Epic's Amazing New 3D Game
Mark Rein (Epic)
------------------------------------------------------
EPIC MEGAGAMES AND IT'S AWARD WINNING DIGITAL EXTREMES
DEVELOPMENT TEAM ARE WORKING ON AN AWESOME 3D ACTION
GAME FOR WINDOWS 95 KNOWN SIMPLY AS "UNREAL"
------------------------------------------------------
We call it "UNREAL" because that's the reaction we've been getting
from people who have seen this (until now) highly secret game running.
If you're anticipating Quake, you might want to download the shareware
version of Extreme Pinball which is being released on our web site,
ftp site, and CompuServe form (GO EPICFORUM) on Friday November 10th.
Check out the READ THIS section. At the very end there are two screen
shots of OUR awesome new 3D game, UNREAL. Those aren't renderings from
our Silicon Graphics workstations - those are REAL screen shots from
the game itself!
A leading games magazine writer in England who recently played an
early version of UNREAL wrote us saying that it "LOOKS BETTER THAN
QUAKE". We've seen Quake too and we know our game will kick it's ass
so keep an eye out for UNREAL!
While you've got it, don't forget to play and purchase Extreme
Pinball, it's amazing for more reasons than just the UNREAL screen
shots! In fact, it's so good that it's being released in retail stores
world-wide by Electronic Arts on PC-CD and coming soon on Sony
Playstation. Both UNREAL and Extreme Pinball are developed by Digital
Extremes, the team that brought you the award winning Epic Pinball (PC
Format rated 91%). If you don't already own the classic Epic Pinball
check out the awesome deal where you can get Extreme Pinball CD AND
Epic Pinball CD for only $69!! Extreme Pinball CDs are in-stock and
shipping NOW!
In addition to Extreme Pinball we've also just released Radix, a 3D
flying shoot-em-up and an a new 1995 Christmas Shareware Edition of
Jazz Jackrabbit. If you haven't seen our recently released scrolling
shooter Tyrian check that out too!
The UNREAL engine is a polygon-based real 3D engine and it WILL be out
in 1996. It will require Windows 95 and 8Mb of RAM. The screen shots
you see in Extreme Pinball are reduced to 320x400 (the resolution of
Extreme) but in the game itself you're can play in a Window at any
resolution or at 640x480 in full screen using Direct Draw. With
Windows Dispdib support slower machines (ie. less than 486/75) can be
easily accomodated using a super-fast 320x240 mode.
We're not going to tell too much about the engine features, network
play or the gameplay features because we want to keep a lot of the
state-of-the-art details secret until the game is closer to being
released. Over the next few months we will release more high-res
screen shots and some Quicktime and Video for Windows movies of the
game in action. This way you'll have a chance to learn lots about this
incredible game and the industry leading technology behind it.
It's going to totally ROCK! Epic MegaGames is now working with
Electronic Arts, the world's leading entertainment software publisher.
Our first project with EA, Extreme Pinball, is finished and coming to
stores this month. We've signed contracts for two more awesome games
with Electronic Arts (sorry, no details about those two games are
being released yet) and we expect further announcements to come soon.
With our alliance with EA you can count on UNREAL containing some
pretty awesome stuff!
As shareware fans already know, Epic is reknowned for having superior
sound quality. ALL of our new games are for Windows 95 and we've
written a completely new sound system to take advantage of it. The new
sound system is a vast improvement over it's DOS-based predecessor.
Because it's Windows 95, any sound card that works under Windows
automatically works with this system without installation. Plug and
Play is finally here and it's going to be great! Now you can enjoy the
crystal clear sound that eminates from high end sound cards, like the
Turtle Beach Monterrey, that was not previously supported by many DOS
games. With this sound system the new games are all going to sound
amazing, especially UNREAL which has uses the advanced 3D spacial
features of the new sound engine for maximum effect.
In addition to UNREAL we're working on a sequel to One Must Fall which
will be a full 3D polygon-based fighting game with the kind of
realistic lighting and detailed 3D characters shown in the UNREAL
screen shots. PC Format's ARCADE GAME OF THE YEAR, Jazz Jackrabbit
also gets a sequel and this time it's got 8 amazing levels of parallax
scrolling and loads of special visual effects. We believe it will be
the best platform game ever created for the PC - wait until you hear
how incredible the music sounds in Jazz2!
More details about OMF II and screen shots and movies of Jazz2 (which
will likely come out around April/May 96) will start appearing on our
Web site (http://www.epicgames.com) soon after Christmas. A T1 line,
which will increase the speed and connection capacity of our Web
server 30 times, is on order and should be in place in around December
1, 1995. Until then we apologize if you have problems getting through
or if you experience sluggish performance.
Mark Rein,
Epic MegaGames.
Check out the Epic Web Site at http://www.epicgames.com or
GO EPIC on CompuServe to visit our forum or download our latest
shareware games via FTP at ftp.uml.edu in /msdos/games/epic
Jared Ong
>It's going to totally ROCK! Epic MegaGames is now working with
>In addition to UNREAL we're working on a sequel to One Must Fall which
>will be a full 3D polygon-based fighting game with the kind of
Wait, is the sequel to One Must Fall 3-D like Toshinden or Tekken?
Please be true.
--
Jared Ong
jo...@owl.csusm.edu
---------------------------------------
We are spinning our own fates
good or evil, and never to be undone
Every smallest stroke of virtue or of vice leaves
its never so little scar...Nothing we ever do is,
in strict scientific literalness, wiped out.
- William James
Mark Rein (Epic)
>Wait, is the sequel to One Must Fall 3-D like Toshinden or Tekken?
Yes but hopefully better than both of them. I think OMF was a far
better fighting game than either Toshinden or Tekken. Those two games
have pretty good 3D graphics but the gameplay is below the quality of
OMF. Just imagine something like Tekken but with more detailed, higher
resolution 3D robots and even better control and gameplay than One
Must Fall 2097. That's what we're going for and I firmly believe
that's what we'll get.
Gordon J. Gray
writes:
>
>>Wait, is the sequel to One Must Fall 3-D like Toshinden or Tekken?
>
>Yes but hopefully better than both of them. I think OMF was a far
>better fighting game than either Toshinden or Tekken. Those two games
>have pretty good 3D graphics but the gameplay is below the quality of
>OMF. Just imagine something like Tekken but with more detailed, higher
>resolution 3D robots and even better control and gameplay than One
>Must Fall 2097. That's what we're going for and I firmly believe
>that's what we'll get.
>
Sounds great, but when is it going to come out? I hope not as long as
we waited for the modem patch. By the way, how do you get the fire
ball for the Kitana?
Hans
>
If Epic wanna use their 3-D Engine...
make it like Killer Instinct. 3-D, rotation, scaling, etc.
but easy to control.
I mean 3-D game's good, I like Tekken and Toshinden, but...
with VF, those two, Fx Fighter, etc etc... don ya get a lil
sick after a while?
/\/\/\Frostie/\/\/\
J. Box
>>Wait, is the sequel to One Must Fall 3-D like Toshinden or Tekken?
>Yes but hopefully better than both of them. I think OMF was a far
>better fighting game than either Toshinden or Tekken. Those two games
>have pretty good 3D graphics but the gameplay is below the quality of
>OMF. Just imagine something like Tekken but with more detailed, higher
>resolution 3D robots and even better control and gameplay than One
>Must Fall 2097. That's what we're going for and I firmly believe
>that's what we'll get.
Check out Zero Divide for the Playstation... too bad its only a Japan
release right now. The game kicks ass...
Mr Happy
: fros...@ix.netcom.com (Hans ) wrote:
: >If Epic wanna use their 3-D Engine...
: >make it like Killer Instinct. 3-D, rotation, scaling, etc.
: >but easy to control.
: Arrrrrrrrrrrrggggghh.
: >I mean 3-D game's good, I like Tekken and Toshinden, but...
: >with VF, those two, Fx Fighter, etc etc... don ya get a lil
: >sick after a while?
: Don't You... Sit there holding back. When oppenent messes up perform
: 13-20+ combo and repeat. Then in perform Ultracombo or fatality and
: repeat at next oppenent. Bleeeccchhhhhhh. And if you mess up just
: use your combo breaker than shadow combo... and repeat if necessary.
: At least in VF2 you have variety of moves and combos to choose from...
: and the combos are realistic. Plus each match is unique instead of
: block combo block combo block ultracombo and on and on and on
: and..........
Can't agree more. Turtle turtle turtle combo turtle turtle combo. KI
gets the prize for the only fighting game where its more fun to play vs.
the CPU then against another person. At least you get to combo the CPU
(that is until one hit becomes a combo and every hit you land = combo
breaker) human vs human fights is all just sitting and waiting for
someone to get bored and decide to attack. Then combo him to death.
: I think OMF2 should be a 3D polygon fighter with some really awesome
: robot designs (if you're goin' to steal at least steal from anime).
: Also OMF2 should have nothing to do with OMF except for the fact that
: the fighters are robots.
: MODO
This would be the game of my dreams. Huge anime robots pounding each
other. I say keep the special move idea like in TOSHINDEN that would
make it more similar to OMF1. Also it would be cool if you could damage
specific limbs like in ZERO DIVIDE. Please don't do the same thing you
did with OMF1. While I love that game and I think it plays great (in
fact I do think its the best PC fighter) the graphics are really
dissapointing. Put more work on the graphics this time, but lets have
the same great game play (I want alot don't I). This could just make
this game amazing.
--
************************BE STRONG BE WRONG********************************
Orion's sword. Raised in need, raised in deed - Vivat Grendel
*********************Two wrongs do make a wright*****************************
Mark Rein (Epic)
>other. I say keep the special move idea like in TOSHINDEN that would
>make it more similar to OMF1.
It will have a lot of similarity to the original. It is a sequel after
all! <g> But where the similarity ends is that OMF II will have way,
way better graphics (we've hired a professional who did awesome 3D
models for DISNEY at his last job) and will be in 3D.
>Please don't do the same thing you
>did with OMF1. While I love that game and I think it plays great (in
>fact I do think its the best PC fighter) the graphics are really
>dissapointing. Put more work on the graphics this time, but lets have
>the same great game play (I want alot don't I). This could just make
>this game amazing.
