Re: Thoughts about Second Sight

[philip@labtam.oz.au (Philip Stephens)]

Alexander Siegfried wrote:

>Who is talking about a possible Doom or whatsoever with SS? I feel people
>should be a bit more down to earth concerning SS...

  That was me, and I'd better clear up any misconceptions people might have
about what I've said regarding a Doom-like game using the SS.

  There is no doubt, none at all, that I can port my Doom-like 3D graphics
engine to the GS and be able to display images that look as good as what
I'm getting on Unix using X windows.  It is a SVGA-style video board after
all.

  However, I have already stated that I doubt that I'll get it running very
fast, as the speed is limited by how quickly the GS can do 32-bit integer
multiplies and divides, which is "not very fast".  I gave as an example the
prototype I wrote on my GS, which runs between 2 - 0.5 fps depending on
how complex the scene being rendered is.

  _However_, it may (just _may_) be possible to do a bit of parallel
processing (even though the Z180 is only an 8-bit processor) that might
help to speed things up a little.  I'm not promising anything, but as soon
as my SS arrives I'm going to give it a shot.  The prototype code wasn't
fully optimised in any event, so I may still be able to squeeze a few more
fps out of it if I try hard enough.

  I decided to mention my program in the first place simply because I've
had a lot of fun writing it, and even though the GS is not capable of
running a game like Doom, a Doom-like 3D graphics engine may still prove
to be very useful for those who might be interested in using it in a 
program or game of their own.  I'm not trying to get anybody's hopes up,
or to suggest that the GS is capable of doing something that it's not.