TA3D on EEE PC 701 :)

You have tested TA3D, share your experience /
Vous avez testé TA3D, venez partager votre expérience
Post Reply
User avatar
zuzuf
Administrateur - Site Admin
Posts: 3281
Joined: Mon Oct 30, 2006 8:49 pm
Location: Toulouse, France
Contact:

TA3D on EEE PC 701 :)

Post by zuzuf » Tue Jul 22, 2008 8:06 pm

It works !!

I built it on the original OS (Xandros, Debian based Linux distro). I built it without speed optimization (it was already very long to build ...). The 3DMEditor runs fine, but 800x600 is a bit above EEE PC's 800x480 LCD :( .

It runs at 2 fps :shock: but it runs !! Also I noticed we can remove several features drawn on screen that slow down the game on such a machine:
_sky (lots of geometry for nothing, remember Intel GMA 900 doesn't have any T&L or vertex program/shader capability, all geometry is computed on the CPU which is a 900MHz celeron here :P )

_map geometry has lots of details ... too much for such a small screen, I'll add an option to remove some useless geometry.

_sprite features are converted to 3D model when possible which increases the number of triangles to draw

_3DM HD models have lots of polygons too

Despite the speed at which the gfx engine runs, the simulation engine runs at full speed (1x) and the AI easily wins against a human player who has such a painfully slow interface to fight :cry:

PS: I ran those tests with default configuration, using only totala1.hpi and totala2.hpi, with CC data files or rev31.gp3 it loads too much data and the 512MB of RAM aren't enough to load the game.
=>;-D Penguin Powered

milipili
Posts: 545
Joined: Thu Nov 02, 2006 8:52 am
Location: Paris (France)
Contact:

Post by milipili » Tue Jul 22, 2008 9:37 pm

It runs at 2 fps
I find Ta3D slow on my computer too (and my PC), so I can easily imagine on a EePC :)
the 512MB of RAM aren't enough to load the game.
You're kidding ya ?
Hum... Can you identify a process in particular or it is the game in general that is a bit too memory-hungry ?
Damien Gerard
Ta3d & Yuni Developer

User avatar
zuzuf
Administrateur - Site Admin
Posts: 3281
Joined: Mon Oct 30, 2006 8:49 pm
Location: Toulouse, France
Contact:

Post by zuzuf » Wed Jul 23, 2008 6:44 am

In fact Intel's GMA chip doesn't have its own memory so all texture memory is shared RAM ... so the culpit here is the X server :P

I am sure I can optimize things to run at a descent speed, for example we don't need to render the map each frame if the camera doesn't move, we can just save the result in a buffer and copy it back if the camera hasn't moved, that way we'll save lots of geometry calculations (which is the weakness of GMA chips)
=>;-D Penguin Powered

milipili
Posts: 545
Joined: Thu Nov 02, 2006 8:52 am
Location: Paris (France)
Contact:

Post by milipili » Wed Jul 23, 2008 8:53 am

Oki ^^ We would have to synchronize our work I think. I would like to make some code refactoring in ta3d.cpp in a near future. But it is a lot of work and it cannot be done in a single commit.
Damien Gerard
Ta3d & Yuni Developer

User avatar
Balthazar
Moderator
Posts: 2055
Joined: Wed Nov 01, 2006 4:31 pm
Location: Russian Federation
Contact:

Post by Balthazar » Wed Jul 23, 2008 12:19 pm

Wow, if this continues, I`ll by able to play TA3D on my mobile phone. :D

Zuzuf, please, pay more attention to normal PC`s, than freakish :)

milipili
Posts: 545
Joined: Thu Nov 02, 2006 8:52 am
Location: Paris (France)
Contact:

Post by milipili » Wed Jul 23, 2008 12:39 pm

On an iPhone ? hum... :D
Damien Gerard
Ta3d & Yuni Developer

User avatar
zuzuf
Administrateur - Site Admin
Posts: 3281
Joined: Mon Oct 30, 2006 8:49 pm
Location: Toulouse, France
Contact:

Post by zuzuf » Wed Jul 23, 2008 3:33 pm

I doubt we can run it on an iPhone :?