As I said above, the graphics will be amazing. Rob Elam did the
graphics himself for the last game and he's thrilled to have
professionals doing them this time so he can spend even more time
honing the gameplay and fighting moves. I think the gameplay will be
top-notch. Rob is a real fighting game nut and with because he can now
get around the limitations of 2D sprites and use real 3D actors he can
do a lot more. He's developed a really powerful 3D motion system and a
lot of the moves are being stop-motioned captured using a really cool
device called a "Monkey" to make them really smooth and really unique.
Mark Rein (Epic)
>OMF had a great 2D gameplay but it wasn't as good as Capcom games.
>You can't really compare 2D fighting and 3D fighting games.
Sure you can. It's just that everyone who has done a 3D fighting game
thus far has relied on the 3D gimmick to sell the game instead of
solid gameplay. We won't be doing that. We'll make an awesome fighting
game that plays in 3D. Remember most of the 3D fighting games are
played pretty much in a 2D mode but viewed from a 3D perspective. I
don't think ours will be much different except that the legacy we're
working from (OMF) is a better quality fighting game than any of the
current batch of games were. For instance Toshinden looks good but it
really sucks as a fighting game. IMHO VF2 is the best of the bunch.
J. Box
>If Epic wanna use their 3-D Engine...
>make it like Killer Instinct. 3-D, rotation, scaling, etc.
>but easy to control.
Arrrrrrrrrrrrggggghh.
>I mean 3-D game's good, I like Tekken and Toshinden, but...
>with VF, those two, Fx Fighter, etc etc... don ya get a lil
>sick after a while?
Don't You... Sit there holding back. When oppenent messes up perform
13-20+ combo and repeat. Then in perform Ultracombo or fatality and
repeat at next oppenent. Bleeeccchhhhhhh. And if you mess up just
use your combo breaker than shadow combo... and repeat if necessary.
At least in VF2 you have variety of moves and combos to choose from...
and the combos are realistic. Plus each match is unique instead of
block combo block combo block ultracombo and on and on and on
and..........
I think OMF2 should be a 3D polygon fighter with some really awesome
robot designs (if you're goin' to steal at least steal from anime).
Also OMF2 should have nothing to do with OMF except for the fact that
the fighters are robots.
MODO
*-------------*-----------------------------------------------------------*
|Jason Box | "I've seen things you people wouldn't believe. Attack | |bo...@rpi.edu | ships on fire off the shoulder of Orion. I watched |
| | C-beams glitter in the dark near the Tannhauser gate. |
|This space | All those moments will be lost in time, like tears in |
| for | rain. Time to die." |
| rent! | --Roy Batty |
| | _Blade Runner_ |
*-------------*-----------------------------------------------------------*
J. Box
>>Sounds great, but when is it going to come out?
>We don't really know. It's too early to speculate. Check our web site
>in January or February and maybe we'll have some news.
So has the OMF CD been canceled? Also look at my other post about my
thoughts on OMF2. Also saw the shots of _UnReal_ in the Extreme
Pinball SW and just about fell out of my seat. Are those actual
finished polygon charater objects? Also why the medevil setting? Is
the game called UnReal or is that the name of the game engine? Can't
waite to see more pix... BTW: I thought the second screen shot was
many times more impressive than the shots of Quake that I've seen,
that shot was f'ing beautiful man.
Any chance you guys need a game designer? :)
Led Mirage
Mark Rein (Epic) <mr...@inforamp.net> wrote:
>
>>Wait, is the sequel to One Must Fall 3-D like Toshinden or Tekken?
>
>Yes but hopefully better than both of them. I think OMF was a far
>better fighting game than either Toshinden or Tekken. Those two games
>have pretty good 3D graphics but the gameplay is below the quality of
>OMF. Just imagine something like Tekken but with more detailed, higher
>resolution 3D robots and even better control and gameplay than One
>Must Fall 2097. That's what we're going for and I firmly believe
>that's what we'll get.
>
Does OMF2 have scrap and destruction moves, like OMF1? I love those moves. And
some of those special characters/bots are really cool as well. I hope you guys
leave those in. So from what I gathered, OMF2 will be something of a cross
between Virtua Fighter and OMF1? That would be way awesome! Can't wait.
Mark Rein (Epic)
We don't really know. It's too early to speculate. Check our web site
in January or February and maybe we'll have some news.
>By the way, how do you get the fire
>ball for the Kitana?
I don't know that either.
Mark Rein (Epic)
> Check out Zero Divide for the Playstation... too bad its only a Japan
>release right now. The game kicks ass...
Haven't seen that one. Can you tell me about it? I think I might want
to order it.
Dave Glue
>going to support 3-D accelerators? Will you support the GRIP by Gravis
>(please add in more buttons that just punch and kick. It will add a
>lot more moves and intricacy to the game).
I think supporting the Grip should be standard fare for _any_ games in
the future. Digitial joysticks are the way to go, and finally the
Grip solves the PC joystick problem. If it gets support, I'm gettin'
one. No more swapping my flightstick and gamepads.
Dave Glue
> So has the OMF CD been canceled? Also look at my other post about my
>thoughts on OMF2. Also saw the shots of _UnReal_ in the Extreme
>Pinball SW and just about fell out of my seat. Are those actual
>finished polygon charater objects? Also why the medevil setting? Is
>the game called UnReal or is that the name of the game engine? Can't
>waite to see more pix... BTW: I thought the second screen shot was
>many times more impressive than the shots of Quake that I've seen,
>that shot was f'ing beautiful man.
No, those are apparently actual shots of the game according to Epic.
Keep in mind those are only 320*400, the real 640*480 pics apparently
look a _lot_ better.
Mark Rein (Epic)
> So has the OMF CD been canceled?
The enhanced one, yes. There is an OMF CD but it is merely the latest
registered version shipping on and playable from CD.
>Also saw the shots of _UnReal_ in the Extreme
>Pinball SW and just about fell out of my seat.
Cool!
>Are those actual
>finished polygon charater objects?
Yes. But I'm not sure if those particular characters will make it into
the game because there are a whole ton of way better ones being worked
on right now.
>Also why the medevil setting?
Why not? <g> Actually, the setting for the game is not Medievil.
Those are simply programmer-created graphics. The real artists are
working on the real stuff right now and it's going to be way better. I
think you could see the flaws in those textures quite easily.
>Is the game called UnReal or is that the name of the game engine?
Both for now.
>waite to see more pix... BTW: I thought the second screen shot was
>many times more impressive than the shots of Quake that I've seen,
>that shot was f'ing beautiful man.
Thank you. But wait till you see it moving and at the proper
resolution, it looks even better! We'll have the high-res screen
shots up on our web site just after XMAS. We'll likely have some major
new announcements about the game by then as well.
> Any chance you guys need a game designer? :)
No but we're constantly looking for really talented artists who can
create realistic textures and skins. Interested persons should reply
by email.
Mark Rein (Epic)
>No, those are apparently actual shots of the game according to Epic.
>Keep in mind those are only 320*400, the real 640*480 pics apparently
>look a _lot_ better.
That is correct. Those are actual shots taken from the game and, yes,
they do look better in the game itself.
Tero Paananen
I hope you can manage to keep OMF 2 playable with two button joysticks as
well. I don't think going for the one-hundred-button games that some of
your competition is doing is the way to go. OMF 1's success was IMHO
as much due to it being simple enough as to it's excellent gameplay.
Don't fall for the "let's include as many features as we can come up with"
kind of attitude that seems to be on top of every game developpers mind
nowadays.
>Mark Rein,
>Epic MegaGames.
>Check out the Epic Web Site at http://www.epicgames.com or
>GO EPIC on CompuServe to visit our forum or download our latest
>shareware games via FTP at ftp.uml.edu in /msdos/games/epic
-TPP
Hans
I did say I hope the game "looks" like KI...
I didnt say that it should follow KI c'mon relax. ;>
Gotta admit that rendered graphic looks real nice to the eye.
And BTW another thing...
I hope OMF2 wont require one of those "3-d boards".
If you have to, perhaps release it for the PS or Saturn.
Coz personally I'd rather shell out 500 bux for a PS than
a 3-D board.
/\/\/\FrostByte/\/\/\
Ping W Kwong
>
>Yes but hopefully better than both of them. I think OMF was a far
>better fighting game than either Toshinden or Tekken. Those two games
You'd better hope you can live up to the hype then. Tekken is
AWESOME on the Playstation.
MASHOOD KHAN
> >This would be the game of my dreams. Huge anime robots pounding each
> >other. I say keep the special move idea like in TOSHINDEN that would
> >make it more similar to OMF1.
>
> It will have a lot of similarity to the original. It is a sequel after
> all! <g> But where the similarity ends is that OMF II will have way,
> way better graphics (we've hired a professional who did awesome 3D
> models for DISNEY at his last job) and will be in 3D.
>
> >Please don't do the same thing you
> >did with OMF1. While I love that game and I think it plays great (in
> >fact I do think its the best PC fighter) the graphics are really
> >dissapointing. Put more work on the graphics this time, but lets have
> >the same great game play (I want alot don't I). This could just make
> >this game amazing.
>
> As I said above, the graphics will be amazing. Rob Elam did the
> graphics himself for the last game and he's thrilled to have
> professionals doing them this time so he can spend even more time
> honing the gameplay and fighting moves. I think the gameplay will be
> top-notch. Rob is a real fighting game nut and with because he can now
> get around the limitations of 2D sprites and use real 3D actors he can
> do a lot more. He's developed a really powerful 3D motion system and a
> lot of the moves are being stop-motioned captured using a really cool
> device called a "Monkey" to make them really smooth and really unique.
>
>
>
> Mark Rein,
> Epic MegaGames.
>
> Check out the Epic Web Site at http://www.epicgames.com or
> GO EPIC on CompuServe to visit our forum or download our latest
> shareware games via FTP at ftp.uml.edu in /msdos/games/epic
>
>Sounds great, What will be the bare minimum we'll need to get the game
running.
