My parents now use Linux

Solar · Post by **Solar** » Fri May 04, 2007 12:49 am

Alboin wrote:
Solar wrote:Currently I'm re-playing "The Bard's Tale"...
For the xbox?

*COUGH*

WHAT?

Ahahahahahaaaa.... ( <- manic laughter )

No, actually I was referring to the real The Bard's Tale. You know, Electronic Arts, 1985?

pcmattman · Post by **pcmattman** » Fri May 04, 2007 1:13 am

Brynet-Inc wrote:
anon19287473 wrote:Even OSX, with its 4-5% market share doesnt have ports of many popular games.
It would probably be easier getting "Gamers" to switch away if more commercial games on the market refrained from using "DirectX", Companies are likely unable to provide MacOSX or Linux ports due to necessary work involved.

More software utilizing 3D graphics should use OpenGL instead...

But hey, I don't even use OpenGL.. So it's not really important too me.

DirectX is hard. It overuses C++ features and it really makes it really difficult to understand and use. Far too many 'interfaces' to other classes and whatnot make for tedious programming. I wrote a simple 'Pong' game with DirectDraw and hated every minute of it.

I haven't tried OpenGL, but it looks like there aren't any classes involved. Thank God for that.

Note: I like classes, but not when M$ does them - MFC is the biffest joke ever.

AndrewAPrice · Post by **AndrewAPrice** » Fri May 04, 2007 2:58 am

pcmattman wrote:
Brynet-Inc wrote:
anon19287473 wrote:Even OSX, with its 4-5% market share doesnt have ports of many popular games.
It would probably be easier getting "Gamers" to switch away if more commercial games on the market refrained from using "DirectX", Companies are likely unable to provide MacOSX or Linux ports due to necessary work involved.

More software utilizing 3D graphics should use OpenGL instead...

But hey, I don't even use OpenGL.. So it's not really important too me.
DirectX is hard. It overuses C++ features and it really makes it really difficult to understand and use. Far too many 'interfaces' to other classes and whatnot make for tedious programming. I wrote a simple 'Pong' game with DirectDraw and hated every minute of it.

I haven't tried OpenGL, but it looks like there aren't any classes involved. Thank God for that.

Note: I like classes, but not when M$ does them - MFC is the biffest joke ever.

Do you remember the Glide API and the old 3dfx Voodoo cards? Glide was a cut down version of OpenGL with only what 3dfx though was necessary for games. The API was designed in such a way that each call was directly sent to the video card to speed things up significantly. Unfortunately for them, to maintain performance and backwards compatibility, they ended up being locked into one standard they couldn't change or extend (a famous example is Glide only supported 16-bit colour).

pcmattman · Post by **pcmattman** » Fri May 04, 2007 3:05 am

I downloaded a game engine - Genesis3D, that had support for Glide.

I never understood how the game worked, though. I just created maps for it (and they were good maps too, with traps, mirrors etc...) and then took them to school for a massive multiplayer test of them. The class loved them, I enjoyed them (and I found out that once the server took in more than 16 players it crashed

)...

AndrewAPrice · Post by **AndrewAPrice** » Fri May 04, 2007 4:08 am

I did that with Soldier of Fortune 2. The demo version did a CRC check on its assets archive. Everyone spent weeks trying to look how to fake a CRC check. I took it home one night, and with the help of a dissembler, if found where it checked the archive and I saw it compared the real CRC with the one it calculated, following a jnz instruction. The dissembler told me the location of the instruction, so I fired up my hex editor and I cleared it all to 00 (no operation). Oh, and I also embedded my name into the loading screen

Soon, all over school custom maps, mods, weapons, you name it appeared!

pcmattman · Post by **pcmattman** » Fri May 04, 2007 4:12 am

Ohhhhhh!!! We all tried that, stuffing around in the settings to have heaps of fun stuff (we're talking rapid-fire rockets etc...) but never thought to check the CRC. Didn't know about it either, and didn't know enough about hex editing and assembly...

The other game I did so in was Tribes, I made a full mod that made every gun in the game rapid-fire. I became popular fast when people realized bombing raids with the mortar were possible

Colonel Kernel · Post by **Colonel Kernel** » Fri May 04, 2007 8:55 am

pcmattman wrote:DirectX is hard. It overuses C++ features and it really makes it really difficult to understand and use. Far too many 'interfaces' to other classes and whatnot make for tedious programming. I wrote a simple 'Pong' game with DirectDraw and hated every minute of it.

The problem is that it's based on COM, just like most legacy Windows APIs (except Win32 itself). COM is just @#$@ ugly and should have died off years ago. It is not really an example of how C++ should be used, IMO.

Note: I like classes, but not when M$ does them - MFC is the biffest joke ever.

That's why we call it FMC.

inflater · Post by **inflater** » Sat May 05, 2007 4:36 am

pcmattman wrote:I downloaded a game engine - Genesis3D, that had support for Glide.

I never understood how the game worked, though. I just created maps for it (and they were good maps too, with traps, mirrors etc...) and then took them to school for a massive multiplayer test of them. The class loved them, I enjoyed them (and I found out that once the server took in more than 16 players it crashed )...

You mean RealityFactory? It is a good way to begin with game programming, except that very outdated engine Genesis3D...

inflater