6 ms·

These tricks are things that you could still pull off today. The difference is, outside of competitions or the demoscene, nobody _needs_ to pull them off - it g

These tricks are things that you could still pull off today. The difference is, outside of competitions or the demoscene, nobody _needs_ to pull them off - it greatly decreases your time-to-market to do things in a straightforward way, rather than a novel way. That wasn't true 20+ years ago - the straightforward way often brought you up against hardware limitations.

kqr 5y ago
> it greatly decreases your time-to-market to do things in a straightforward way I mean, it's hard to disagree when you phrase it this way, but... really? In the old days (mid-'90s) studios like id released many games per year, some of which with completely new technology. Modern studios and indie developers (!) who "do things in a straightforward way" can be happy to release even one game per year, and that's with a lot of reuse. Forget novel technology once a year! So maybe these tricks don't really increase time to market that much, compared to other variables that are also in play?
- Pamar 5y ago
  I have zero information about (due also to little interest for) computer games, so this is just a wild speculation: maybe the visuals in terms of "levels/textures/objects/mesh/characters/voice/audio" dominate the planning, now?
  - hulitu 5y ago
    The visuals are crap. Greed dominates the game industry.
    - Pamar 5y ago
      I wrote "planning", meaning that the development of the fame assets maybe now takes more time than the actual engine/logic of the game itself.
    - pvillano 5y ago
      Greed does dominate the industry, but there's more indie games than ever
KronisLV 5y ago
> ... it greatly decreases your time-to-market to do things in a straightforward way ... I'd actually like to link the YouTube channel of a person who is writing their own game engine and game at the same time: https://www.youtube.com/c/RandallThomas/videos https://www.youtube.com/c/RandallThomas/videos You can see how using Godot, Unity or Unreal (or most other engines) would have been much faster in regards to time to market. Similar differences show up when you try to build the same project, once while using an engine and another without it, the performance can be much better if you write your own optimized code (supposing that you can do so in the first place), however the development still takes much longer, for example: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=tInaI3pU19Y https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=tInaI3pU19Y Now, whether that matters to you or not is a different matter entirely: some care about learning a lot more about the lower level stuff, others just want to develop games and care more about the art/story/etc., while others care about selling them ASAP.
bailey1541 5y ago
Having been a game programmer back in the day (C64, Amiga, Atari Jaguar, N64, and beyond to newer machines) I fully agree with your point. My earliest days had the most fantastic tricks. So called game engines were useless. Now it’s the complete opposite.
- Dracophoenix 5y ago
  What did you program on the N64? And which among those platforms was was your favorite?

kqr 5y ago

> it greatly decreases your time-to-market to do things in a straightforward way I mean, it's hard to disagree when you phrase it this way, but... really? In the old days (mid-'90s) studios like id released many games per year, some of which with completely new technology. Modern studios and indie developers (!) who "do things in a straightforward way" can be happy to release even one game per year, and that's with a lot of reuse. Forget novel technology once a year! So maybe these tricks don't really increase time to market that much, compared to other variables that are also in play?

Pamar 5y ago
I have zero information about (due also to little interest for) computer games, so this is just a wild speculation: maybe the visuals in terms of "levels/textures/objects/mesh/characters/voice/audio" dominate the planning, now?
- hulitu 5y ago
  The visuals are crap. Greed dominates the game industry.
  - Pamar 5y ago
    I wrote "planning", meaning that the development of the fame assets maybe now takes more time than the actual engine/logic of the game itself.
  - pvillano 5y ago
    Greed does dominate the industry, but there's more indie games than ever

KronisLV 5y ago

> ... it greatly decreases your time-to-market to do things in a straightforward way ... I'd actually like to link the YouTube channel of a person who is writing their own game engine and game at the same time: https://www.youtube.com/c/RandallThomas/videos https://www.youtube.com/c/RandallThomas/videos You can see how using Godot, Unity or Unreal (or most other engines) would have been much faster in regards to time to market. Similar differences show up when you try to build the same project, once while using an engine and another without it, the performance can be much better if you write your own optimized code (supposing that you can do so in the first place), however the development still takes much longer, for example: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=tInaI3pU19Y https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=tInaI3pU19Y Now, whether that matters to you or not is a different matter entirely: some care about learning a lot more about the lower level stuff, others just want to develop games and care more about the art/story/etc., while others care about selling them ASAP.

bailey1541 5y ago

Having been a game programmer back in the day (C64, Amiga, Atari Jaguar, N64, and beyond to newer machines) I fully agree with your point. My earliest days had the most fantastic tricks. So called game engines were useless. Now it’s the complete opposite.

Dracophoenix 5y ago
What did you program on the N64? And which among those platforms was was your favorite?