MoroseTroll

Bikerdude: Well, yes. The plan is to complete the library, polish it to shine for specific CPUs models (there are several code paths exist in my version of the library for every AMD CPUs generation), and publish a custom gamex86.dll for Doom 3, Quake 4, Prey, and ET:QW. Of course, any noncommercial games based on the mentioned titles are welcome to use my work free of charge.

Yes, I know. But if we look at what Raven programmers have made with id Tech 4 in Quake 4 in all and in the idSIMD library particular, then there is a good chance, I hope, that my work will bring some good results. So, time will tell. P.S. I must admit that I'm doing this work in order to get some grant from AMD . But quiet - nobody should know my insidious plan

AFAIK, the idSIMD library is tightly connected with a render and physics components of the engine, so I believe that my optimizations will improve overall performance. Jan Paul van Waveren, the author of the original idSIMD library, has stated somewhere (alas, I don't remember where exactly) that the BlendJoints function is very important for a geometry transformations in the engine. I hope, all other functions are important as well . As for the calls to the idSIMD library: it contains very optimized vector and matrix routines, fast memcpy analog and many other useful things. Morethen, if you feel that there is some operation in the game code is too hungry for CPU, I can optimize it by SIMD as well. Of course, such kind of optimization is possible only if the piece of code is doing a relatively simple and repeated actions, as all the functions in the idSIMD library do. As for tests: no, I haven't made it yet. But I plan to do it this summer, on my vacation, and complete the work.

I'm working on my own implementation of the idSIMD library in Doom 3. The work itself is hard enough because it is 100% asm, and it is not completed yet (11K lines in total). My main goal is to accelerate the library on AMD CPUs, because on Intel CPUs it is already works fast enough, I believe. Anyway, in the attached PDF you can find a statistics about the almost all functions I've rewritten. Some of them were not accelerated at all (i.e. ~1.0 boost coefficient), some of them were accelerated at rate of 5 (but these are seldom). So, what do you say, guys? Does anyone of you already work on the idSIMD library? Do you need my work? MyIdLib.pdf

Fidcal: I like your idea as well . But I think that your darkbomb should be expendable asset (i.e. the player should buy it, if (s)he wants to, for a relatively large sum). As for its visual effect, I vote for anti-light (or anti-lantern/anti-torch, if you wish), i.e. an object that emits darkness instead of light, with a finite time of action (just for a few seconds).

AFAIK, Prey 2 in 2012 will be the final game based on id Tech 4.

Briareos H: Good idea about the CAPTCHA-like question during a registration!

I've heard that Just Cause 2 is a DX10-game, so it appears that it works only on Windows Vista/7 + DX10/DX11 hardware.

Fidcal: I have no doubt about quality of the upcoming TDM FMs. I am just sorry that many taffers will skip them just because they will be created for TDM. Heck, maybe it's a language barrier, but my point of the remaking was to make TDM much more attractive for taffers than it is now. There are two ways to achieve this, as I can see: 1) Either to create much more attractive FMs (than for T1&T2); 2) Or to demonstrate the T1&T2 community that TDM is much more handy tool to create new FMs. As I can see, the part 1 is still not achieved. As I said, I have no doubt about quality of upcoming TDM FMs, but will they attract as much taffers as you, guys, want? I don't know. Do you? As of the part 2, I think many enough taffers know that, but, I believe, not as much as you, guys, want. That's why I'm trying to convince at least one of you to create something that would demonstrate TDM's power. Of course, a remake of FM is troublesome, but what about some kind of tech demo (just geometry, not FM) of some famous FM or even OM for T1/T2 (something like the Digital Nightfall's Cathedral for UT2004)? Just to allow people to watch and compare with original and, of course, make decision: "Damn! TDM is just ***ing good!" Tels: A) Absolutely. AFAIK, TDM has been created as a much more modern (and handy) basis for FM creation in mind. You, guys, have made a lots of work, but, I believe, you need to... advertise it some way. Do you remember TV ads? They take some unnamed product and compare with a new one. That's right, I vote for this type of ad . B, C) I have no doubt, the id Tech 4 is much more powerful then the Dark Engine, but these are just engines. The main goal is to have a quality (popular, if you wish) FMs created for those engines, right? Who will create them for TDM? The current TDM FM authors are still in the minority if we compare their quantity with the T1&T2 FM authors. The root of this problem, as I can see it, is in some... blood transfusion (some T1&T2 FM authors would migrate to TDM). How can you do that? By convincing them, I suppose. How exactly? By demonstrating them the power of TDM in some kind of tech demo (like in Serious Sam 1).

