New Half Life 2 Preiview - Viavga

[Goombatommy]

http://www.viavga.com/default.asp?PageID=20&Article=18

Pretty lengthy preview.

 

[Dsty2001]

I didn't see any new screenshots

 

[Varsity]

Nope, no new screens or info.

 

[Goombatommy]

Yea, I apologize, no new screenshots. I saw them before too. Again my apologies.

 

[SMT]

Yeah, but the preview is new!

The villagers are restless.

 

[The Dark Elf]

Comes across as an article written after reading a bunch of others

 

[Mr-Fusion]

That site has other articles of more interest to me
http://www.viavga.com/default.asp?PageID=20&Article=15

 

[Chris D]

The preview is new, it just doesn't have any new information. I still find it interesting to read different opinions of Half-Life 2.

 

[Goombatommy]

Wow, how the hell did I miss that one

 

[Alec_85]

Actually, that Source won't support OpenGL was news to me. I thought OpenGL was way more superior than D3D ever was?! That's the impression I've had for years for some reason...

 

[Wildhound]

Actually, that Source won't support OpenGL was news to me. I thought OpenGL was way more superior than D3D ever was?! That's the impression I've had for years for some reason...

That may have been true until DX9, but not any longer. OpenGL is pretty much out of date these days.

That said it can pull off some reasonably impressive visuals in Far Cry. DX9 looks slighly better and runs about 10fps faster, on my system at least. 10fps is alot when you're looking at a jump from 25 to 35.

 

[Alec_85]

Yeah or from 0 to 10. But why did DX9 nail OpenGL? I thought M$ was the main force behind OpenGL. It seems I have been misinformed

 

[JimmehH]

MS make DirectX. OpenGL is an open source, community made graphics thingy. Both real purdy now, but DirectX is a bit better because it has the money behind it.

 

[mortiz]

OpenGL is generally considered to be id's ball park, since pretty much all of their game engines seem to utilize OpenGL more efficiently. I believe id have updated OpenGL to what's required to run DooM 3 in fact. So it isn't all DX yet.

 

[Alec_85]

Even though I thought M$ was behind it, didn't the Voodoo cards use it a lot too?

 

[qckbeam]

That may have been true until DX9, but not any longer. OpenGL is pretty much out of date these days.

Where did you hear that OpenGL was out of date? Both DX and OpenGL can provide fantastic looking results. OpenGL and DX are pretty much the same as of right now. Neither one provides any huge advantages over the other. The use of one over the other has more to do with personal preference (some programmers prefer the way OpenGL does things, others like DX), and the target audience rather than the feature list of the two API's. Pretty much anything that can be done in one can be done in the other. The only differences between the two: OpenGL is multi-platform, DX is windows only. So OpenGL is portable, which can be a plus, but DX is Windows specific, which means it could be considered the best when it comes to Windows gaming since that's exactly what it's made for.

 

[Alec_85]

So DX == D3D? Am I following?

 

[neozero]

First thing's first. Voodoo card's ran primarily on Glide. If you didn't have that, there was also miniGL.

D3D is just a peice of DX, which handles 3d rendering. The other peices are DirectSound (sound), DirectDraw(2d), DirectMusic(music), DirectInput (Input), and DirectPlay (networking).

All DX/OGL/Glide are are programs that enables windows the use as much of the pc's resources as possible for games.

 

[Alec_85]

Alrighty then. You learn something new every day

 

[kaf11]

no new info, but that was a good article nonetheless.

 

[x84D80Yx]

That site has other articles of more interest to me
http://www.viavga.com/default.asp?PageID=20&Article=15

:E :cheers: :E

 

[serum.157]

Actually, that Source won't support OpenGL was news to me.

opengl is not supported in hl2? doesn't really matter to me since d3d has improved lots over the past few years, but this is news to me as well, is this true then?

 

[iamaelephant]

I think the fact that Doom 3 uses it speaks volumes for OpenGL.

 

[vertetski]

No new info?! I read somewhere in the preview that all buildings are fully destructable, first thing I hear of it, anyone else knows more about it?

 

[amneziac85]

That site has other articles of more interest to me
http://www.viavga.com/default.asp?PageID=20&Article=15

Ehhh, those broads are average at best.

 

[scarecrow1]

It says that the combine are ALIENS conspiring with the Government(breen). So the COmbine are ALiens? or is he talking about the Xen invasion force?

 

[Goombatommy]

Yea, have we even seen what OpenGL 2.0 can do yet? No games to date support it.

 

[HybridM]

D3D is just a peice of DX, which handles 3d rendering. The other peices are DirectSound (sound), DirectDraw(2d), DirectMusic(music), DirectInput (Input), and DirectPlay (networking).

DirectDraw no longer exists in DirectX. Direct3D is used for 2D. Also you missed DirectShow (webcams, avi etc.).

Until the new version of OpenGL comes out, Direct3D is superior.

 

[lans]

A satisfying preview indeed.This previewer actually did a better job then others, IMO. True, it's the same info, but at least his view is not cornered on nit-picking small issues such as "OMG!..the arsenal is the same, the game will suck!".Th openGL part was definately new news to me,