rec.autos.simulators

That is what ticks me off... and not only that but... gee, let's see... I
have a video card that can reach 1600x1200 resolutions with its 3D settings
on full... no other 3D card can do that.  So why isn't there more support
for this card???

You think if Oil companies could find a way to imitate *** companies..
we'd start seeing that any gas with a 93 octane rating would only work on
Dodge Neons.  Wouldn't that be a hoot.  Thank GOD that no one follows in
Sierra's footsteps.  (I personally think it is the head cheese in Sierra,
not Papyrus that decided to NOT support OpenGL/DirectX 6)

The only reason to bring Q2 up is that it is the best example of an
extremely (much more than GPL) graphics intensive application that
chose to use a standard library (OpenGL) rather than some video
manufacturer's proprietary instruction set. It was good enough for
it's graphics- why was it not good enough for Papy?

Why didn't Papy use D3D or OpenGL? If this thing is like Indy500, ICR
or ICR2 or NASCAR, people are going to be using it for the next 5
years... do you think the "Rendition instruction set" is still going
to be popular then? I think there is a good possibility that you won't
even be able to find a video card with either of the supported the
chips GPL was written for in 5 years. Meanwhile, OpenGL is already
about 15 years old!

So eager am I to use this sim and not take it back that I went to the
store today to buy a freakin' Diamond board. But given that there is
no way with Win95 to support two video cards, and that I'd be stepping
down from the 128-bit card I have to a 64-bit card... I spent an hour
agonizing over the decision. Left the store without it, came home and
tried GPL at 19 FPS in 320*200 again. I mean, what do I do with GPL?
And please, no grotesque answers.

Oh... except for the Stealth II I almost bit the bullet to buy today
becaue Papy recommended it! Box says it only has NT OpenGL drivers
presently. That was the last straw on it for me.

Even the Id guys say that D3D is not so bad anymore- their main
complaint now was that Microsoft was, for no good reason, intent on
re-inventing the 3D graphics world because they knew they could force
it down the world's throat for a profit- meanwhile, back then, *it
definitely wasn't* as good as OpenGL, nor even as organized and
logical. Now it isn't so bad.

But D3D should have been good enough. And certainly OpenGL should have
been. What were they thinking?

The fact is, Papy wrote the graphics for a 3D card, not for a CPU, and
I hear people with 450Mhz machines complaining about getting nothing
out of GPL because of the FPS.

And the last difference I have with your argument is that *they could
have written an OpenGL version anyway*. That is, they can keep their
proprietary versions as-is, and simply added another entry ofr D3D or
OpenGL in that menu of theirs with the two chipsets. Please- anyone
have a reason why they didn't? Sierra breathing down their necks? I am
not sure this is profitable enough for a real hardware-payoff
***.

I pray they do come out with an OpenGL port; because now that I have
bought this thing, I'd like to hold on to it. But let's face it, I
can't really race at 9 FPS, or even at 19FPS in 320x200 rez (because I
can't see anything- too chunky). And after an hour in CompUSA
agonizing over whether or not to *downgrade* to the 64-bit Stealth II
Papy recommends... I'm even that much more stubborn about it.

I can only figure that Papy ran out of time with Sierra. But the
authority with which the manual says "for two chipsets, and ONLY two"
really wigs me out. I mean, don't paint yourselves in a corner, Papy!
Patches are why your sims are great.

Or, if you already happen to own a $250, 128-bit AGP 3D card,
downgrade, as mentioned above...

Papy should have made owning a Rendition a minimum requirement then.
it is not even mentioned in their minimums. I read the minimums and
said to myself "hey- I have better than double their minimums!" To me,
that meant if they considered 11 FPS a minimum, I would at least get
22- which would have been acceptable to me. I get 9FPS- and sorry, I
just can't play this thing at 320x200- too chunky, too many memories
of Indy500: The Simulation. Hard to do when I have graphic powerhouses
like CPR a double-click away. People flame CPR like mad- yet the more
I use it, the less I see why- it's flaws are no worse than what we
lived with for years with Papy sims. And, thanks to the dreaded D3D,
*I am getting about 30FPS in it, all detail on!*

<...>

I would agree if they mentioned the hardware they required in their
minumum requirements. I have double their minimum requirements, and I
am at 9 FPS. They consider 4.5 FPS acceptable play? I don't consider
320x200 rex acceptable period in a modern sim- but even at that level,
I am getting sub-20 FPS at double their minimum hardware requirements.

 I mean, I am not a law-suit-minded guy... but let's face it, their
minimum requirements on the box are bull- and their advertising of
minimum requirements did indeed give me the confidence to buy it. Many
people seeing this box in the checkout aisle at CompUSA will get this
thing home to put on the 166Mhz P, and really flip.

Papy makes great sims, probably the greatest; but often I can't put my
finger on quite why they are great. Because detail for detail, there
is always so much that they should have, with just a minimum of
thought, done slightly differently. Going all the way back to the
beginning, and probably accounts for some of the aggravation factor
that has always beset them from their users.

But for some reason, I get bored with all other sims eventually. N2
and ICR2 always came back out of the closet when the e***ment over
this and that new sim came out.

I expect GPL to eventually meet this criteria too- but for now, I
honestly can't use it!

You mean the chipset, or just the generic idea of a "3D graphics
card." I definitely agree with the latter.

