Double rainbow all the way across the sky
Entry posted by Josh ·
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Here is the amazing first shot of Leadwerks Engine 3. Behold not one, but TWO triangles! It's a dual display of isosceles inspiration.
Believe it or not, this screenshot actually demonstrates a feature that's new for LE3...hardware multisampling. Look carefully at the edges of the triangle:
This isn't the first time I've done multisampling, but until now it hasn't been possible to use with deferred rendering. It's now possible to combine these techniques with OpenGL4. You'll have our awesome lighting combined with high-quality 16x antialiasing for raytracer-like graphics. Oh yeah, multiple layers of transparency, each with proper light and shadows, will also be supported.
I ran into problems getting Code::Blocks to import the glew library. Something struck me when I was Googling around for docs. I became aware that most Code::Blocks programmers are probably coding for Linux, and all the examples I read just assumed I was using MS Visual Studio. I didn't give in to the C++ monster just so I could go off on another "non-standard" (if there is such a thing) development route, so I am back on MSVC. I really don't like the poor (or complete lack of) error handling, but I am just going to have to adjust my coding style to this environment. If anyone knows if either the pro version of MSVC or the Intel compiler will stop on the first error and select the line it occurs on, I would gladly pay for that functionality.
As annoying as C++ can be, there are some compelling reasons to write the next iteration of our technology in it. First, I need C++ source code to have something I can sell to professional studios. Second, it is extremely difficult to find programmers willing to work in either BlitzMax or C, and dealing with the interface between BlitzMax and C libraries can get ugly. It's not so technically difficult, but you are doing something in the world no one else is, so there's not any support for it. Having Leadwerks Engine 3 written in pure C++ code allows me to work with other programmers who can handle various tasks like networking, some special effects, and ports to other platforms. It also makes it easier to include external libraries for added features. Finally, only C++ can be used for all the platforms I want to support, including Android, iPhone, XBox, PS3, Wii, etc.
C++ programmers will like this a lot because the LE3 command set allows them more power than they have had before. It's possible to write your own drivers for physics, graphics, device input, and have it all work with the core engine. You can also extends existing classes. This is particularly useful for entity programming.
Should you switch to C++ for LE3? If you've already got another language you're comfortable with, I don't see any reason to. When you are programming a game, flexibility and production efficiency are more important than the raw speed of the final program. Let's say that C++ gave a 25% speed increase over another language. This is probably not realistic, but for the sake of argument let's use that number. That still doesn't mean much, if the user can get a 300% speed increase by switching the GPU or changing some quality settings. So unless you want to support a lot of extra platforms or you just like C++, I don't see any big advantage when it comes to actual game authoring. I need a C interface for use with BlitzMax, because I intend to continue making the editor with that language. Therefore, our policy of allowing you to "code the way you want", with any language you want, will continue.
By the way, Khronos has done a really great job with the design of OpenGL 3.1 and onwards. A few points of interest are that immediate mode rendering is finally done away with:
glBegin(GL_TRIANGLES); glVertex3f(1,2,3); glVertex3f(1,4,3); glVertex3f(1,2,4); glEnd();
No more! It doesn't make sense to have three different ways of drawing primitives, and it just makes the drivers overly complicated. You should learn the one right way of doing things, from the start.
Also, the shaders have all the remnants of the old fixed function pipeline cleaned out. The GPU doesn't have a "color array" or a "texcoord array". It just has vertex arrays and you decide what they are, and what format they should be in. So I can do things like compress surface normals into four bytes and not worry about needing the color array for something else.
I didn't get much into it, but it looks like shaders have a nicer implementation of what used to be called "varyings". Variables are just "in" or "out" in the vertex and fragment shaders. Uniforms remain unchanged. I might have a play at geometry shaders, but two years later I am still not sure what they are for, other than something that would have been nice when stencil shadows were popular. Of course, what I am really looking forward to is the OpenGL4 hardware tessellation. 
Anyways, I am pretty comfortable with C++, and am happy to be back into graphics, my favorite area of technology. Thanks again to Roland Strålberg for his advice with some C++ details. Have a good week!
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