From: Tim Watson <trpw@cix.compulink.co.uk>
Subject: VR: Low-End 3D -- Big in U.K., Why Not the U.S.?
Date: Mon, 14 Oct 91 02:46 GMT



I am a little confused about the "Low End 3D" postings on sci.virtual-worlds.

I'll explain (in a round about way):

	A few years back I was involved in writing some 3D software for the
	PC and on a good day my program could splat about 1000 shaded 
	polygons per second on the screen of a 25Mhz 386. This program went
	on to form the basis of Argonaut Software's game Starglider 2. Jez 
	San (of whom you may have heard), the head of Argonaut Software, says
	(and I've no reason to doubt him) that the routines have been vastly
	improved since I left Argonaut. In the past few years I have seen
	programs from at least five companies or individuals which overshadow
	my efforts.

	The thing about this situation is that almost all the companies and
	individuals are British. In fact I have NEVER seen a 3D polygon	game
	from the US that is anything like as fast or smooth as any one of the
	British products. I don't know why this is, other than that we don't
	have any money in the UK to build accelarator boards or the like, so
	we have to write fast low level code to run on our cheap PCs.

So given that there is a growing community of programmers in the UK who can
write low-level 3D graphics routines for the PC, I find it a little suprising
that there isn't a similar community in the US. You might imagine that I was
shocked to see someone suggest using C to write their 3D routines.

Oddly enough the best starter book for programming 3D routines on personal
computers is written by an American programmer named Bruce Artwick (I
believe he writes flight simulators for Sublogic - he might even run
Sublogic come to that). The good thing about this book is that it presents
a way of writing pared down 3D routines specifically for making real-time 
games on a personal computer rather than the heavily mathematical methods 
used in other more comprehensive books.

The five (at least) individuals or companies?

Argonaut. 	They (Jez San actually) claim to have the fastest 3D routines
		on God's clean sweet wonderful earth.

Incentive.	This is the sister company of Dimension international. It
		sells a product called the 3D construction kit which costs
		under 50 pounds(less than $100). They would probably claim to
		be faster than Argonaut.

Vektor.		These people are putting the finishing touches to a brilliant
		looking 3D game called Killing Cloud which involves you
		flying round a partially fog bound San Francisco. The objects
		that they have designed look wonderful and can be placed in
		their 3D world using their own in-house editor.

Interphase.	This is not the name of a company or person but of a very
		fast 3D game which included unicyling frogs and rotating
		ellipses.

David Braben	This guy writes extremely fast 3D programs on obscure
		computers such as the Acorn Archimedes.

Eye of the 
Storm.		Another program name written by another ex-Argonaut
		programmer. This game has been claimed to be capable of
		displaying about 2000 Goraud shaded polygons per second on a
		486 PC.

Please let me know if you want more information (I can find out more detail).

Tim Watson
trpw@cix.compulink.co.uk


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