Request: Option to disable new terrain renderer

[Buginator]

Are you sure? Because I got the 3 PCI, then a long, thin black strip above them. Is that the PCIe?

* Three PCI
* One PCI Express (No AGP slot)

I don't know what color it is, but it would be next to the CPU, and it is longer than the PCI slot, but they all face the same direction.

[EvilGuru]

For 2.3 we want to be able to break away somewhat from the (tried and tested) mould that Pumpkin set. This means making it more community than compatibility driven. Heretofore most of the work that we've done has been in portability, bug fixing and some neat additions. Nothing radical.

This is why 2.2 is a long-term support release. It is not going away any time soon. It exists to allow users on legacy hardware to continue to enjoy the game and also to allow those who want a (tweaked) 1.10-like game.

Regards, Freddie.

[Zarel]

This means making it more community than compatibility driven.

We're not going to make it very community driven if no one can run it.

Although this is already a problem - nearly every friend I've introduced Warzone to can't play it since it driver-crashes too often.

[EvilGuru]

Although this is already a problem - nearly every friend I've introduced Warzone to can't play it since it driver-crashes too often.

The problem is not half as bad as you make it sound. The vast majority can play it without issue. Driver issues mainly affect Intel GPUs on Windows and Linux and nvidia GPUs on certain platforms. Open source drivers are known to be twitchy, but the game is more than stable enough.

If we do get GPU crashes, it is important to report them. Driver developers are usually quite good at getting them fixed, in my experience.

Regards, Freddie.

[Zarel]

The problem is not half as bad as you make it sound. The vast majority can play it without issue. Driver issues mainly affect Intel GPUs on Windows and Linux and nvidia GPUs on certain platforms.

Intel and nVidia, yeah, that's only the vast majority of all GPUs on the market. Oh, you forgot ATI, we have problems with ATI video cards once in a while, too. And every other video card brand? Forget about it, Warzone doesn't even run. Intel cards entirely don't work on Windows, nVidia cards require you to install a fairly recent version of manufacturer's drivers and still have issues if they're not a fairly recent video card, and this is from the video card manufacturer that supports Warzone the best.

You say "the vast majority" can play it without issue, but that's only the vast majority on the forums and IRC channels, and that's because the people who can't play don't join them. Even on the forums, there are a bunch of people who have to save every few minutes because of all the crashes, and I remember on the IRC channels, where 60% of the time when you'd ask "How'd the game go?" they'd say "It crashed".

Remember: Selection bias. The ones with video cards that don't work generally just leave.

Open source drivers are known to be twitchy, but the game is more than stable enough.

If we do get GPU crashes, it is important to report them. Driver developers are usually quite good at getting them fixed, in my experience.

What do we report? "The game crashed, fix it"?

[cybersphinx]

What do we report? "The game crashed, fix it"?

What else do you suggest? Unless we have access to the hardware/driver combinations that don't work, we cannot find out the problem and possible solutions/workarounds. Or is there some OpenGL debugger we can tell people to install and send us the results?

[Zarel]

What else do you suggest? Unless we have access to the hardware/driver combinations that don't work, we cannot find out the problem and possible solutions/workarounds. Or is there some OpenGL debugger we can tell people to install and send us the results?

There is, but it costs $80 per machine, and that's the academic license. The regular price is closer to $300.

[Per]

There is, but it costs $80 per machine, and that's the academic license. The regular price is closer to $300.

So what do you suggest then?

[Zarel]

So what do you suggest then?

Um, whining about it on our forums? That's all I'm going to do. Really, I'd rather not learn all about 3D graphics and OpenGL and rendering. I'll stick to my balancing and AI and 2D graphics and UI and stats, for now.

I'm just saying, if someone could figure out what to do about the driver problems (which I suspect are much worse than that of most other games, and may have to do with us using methods everyone "knows" are unreliable on some drivers but never really writes that down), I'd be extremely grateful.