Mash
>
Evan
>In article <47tnao$c...@sam.inforamp.net>,
>Mark Rein (Epic) <mr...@inforamp.net> wrote:
>> sound quality. ALL of our new games are for Windows 95 and we've
>
>All of them?
>
>Including Jazz2, OMF II, Extreme Pinball, etc?
>
>Epic was starting to become my favourite shareware games company... :-( :-(
I'm rather happy that there's little reluctance to move to
Win95 on the part of game developers. They certainly know better than
I do about such things, and they seem to be generally pleased with
Win95's offerings. Believe me, in a year, we'll all wonder how we
ever put up with DOS headaches for so long.
--Evan
Christopher Wong
>xfo...@atlantis.actrix.gen.nz (Michael Fouhy) wrote:
>>
>>All of them?
>>
>>Epic was starting to become my favourite shareware games company... :-( :-(
>
> I'm rather happy that there's little reluctance to move to
>Win95 on the part of game developers. They certainly know better than
>I do about such things, and they seem to be generally pleased with
>Win95's offerings. Believe me, in a year, we'll all wonder how we
>ever put up with DOS headaches for so long.
Well, having been using OS/2 for the last 2 years, I do not consider
installing Win95 to be an upgrade. To get at Epic's new games, I would
have to purchase a copy of Win95, install it *and* buy one of Epic's
games. That is the cost to me of buying Epic, since Win95 holds no
benefit for me otherwise.
Chris
Christopher Wong
Mark Rein (Epic)
As far as I know we will be. Most PC joysticks have only two buttons.
When you have two Gravis PC Gamepads hooked up (which we support) you
can only use them in two-button mode. For that reason I doubt we'd
make extra buttons mandatory.
>well. I don't think going for the one-hundred-button games that some of
>your competition is doing is the way to go. OMF 1's success was IMHO
>as much due to it being simple enough as to it's excellent gameplay.
Agreed. Don't worry Rob Elam knows what he is doing!
>Don't fall for the "let's include as many features as we can come up with"
>kind of attitude that seems to be on top of every game developpers mind
>nowadays.
We're well aware of that and we'll try our hardest to avoid any such
traps!
Mark Rein (Epic)
>Really, if you can pull something graphical wise like Tekken or VF 2 (I
>wish!) with some good game play, I'd buy it quick. It's time to show
>those game consoles a thing or two :).
Well it's far too early to take your order yet but I think you'll be
pleased with our efforts. The goal is to make something that looks as
good as VF2 but plays better than the original OMF.
>I still don't see how you're going to accomplish this. With 3-D
>accelerators...advanced engines, the genius of the Elams?
Well the new 600 Mhz Pentium should help. <g> JUST KIDDING!!
Evan
Not to sound unsympathetic, but isn't that somewhat akin to
someone who buys a more or less obscure sound card, and winces at the
thought of needing to buy a sound blaster just to play a particular
game? Good or bad, it's the price you pay. Just think of what Mac
owners would have to shell out to play most any PC game. Regardless,
Epic will do just fine, like all those other companies who don't
support *relatively* obscure operating systems, soundcards, or
platforms.
--Evan
Michael Fouhy
Mark Rein (Epic) <mr...@inforamp.net> wrote:
> sound quality. ALL of our new games are for Windows 95 and we've
All of them?
Including Jazz2, OMF II, Extreme Pinball, etc?
Epic was starting to become my favourite shareware games company... :-( :-(
Neal W. Miller
> Have you seen the UNREAL screen shots from the Extreme Pinball "read this"?
I'm been looking for these screen shots for a while now... I can
find NO mention whatsoever of anything called UNREAL on Epic's web site.
Is there any way for a person who's just not crazy about pinball games to
see these images?
--
------------------------------------------------------------------------------
Neal Miller | --------------------- | "This Side Up - Not Plummet Please!"
mil...@rpi.edu | Southampton, PA 18966 | - the box for my Taiwanese CPU fan
---------------http://www.rpi.edu/~millen3------------------------------------
Neal W. Miller
>All of them?
Careful... Maybe Mark meant that they are guaranteed to work under
Win95, as opposed to requiring Win95... Right? Please?
J. Box
>In article <48f6h7$q...@cocoa.brown.edu>, Evan <Evan_M...@brown.edu> wrote:
>>xfo...@atlantis.actrix.gen.nz (Michael Fouhy) wrote:
>>>
>>>All of them?
>>>
>>>Epic was starting to become my favourite shareware games company... :-( :-(
>>
>> I'm rather happy that there's little reluctance to move to
>>Win95 on the part of game developers. They certainly know better than
>>I do about such things, and they seem to be generally pleased with
>>Win95's offerings. Believe me, in a year, we'll all wonder how we
>>ever put up with DOS headaches for so long.
>Well, having been using OS/2 for the last 2 years, I do not consider
>installing Win95 to be an upgrade. To get at Epic's new games, I would
>have to purchase a copy of Win95, install it *and* buy one of Epic's
>games. That is the cost to me of buying Epic, since Win95 holds no
>benefit for me otherwise.
We all get what we deserve don't we. Those of us who bowed to the
great evil power known as Microsoft early on will get to enjoy all the
great games coming to Win95 only in the next year or so, while OS/2
people get to see the death of their OS. Since IBM has no plan on
making OS/2 run Win95 programs... hell even IBM has acknowledged that
OS/2 is pretty much dead. If OS/2 Warp and Connect doesn't show a
decent profit by the end of the year, IBM is going to shoot it.
Wonder how long OS/2 will be on its feet before it and it's followers
realises OS/2 is dead. The only future OS/2 has is if IBM gets smart
and hands it over to the Lotus guys.
Whichever way you see it, IBM pc's are going to be Microsoft
controlled until someone comes up with a kick ass OS.
Also don't get me wrong I liked Warp (after the week it took me to get
it working with my Diamond Stealth) but the lack of support just
killed it for me. There was no point on having Warp when no one was
going to support it except IBM. So I dumped it and lived happily with
DOS until I got Win95 which I use mainly for net apps, word
processing, and programming. I go back to my previous version of DOS
when I want to play games. Also when I have to do something like
copying, unzipping, etc I just open my handy DOS window and do it all
from there. I just hope NT 4.0 has a DOS window when it comes out
otherwise I'll just add a partition and use it that way.
DOS may die but it'll be awhile before it realises and decides to fall
down. And Warp might do the same thing...
Mark Rein (Epic)
>If you have to, perhaps release it for the PS or Saturn.
It won't require a 3D board.
>Coz personally I'd rather shell out 500 bux for a PS than
>a 3-D board.
So would I. In fact, I did already. Of course $500 bought some
accessories and games too. BTW, we're doing Extreme Pinball right now
for the Playstation. It should be in store in January. It's being
published by Electronic Arts.
Mark Rein (Epic)
>Win95 on the part of game developers. They certainly know better than
>I do about such things, and they seem to be generally pleased with
>Win95's offerings.
Good point.
>Believe me, in a year, we'll all wonder how we
>ever put up with DOS headaches for so long.
Yes, we're all going to go through this painful transitionary year
where we try to make DOS apps and older Windows apps run well under
Windows 95. I've found Windows 95 to be great but there are always
some problems that can crop up with anything new and it's definitely
new. But once software developers are all firmly in the Windows 95
camp we'll look back at the DOS days and wonder how we ever managed.
Mark Rein (Epic)
>recently. Back even a year ago, for shareware games I waited for Apogee's
>titles and Epic was a diversion. Now everything has changed. Epic has got
>to be the current king of shareware (id is too commercial to be considered
>SW now). With recent games like Tyrian, the new pinball, Jazz, and Radix
>it is obvious that the quality of your software is head and shoulders above
>the competition.
Thanks!!
> Up until about 2 weeks ago Apogee had released nothing
>but Terminal Velocity all year, and that was REALLY an offshoot company
>(3DRealms) kind of like id branched from Apogee. With their new games,
>Realms of Chaos and that Hocus Pocus type game, it is easy to see that they
>don't care very much any more. Keep up the EXCELLENT work with OMF2!
>Also, a little suggestion. Maybe a sequel for Solar Winds or Zone 66?
>Both are A+, wouldn't mind seeing a new incarnation....
Well that likely won't happen. The guy who wrote Solar Winds went on
to write Epic Pinball and Extreme Pinball. Now he's got a staff of 7
or 8 and they're furiously working on UNREAL - our hot new 3D game. In
fact James himself has been working on UNREAL since Epic Pinball was
completed. He only did graphics for Extreme and had two programmers
working on it while he worked on tools and techniques for UNREAL. Did
you see the UNREAL screen shots at the end of the READ THIS section in
Extreme Pinball?
As for a Zone 66 sequel you just might get your wish but it won't
really be a sequel. Seek and Destroy is like a cross between Zone 66
and Desert Strike. We'll post information on our web site about it in
a couple of weeks. It's not a big huge game but it's got great sound
effects and it's really fun to play.
Also, another treat if you like Zone 66 is something really
spectacular for next year in the arcade action category that is
already signed to be published in retail by Electronic Arts. You'll
need Windows 95 for it. We'll probably release details sometime in
December on this game.
Christopher Wong
>... while OS/2 people get to see the death of their OS. Since IBM
>has no plan on making OS/2 run Win95 programs... hell even IBM has
>acknowledged that OS/2 is pretty much dead. If OS/2 Warp and Connect
>doesn't show a decent profit by the end of the year, IBM is going to
>shoot it. Wonder how long OS/2 will be on its feet before it and
>it's followers realises OS/2 is dead.
Relax. Folks (especially a certain Enderle at Dataquest) have been
predicting the imminent death of OS/2 for the last 3 years or so.
Rumors fly all the time, but the platform has a pretty large installed
base by now. It is still too early to mourn. You know where to go for
further discussion of the OS Wars (hint: it ends with ".advocacy".)
Chris
Christopher Wong
>cw...@world.std.com (Christopher Wong) wrote:
>>
>>Well, having been using OS/2 for the last 2 years, I do not consider
>>installing Win95 to be an upgrade. To get at Epic's new games, I would
>>have to purchase a copy of Win95, install it *and* buy one of Epic's
>>games. That is the cost to me of buying Epic, since Win95 holds no
>>benefit for me otherwise.
