I think the comment about "scratching the surface" meant that there were unused (or largely unused) features that could have had a big impact on how games looked, rather than the DC actually being able to secretly outperform a PS2.

Yeah, I wasn't meaning to hint at PS2 comparisons if you thought I was... I only refer to the DC's ability relative to itself.

Desrcibing software in terms of generations is a bit dodgy, as everyone's experiences are different.

Hehe, true 'nuff. In fact, describing almost ANYTHING in the tech industry is dodgy.
In regards to Shenmue II though, I have no doubt it was burdened with "legacy code" as it were, but still... These games were the games if any were on the platform. I can't imagine Sega being content to let it ride without putting in a lot of the tricks (at least in part) of the machine THEY built. Heh... At least as much as they possibly could wedge in there.

The issue here isn't about whether Shenmue pushed the machine (made efficient use of the hardware) but whether developers could have continued to make better looking games. And that's about using resources better as much as making the machine process more.

I'm certain they would have, but we'll never really know the degree. And, of course, it's not so much an "issue" but more of a "lamentable pondering"...

To be picky for a moment, it didn't really. The PS2 has had just under 3 and a half years now, while the DC was scrapped after a little over 2.

It was launched in November '98 and officially dumped in 2002, so... I'm certain they knew the death tolls a while in advance, but prior to '01 they were still willing to dump $50 million (I believe?) extra into advertising to boost the DC against the PS2 while it was still ramping up? It had only been out for half a year, after all, and there were plenty of people still making fun of all the jaggies and flickering... Hehe.

Plus, even AT only two years you still expect to find some developers doing impressive works (e.g. GT3, Ico, MGS2, FFX, J&D...), and you can gauge the platform-relative parallels by watching where they go from there...

DC was definitely hurting and in decline at the end, but I wouldn't draw the line of their proper development cycle at 2 years.

Silent Hill 3 is amazing BTW - got to be one of the best looking games ever, especially in the cutscenes. But I did laugh when I climbed out the toilet window at the start and saw massive and unmistakeable texture aliasing on the sides of the back alley. The ghost of Shenmue ...

agree++

It's all I can do to keep from licking my screen!

I seriously suggest you go and look at VF3tb, Pen Pen Tricellon and Godzilla Generations. Then look at Soul Calibur, Shenmue 2 and F355. You certainly won't be saying the same thing then! Hell, even compare Sonic Adventure 1 with Sonic Adventure 2 (damn, I used Sonic Adventure 2 as an example after all ).

I'm not digging at game quality or anything... (and trust me I look at Soul Calibur quite a bit even NOW! ) I was just saying that if the machine had some HUGE capabilities missed/untapped in it when the games stopped a-developin' I'd wonder just what people were doing in the years previous to not notice/take advantage of them. Certainly there's NO question that it was easier to program for the Dreamcast than a certain console that followed it...

Oops, 5:37 am ...

Aw... too bad. You should hop in the "ATI on Xbox" thread. It's very active and fun right now.

 

[Vince]

Aw... too bad. You should hop in the "ATI on Xbox" thread. It's very active and fun right now.

HAHAH!

 

[marconelly!]

The 'problem' with 'what'? How would ignoring the DC's more advanced texture operations - or any of the other strengths specific to or offered by the DC hardware - have helped the fact it couldn't match the PS2 for T&L or fillrate? Just what is the 'problem' in making the best use of your hardware?

No, the problem with your claim is that all the features you mentioned (better lighting, shadowing, multitexturing) haven't developed in more than a year on DC as they were in the launch titles on PS2 (and they just keep on improving with existing and upcoming titles). It's like hoping beyond all hope that later in it's life DC could overtake PS2 in those categories, when it's developers had much more time to come up with them, but didn't.

 

[Crazyace]

I think the best games...

The best games on the DC were starting to show the limits. Sega internal devs worked with it from before 1998 ( Learning and developing libraries on Naomi ) all the way through to BH Code Veronica and Shenmue 2.

Look at

Blue Stinger / Zero / Code Veronica

Sega Rally 2 / Daytona / Sega GT

And Rez was a late generation game - and definitely more a 'tech demo' rather than 'texture' driven game.

Tokyo highway battle 1 / 2 showed a big improvement

Sonic 1 to Sonic 2 as well...


Sh4 could process ( load verts from memory / transform / and send via store pipes ) 10M simple vertices - and the PVR could possibly render 6-7Million triangles , but that's the absolute best case ( No Triangles crossing tile blocks at all - in the worst case each tiny triangle could cross 4 tile blocks, reducing performance heavily ) These figures are top end limits though, and in game the actual T&L phase may be a little as 30% with the rest going on scene management, physics , and (god-forbid) AI and gameplay.