[stiv]

Um, whining about it on our forums? That's all I'm going to do....

I'm just saying, if someone could figure out what to do about the driver problems (which I suspect are much worse than that of most other games, and may have to do with us using methods everyone "knows" are unreliable on some drivers but never really writes that down), I'd be extremely grateful.

Perhaps we could create a sticky thread to localise the repeated whining to one spot. It would also serve to spotlight the platforms (operating system + card/chipset + driver) known not to work.

*Every* application, game or otherwise, that uses OpenGL has the same problems on the same platforms as WZ does. And even working platforms get broken. Apple, for example, has done this a couple times with different releases of OSX. Ubuntu created all kinds of hell when it made compiz the default.

From experience, you can code around a broken driver, but that breaks other working implementations.

Bottom line - cheap hardware does not make a good gaming platform.

[EvilGuru]

On a side note I am not convinced how an OpenGL debugger would help. Unless we are doing something wrong which is causing the driver to segfault instead of return an error code.

OS X, for the record, has two very competent OpenGL debugging/profiling utilities. Both come as standard. So people with OS X can debug the OpenGL code if they so desire.

Regards, Freddie.

[Zarel]

Perhaps we could create a sticky thread to localise the repeated whining to one spot. It would also serve to spotlight the platforms (operating system + card/chipset + driver) known not to work.

*Every* application, game or otherwise, that uses OpenGL has the same problems on the same platforms as WZ does. And even working platforms get broken. Apple, for example, has done this a couple times with different releases of OSX. Ubuntu created all kinds of hell when it made compiz the default.

From experience, you can code around a broken driver, but that breaks other working implementations.

Bottom line - cheap hardware does not make a good gaming platform.

I can understand cheap hardware not being good for hardcore gaming, but anything more advanced than a cheap cell phone or calculator should be able to handle at least basic 3D without trouble.

As far as I can tell, in Warzone, we have terrain as a textured grid with height, for terrain. A layer at water level, for water. Some polygons, for units, structures, features, and projectiles, and some effects. A square off in the distance, for sky. And a bunch of 2D effects and interfaces. None of that sounds terribly hard to do. Sure, it might not look as pretty, but it should still be playable.

I wonder if it would really be that hard just to keep the original Pumpkin DirectX and software renderers as fallbacks. As far as I know, we mainly dropped them because we didn't have enough developers to maintain them. Well, we still don't, but would they really take that much maintenance?

On a side note I am not convinced how an OpenGL debugger would help. Unless we are doing something wrong which is causing the driver to segfault instead of return an error code.

OS X, for the record, has two very competent OpenGL debugging/profiling utilities. Both come as standard. So people with OS X can debug the OpenGL code if they so desire.

OS X, on the other hand, actually has working OpenGL drivers. It's generally the crappy Windows drivers that cause problems, so we might need to debug on there for it to be useful.

[EvilGuru]

I wonder if it would really be that hard just to keep the original Pumpkin DirectX and software renderers as fallbacks. As far as I know, we mainly dropped them because we didn't have enough developers to maintain them. Well, we still don't, but would they really take that much maintenance?

Very few of the devs use Windows. Very few of the devs have a need for a software renderer. Very few of the devs understand enough of the math and have the required assembly knowledge to implement software rendering. Very few of the devs know DirectX.

If someone is volunteering, then sure, if it is maintained it is quite likely to get accepted. However to the best of my knowledge none of the current devs have any interest (or time) in reviving either.

OpenGL is hardware accelerated, modern and cross platform.

Regards, Freddie.

[stiv]

I can understand cheap hardware not being good for hardcore gaming, but anything more advanced than a cheap cell phone or calculator should be able to handle at least basic 3D without trouble.

You keep saying *should*. I don't think that word means what you think it means.

[XboxJosh]

It's generally the crappy Windows drivers that cause problems, so we might need to debug on there for it to be useful.

If I may share some experience, I code with an engine and am completely unable to use it with OpenGL on my Windows machine.