Balthazar: running TA3D on low-end hardware implies pushing the engine above its limits by optimizing it as mush as possible which will benefit normal PCs :P

Imagine an engine capable of running a war on a high scale battlefield with lots of details ... allowing you to play RTS, FPS, etc... it's just a question of scripting :) and optimization :D
=>;-D Penguin Powered

User avatar
Balthazar
Moderator
Posts: 2055
Joined: Wed Nov 01, 2006 4:31 pm
Location: Russian Federation
Contact:

Post by Balthazar » Wed Jul 23, 2008 4:07 pm

Yes, I`m voting for the optimization with my both hands :) I`m still thinking that TA3D quite a resource-demanding game, but now it`s much faster, than it was, and it will be much better in future :D

Vampiloup
Posts: 56
Joined: Thu Mar 20, 2008 9:13 am

Post by Vampiloup » Wed Jul 23, 2008 7:24 pm

I vote for optimization, too. For theses reasons :


- Real coders LOVE optimize ;

- We want to make units with more polys than in OTA ;

- We want to use better, bigger textures ;

- We want to have LOT of units. It's not DoW or Starcraft, here ! We are adults !

- We want to have bigger maps ;

- With a lot of sides simultaneously ;

User avatar
Balthazar
Moderator
Posts: 2055
Joined: Wed Nov 01, 2006 4:31 pm
Location: Russian Federation
Contact:

Post by Balthazar » Thu Jul 24, 2008 5:18 am

Well, yes :)

- with dinamically changing landscape (water flooding and terrain deformation)

- with nice visual effects

Now the list seems more complete :)

User avatar
zuzuf
Administrateur - Site Admin
Posts: 3281
Joined: Mon Oct 30, 2006 8:49 pm
Location: Toulouse, France
Contact:

Post by zuzuf » Thu Jul 24, 2008 6:46 am

water flooding and terrain deformation would be difficult to add using current map format, I think it'll be better to add a new one (without dropping TA maps support :wink: ) which will be designed to support this :twisted:
=>;-D Penguin Powered

milipili
Posts: 545
Joined: Thu Nov 02, 2006 8:52 am
Location: Paris (France)
Contact:

Post by milipili » Thu Jul 24, 2008 9:54 am

I don't see the link with TA maps ? Deformation are only when playing. They are only dynamics effects.
Damien Gerard
Ta3d & Yuni Developer

User avatar
zuzuf
Administrateur - Site Admin
Posts: 3281
Joined: Mon Oct 30, 2006 8:49 pm
Location: Toulouse, France
Contact:

Post by zuzuf » Thu Jul 24, 2008 10:02 am

the problem is that it's dynamic ... whereas TA maps are prerendered at an angle ... so we have to do some reverse projection in order to get the correct cooridnates in space. This is done on the geometry itself not on the height map ! (it increases quality because it doesn't lose details that way)

So we cannot change map geometry dynamically without having to do extra calculations on those height maps and displacement calculations etc...

Also we cannot change the texture easily which is problematic when you want to create a nice crater ... Also simulating fluid over the map is very slow, if we can optimize that by doing better choices on the data structures we use it won't be too much :wink:
=>;-D Penguin Powered

Vampiloup
Posts: 56
Joined: Thu Mar 20, 2008 9:13 am

Post by Vampiloup » Thu Jul 24, 2008 11:05 am

Maybe we can use two format ? The classical and a "populous" style ?

Populous was, if you hear me, the best idea for a 3D map.
With this format, map can be easy to make.

