Re: Quake for the GS

[Daniel Webster <dwebster@monmouth.com>]

Philip Stephens wrote:
> 
> Matt Portune wrote:
> 
> >Here's a novel idea.  Let's get the source code for Linux Quake, and
> >recompile it for GNO, and have it make use of the Number Cruncher
> >since the game heavily relies on an FPU.
> 
>   Ugh!  The GS is barely capable of running a Doom port, let alone a
> Quake port!  Both of those games are real CPU hogs.
> 
>   I ported my Doom-style engine to my GS a few months back.  After
> rewriting the critical parts of the code in assembler I got it
> rendering one frame every 10 seconds on a 7 Mhz Zipped GS, at
> 320x200x256 resolution on a Second Sight display.  True, I wasn't
> using an FPU, but I wasn't using floating point either--all the
> arithmetic was done in 32-bit fixed point with table-driven integer
> multiplies.  Of course, integer arithmetic beyond 16-bits is still
> too slow for this kind of program anyhow, even when using table-driven algorithms.
> 
>   I probably could have gotten it faster given enough effort in the
> optimisation, but I wasn't ever expecting to get sub-second frame
> rates.  The GS simply doesn't have the grunt for it.
> 
>   Quake in comparison requires significantly more CPU time.  I would
> expect it to run at least three times as slow as my Doom port on the GS,
> although in some respects the rendering algorithm is actually simpler
> and cleaner than the Doom one.  Hmmm, maybe for the hell of it I'll
> port my 3D polygon renderer prototype to the GS and report back on
> how fast I can get it to run.  It's not likely to be very quick,
> since it requires floating point or 48-bit fixed point arithmetic
> (requiring 96-bit intermediate results).

I am interested in seeing this 'Doom' port for the GS.  Did you
ditribute it, and if so, where can I get a copy?

Thanks