Hello QL community, After many years of trying unsuccessfully to have fun writing software for other computers, I recently realized that I missed writing QL programs, especially 68000 assembly. I know that to maximize my motivation a project has to be challenging, as writing a chess program from scratch for the QL (Blackknight) was many years ago.
So here is my project: I am currently writing a game for the QL. The game will be a fast paced 3D wireframe of the type "shoot everything you can as fast as possible or else you will crash onto it" I decided the game has to be fast and challenging, the graphics smooth and colorful. I also wanted to include some nice presentation screens using high color modes and maybe some kind of film sequence between the different levels. That was a month ago. I did not want to talk about it to soon because I was not sure it would be possible to achieve that kind performance on a QL. But now I think I can do it. As of today, the complete 3D engine is written and is performing well. It is a real 3D engine, not a pseudo 3D. You can navigate around in any direction, the object can have any shape and any movement, etc. It does take a lot of processing power from the QL, so I don't think a bare QL will be able to handle it but I am hoping that a GoldCard will be enough. For the moment the engine can achieve between 20 and 30 frames per second, depending of the complexity of the scene, running on a SuperGoldCard. The game will support the following system / graphics in its first iteration Standard QL mode 4 : very little flickering, 4 colors only, good performance in fps Standard QL mode 8 : very little flickering, 8 colors, fat ugly dots, best performance in fps Minerva QL mode 4 : No flickering, 4 colors only, good performance in fps Minerva QL mode 8 : No flickering, 8 colors, fat ugly dots, best performance in fps Minerva QL mode 4 : Lots of flickering, 10 colors, bad performance in fps Minerva QL mode 8 : Lots of flickering, 27 colors, fat ugly but colorful dots, bad performance in fps Aurora QL mode 16 : little flickering, 16 colors, sharp graphics, worst performance in fps I don't think I will do an Aurora 256 colors version. Not because it is difficult, but because it really gonna be too slow. As I don't have a Q40 or QPCII, I am not doing anything to support their additional graphic modes, but maybe sometime in the future I will look into that too. Feel free to ask any question, any word of encouragement is also welcome ! François Lanciault _______________________________________________ QL-Users Mailing List http://www.q-v-d.demon.co.uk/smsqe.htm