User avatar
Balthazar
Moderator
Posts: 2055
Joined: Wed Nov 01, 2006 4:31 pm
Location: Russian Federation
Contact:

Post by Balthazar » Thu Jul 24, 2008 6:17 pm

Or, for example, Magic Carpet 2 - the best way to create dynamical terrain deformation, made by legendary Bullfrog

User avatar
zuzuf
Administrateur - Site Admin
Posts: 3281
Joined: Mon Oct 30, 2006 8:49 pm
Location: Toulouse, France
Contact:

Post by zuzuf » Thu Jul 24, 2008 7:30 pm

I don't know those games ... I was hardly 3 when populous was released :)

can you explain me a bit more about those map styles ?
=>;-D Penguin Powered

milipili
Posts: 545
Joined: Thu Nov 02, 2006 8:52 am
Location: Paris (France)
Contact:

Post by milipili » Thu Jul 24, 2008 9:36 pm

I want those deformations :D

http://www.gamekult.com/video/9132502
Damien Gerard
Ta3d & Yuni Developer

User avatar
Balthazar
Moderator
Posts: 2055
Joined: Wed Nov 01, 2006 4:31 pm
Location: Russian Federation
Contact:

Post by Balthazar » Fri Jul 25, 2008 6:01 am

Yeah, K-D Labs knows how to do such things. Just look at the the Perimetr game, that`s the first one in the Perimetr series. Full 110% terramorphing :)

But we can`t use it in TA3D, since it`ll become not TA-like game at all!

Image

Image

Image

Image

User avatar
zuzuf
Administrateur - Site Admin
Posts: 3281
Joined: Mon Oct 30, 2006 8:49 pm
Location: Toulouse, France
Contact:

Post by zuzuf » Fri Jul 25, 2008 6:50 am

I already played Perimeter, but we cannot do the same for TA3D because :
1) it would be too slow if it runs at Perimeter's speed
2) maps are too big to have such a high level of geometric details

but it's obvious that the map should be a grid rendered using some kind of displacement mapping like in Perimeter. But what isn't obivous at all is the way to store data in memory to implement fluid simulation on top of that ... Also we can use the classical multi-resolution textures technique which consists of several textures rendered at different scales, some used only to tell a fragment program which type of material we have, etc ...

For now I am only sure of one thing : fluid simulation must not be done on a grid with the same resolution as the map, otherwise it'll be awfully slow. If possible we should make that simulation run on the GPU it'll be much faster !
=>;-D Penguin Powered

User avatar
Balthazar
Moderator
Posts: 2055
Joined: Wed Nov 01, 2006 4:31 pm
Location: Russian Federation
Contact:

Post by Balthazar » Fri Jul 25, 2008 7:08 am

Well, adding terrain deformation and flooding is not the top priority for now. And maybe not the priority at all, so where will be much time to think about it in the future :D


And if anyone interested - link to the new screenshots from the Perimetr 2
http://perimeter2.kdlab.com/

milipili
Posts: 545
Joined: Thu Nov 02, 2006 8:52 am
Location: Paris (France)
Contact:

Post by milipili » Fri Jul 25, 2008 7:11 am

it would be too slow if it runs at Perimeter's speed
Why ?

Because it whould be better to code new optimized engine specially for terrain deformation support, than trying to put it in the TA3D :)
Damien Gerard
Ta3d & Yuni Developer

User avatar
zuzuf
Administrateur - Site Admin
Posts: 3281
Joined: Mon Oct 30, 2006 8:49 pm
Location: Toulouse, France
Contact:

Post by zuzuf » Fri Jul 25, 2008 7:53 am

it would be too slow because you want to play on maps whose scale has nothing in common with Perimeter maps :P, remember tactical view is a very convenient feature :).

Of course adding a new map format will require coding a new renderer for it, as well as alternative functions for everything ...