Melan: I'm sure that you're right, but the main goal - to demonstrate that TDM is more powerful and better the the Dark Engine - is still not reached yet, IMHO. I believe that people are needed to compare apples to apples, i.e. that mission in T1/T2 and the same or similar mission in TDM. It's like to see the dmDeck16 from Unreal 1 (1998) in Unreal Tournament 2007 - the engine versions are different, but the map is the same, and for me personnally it was very nice to walk (more precisely - to run), see and compare. Of course, I don't (and can't) insist that this should be the Fidcal's Night Watch, but perhaps something not as big and complex, still famous. Shadowhide: I think it's a matter of time to see those beasts (or their analogs) in TDM.

Fidcal: What about to remake your Night Watch FM for TDM? Perhaps, this won't be as interested as this was long time ago, but, I believe, this will be a step in the right direction: technically, TDM is much more powerful than the Dark Engine, and your remake of NW could demonstrate it for everyone.

I doubt that Valve or Epic will ever open even ealier versions of their engines. As for next gen versions - yes, they are already exist (Tim Sweeney has mentioned at GDC 2009 that Epic's next gen game will be in production for five years: 2009-2014), but I doubt that they are available to license for everybody.

Happy birthday, GameDevGoro !

Well, my point about remaking T1/T2/T3 FMs in TDM is to let gamers to compare them. For example, let's take, say, Deceptive Perception 1, a relatively small FM. Would it be hard to remake it in TDM? I'm not sure (because I'm not a mapper at all), but I hope it wouldn't. Then, if someone would make this job, people would compare the original FM and its new version, and who knows - maybe they would understand that TDM is way more powerful then T1/T2/T3.

Damn, I've completed Dark Messiah at least five times! Yes, this game is a fantasy, but trust me Melan, it'll worth your while if you'll try to play it. It has damn good physics abilities - you can easily skip a battle against your foe just by having falling him into abyss or impaling him or throwing him into bonfire, let alone cutting his throat.

What about to remake some popular T1/T2/T3 FMs? I suppose, any OM cannot be remaked in TDM due to copyright issues.

Melan: What about the "Dark Messiah of Might & Magic" game from the creators of "Arx," Arkane Studios? Do you know that one of the famous Thief FM authors, Anthony Huso a.k.a. Purah, has participated in the development of this game?

Fidcal: What about the "Adblock Plus" plugin? I'm using Firefox with this tool for years and seeing no flash ads, at all. Also, I've heard that something similar does exist for Opera 11 too. Also, there are lots of traffic compressors exist, some of them are free of charge, if you prefere to don't use Opera's built-in "Turbo" compression option.

eigenface: Did you try to disable Hyper Threading Technology in your PC's BIOS? I've heard that this sometime might help in order to combat with a stuttering like you have encountered.

id3839315: What about your Catalyst AI settings? Make sure it is off. BTW, you do have a good enough monitor (22", 1920*1080), but how it's happened that you don't have a good enough graphics card for it?

Tels: Nice!

Frankly, I've never seen displays with non-square pixels, excluding, of course, CGA (320*200, 640*200) and EGA (640*350) resolutions, but these ones are gone long time ago. All LCD monitors, AFAIK, have a square pixels, and almost all CRT have the same as well. BTW, guys, some people have a 5:4 aspect ratio on their LCD monitors (I mean 1280*1024 resolution), but the game seems doesn't support it, so these people are running the game with deformed, 4:3 image. So, yes, automated aspect ratio correction, of course, would be nice.

Aside of the awesome Bikerdude's Eyefinity configuration, what about automatic aspect ratio setup: i.e. the game would calculate aspect_x and aspect_y by itself? When I choose 1680*1050 on my PC, it's obvious that my monitor has 16:10 aspect. So why end user should worry about aspect, if the game can solve it by using the Greatest Common Divisor of the width and height of the resolution, right?

Ok... One more question: is there any possibility that TDM will be more multithreaded when Doom 3 will be opened?

I'm definitely not a graphics programmer, but what if the main (game) thread won't wait for the result of the light gem function, but use the last known one? I mean that the main (game) and the light gem threads would work asynchronously, i.e. the light gem thread synchronously would receieve the rendershot from the main (game) thread, but would return the result asynchronously?