From: sl8nl@cc.usu.edu
Newsgroups: rec.games.programmer
Subject: Re: Game libraries...
Date: 29 Jul 92 17:18:23 MDT
Organization: Utah State University

Turning on my anti-flame forcefields.

>>I didn't think the interest in text adventure compilers was still there,
>>so I didn't release it in the first place.
> 
> Well there's plenty of interest.  So let's see it.  We've heard the
> claims (which I'm sure you wouldn't make without having had a good look
> at TADS first), so let's see the end product.  A precompiled game
> without source would be fine if you don't want to make the system
> itself available.
> 

Show me the interest.  You are the only one who's said anything about it.

> "Trust me, compilers aren't that hard to right (sic)."   And you've

Fine, I'll trust you :)

> written a compiler.  Ever look at the GCC/G++ source?  No problem; I

Nope, I haven't.

> guess you could bang out those 100,000{ lines in a couple weeks -- no
> wait -- you'd write the equivalent in only a thousand lines and it
> would fit in 18K.  Your blanket statement is just as absurd to me as
> the notion that you could write TADS or an equivalent in two weeks.  I
> wouldn't believe even Richard Stallman could write TADS or an
> equivalent in two weeks (or even two months).

Hell, man!  Have you ever taken a compilers class in college?  Do you
even know how to program, short of writing text adventures in TADS?
If not, then you have absolutely no business being on this thread.

> If you're going to disucss things here, please get a grip on reality
> and stop wasting your time trying to convince everyone that difficult
> things are completely trivial for you.  Not only is it transparent but
> it annoys the hell out of people whose work you trivialize (and the
> people who appreciate the work that went into others' systems)

OK.  How long have you been reading the nets?  I have answered more
than 15 pleas for help on how to do something in the past month...
usually sending source.  I don't see you doing anything to benefit 
the programming/gaming community short of your whining and complaining.
I'm posting source to do what I said!  Where's your source?  I'm
helping the programmers that program games and others like them by
turning out some of the more hidden items (like scaling in real-time
and such).

>>Maybe I'll make the system available, maybe I won't.  I'd have to dig
>>it out of my archives.
> 
> Ahh, I see.  So trivial you just can't find it.

Give me a break.  I have three drawerfuls of disks at home...more than
a thousand disks.  Most have source code from up to ten years ago on them.

>>Right?  Good.  Now that you understand that point, we'll get on with it.
> 
> Guess what, smart guy?  What you're describing is the *theory behind an
> algorithm*; one that simplifies the problem a lot (like Apogee did in
> Wolf 3D), but theory nonetheless.  You said, "who needs an algorithm,"
> but you're using one yourself.  Your algorithm is neither trivial nor
> trivial to explain, IMO, and is far from trivial to implement,
> particularly in 80x86 assembly.

Pardon me for living.  Bresenham is an algorithm...I just modified it to
suit my own needs.  I suppose you can give me a technical description of
how Apogee pulled of Wolf3d.  I spent weeks after seeing it coming up 
with the algorithms to pull it off.  And frankly, there are under 10.
I've implemented my algorithm in 8086 assembly.  Get your head out of
the clouds and come down to earth.  There are easy ways to do things.
I'm not saying a raytracer can be done without floating point, but a
texture and perspective mapper can...period.

>>A good perspective mapper must scale as it goes.  Bresenham can be used
>>to create a scaling routine too that is super fast.  The entire perspective
>>mapper is based on the Bresenham line drawing routine...the perspective
>>is drawn by a pseudo-line drawer, and the scaling is done by the routine.
> 
> Bresenham's general algorithm doesn't count as an algorithm or theory?
> Is it also trivial?  As with the 3-D bitmaps discussion, we can *say*
> all sorts of stuff like "just apply Bresenham's scaling algorithm, then
> rotate the images in real-time, perform lighting calculations, and
> viola!" very easily.  The implementation is far from trivial for such
> things.  Anyone who thinks, e.g., that Origin (Blue Sky) didn't spend a
> great deal of time on their 3-D texture mapping engine needs a serious
> wake-up call.

I'm well aware that Blue Sky spent a whole heck of a lot of time on their
engine...but Ultima Underworld is not real-time.  And I'm not knocking
UW either.  It's going to open up a new world for virtual reality.

> I'm really not sure what your point is throughout this thread.  It
> seems like you're just convinced that game design systems are
> unnecessary because they're so incredibly trivial to write.  My

That's coming out of your mouth, Dave.

> contention is that if you think that, you haven't seen a decent game
> design system.  Your contention seems to be that you're so smart that

Speak for yourself.  You are acting like the know-it-all here, not me.
I'm providing the insights, you're arguing the points.  Plain and
simple as that.

> what everyone else spends years on only requires a few weeks of your
> time.  Frankly, I don't believe that.

That's your choice.

Josh
Newsgroups: rec.games.programmer