And again, fluid simulation is very power demanding, I can send you a test program if you want :)
=>;-D Penguin Powered

milipili
Posts: 545
Joined: Thu Nov 02, 2006 8:52 am
Location: Paris (France)
Contact:

Post by milipili » Fri Jul 25, 2008 2:14 pm

I can send you a test program if you want
Obviously :D
Damien Gerard
Ta3d & Yuni Developer

milipili
Posts: 545
Joined: Thu Nov 02, 2006 8:52 am
Location: Paris (France)
Contact:

Post by milipili » Fri Jul 25, 2008 2:15 pm

milipili wrote:
I can send you a test program if you want
Obviously :D (Windows/Linux or OS X as you want)
Damien Gerard
Ta3d & Yuni Developer

Vampiloup
Posts: 56
Joined: Thu Mar 20, 2008 9:13 am

Post by Vampiloup » Fri Jul 25, 2008 4:08 pm

Populous use triangles for ground in very simple fashion : When you click on a vertex, you can change the heigh of the vertex. Since a vertex is always part of some triangles, the angle of theses triangles change also.
Hell, this game is from 1988, but they have done a version for Nitendo DS this year !!! No, really !

Pictures here :

http://populousrevolution.strategyplane ... p?album=22

Look here, too (you can see the evolution in the game Powermonger : Simple to make good mountains, with this system, as you can see) :

http://www.viridiangames.com/blog/categ ... our-games/

User avatar
zuzuf
Administrateur - Site Admin
Posts: 3281
Joined: Mon Oct 30, 2006 8:49 pm
Location: Toulouse, France
Contact:

Post by zuzuf » Fri Jul 25, 2008 4:41 pm

doing displacement mapping on a grid is the classic geometry used to do that, but it doesn't tell us how it is stored in memory and here we're using OpenGL we should take that into account in order to optimize things a bit (currently it's not the case with TA's maps which are optimized for software rendering)
=>;-D Penguin Powered

User avatar
zuzuf
Administrateur - Site Admin
Posts: 3281
Joined: Mon Oct 30, 2006 8:49 pm
Location: Toulouse, France
Contact:

Post by zuzuf » Tue Jul 29, 2008 5:43 pm

I ran a new test on my EEE PC using an optimized build (-O3 -march=i686) and it runs at 13 fps OO !! And I could even run the simulation at 3X !!!

This is without engine optimizations, so I really think it could run smoothly with a less detailed map and without sky :) and with a cache to prevent rendering the map from the same point of view every frame :)
=>;-D Penguin Powered

User avatar
Balthazar
Moderator
Posts: 2055
Joined: Wed Nov 01, 2006 4:31 pm
Location: Russian Federation
Contact:

Post by Balthazar » Tue Jul 29, 2008 7:31 pm

Well, optimization sometimes makes miracles :D

milipili
Posts: 545
Joined: Thu Nov 02, 2006 8:52 am
Location: Paris (France)
Contact:

Post by milipili » Wed Jul 30, 2008 6:35 am

Great ! :D
Damien Gerard
Ta3d & Yuni Developer

User avatar
zuzuf
Administrateur - Site Admin
Posts: 3281
Joined: Mon Oct 30, 2006 8:49 pm
Location: Toulouse, France
Contact:

Post by zuzuf » Wed Jul 30, 2008 7:11 am

It reached 16 fps without sky and with map in low definition mode (2 new options :D )
=>;-D Penguin Powered

User avatar
Balthazar
Moderator
Posts: 2055
Joined: Wed Nov 01, 2006 4:31 pm
Location: Russian Federation
Contact:

Post by Balthazar » Wed Jul 30, 2008 7:20 am

Well, time to think about rewriting TA font in high-definition, because number of options grows like the mushrooms after the rain, but TA font is quite hard to read with high resolution.

User avatar
zuzuf
Administrateur - Site Admin
Posts: 3281
Joined: Mon Oct 30, 2006 8:49 pm
Location: Toulouse, France
Contact:

Post by zuzuf » Wed Jul 30, 2008 8:01 am

We'll need someone to do that, and include some unicode symbols as well :P
=>;-D Penguin Powered

Post Reply

Who is online

Users browsing this forum: No registered users and 20 guests