PS2 , Xbox , and Gamecube all have the advantages that the T&L run independantly of the core cpu - which allow higher throughput in game situations.

 

[Fox5]

So if Soul Reaver 2(I think it at least started work on dreamcast), Sonic Adventure 2, and Rez didn't show the kind of improvements you were looking for, what about NHL 2k2? Sports games generally define generations, it was one of the last games released on the system, and well......I have no clue how good it looks since I think xbox and gamecube were already out by then and I had moved on.(I think it came out around the Christmas the two systems had come out)

BTW, was it memory that limited the PVR to 6-7 million triangles? If so, how come ps2 can do so much more? I think we may have seen dc edging a bit over 10 million if it lived for a full 5 years.

 

[wazoo]

BTW, was it memory that limited the PVR to 6-7 million triangles? If so, how come ps2 can do so much more? I think we may have seen dc edging a bit over 10 million if it lived for a full 5 years.

Memory was surely a problem since you had to store display lists in VRAM. Anyway, you would have problems to find even 4M pol/sec DC games. MSR was 1.5/2M for example (and one of the best looking DC games). LeMans team claim more than 3/4M for its racing game (but they claim 20M for its recent ps2 racing game ).

 

[Simon F]

BTW, was it memory that limited the PVR to 6-7 million triangles?

That figure is a hard limit in the setup engine of the CLX2 chip. They only way to go faster is to overclock it! (Actually, AFAIK, from experiments the CLX2 had about 30% headroom but that meant the SH4 would also have to be overclocked by the same margin which was not possible).

To Marconelly,
I'm going to be blunt with you. AFAIK you are not, nor have ever been, an employee of PowerVR and so I don't expect that you know the internals of CLX. When I say that there were untapped features in the chip, I mean it. It takes time for developers to learn the intricacies of any system and there wasn't sufficient time. No, not even for Sega.

 

[YPO]

Oohhh so you're an employee of PowerVR. So why didn't you divulge those secret workings of DC to Sega or it's 100's developers? Let me be blunt too. Ever heard of "the proof is in the pudding?" Like Marconnelly said, first batches of PS2 already show superior multi-texturing effect, shadowing, etc...something the DC games weren't able to achieve in 3 years of its liffe. And this is on a machine that is supposed to be sh@tload more difficult to program for. Tell me why was the first batch of PS2 games were able to demonstrate that, but 3 years worth of DC games couldn't?

You know what. The PS2 is able to do bumpmapping better than the Xbox, it's OK if no game has demonostrated that, because with time the true secrets of the PS2 capability will show you the way. I heard it's able to do real-time raytracing too, just that no one has discover that secret function yet.

 

[London Geezer]

Oohhh so you're an employee of PowerVR. So why didn't you divulge those secret workings of DC to Sega or it's 100's developers? Let me be blunt too. Ever heard of "the proof is in the pudding?" Like Marconnelly said, first batches of PS2 already show superior multi-texturing effect, shadowing, etc...something the DC games weren't able to achieve in 3 years of its liffe. And this is on a machine that is supposed to be sh@tload more difficult to program for. Tell me why was the first batch of PS2 games were able to demonstrate that, but 3 years worth of DC games couldn't?

You know what. The PS2 is able to do bumpmapping better than the Xbox, it's OK if no game has demonostrated that, because with time the true secrets of the PS2 capability will show you the way. I heard it's able to do real-time raytracing too, just that no one has discover that secret function yet.

agreed. it's the same argument people use with PS2-Xbox comparisons.

shame that for some people PS2 always comes out losing, either against DC or Xbox.... go figure...

 

[YPO]

Speaking of bump mapping on PS2, heheh. For those who have seen the latter half of Silent Hill 3, those haven't might want to skip this part. Are those bloody wall/veins things done with bump mapping? Seems like the veins' shadows are affected by the flashlight. Just curious, how is that done. Anyone?

 

[function]

lol, "when trolls attack!!".

cthellis42, I think we're actually in agreement on a lot of stuff!

And, of course, it's not so much an "issue" but more of a "lamentable pondering"...

Indeed. Sometimes I even lamentably ponder the fate of the Jaguar. :?

It was launched in November '98 and officially dumped in 2002, so... I'm certain they knew the death tolls a while in advance, but prior to '01 they were still willing to dump $50 million (I believe?) extra into advertising to boost the DC against the PS2 while it was still ramping up? It had only been out for half a year, after all, and there were plenty of people still making fun of all the jaggies and flickering... Hehe.

The official death of DC announcement was made by Sega of Japan in January 2001, only 26 months after the machine was launched. This had enormous implications for software development on the machine. Even Sega's best games took a hit after Sega announced they were scrapping DC (Shenmue 2 lacks some the pollish of the first game, despite being better overall). Stuff like Ikaruga (Treasure) and Rez seemed to make it through pretty much unscathed though, so yeah, it's not as if impressive games weren't still appearing.