>
>someone who buys a more or less obscure sound card, and winces at the
>thought of needing to buy a sound blaster just to play a particular
>game?
To make the analogy more complete, the hypothetical game company would
have in the past been writing great games that did work with the
hypothetical more or less obscure sound card. Suddenly, the
hypothetical game company declares that they will no longer be writing
software compatible with that more or less obscure sound card or any
other existing sound card save for a recently introduced brand X95.
The majority of their customer base would have to buy X95 to use their
future games.
There would not be any fuss if not for the fact that Epic writes great
games. I was not expecting them to write for OS/2. In this case, they
are abandoning a platform (Dos) that they previously supported. Their
reasons are understandable -- this move will make their development
work theoretically much easier -- but it is nevertheless disappointing
for many. On the other hand, Epic deserves a commission from Microsoft
for driving sales of win 95. Hopefully, Epic will keep their prices
reasonable with this in mind.
Chris
Eye Eqs Ehl
Christopher Wong <cw...@world.std.com> wrote:
} To make the analogy more complete, the hypothetical game company would
} have in the past been writing great games that did work with the
} hypothetical more or less obscure sound card. Suddenly, the
} hypothetical game company declares that they will no longer be writing
} software compatible with that more or less obscure sound card or any
} other existing sound card save for a recently introduced brand X95.
} The majority of their customer base would have to buy X95 to use their
} future games.
The point is that the majority of their customer base *already* has
or is going to buy "X95". Why should they limit the growth of their
product, and their market base, for the sake of a few people who
stubbornly hang on to an unaccepted fringe OS?
cheers,
-*-
charles
Tero Paananen
>Believe me, in a year, we'll all wonder how we
>ever put up with DOS headaches for so long.
Yeps, because we're busy wondering all the Win95 headaches.
-TPP
William Lane
: Yes, we're all going to go through this painful transitionary year
: where we try to make DOS apps and older Windows apps run well under
: Windows 95. I've found Windows 95 to be great but there are always
: some problems that can crop up with anything new and it's definitely
: new. But once software developers are all firmly in the Windows 95
: camp we'll look back at the DOS days and wonder how we ever managed.
: Mark Rein,
: Epic MegaGames.
Did good ole' Uncle Bill pay this guy off or WHAT? What's
uncle Bill threatening to do, but OUT YOUR COMPANY and fire you or
something? Or is he just slipping you and your company a few bills
to do "the right thing." It's kinda of strange that I don't here ANY
other games companies raving about windows 95, and damn few of my
friends/acquaintances either...
Brian Hillegass
>
[snip]
> Did good ole' Uncle Bill pay this guy off or WHAT? What's
>uncle Bill threatening to do, but OUT YOUR COMPANY and fire you or
>something? Or is he just slipping you and your company a few bills
>to do "the right thing." It's kinda of strange that I don't here ANY
>other games companies raving about windows 95, and damn few of my
>friends/acquaintances either...
If you meant 'hear other companies', then maybe you're not listening. MANY
(most?) companies are starting to code their games for Win95. I'm not
proclaiming Bill/M$ as the second coming, but they've got industry support.
Maybe you didn't notice that Quake is going to come out as a DOS/Win95 app,
Ultima 9 will be Win95 ONLY, ad nauseum.
I'm not trying to start another advocacy debate. I just had to throw my $0.02
out.
--
Brian (bri...@fast.net) How noiseless falls the foot of time!
----Let's Go Flyers!!---- --W. R. Spencer
Dave Glue
> Did good ole' Uncle Bill pay this guy off or WHAT? What's
>uncle Bill threatening to do, but OUT YOUR COMPANY and fire you or
>something? Or is he just slipping you and your company a few bills
>to do "the right thing." It's kinda of strange that I don't here ANY
>other games companies raving about windows 95, and damn few of my
>friends/acquaintances either...
If you haven't heard other games companies raving about Win95, you
haven't asked. Check out PC Gamer and CGW back issues when they had
features on Win95- there were _plenty_ of positive comments on Win95
from developers.
Greg Connor
> Did good ole' Uncle Bill pay this guy off or WHAT? What's
>uncle Bill threatening to do, but OUT YOUR COMPANY and fire you or
>something? Or is he just slipping you and your company a few bills
>to do "the right thing." It's kinda of strange that I don't here ANY
>other games companies raving about windows 95, and damn few of my
>friends/acquaintances either...
I understand for those whose platform is not Win95, this might seem
strange, but the platform before, namely DOS, was "Uncle Bill's" too.
Is it so strange for all the software companies (if you don't think
all the software companies are moving to Win95 go look at Microsoft's
game web page for who's who of game companies throwing their support
behind it) to want to eliminate their hardware support headaches and
use faster and more simplified development tools?
Does that mean Win95 is a great operating system? No, its adequate.
However, one thing is for sure, it makes a hell of a development
platform for games for three reasons:
1. Direct X device interface for seamless hardware support including
soundcards, digital joysticks, feedback VR headsets, etc.
2. It runs as fast or faster than DOS.
3. Seamless networking with DirectPlay making it very easy to write
games with networking features.
What does all this mean? Despite Win95s other lackluster features, if
you love games, you WILL buy Win95 - at least as a gaming platform. A
fait accompli for "uncle Bill."
-Greg Connor
Mark Rein (Epic)
>find NO mention whatsoever of anything called UNREAL on Epic's web site.
>Is there any way for a person who's just not crazy about pinball games to
>see these images?
Not yet. Probably not until after Christmas. Our web site is getting
seriously bogged down by the high number of accesses and it wouldn't
be fair to slow it down further with screen shots of games people
can't buy yet. We've ordered a T1 and it should be installed sometime
in December which will increase capacity a lot.
Mark Rein (Epic)
>man. Origin will be moving to Win 95 only in about a year, so too would Sierra
>(from the looks of it). In a couple of years, most companies will be releasing
>their games Win 95 only. As for "no other games company raving about Win 95"
>check out any game mags and you'll see plenty (especially Origin).
We're not talking about a "couple of years" - we're talking about a
couple of MONTHS.
Everyone Loves Fudge
>
>xfo...@atlantis.actrix.gen.nz (Michael Fouhy) wrote:
>
>>In article <47tnao$c...@sam.inforamp.net>,
>>Mark Rein (Epic) <mr...@inforamp.net> wrote:
>>> sound quality. ALL of our new games are for Windows 95 and we've
>>
>>All of them?
>>
>>Including Jazz2, OMF II, Extreme Pinball, etc?
>>
>
>Win95 on the part of game developers. They certainly know better than
>I do about such things, and they seem to be generally pleased with
>ever put up with DOS headaches for so long.
>
>
>
install linux on your system. unix compatible command prompt <no need for
internet software, just type "ppp" or "telnet" or some such from the command
line>, it runs All major file systems <ms-dos, mac files, you name it>, has No
memory limitations, and it's FREE. absolutely FREE. public domain software.
why would you Want to install an operating system that eats up a quater of
your computer's resources and forces you to pay through the nose to be
tethered to microsoft?
elf.
Mark Rein (Epic)
>games. I was not expecting them to write for OS/2. In this case, they
>are abandoning a platform (Dos) that they previously supported.
We're being forced to abandon DOS because that's what the developer of
DOS is doing and that's what the market is demanding and we're not
about to apologize for it. In fact, we're delighted with the move. The
entire industry is moving in this direction. Our retail publisher,
Electronic Arts, doesn't want DOS games anymore because their
customers, the retail stores, don't want them either. Even if we tried
to develop BOTH DOS and Windows 95 games all of the games would be
delayed and by the time they were released the DOS versions would have
a severely reduced market. I'm sure you're well aware of the many
up-sides to Windows 95 from a developers point of view.
That's my company Vice President view. From a personal (ie. gamer's)
standpoint Windows 95 is wonderful! No more worries about
installation or sound card support. No more making DOS boot diskettes,
CONFIG.SYS modifications or rebooting. No more worrying about device
support - once a device is installed under Windows it will work in the
game if it's required. No more tying up my machine to run a game - if
I need to get at some data or write a quick letter I only have to
pause the game and switch windows instead of rebooting as was often
the case before. I have a high-end Turtle Beach sound card which very
few games supported in the past yet it works beautifully with Windows
95 games, crystal clear sound. Super VGA in Direct Draw works just as
well as any previous DOS equivalent but without all the other
associated worries like RAM, VESA drivers, etc.
>reasons are understandable -- this move will make their development
>work theoretically much easier -- but it is nevertheless disappointing
>for many. On the other hand, Epic deserves a commission from Microsoft
>for driving sales of win 95. Hopefully, Epic will keep their prices
>reasonable with this in mind.
I think our prices are reasonable. Windows 95 makes the fringe
development tasks easier. We're talking about the ones that people
always hated doing anyway like joystick support, modem support,
internet protocols, sound card support, installation. It doesn't make
developing the game any easier but it frees the developers to
concentrate their efforts on making the core game better instead of
worrying about all the other junk.
You might find it disappointing but frankly for me Windows 95 is a
breath of fresh air. Even if the rest of the industry wasn't going in
the same direction, I would not apologize for our decision to go to
Windows 95 - it will benefit games and improve the industry.
Mark Rein (Epic)
>uncle Bill threatening to do, but OUT YOUR COMPANY and fire you or
>something? Or is he just slipping you and your company a few bills
>to do "the right thing."
That's nonsense.
>It's kinda of strange that I don't here ANY
>other games companies raving about windows 95, and damn few of my
>friends/acquaintances either...
Well maybe those companies don't have any games that are very far
along. UNREAL and Jazz II are running beautifully under windows and
installing them is sheer nothingness. Just click and go. My Turtle
Beach Monterrey sound card sounds amazing and I didn't have to do one
single thing to install it.
BTW, John Romero from id was recently quoted as saying he "loves"
Windows 95.
I know this is a big issue with people right now. But in few years
we'll all be thrilled about how well our computers work and how
Windows 95 opened up new doors for us.
