Someone Do Something With The Yeti3d Engine, For Goodness Sake!


Rambozo

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Apr 28, 2003
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The port of the Yeti3D engine to GP2X has been around for ages and yet I haven't seen anyone make a real game with it. Instead I see release after release of basic, Atari-ish arcade type games with simple 2D graphics and zero depth. Not that I don't appreciate the effort, but why keep reinventing the wheel when you could be doing something more complex and ambitious with a pre-existing 3D engine?

Yeti3D already runs very well on the GP2X hardware although presumably it has yet to be fully optimized. I get 25-30fps, more than enough although getting it smoother and adding perspective correction for textures would be welcome. The PocketPC port also has OpenGL ES texture smoothing, and as OpenGLES was recently made available for GP2X I figure the same could be done.

As for what do to with it, I won't tell you. FPS? Tactical third person? Turn based? Descent style tunnel shooter? I don't care, I'm just really frustrated that the Yeti3D engine has been around on Gamepark handhelds since the GP32 and nobody has done anything with it yet.
 
Maybe people are not intrested, Too busy creating their "basic, Atari-ish arcade type games with simple 2D graphics and zero depth", Or maybe they just don`t have the time.

Well, Maybe you could start the ball rolling ?.

Trooper
 
trooper said:
Well, Maybe you could start the ball rolling ?.
I was unaware that I had to be a programmer in order to suggest things.
 
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The way you suggest things could use a little work.
 
Nice entrance after a long time away.

EDIT: You might want to look at this thread from an experienced coder, You may find your answer.

Trooper
 
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Hi,

I think it's a pity not to have more 3D games on GP2X. Yesterday I had a look at the GP32 archive, and it had more 3D games that the GP2X has, while being "less powerful".

Besides, tools are existing for our platform: GMath, Yeti3D, ZeEngine, why not using them ? (only if 3D could add something to the gameplay, if not, stick to 2D).

I have a lot of fun playing these "basic, Atari-ish arcade type games with simple 2D graphics and zero depth", so I don't really care about 3D games, but I think it would be nice to use ALL the functionalities the GP2X has to offer, before the Craiginator is released. One could then proudly say "look at what we achieved on this machine".

We all know that the GP2X is 3D capable (Payback, Egoboo, psx4gp2x, etc)...I'm not a dev, but I believe those who are to like challenges...like creating a GREAT 3D game on a 2D homebrew handheld :) And I think some are already hard at work :)

Bye

Magic Sam
 
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I've been intending to do something "3D" for quite a while, I just have never managed to get around to it. Everytime I tried to use GPU940, I had no luck getting a program to compile(and work...)... But now I have managed to get a very simple test program to compile and display, things may change... we will see.
EDIT: I forgot to say that I may look into this Yeti3D stuff and if it's simple enough to use, then may just use that... depends...

My first priority right now is to get CromoZome to a "finished" state, so nothing will start on the 3D front until I've decided that this goal is fulfilled. ;)

I intend to create a cut-down version of Atrox for the 2X at some-point... but it's too early to say if it's even remotely possible. It will surely be a fun challenge.
I think the video sequences will have to be scrapped and just use still images with the voice over...
 
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First of all, Yeti3D sucks.

Second of all there is gpu940 which is pretty good, but some coders don't really like using other peoples libraries when they can make something better for their needs themselves.

Also, there are quite a few good 3D games for the GP2X, especially if you note the fact that it doesn't have any hardware acceleration. Payback, Quake and FleshChasmer come to mind.

Also remember that coding a good 2D game is hard enough, even for experts but especially for beginners. 3D just makes it harder.

And most importantly remember that we all have lives and you're not paying us anything.
 
obviously the real question is, where is the voxel love? i tried to do bring in some sweet voxels myself, but there were too many of them and i hadn't disciplined them enough. we need someone who can really wrangle those voxels and make them stay put.

seriously, rather than learn more about coding, i think i unlearned some stuff during that. i can see why there hasn't been much done there. i definitely remember a scene demo or two though.

maybe i can get it going again before the craiginator arrives, but i doubt it :(
 
Yeah voxels can be quite nice... I was trying to write a voxel renderer at one point... I didn't quite make the progress I wanted with it... and I'd forgot about until I read your post...
 
well, nothing quite so fancy, but something along those lines.

actually what i was talking about should really be called heightfield rendering since a full-featured voxel renderer is different than what i'm picturing.

http://www.unitzeroone.com/blog/flash_exam...landscapes.html

that'd be a little easier on the gp2x :D

heightfield engines can be coded so that they don't require 3d acceleration or floating point math. but they still look very 3d. doom is similar...looks 3d but the maps are really 2d. doom has a bunch of other clever things going on though.

a long time ago, i did a very rough port of this. i took the trig functions out, but ran into problems switching to fixed point. it still ran pretty well, but i wasn't checking the framerate so i don't know exactly how well. but based on that it seemed totally reasonable to expect to get a nice voxel engine going on the gp2x. so i tried to start my own from scratch, and i got pretty far. then i changed something in my code that destroyed it, and i couldn't figure out what i'd changed. :(

like i said, there's at least a couple of tech demos that have voxel bits, but i'd have to go back and watch a bunch to remember which one. hal9000 was working on a ski game, don't know if he finished.
 
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