I would like to have seen what Smilebit could have done with Panzer Dragoon Orta on the DC (as production was originally on the DC). Started after JSR, they were obviously very tallented and experienced with the platform - and not afraid to take chances (though they probably are now after sales of their Xbox games ).

Sega did throw a last ditch effort into marketing the DC in America for Xmas 2000, while bizarrely ignoring Europe, a territory where I think there were large gains to be made. However, prior to even Xmas 2000 (before the machines was even 2 years old) there were rumblings from Sega executives about dropping hardware. PS2 had only actually been out a little over 6 months at this point, and it's PR masters had done an awesome job.

I was just saying that if the machine had some HUGE capabilities missed/untapped in it when the games stopped a-developin' I'd wonder just what people were doing in the years previous to not notice/take advantage of them.

And it's fair enough to ask that. Software development takes time to catch up with hardware though. My Radeon from 2000 could do DOT3, but it's 2003 and Doom 3 still isn't here. :? While you'd expect console development to make use of hardware faster, there can still be holdups. Sega came from a background of Saturn, model 1, model 2 and model 3. All of which (I think) were IMR's too. The natural progression is to use more polygons, better lighting and better textures.

Making use of modern features requires experimentation and understanding from everyone in the team. For instance, it has become relatively straight forward now to make create high res normal maps for low poly models to give them a high poly look. Master Chief in Halo 2 is supposed to be around only 3,000 polys, but looks massively more detailed thanks to BM.

Unless I'm missing something, the DC could reasonably have a few models with that kind of poly count, in a fairly detailed room. With a second pass for bump mapping, the level or perceived 3D detail in there would shoot up. Perfect for a survival horror game (not as if you need much in the way of physics or AI). Have a section where with no enemies but a torch in total blackness. Would look great.

I think you can actually get plugins that'll create the low poly models + corresponding normal maps, from high poly models, for 3DS max now. Minimum effort, maximum result (might be an advertising slogan in there somewhere).

I'm getting really into this lamentable pondering, as you can see.

Oops, 5:37 am ...

Aw... too bad. You should hop in the "ATI on Xbox" thread. It's very active and fun right now.

I've just looked at for the first time since last night. Wow, you guys have been busy.

 

[Simon F]

Oohhh so you're an employee of PowerVR.

Many of the people who have posted here more than once already know that. They also know that I don't suffer fools gladly.

So why didn't you divulge those secret workings of DC to Sega or it's 100's developers?

They were along with numerous example programs. I suspect you are not a software developer. Do you think it takes a few seconds to incorporate a brand new feature? Why don't you ask one of the game software developers here (eg Faf)? Just because you are given a book on Complex Analysis doesn't immediately mean you can integrate around the singularities in the complex plane.

Let me be blunt too. Ever heard of "the proof is in the pudding?"

Only from people who don't know the correct quotation

Like Marconnelly said, first batches of PS2 already show superior multi-texturing effect, shadowing, etc...something the DC games weren't able to achieve in 3 years of its liffe.And this is on a machine that is supposed to be sh@tload more difficult to program for. Tell me why was the first batch of PS2 games were able to demonstrate that, but 3 years worth of DC games couldn't?

The first batches? I think not. Being of professional interest, we looked very closely at the games that were released on the PS2 at that time and they were, at most, only on-par with the DC games. Certainly the rendering effects improved over time, which is only to be expected from a device which possibly had about 4~5x (*) as much silicon as the DC.

You know what. The PS2 is able to do bumpmapping better than the Xbox, it's OK if no game has demonostrated that, because with time the true secrets of the PS2 capability will show you the way. I heard it's able to do real-time raytracing too, just that no one has discover that secret function yet.

Now I know you are a troll. Go cast your nets elsewhere.

To the others, I apologies for being a bit vitriolic.

*I can't recall the exact figures.

 

[London Geezer]

Speaking of bump mapping on PS2, heheh. For those who have seen the latter half of Silent Hill 3, those haven't might want to skip this part. Are those bloody wall/veins things done with bump mapping? Seems like the veins' shadows are affected by the flashlight. Just curious, how is that done. Anyone?

i can say with 100% certainty that those effects are an implementation of procedurally generated textures, NOT bump mapping.
there are some different variants of the effect, from a "quite large vein/blood streamy bit" used on the walls to a "very fine bloody streamy bit" used on the characters and sometimes on the walls.

there are different implementations of the same effect, as in the car cut scene, where it's used (to a gorgeous final result i must say) for the rain drops on the car windows. and also a different implementation in some kind of slime always on the walls...

still, NOT bump mapping i'm afraid matey