Chris Ege
> Did good ole' Uncle Bill pay this guy off or WHAT? What's
>uncle Bill threatening to do, but OUT YOUR COMPANY and fire you or
>something? Or is he just slipping you and your company a few bills
>to do "the right thing." It's kinda of strange that I don't here ANY
>other games companies raving about windows 95, and damn few of my
>friends/acquaintances either...
hmm... maybe "good ole' uncle bill" has been paying off all game
companies for several years now. let's see, what was that operating
system called? MS-DOS? hmm, what does the MS stand for? I'll give
you a hint; it's not apple.
get a clue.
Markus Rytk|l{ INF
>That's my company Vice President view. From a personal (ie. gamer's)
>standpoint Windows 95 is wonderful! No more worries about
>installation or sound card support. No more making DOS boot diskettes,
>CONFIG.SYS modifications or rebooting. No more worrying about device
>support - once a device is installed under Windows it will work in the
>game if it's required. No more tying up my machine to run a game - if
>I need to get at some data or write a quick letter I only have to
>pause the game and switch windows instead of rebooting as was often
>the case before. I have a high-end Turtle Beach sound card which very
>few games supported in the past yet it works beautifully with Windows
>95 games, crystal clear sound. Super VGA in Direct Draw works just as
>well as any previous DOS equivalent but without all the other
>associated worries like RAM, VESA drivers, etc.
Ok, cool...but say, does a action game that scrolls the screen alot etc.
work as fast in Win95 as in Dos if we have a 486Dx33 or Dx50 ? or let`s
put it this way, Gamer X has a 486DX2 50,8meg, and a Cirrus5428, will
a game like Doom, Descent run as good in win95 as in Dos ? If it does,
well then I agree win95 does do good to the gaming market. but if the
answer is No, are you telling that Gamer X should get a new machine ?
just to play games ? oh well...
btw, Does your High-end Turtle have a onboard processor so the cpu usage
stays low ? and if it does, will win95 make us of it ?
//MaKa
L.J. Wischik
>uncle Bill threatening to do, but OUT YOUR COMPANY and fire you or
>something? Or is he just slipping you and your company a few bills
>to do "the right thing."
>It's kinda of strange that I don't here ANY
>other games companies raving about windows 95, and damn few of my
>friends/acquaintances either...
I've been looking for holiday employment in a computer games company.
EVERY SINGLE ONE told me: "currently-in-progress games are being
finished; but for ALL future development we will be using Windows95."
--
Lucian Wischik, Queens' College, U of Cambridge. ljw...@cam.ac.uk
Rich Schmidt
>Oh, I don't know, maybe so we can play games? For some reason I thought
>this was comp.sys.IBM.PC.GAMES. This implies that we enjoy playing games
>on Intel/PC architectures, and the last game I know of to be released for
>Linux is Abuse, then DOOM before that, then...Moria! And don't
>claim that everyone should use the Dosemu emulation software because its
>slooow. Yeah, I run Linux, but I also run DOS/Win95 for games and other
>things like word processing, etc. Why is someone who is a strict linux
>adherant/DOS despiser even reading this group?
Yeah, it's IBM.PC.GAMES -- you yourself know that you can run Linux on
Intel/PC architectures. This isn't "DOS games only" or "Win95 games
only" or whatever. The guy was completely in line, even though this
thread isn't.
Why do I do this...
Ron Asbestos Dippold
95. Win '95 does a lot of stuff that DOS doesn't, and removes
incompatabilities, so makes less work for the game companies, of course
they're going to love it. It's hard to blame them for writing for it. On
the other hand, actually doing serious work under Win '95 and doing useful
things which involves multiple things running at once with it is just
painful and disgusting and horrid. I've tried, honest. So just set up one
partition with Win 95 and the rest with OS/2 or Linux or something that's
actually robust, and downgrade and boot Win 95 when you need to play Win 95
games. It's what I do, and it's not too horrible. Advocacy is okay, but
flexibility will get you more places. Deal with it in a practical manner.
--
Whether you can hear it or not, the Universe is laughing behind your back.
Jamison Collins
> Ok, cool...but say, does a action game that scrolls the screen alot etc.
>work as fast in Win95 as in Dos if we have a 486Dx33 or Dx50 ? or let`s
>put it this way, Gamer X has a 486DX2 50,8meg, and a Cirrus5428, will
>a game like Doom, Descent run as good in win95 as in Dos ? If it does,
>well then I agree win95 does do good to the gaming market. but if the
>answer is No, are you telling that Gamer X should get a new machine ?
>just to play games ? oh well...
That computer was already at the low end of the market. On my friends
DX2 66 he has gotten extremely good graphix rates in Win 3.11 with
only WinG, and since Win95 goez faster, it should be even better.
Jamison Collins
Missionary rank: PFC
Missionary record: 2 - 1
In order to avoid entrapment, law enforcement officials are
required to reveal that they are the said officials upon
request. Let this serve as my request to know to anyone
reading this message.
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"The problem with conservatisism is it uses new techniques to
return to old ways..."
Keiko Aimee O'leary
DooMer
: If you meant 'hear other companies', then maybe you're not listening. MANY
: proclaiming Bill/M$ as the second coming, but they've got industry support.
: I'm not trying to start another advocacy debate. I just had to throw my $0.02
: out.
Wrong, Quake will be out for DOS, linux/unix variants, then
win95. In a message in a linux group, Dave Taylor said that DOS will be
the fastest version of Quake, for the sole reason that it has direct
video access.. Linux guys are developing a new way to do a direct video
access also.. Therefore Dave Taylor ended his message with explaining
about how DOS/Linux will be the fastest versions of quake available..
While DOS may not be pretty enough for some, it still will outperform
these new OS's..
Chris
: --
Mark Rein (Epic)
>work as fast in Win95 as in Dos if we have a 486Dx33 or Dx50 ?
Yes. But that doesn't mean a game wouldn't still suck on so slow a
processor. Windows 95 doesn't speed things up, it just levels the
playing field. In the past games under Windows were much slower
whereas now they can run just about as fast as they did under DOS. In
some cases faster.
Corporal Punishment
point out that Epic is pretty much the only company I heard telling us how
"cool" or "awesome" their games are. It just bugs me, I don't know why. I
never saw anyone from ID bragging about how cool DOOM is, of someone from
Interplay telling us how much he thinks Descent is a "Doom-Killer". I laughed
when I read Mark's post about how Extreme is so much better than Quake, and
how awesome the screen-shots look. Give us a break! Have you played Quake
yet? Didn't think so. Any moron knows that you can't judge a game by a (or
two in this case, I think) screen-shots.
I guess what I'm trying to say is, don't ruin that nice feeling we're
getting from you by negative-advertising your games when they're not even
released, and by comparing them against other games that are also not
yet released. Let us make up our own opinions by trying out the shareware
versions that you so generously provide to us.
--
808 Aleksander Zawisza, Applied Science (EE), Queen's University 808
808 WWW: http://qlink.queensu.ca/~3awz/ e-mail: 3a...@qlink.queensu.ca 808
808 The Queen's Computer Generated Imagery page: 808
808 http://engsoc.queensu.ca/design/qcgi/ 808
Markus Rytk|l{ INF
>Yes. But that doesn't mean a game wouldn't still suck on so slow a
>processor. Windows 95 doesn't speed things up, it just levels the
>playing field. In the past games under Windows were much slower
>whereas now they can run just about as fast as they did under DOS. In
>some cases faster.
...so Epic MegaGames are telling the public that poor people with a
'sucky' dx50 can't enjoy Epic games, Cause we at Epic feel that the
people with money to get P133s are the group to target the Epic games
at ? or am I wrong ? Actually I thought that VERY many familys that
buy games for their children still have a dx33 or dx50 on their table?
So come on dad, you have to get me a new computer every 2nd year so
that I can play Epic games (well Origin too)...It'll just cost you
about $2500...
Anyway, the PC game market is totally screwed anyway, think about it,
we STILL use Sblaster or compatibles to get sound, and the damn things
don't even have their own processor to get load of the Cpu.
//MaKa
William Lane
going to WinBlOWS 95? THe fact that if a game used
to require say 4MB of RAM to run I'll now have to
have 20MB to run it! 4MB for the game and the OTHER
16MB to load WINBLOWS 95 to start the friggin' game.
This move to WINBLOWS 95 to run games seems absolutely
insane. It's already a fact taht WINBLOWS 95 is buggy,
so I guess now we'll all get to play the great game
TROUBLESHOOTER in which the consumer gets to debug NOT
only the game but the OS as well? EPIC will have the
great advantage (from a technical support standpoint)
of being able to point fingers at MS!
Steven E. Hugg
mryt...@news.abo.fi (Markus Rytk|l{ INF) wrote:
>mr...@inforamp.net (Mark Rein (Epic)) writes:
>
>>Yes. But that doesn't mean a game wouldn't still suck on so slow a
>>processor. Windows 95 doesn't speed things up, it just levels the
>>playing field. In the past games under Windows were much slower
>>whereas now they can run just about as fast as they did under DOS. In
>>some cases faster.
>
> ...so Epic MegaGames are telling the public that poor people with a
>'sucky' dx50 can't enjoy Epic games, Cause we at Epic feel that the
>people with money to get P133s are the group to target the Epic games
>at ? or am I wrong ? Actually I thought that VERY many familys that
>buy games for their children still have a dx33 or dx50 on their table?
The solution to this problem is already being taken care of -- just shove
"Intel Inside" commercials down people's throats until they are positive that
if they don't buy little Tommy a Pentium for Christmas, he will become a crack
dealer by age 14.
---------------------------------------------------------------------
Steven E. Hugg
HAMCO Software
Jason Zisk
>In article <494j11$k...@sam.inforamp.net>
> mr...@inforamp.net "Mark Rein (Epic" writes:
> Therefore there is no advantage to writing them under Win95; after all,
>Win95 slows down other things and takes up way too many system resources. I
>really have doubts about an OS that, when you type request a directory, has
>to read the directory track, open every file in the directory, load a
>resource table from each one, search that for a certain entry, load that entry
>if there is one present, look up another one from memory if there isn't,
>calculate where on screen that image should be placed, calculate how much of
>the image should be displayed, read from a file that stores where the images
>should be based.. JUST so that you can have a dinky little icon to click on!
