"Well, theoretically that's correct—"
Vivian put down the control panel and turned off the TV. "But it's actually impossible to do that."
She immediately poured cold water on the situation.
There will always be a gap between ideals and reality.
This difference is particularly pronounced in graphics cards.
"I understand, it's a video memory issue, right?"
Lin Lixin sighed; it all boils down to capacity.
Regardless of the era, memory has always been one of the most expensive components in digital products.
Even with 256 colors, we still need over 300KB of video memory at a resolution of 640.480.
"That's right," Vivian nodded regretfully, "And if we want to make it a general-purpose graphics card that can also be used in PCs, the transmission bandwidth won't be enough."
At a resolution of 640.480, the amount of communication data for 16 colors has reached the limit of the ISA bus.
If it's on a highly integrated architecture like NovaBo, that's fine, but if it's made into a general-purpose graphics expansion card according to Lin Lixin's idea, then it will be troublesome.
This situation only improved significantly after the introduction of modern slot specifications such as PCI.
"The money required to develop NAND technology is no less than what's needed here—"
Lin Lixin rubbed his temples.
The semiconductor industry is incredibly expensive. Even though it has become a leading game company in the US and has captured a large market share in Japan, it still seems like a greenhorn when faced with the bottomless pit of the semiconductor industry.
"I'll figure out a way to handle the video memory issue later. Let's get this specification implemented first. Where's Dr. Jim?"
"At SGI, he said he wanted to use a RISC architecture to build a workstation."
"Okay, 16-color it is. Get the first batch of VGA-compliant graphics cards produced as soon as possible."
Lin Lixin pondered for a moment.
All that's needed is to adjust the specification so that it supports both 16 colors at 640p and 256 colors at 320p.
This level of performance is perfectly adequate for current game consoles.
To deal with IBM, the blue giant, they need to act quickly.
You need to seize the right to define things before the other party can react.
To achieve this goal, it is clearly necessary to directly issue ISA slot graphics cards that can be plug-and-play with PCs.
"Let's call this product line Radeon, Nova-Radeon."
The Nova Radeon actually has that vibe.
Of course, a general-purpose graphics card requires more than just hardware.
Lin Lixin had sent Carmack here a long time ago, naturally in preparation for this part.
It must be able to provide a standard library for the DOS system.
This is also a prerequisite for OpenGL.
After arranging all this, Lin Lixin got up to leave.
"No, no, I almost forgot the important business we came here for."
He slapped his forehead. "I need an MMC enhancement chip for the new game."
[Thoughts on playing Pinball, Game Physics Experience ++]
[Thoughts on playing Pinball, Game Physics Experience ++]
If there's one Nintendo title that Lin Lixin dreams of owning, the first answer would undoubtedly be Pinball, which was released in early 1984.
This was one of the earliest games on the Famicom (FC) and also one of the games released on the NES.
Its developer, HAL Laboratory, is in many ways a direct descendant of Nintendo.
The developers behind later titles Kirby of the Stars and Super Smash Bros. were all involved in this project. Even Satoru Iwata, Brother Satoru would later succeed Hiroshi Yamauchi as president, was still studying at HAL Laboratory at that time.
" Pinball " is one of Brother Satoru's works.
Lin Lixin stared at the marbles bouncing around on the screen, constantly racking up higher scores, his face full of suspicion.
"That's really strange. How did the NES, with its crappy hardware, manage to achieve this level of physical realism?"
It's worth noting that the NES's processor was a Ricoh 6502 with a clock speed of only 1.8MHz, which was significantly outperformed by the NovaBo.
With that thing's performance, even a 2D physics simulation couldn't be this smooth.
"Does Brother Satoru also have some kind of advanced technology?"
If he were to design it with his current skills, Lin Lixin believes he could create a physics-realistic effect far surpassing that of " Pinball ".
But he couldn't make these effects consume so little performance.
Keep in mind that " Double Dribble " has a total of 10 characters moving at high speeds, so there simply isn't enough performance redundancy to do a lot of physics calculations.
[bite!]
[Acquired Skill]:
[ The Cleverest Trick ]: [Master basic game physics and gain a 1.4x increase in hardware-related attribute growth rate]
"Um?"
This was the first time Lin Lixin had such a strange feeling.
Despite having improved his understanding of game physics, he still had no clue how to solve the problem at hand.
"Wrong."
He stared intently at the marble, watching the moment it was knocked away by the movable barrier, when a sense of unease suddenly flashed through his mind.
Perhaps due to a more refined understanding of game physics, Lin Lixin sees * Pinball * as...
The physical effects suddenly weren't as perfect.
It is riddled with bizarre flaws.
The marbles move too rigidly.
Lin Lixin initially thought that the low operating speed was due to insufficient NES functionality.
This situation often occurs even on NovaBo.
But as he observed more closely, he actually noticed something.
This is not a performance issue, but rather a problem with the physics simulation of Pinball itself.
Every movement of the marble, seemingly free and random within the Pinball, reveals upon close observation that each change in its state is exactly the same.
"No wonder it was a scam, so that's how it is—"
I've completely misunderstood; Pinball didn't use any physics-based simulations at all.
In essence, it's actually a table lookup!
Lin Lixin pulled out a notebook from the side and quickly made notes on it.
"Slow rolling, fast rolling, free fall, bounce----"
The speed of the marble is predefined in different states.
"If it's on a slope, increase by a fixed value----"
"When it hits the buffer and barrier, take the normal direction----"
"No, even the collision detection is fake??"
The deeper Lin Lixin delved into the research, the greater his astonishment became.
This seemingly perfect physics simulation is actually a carefully crafted magic trick for the players.
Pinball uses minimal computation to create an effect that can fool all players.
"This is the wisdom of the ancients! It's truly amazing."
In this era where performance and capacity are extremely valuable, only these imaginative and ingenious techniques can enable them to achieve these seemingly impossible effects.
This is precisely the ability that Lin Lixin, a newcomer accustomed to modern development, easily overlooks.
"I've been so busy with hardware lately, I've really gotten myself into a rut."
Lin Lixin suddenly realized.
Regardless of its process or how it is implemented at the underlying level.
Video games are ultimately created to serve the players.
As long as the final result meets expectations, the way it is implemented is completely irrelevant.