Why does id use Open_GL over DirectX 9?

[toxicfluff]

Arno said:

That's probably because the Far Cry demo renders an entire tropical island, while the Doom3 alpha only has to worry about a couple of small corridors. I expect the full Doom3 game to support much larger areas.

Funnily enough, I found Far Cry to run faster outdoors than indoors.

[YabbaDabbaDon't]

Cleanup

Edited October 13, 2022 by YabbaDabbaDon't

[toxicfluff]

As far as I can recall the indoor lighting was a mixture of high-resolution lightmaps and stencil shadows, with either one or both operating in different areas.

[JimboC]

Sephiroth said:

from what i know OpenGL is far easier to use. lets ignore the whole cross platform thing.

Not really true anymore, and I believe even John Carmack has said so. At least for non-managed (meaning non-.NET) programming.

As with most Microsoft products, Microsoft released early versions before they were really worthwhile, relying on their Windows monopoly to shove it down people's throats. Then they listen to the feedback and change it a little at a time until it becomes a good product. DirectX reached that point at version 8. Version 9 they mostly focused on implementing .NET support. They added some new features, but mostly they wanted to get DirectX working with .NET. At this point in time .NET really sucks, so obviously the cycle has started over again and Microsoft is going to have to fix .NET support.

[Skeletor]

JimboC said:

Not really true anymore, and I believe even John Carmack has said so. At least for non-managed (meaning non-.NET) programming.

As with most Microsoft products, Microsoft released early versions before they were really worthwhile, relying on their Windows monopoly to shove it down people's throats. Then they listen to the feedback and change it a little at a time until it becomes a good product. DirectX reached that point at version 8. Version 9 they mostly focused on implementing .NET support. They added some new features, but mostly they wanted to get DirectX working with .NET. At this point in time .NET really sucks, so obviously the cycle has started over again and Microsoft is going to have to fix .NET support.

I don't know. I haven't worked with DX before, but all I know is that it takes I think a few 100 more lines of code to create a triangle on the screen. I also heard working with COM (component object models) objects are a bitch.

[The Butcher]

Skeletor said:

but all I know is that it takes I think a few 100 more lines of code to create a triangle on the screen.

It has been awhile since I've messed with DX8, but I'm pretty sure it takes roughly the same amount of code as OpenGL. I believe DX7 and earlier were not quite so friendly.