>Although GUI's are useful in some ways, I can't see how having a picture of
>an ornate W above the name of the word processor improves productivity,
>playability, or anything else.
If someone wrote a game in straight assembly with no OS, it would fly.
No doubts about it. The only problem is that the game would be buggy
if it was slightly complex...Win95's advantages are that it provides
device independance to the developer. It may be slower, but it is
really negligable because the game can be releases so much sooner and
very bug free. Plus there are some API calls that would take a long
time and a lot of effort to write in the GDK. I would rather have
microsoft write them for me, than write my own and have them be less
effective. Would you rather have a game that was buggy and out 1 year
after supposed relase, or a game that was 1 fps slower but installs
without problems and runs perfect every time?
> In any case, I was under the impression that an awful lot of games these
>days don't even run under DOS - they load it, then kick it out of memory.
>Why did they do this? Because DOS was too restrictive. And some day Win95
>will be too restrictive...
Maybe, although I have never heard of this technique...do you mean
running thier own internal 32-bit extenders maybe?
- Jason Zisk
- Sophmore at the University of Hartford College of Arts and Sciences
- email: zi...@uhavax.hartford.edu
Mark Rein (Epic)
>up on a web/ftp site? I'd really like to see these pics that everyone's
>ranting about. Thanks,
They're in the game Extreme Pinball which you can download from our
web site. They in the Read This section on pages 5 and 6.
Alden Bates
: And some day Win95 will be too restrictive...
Next Tuesday, in fact. :-)
Alden Bates.
--
/| |~) "Is lower the lofty tone no enormously end, monkey-hominids going
/===== shit sod bugger all the sodding time." - Unnamed Sloathe
/ | |_) - Dave Stone, Doctor Who: Sky Pirates!
Alden Bates, aba...@central.co.nz
Tiitus Tamminen
->win95. In a message in a linux group, Dave Taylor said that DOS will be
->the fastest version of Quake, for the sole reason that it has direct
->video access.. Linux guys are developing a new way to do a direct video
Did he mean with or without a 3D accelerator? Will the DOS and
Linux versions support the new 3D hardware?
--
TLT ---> http://spider.compart.fi/~ttammi/ <---
Mark Rein (Epic)
>point out that Epic is pretty much the only company I heard telling us how
>"cool" or "awesome" their games are.
Give me a break! We're usually the last people to hype games! Read
anything written by id about Quake and you'll find a lot of "braggin".
Read anything written by Apogee and you'll find the same thing.
>never saw anyone from ID bragging about how cool DOOM is
You must not have been looking very hard.
>how awesome the screen-shots look. Give us a break! Have you played Quake
>yet?
Yes I have actually.
> I guess what I'm trying to say is, don't ruin that nice feeling we're
>getting from you by negative-advertising your games when they're not even
>released, and by comparing them against other games that are also not
>yet released. Let us make up our own opinions by trying out the shareware
>versions that you so generously provide to us.
I see your point. But you have to realize that the days of BBSes and
id, Apogee and Epic having a guaranteed audience are over. It used to
be that we shareware companies had the BBSes almost all to ourselves.
Now BBSes are mostly dead and everybody has a web site. This means we
have to scream a little louder to be heard over the crowd. I'm sorry
that it offends you but it's the only way a small company like us can
be heard in a giant sea like the Internet.
There is a massive amount of hype around Quake carefully orchestrated
by id Software (check out all the magazine interviews). We need to
combat that a little bit because we think we'll have a very worthy
competitor.
Bruce Geerdes
> ...so Epic MegaGames are telling the public that poor people with a
> 'sucky' dx50 can't enjoy Epic games, Cause we at Epic feel that the
> people with money to get P133s are the group to target the Epic games
> at ? or am I wrong ? Actually I thought that VERY many familys that
> buy games for their children still have a dx33 or dx50 on their table?
I take it you own a dx50, else you'd also be whining about the market no
longer supporting 386's, 286's, and XT's. Guess what? The latest and greatest
games are *not* going to run well on low-end machines! Surprise!
> Anyway, the PC game market is totally screwed anyway, think about it,
> we STILL use Sblaster or compatibles to get sound, and the damn things
> don't even have their own processor to get load of the Cpu.
Oh gee, but if the software companies left the Soundblaster standard behind
you'd be whining about having to buy a new soundcard!
--
bgee...@igs.com (Bruce Geerdes)
C:\ONGRTLNS.W95
Markus Rytk|l{ INF
>You know what I LOVE about the fact that EPIC is
>going to WinBlOWS 95? THe fact that if a game used
>to require say 4MB of RAM to run I'll now have to
>have 20MB to run it! 4MB for the game and the OTHER
>16MB to load WINBLOWS 95 to start the friggin' game.
Ok boys and girls, you wanna play Jazz jackRabbit clone ? you gotta
have a minimum 8mb but 16mb would be better, I know I know, on the
Amiga you could play a game like that with 1mb but in the year 1995
you need a minimum of 8mb.
I was thinking the other day that I should buy a PentiumPro to play
this awesome new version of Minesweeper...my friend has the same version
running in 128kb but I heard that Epics new version will only require 8mbs...
//MaKa
BamBam
>
>>You know what I LOVE about the fact that EPIC is
>>going to WinBlOWS 95?
>
>going to Windows 95. Are you not aware that the entire PC game
>industry is moving to Windows 95. Ask any major game company and they
>will tell you that.
>
>We recently signed two more publishing contracts with Electronic Arts.
>EA insisted that the only PC platform they wanted was Windows 95. They
>didn't even want DOS versions of the games.
>
>This movement isn't something we invented.
>
>
>Mark Rein,
>Epic MegaGames.
>
>Check out the Epic Web Site at http://www.epicgames.com or
>GO EPIC on CompuServe to visit our forum or download our latest
>shareware games via FTP at ftp.uml.edu in /msdos/games/epic
>
First I would hope that by "you people" you mean the few malcontents who are
probably using OS/2, and when games go WIN95 instead of DOS they will have
none to play. Second, the more informed of us know that you are not the
only company doing this, 10 or so featured in a past PC Gamer Mag article
and 20 or more listed on Microsoft's WWW site, and most of us appreciate
what you are doing. I run a measly 486/33 8MB RAM system and so far games
under '95 have not been disappointing, ie. PitFall. Don't get goaded into a
flame war by a few malcontents. We appreciate the job you are doing!
Dale
Markus Rytk|l{ INF
>I take it you own a dx50, else you'd also be whining about the market no
>longer supporting 386's, 286's, and XT's. Guess what? The latest and greatest
>games are *not* going to run well on low-end machines! Surprise!
Bruce, I don't ;)
>Oh gee, but if the software companies left the Soundblaster standard behind
>you'd be whining about having to buy a new soundcard!
I see you think the SB standard is allright :) , well I assume you haven't
heard anything better, nor seen better technology.
//MaKa
Dave Glue
INF) wrote:
> Ok boys and girls, you wanna play Jazz jackRabbit clone ? you gotta
>have a minimum 8mb but 16mb would be better, I know I know, on the
>Amiga you could play a game like that with 1mb but in the year 1995
>you need a minimum of 8mb.
That's part of the difference between 320*200 in 32 colours and
640*480 in 256 colours with 5 layers of parallax scrolling. Wow- more
memory. Who would have thunk it?
Jeramia Ory
: You know it's amazing. You people talk like we're the only company
: going to Windows 95. Are you not aware that the entire PC game
: industry is moving to Windows 95. Ask any major game company and they
: will tell you that.
: This movement isn't something we invented.
No, you left that up to the Microsoft Marketing Division. You all
can argue technical merits, movement of the industry, until the cows come
home, but the only real reason the industry is moving to Windows 95 is
simple: Microsoft and the megabucks they dumped into hauling this thing
into the marketplace. From the MAJOR attitude you have been throwing
around, I can tell you won't care one whit about my next statement, but
oh well. Any Epic product that is Win95 only is a lost sale from me. The
ONLY game that has even made me _think_ about dedicating a partition to
Win95 is Ultima 9, and that is only because I am an Ultima nut. Another
action game? Please...
---------------------------------------------------------------------------
Jeramia Ory - Resident UnixWeenie | Alchemic Dragon | "Friends don't
o...@lenti.med.umn.edu | --=(UDIC)=-- | let friends
http://lenti.med.umn.edu/~ory/home.html | OS/2 Warp ver3 | use VAX/VMS."
---------------------------------------------------------------------------
Bill
: oh well. Any Epic product that is Win95 only is a lost sale from me. The
: ONLY game that has even made me _think_ about dedicating a partition to
: Win95 is Ultima 9, and that is only because I am an Ultima nut. Another
: action game? Please...
I've dedicated a partition to running DOS for games, I don't see the problem with
dedicating a partition for running Windows'95 games. Of course I
probably won't include much in the Win95 setup. Just the bare minimum.
If the DOS game companies want to start treating Win95 like they used to
treat DOS, I might too. According to what I've read, Win95 is a better
game platform than DOS.
That doesn't mean I'll give up my OS/2 for doing everything else.
--
+-------------------+----------------------------+------------------------+
| Bill Poitras | Molecular Simulations Inc. | Tel (408)522-0116 |
| bi...@ba.msi.com | Sunnyvale, CA 94087-40237 | FAX (408)522-0199 |
+-------------------+----------------------------+------------------------+
|FTP Mail |mail ftp...@decwrl.dec.com | Offers:ftp via email |
| |Subject:<CR>help<CR>quit | |
+-------------------------------------------------------------------------+
nelson jeffrey dale
>Mark Rein (Epic) (mr...@inforamp.net) was heard babbling about:
>: You know it's amazing. You people talk like we're the only company
>: going to Windows 95. Are you not aware that the entire PC game
>: industry is moving to Windows 95. Ask any major game company and they
>: will tell you that.
>[snip]
>: This movement isn't something we invented.
> No, you left that up to the Microsoft Marketing Division. You all
>can argue technical merits, movement of the industry, until the cows come
>home, but the only real reason the industry is moving to Windows 95 is
>simple: Microsoft and the megabucks they dumped into hauling this thing
>into the marketplace.