My prediction: there is no doubt that a universal 3D standard, like
D3D and OpenGL, will be the way of the future. Papy coming out with
this "two chipsets and two only" stand is very weird. Probably time
demands from Sierra mixed with some "in bed with" relations with some
hardware manufacturer by someone in Sierra, I'd assume.

People are saying "It would have taken longer, and taken away some of the
great things that make this game.. GPL runs great, why make it take longer?"
That's alot of BS... if you are going to sell a product where its customers
have so many different devices... why only allow 2??  I mean.. so what if
they worked on it longer?? At least then it would a better product for all
of us.. not just some of us.  I wouldn't care if their DirectX version
wasn't all that cool looking, as long as it gave me good framerates.

To be honest, the people at Papyrus/Sierra spend too much time listening to
the 'men in suits' rather than the people like us who make it possible for
them to go home and afford groceries and rent.. etc..

If I didn't buy GPL.. it probably wouldn't affect their paycheck, but if
some 150,000 potential customers didn't buy GPL (but could have it they
supported Direct3D) it would affect their paycheck.

I don't see what was so deceiving about the post, care to elaborate?

Hey, I have not tried CPR with the TNT yet, but I was getting way
better than 30fps with the V2/12MB even with the view distance slider
maxed.

Clark A.

Native Glide- well it's nice, i guess.... but again, it's going for a (bigger)
but still, exclusive section of the potential market. No Glide wrappers, after
all.

No 3D Sound hardware support.

No Force Feedback.

Biggest miss remain the lack of a cross-hardware 3D API.
Every PC these days is shipping with 3D hardware- be it TNT, G200, or Riva128
ro Rage II (admitally dodgy;), i740. All of these (except G200 which uses a
OpenGL->D3D wrapper) have opengl support, and D3D support are effectively
excluded. Banshee or V2 are avaliable in a few select manchines now- but
Rendtition? :)
 This is probably not going to bother people who own thew game- i dare say
you own a 3Dfx card or rendition.

But Cendant sllowing this out have shot themselves in the foot. If i was a
shareholder, i'd be very annoyed. A pretty good sim is not going to ship it
potential, simply becuase it's not runnable in software, and the hardware
support is so limited.

And in the case of the Rendition clan.... why should people want to downgrade
their excellent TNT's or G200 to a rendition card, for one game? or buy a 3Dfx
card? they won't. Simple as that.

GPL might be the work of genius, but it's been built with cardboard, not
bricks.

Z.

Are you all blind to the reality of the market when development started on
the game, probably two years ago?  At that time, D3D was a joke, OpenGL was
for high-end workstations, and 3dfx ruled the world (Rendition support was a
given because of Sierra).

Yes, they could have changed the specs down the road, but for what?  The
first TNT boards didn't start shipping until about a month or two before
GPL, and they are the first boards to give GLide a real competitor - how was
Papyrus supposed to write a game for a chip that simply didn't exist for the
vast majority of GPL's development.

Business reality says one thing - ship the product.  Yeah, maybe a D3D or
OpenGL version is possible, but if a company continually changes product
specs to suit the current market, rather than the market as it existed at
product conception, you know what you end up with?  A four year development
cycle and a cancelled game, like MicroProse's super heroes title (name
escapes me right now).

If GPL began development 6 months ago, the story would be different, but it
didn't.  Quit whinging - either pick up a supported accelerator or decide
that you don't need to play GPL.  Crimminy, I bought a Monster3D just to
play the demo.......................

Rick

Id writes things the way I wish all software manufacturers would. Id
writes things with longevity, machine independence, and modular
upgradeability (both for their own patches and for add-ons that users
write) in mind at every step. And  they would never think of doing a
major release for "one or two video chipsets"- they write BIG, with
eventually porting to most major OS' in mind- Linux, Solaris, Mac,
WinNT, etc. Meanwhile, while obviously highly portable, I am
hard-pressed to name more efficent code. Actually, I think the guys at
NovaLogic are high up there too for efficency- but not in all the
other aspects mentioned above.

The guys at Id are superstars. Unfortunately for us, they have no
interest in racing, it appears, and certainly would not be people I'd
want writing racing sims..

Warts and all, I love Papyrus sims- and I end up using them more than
anything Id ever made. Wouldn't it be amazing if Papy wrote their
stuff with the same Id degree of  open-ness, portability, and user
configurability.

But hey, I'd settle with a D3D or OpenGL patch.

Yep.

Cheers!
John

or Unreal...
or Falcon 4...

heh.

i agree.  i have a TNT card, and while it makes things like Forsaken look
exceptionally nice, i still use my Voodoo 2 board more than the AGP TNT card.
it's just plain _faster_.

deal with it.  if you are "stubborn", don't want to upgrade, or are short a
little cash, then as much as i hate to say it, you need to find another
hobby.  you can pick up a Voodoo 2 addon board for a little under $149 at
some places now.  (i paid $323 when they came out. |: )

-jch

Rick, i do wonder if you know the difference between Glide and OpenGl and D3D
as Api's. While D3D is more chipset dependant in it's current form, to support
all these cars in OpenGl woudl require just one version of code, not 5 or 6 to
support all the major chipsets, including rendtion (do they have opengl
drivers?) and 3Dfx.

And your suggestion for people to buy hardware to make for Papy/Cendant only
programming and commercial stupidity, is frankly, laughable.

Z.