I just wonder why all these companies have started assuming that DOS and
Windows 3.1 have all been magically erased from computers all over the
world. I still have no intention of buying WIN95 on my own (I'll accept
it as a gift or with a new computer, not before). Not everybody has
switched to WIN95. Of course it seems like everyone will have to since
the software companies are going to ignore the existence of any OS other
than WIN95.
>From the MAJOR attitude you have been throwing
>around, I can tell you won't care one whit about my next statement, but
>oh well. Any Epic product that is Win95 only is a lost sale from me.
...and a lost sale from me, as well. I liked many of Epic's games (Epic
Pinball is one of my favorites), but if they are going to ignore DOS users
completely, I will see them in a new light.
Richard Wang
>Corporal Punishment (3a...@qlink.queensu.ca) wrote:
>: never saw anyone from ID bragging about how cool DOOM is, of someone from
>
>No? New to the net, eh? One word...and it isn't even a word. SPISPOPD.
>
>Howard
>
You wot?
Bruce Geerdes
Actually, I have an Ensoniq Soundscape and am a bit peeved whenever I encounter
a game that doesn't support it and I have to settle for mono-Soundblaster mode.
I just found it a bit contradictory that on one hand you were complaining that
game companies were leaving old technology behind (e.g., games need a Pentium
to run well) and on the other hand blasting them for clinging to old
technology (Soundblaster).
Bruce Geerdes
> On 29 Nov 1995 22:04:11 GMT, jdne...@cehpx20.cen.uiuc.edu (nelson
> jeffrey dale) wrote:
> >...and a lost sale from me, as well. I liked many of Epic's games (Epic
> >Pinball is one of my favorites), but if they are going to ignore DOS users
> >completely, I will see them in a new light.
> You'll be seeing a lot of companies in a new light. The problem isn't
> Epic moving to Win95, it's that you haven't been following the
> migration and announcements from _many_ gaming companies moving to 95.
> Epic is hardly alone in this area. If you want to stick to DOS, your
> selections in gaming in 96 will be _severly_ limited.
I imagine some companies may come out with DOS versions of their
games, but if they do they'll be released some time after the Win95 versions.
As long as the DOS market share is greater than or equal to the Mac's, there'll
be some hope for some good games. After all, Doom II and Dark Forces were
both ported to the Mac.
Chris Ege
Ory) wrote:
> No, you left that up to the Microsoft Marketing Division. You all
>can argue technical merits, movement of the industry, until the cows come
>home, but the only real reason the industry is moving to Windows 95 is
>simple: Microsoft and the megabucks they dumped into hauling this thing
>into the marketplace.
have you ever developed a hi-res 3-d realtime game? probably not.
sure, its possible to write it in DOS (mechwarrior2, etc are good
examples) but developers all have to write their own interfaces with
video cads and other hardware. lots of fun. with windows 95, you
don't have do do any of that. i guess game developers should be pissed
because they don't get to develop code to interact with different
cards.
> From the MAJOR attitude you have been throwing
>around, I can tell you won't care one whit about my next statement, but
>oh well. Any Epic product that is Win95 only is a lost sale from me. The
do you think any games company gives a flying fuck if one paranoid
person gets really pissed and starts acting like a complete asshole,
threatening to "boycott" them? no. it doesn't bother them. the games
market is big enough that companies don't have to try to make friends
with every customer.
Dave Glue
jeffrey dale) wrote:
>I just wonder why all these companies have started assuming that DOS and
>Windows 3.1 have all been magically erased from computers all over the
>world. I still have no intention of buying WIN95 on my own (I'll accept
>it as a gift or with a new computer, not before). Not everybody has
>switched to WIN95. Of course it seems like everyone will have to since
>the software companies are going to ignore the existence of any OS other
>than WIN95.
The fact is a lot of Win95 sales are going into homes. And those
machines which can run 95 are prime candiates for future games, not
only because of their location but because of the resources they have-
all those Win 3.1 and 386SX DOS machines are _not_ a significant
portion of the gaming market. As well, the reduced development costs
and support costs dealing with Win95 games is another attraction, as
well as hardware support difficult or impossible to do under DOS. And
these Win95 games will not show up until late first quarter-96, where
95 will most likely have sold over 20 million. Add all those up, and
it's simply far more attractive for developers than DOS.
Don Becker
>I just wonder why all these companies have started assuming that DOS and
>Windows 3.1 have all been magically erased from computers all over the
>world. I still have no intention of buying WIN95 on my own (I'll accept
>it as a gift or with a new computer, not before). Not everybody has
>switched to WIN95. Of course it seems like everyone will have to since
>the software companies are going to ignore the existence of any OS other
>than WIN95.
>I liked many of Epic's games (Epic
>Pinball is one of my favorites), but if they are going to ignore DOS users
>completely, I will see them in a new light.
Wasn't Mark also "babbling about" multi-platform support for Epic's
games? I would assume that would include DOS-only users as well.
Personally, I'd hate to see them *not* support Win95. Considering MS's
market share and the amount of people who will switch to Win95 in the
coming year (like all the people waiting for the first bug fixes to be
released), it would be their funeral.
--Don
--
/ Don Becker -- bec...@panther.adelphi.edu -- http://www.adelphi.edu/~becker/ \
| "...and if my owners let me have some free time someday, with all good |
| intention, I would probably run away, clutching the short straw..." |
\ --Marillion, "That Time Of The Night (The Short Straw)" (1987) /
Chris Ege
jeffrey dale) wrote:
>o...@dc-crystal.med.umn.edu (Jeramia Ory) writes:
>
>I just wonder why all these companies have started assuming that DOS and
>Windows 3.1 have all been magically erased from computers all over the
>world. I still have no intention of buying WIN95 on my own (I'll accept
>it as a gift or with a new computer, not before). Not everybody has
>switched to WIN95. Of course it seems like everyone will have to since
>the software companies are going to ignore the existence of any OS other
>than WIN95.
Well, i can see why. Win95 is an obious improvement over dos/win3.11.
You can argue that linux or os/2 are better all you want, but
feature-wise, win95 is much better than win3.11/dos.
Lt. Warf
»Markus Rytk|l{ INF (mryt...@news.abo.fi) wrote:
»> ...so Epic MegaGames are telling the public that poor people with a
»> 'sucky' dx50 can't enjoy Epic games, Cause we at Epic feel that the
»> people with money to get P133s are the group to target the Epic games
»> at ? or am I wrong ? Actually I thought that VERY many familys that
»> buy games for their children still have a dx33 or dx50 on their table?
»I take it you own a dx50, else you'd also be whining about the market no
»longer supporting 386's, 286's, and XT's. Guess what? The latest and greatest
»games are *not* going to run well on low-end machines! Surprise!
Low-end machines? DX50? Are you real, or an invention of MS/Intel? A
year ago this was still a powerfull machine (And I think it still
is..) Maybe those guys who call themselves programmers should leave
their 4GL-languages at home and start programming something efficient.
low-end? BULLSHIT!
»> Anyway, the PC game market is totally screwed anyway, think about it,
»> we STILL use Sblaster or compatibles to get sound, and the damn things
»> don't even have their own processor to get load of the Cpu.
»Oh gee, but if the software companies left the Soundblaster standard behind
»you'd be whining about having to buy a new soundcard!
Putting a CPU on a soundcard doesn't mean you have to leave the
SB-standard behind. It just means that if you are using a SB (without
an extra CPU) youre computer has to work harder than with a soundcard
with extra CPU. you talk BULLSHIT again......
Lt. J. 'I am klingon' Warf
Bruce Geerdes
> Mark Rein (Epic) (mr...@inforamp.net) was heard babbling about:
> can argue technical merits, movement of the industry, until the cows come
> home, but the only real reason the industry is moving to Windows 95 is
> simple: Microsoft and the megabucks they dumped into hauling this thing
> into the marketplace.
MSDOS and Windows3 didn't come to dominate the market because of "technical
merits" so I see no reason why Windows95 should have to.
> From the MAJOR attitude you have been throwing
> around, I can tell you won't care one whit about my next statement, but
> oh well. Any Epic product that is Win95 only is a lost sale from me.
And you'll learn what Amiga and Atari ST owners learned long ago: if you want
the latest/greatest software, you have to go with the flow.
Major attitude? Sounds to me more like excitement that they won't have to
deal with MSDOS any more. If I was in their position I'd be trying to push
everyone into Windows95 too. :)
Bruce Geerdes
> bgee...@igs.com (Bruce Geerdes) wrote:
> »I take it you own a dx50, else you'd also be whining about the market no
> »longer supporting 386's, 286's, and XT's. Guess what? The latest and greatest
> »games are *not* going to run well on low-end machines! Surprise!
> Low-end machines? DX50? Are you real, or an invention of MS/Intel? A
> year ago this was still a powerfull machine (And I think it still
> is..) Maybe those guys who call themselves programmers should leave
> their 4GL-languages at home and start programming something efficient.
> low-end? BULLSHIT!
Get with the times. I bought my P90 a year ago; the DX50 was *not*
considered a "powerful machine".
For the record, I am not a MS/Intel invention. The machine I have now is the
first Intel computer I've owned and the only reason I bought it is because
it is what most software is written for. For that, I have goofballs like
you, who have been buying Intels for the past 10+ years instead of the
superior architectures available (Mac, Amiga, anything!), to blame.
> »Oh gee, but if the software companies left the Soundblaster standard behind
> »you'd be whining about having to buy a new soundcard!
>
> Putting a CPU on a soundcard doesn't mean you have to leave the
> SB-standard behind. It just means that if you are using a SB (without
> an extra CPU) youre computer has to work harder than with a soundcard
> with extra CPU. you talk BULLSHIT again......
But then those running games with Soundblasters would complain that their
computers (DX50's, to be sure) had to work harder and were going too slow.
It's those lazy-assed programmers! Why else would Quake II run so slow on my
DX50?
Christopher Lamar Bell
In article <49jctr$h...@driene.student.utwente.nl>, h.c.g...@student.utwente.nl (Lt. Warf) writes:
>bgee...@igs.com (Bruce Geerdes) wrote:
>
>»Markus Rytk|l{ INF (mryt...@news.abo.fi) wrote:
>»> ...so Epic MegaGames are telling the public that poor people with a
>»> 'sucky' dx50 can't enjoy Epic games, Cause we at Epic feel that the
>»> people with money to get P133s are the group to target the Epic games
>»> at ? or am I wrong ? Actually I thought that VERY many familys that
>»> buy games for their children still have a dx33 or dx50 on their table?
>
>»longer supporting 386's, 286's, and XT's. Guess what? The latest and greatest
>»games are *not* going to run well on low-end machines! Surprise!
>
>Low-end machines? DX50? Are you real, or an invention of MS/Intel? A
>year ago this was still a powerfull machine (And I think it still
>is..) Maybe those guys who call themselves programmers should leave
>their 4GL-languages at home and start programming something efficient.
>low-end? BULLSHIT!
Computer speed (processor speed at least) seems to grow exponentially
with time, so yes, a DX50 probably should be considered low-end by now.
Chris
Bob Duncan
>>computers (DX50's, to be sure) had to work harder and were going too slow.
>>It's those lazy-assed programmers! Why else would Quake II run so slow on my
>>DX50?
>
>games than $2500 for a new P :) ? Dont you ?
>
>//MaKa
Eveerybody does have a point - programming could be more efficient; however, as
the times change, we as users begin to expect more from a program/game. This
means MORE drive space, MORE ram and MORE power...
It's a Catch-22.
Led Mirage
Christopher Lamar Bell <clb...@eos.ncsu.edu> wrote:
>>Low-end machines? DX50? Are you real, or an invention of MS/Intel? A
>>year ago this was still a powerfull machine (And I think it still
>>is..) Maybe those guys who call themselves programmers should leave
>>their 4GL-languages at home and start programming something efficient.
>>low-end? BULLSHIT!
>
>Computer speed (processor speed at least) seems to grow exponentially
>with time, so yes, a DX50 probably should be considered low-end by now.
>
I went to do some games shopping the other day (many, many new games), and many
of those listed 486 DX-2/66 as minimum requirement. So if DX-50 is not low-end,
I don't know what is (any 386s are kiddie toys, and 486-33 is boderline toy)
Markus Rytk|l{ INF
>Get with the times. I bought my P90 a year ago; the DX50 was *not*
>considered a "powerful machine".
N. Liebmann
so we must suffer, but lets look on the bright side.
All these games programmers have got sod all to do now,
seeing as MS have done it all for them,
So games prices will drop - wont they ????!!!
Nick
Walter Meyer
Of cause not. All these companies now have to shell out loads of money to
Micro$osft to get developer support. 8)
Walter
>Nick
Richard Ward
The computer store I work at does not vene sell 80486 machines anymore. The
fact of the matter is that games will always be pushing the power envelope of
existing computers (anyone want to hazard a guess at how many computers were
upgraded for DOOM in late '93 and early '94) and will always do so. It sucks
that companies abandon older platforms as soon as new and more pwerfull
platforms come around, but it is not all their fault. "We" - the game buying
public - want games with better graphics, more moving sprites, cooler music,
etc... When companies _do_ write games for the lower end the game buyers
complain about the flat graphics or the fact it is 16 colors, etc... and
slamming the game as a ripp-off.
--
+----------------------------------------------------------------------------+
| "The box...you opened it. We came. It's a means to summon us - Cenobites. |
| Explorers in the further regions of experience. Demons to some, angels to |
| others. ... No tears please. It's a waste of good suffering." - Pinhead |
| rrw...@netcom.com Richard R. Ward |
+----------------------------------------------------------------------------+
Bill
: I don't advocate the use Win '95, but it's gonna be around for a while,
:
: All these games programmers have got sod all to do now,
: seeing as MS have done it all for them,
:
: So games prices will drop - wont they ????!!!
They are probably going to have to. If Win'95 is as good for games as MS
says it is, then companies are going to have to work harder to distingish
their games. They won't have to worry about mouse, joystick, sound or
music support. They will all have the same thing. And they will have
access to multithreading, something very few developers (outside of OS/2
game develoes ) have had access to.
Game developers will spend all their time learning new rendering
techniques, composing better music and flashier graphics.
Eventually, price will also have to be a consideration, especially given
the power coming to the consoles.
Chris
> this thread at all, you would realize we're talking about Jazz for
> WINDOWS 95. The previous posted decreed that it would take more
> memory than the DOS version. Of course it will take more memory due
> to the advances it has over the DOS version. Please slow down and
> actually _read_ the damn messages before you come off with a sarcastic
> and smug response.
Throughout time things have required more memory. I expect new games
to require more. I remember when people where amazed that SSI's D&D
Azure Bonds series required *gasp* 384k. Been a long time since that.
Things will change, more memory will be required. Just the way things
go.
Chris.
Michal Doniec
On 4 Dec 1995 18:04:49 GMT, wrm...@cip.informatik.uni-erlangen.de
(Walter Meyer) wrote:
>>So games prices will drop - wont they ????!!!
>
> Of cause not. All these companies now have to shell out loads of money to
> Micro$osft to get developer support. 8)
Actually, no.
Michal
---------------------
mor...@ns2.clever.net
Dave Glue
<019...@axe.acadiau.ca> wrote:
>>That's part of the difference between 320*200 in 32 colours and
>>640*480 in 256 colours with 5 layers of parallax scrolling. Wow- more
>>memory. Who would have thunk it?
>>
>
>Jazz runs in 640x480? interesting.
>Jazz has 5 layers of parallax scrolling? intriguing.
>
>Jazz runs in a 'shrunk' 320x200x256 mode with one layer of parallax
>scrolling (parallax to what, you might ask?). The 'shrinking' of the
>screen allows the pixels to be square, where in normal 320x200 modes are
>not since 320/200 doesn't equal 4/3 (standard monitor ratio). I can't
>believe this made you think it was in 640x480! And where did the other 4
>layers of parallax scrolling come in? If you're refering to the sky and
>the sun, it's just palette changing and an extra sprite.
>
>What's the difference in memory from 320x200x32 to 320x200x256?
>320x200x5bits/8 = 40,000 bytes
>320x200x8bits/8 = 64,000 bytes....wow! I'm going to buy my 15 extra megs
>tomorrow!
Bruce Geerdes
> Anybody can say their program will win under win95, but do they
> actually mean in a 'window'? I can't imagine having to program a game to
> handle different number of colors, different resolutions, and all in a
> pre-emptive multitasking gui.
That's the whole point of the Win95 programming environment (and why so many
game programmers are excited about it): it handles most of that for you.
Jason Doucette
>
>>You know what I LOVE about the fact that EPIC is
>>going to WinBlOWS 95? THe fact that if a game used
>>to require say 4MB of RAM to run I'll now have to
>>have 20MB to run it! 4MB for the game and the OTHER
>>16MB to load WINBLOWS 95 to start the friggin' game.
>
> Ok boys and girls, you wanna play Jazz jackRabbit clone ? you gotta
>have a minimum 8mb but 16mb would be better, I know I know, on the
>Amiga you could play a game like that with 1mb but in the year 1995
>you need a minimum of 8mb.
>
> I was thinking the other day that I should buy a PentiumPro to play
>this awesome new version of Minesweeper...my friend has the same version
>running in 128kb but I heard that Epics new version will only require >8mbs...
>
Is Epic really making games that run in Win95? Win95 can still run DOS
programs under a dos shell, and even without win95 running in the
background, as long as you tell it not to load the gui after DOS has been
booted. Anybody can say their program will win under win95, but do they
actually mean in a 'window'? I can't imagine having to program a game to
handle different number of colors, different resolutions, and all in a
pre-emptive multitasking gui.
--
Jason Allen Doucette "You know you're drunk when you feel it's
Saw Tooth Distortion necessary to inform others you're not."
019...@axe.acadiau.ca
Tiitus Tamminen
->dav...@interlog.com (Dave Glue) wrote:
->>On 27 Nov 1995 20:49:53 +0200, mryt...@news.abo.fi (Markus Rytk|l{
->>INF) wrote:
->>
->>> Ok boys and girls, you wanna play Jazz jackRabbit clone ? you gotta
->>>have a minimum 8mb but 16mb would be better, I know I know, on the
->>>Amiga you could play a game like that with 1mb but in the year 1995
->>>you need a minimum of 8mb.
->>That's part of the difference between 320*200 in 32 colours and
->>640*480 in 256 colours with 5 layers of parallax scrolling. Wow- more
->>memory. Who would have thunk it?
->
->Jazz runs in 640x480? interesting.
->Jazz has 5 layers of parallax scrolling? intriguing.
If you read the whole thread again, you'd see they were talking
about a Jazz >clone< running under Win95. Presumably Jazz 2.
--
TLT ---> http://spider.compart.fi/~ttammi/ <---
Chris Ege
<019...@axe.acadiau.ca> wrote:
>>That's part of the difference between 320*200 in 32 colours and
>>640*480 in 256 colours with 5 layers of parallax scrolling. Wow- more
>>memory. Who would have thunk it?
>>
>
>Jazz runs in 640x480? interesting.
>Jazz has 5 layers of parallax scrolling? intriguing.
>
(ahem)
read a little more carefully before you post idiotic shit like that
again. The previous poster was referring to jazz jackrabbit 2 (not 1)
which will be made to support windows95's DirectX libraries. This
game will be the one which will do the above mentioned things. So yes,
you will need more memory. If you want to know why epic (and almost
all other companies) are developing for windows 95 now, read on:
The directx libraries make it possible for games developers to write
games without worring about things like how the game will interact
with about 70 different soundcards, and literally hundreds of video
cards. Now, maybe you know otherwise, but I think games developers
would rather spend their time writing the actual game than fucking
around with video card compatibility. So a win95 game which uses
directx will be "plug and play" (i hate that term) meaning that you
will install it and play it. No messing with boot disks or sound card
drivers. if you have an obscure soundcard, such as a ensoniq
soundscape, or whatever, it will be supported, not through a
soundblaster emulation, but fully- because the game will be using the
soundcard manufacturer's driver to play the sounds.
so before you go bitching about something you don't understand, take
time to understand. If you're informed on a subject and still have
something to bitch about, then go ahead.