anyone else check these forums everyday on the hope that they suddenly announce it is available for android? (i know they said end of month at earliest but i am optimistic)
same here. I even look at twitter.com/TrentOster almost daily. and I don't even have a Twitter.
I do the same thing. I don't have a Twitter account, but I know that any news will show up there first.
anyone else check these forums everyday on the hope that they suddenly announce it is available for android? (i know they said end of month at earliest but i am optimistic)
same here. I even look at twitter.com/TrentOster almost daily. and I don't even have a Twitter.
I do the same thing. I don't have a Twitter account, but I know that any news will show up there first.
Me too... and I've subscribed to Twitter only to ask Trent about Android and the italian language...
I can't understand why they had to take apart all the filesystem implementation and redo it from the beginning... to me, this sounds excessive
Anyway, we can only sadly wait
From what it sounds like the filesystem rewrite is something they were going to do anyways, since it is the only way to solve some of the slowdowns that happen on the ipad build (i.e. casting entangled) and it will also help with the high memory usage on the ipad 1. So they probably decided that it would be less work in the end if they just redid it all now instead of coming up with a temp fix. If they are going to find a fix for the problem they might as well do it right the first time.
Asolutely agree, better doing something definitive than keeping to apply patches over patches.
Just to cast more light on what Trent insists to write over Twitter (instead of his own forum...):
the Render Engine is a whole different part respect to the Filesystem engine, the first has serious performance impact over the whole game if made wrong, the second does only in very specific parts (loading time)... and the two have nothing to share with each other.
First tweet: "Entangle is a pretty special spell in terms of fixes. It will be fixed in the upcoming render re-write (yes, it is that bad)"
True, the render is something executed 30 times per second, the problem with the famous spell which causes FPS to drop to near zero is all about this.
Second tweet: "The file system re-write and renderer re-write will both be brought to all platforms. Should really help performance"
True, note Trent does not relate the two systems in any way.
Final consideration: IMHO, rewriting the entire filesystem is an excessive action, it can't be that bad. Instead revisiting the rendering loop is beneficial over all platforms, including our Androids where the video card models is much more varied than Apple ones (they have only two).
EDIT: if anyone wants a more tech explanation over the opengl rendering problems, just ask
Filesystem: it's the way files are organized on the disk and the mentioned "engine" is the part of BG:EE which know how to look for them and loads the data. The difficult part here is that on mobile devices files can be forced to be zipped, then BG:EE must be aware of this or all loading will badly fail.
Rendering: this is the complicated part, it's the part which draws the screen
the rendering loop is made with OpenGL which is all about 3D graphics, what BG:EE does is drawing a lot of 3D rectangles in orthographic mode (flat right in front of your eyes) with all the 2D graphics painted on them.
Because of the nature of OpenGL, it requires that all graphic elements to be loaded in memory before trying to start the scene painting, for a scene with 3 objects (a man, a goblin and the backdrop) one can do: load,load,load, draw,draw,draw... but NOT load,draw,load,draw,load,draw) This is usually repeated 30 or 60 times per seconds, the famous FPS measurement.
this is the bad part, on even the most average PC, doing a load in the middle of the draw process does not impact the speed (it does, but it's hardly noted APART on Intel HD chipsets where it's a pain) but on mobile devices, a load in the middle forces a stop in the video system and slows things down to a dead snail level
Yep, I bet it's already 90% that way apart the section which renders the famous Entangle Spell... so it means it has to be fully revised to make sure it's not only that one.
I think the renderer rewrite will come after Android and Linux versions ship because only certain things (like entangle) are really affected by it. If they felt the renderer rewrite was "that big of a deal" they would of done it before iPad.
What if they didn't notice it before? Isn't that issue quite serious on tablet? (Almost like freezing?) And I think avoiding a certain spell is a big deal in terms of gameplay. :P
Linux version? Still in doubt if it would be done.
I speculate, based on today's post by Trent, the Android version will ship approximately March 14th alongside the v. 2014 patch.
Right now it's February the 20th already, we don't even have the v.2013 patch yet. It's highly unlikely the v. 2014 patch will be out at March the 14th. So I guess we should wait for the Android version longer.
Right now it's February the 20th already, we don't even have the v.2013 patch yet. It's highly unlikely the v. 2014 patch will be out at March the 14th.
Trent said the next patch would be coming out with the mac version on the 22.
So it is vary possible that we will have patch v. 2015 by the time android is released. And seeing as they are now concentrating all their effort (or at least a majority of it) on android I am holding out hope they can finish it in another 3-4 weeks.
Right now it's February the 20th already, we don't even have the v.2013 patch yet. It's highly unlikely the v. 2014 patch will be out at March the 14th. So I guess we should wait for the Android version longer.
I expect the 2013 patch should come on Friday alongside the MAC version. The inclusion of the stand alone MAC version seems to of pushed things back a bit.
I still think we'll see v2014 along with Android in late March, then Linux a month or two after that.
Holiday 2013 is my guess. They don't seem to be all that interested in launching android(they only found out that it didn't work.........at all when they tried to release it. Which any way you slice it means somebody didn't care enough to check if it would work) And so far they have only release the same useless " cam is (random noun/buzzword) but its not done yet" which could literally mean anything.
Android was not originally planned and was added very late in the project, October or November last year.
Development was actually quite fast until the problem with the I/O routines and pkg files was discovered, leading to the need of a complete rewrite of the I/O code.
So while the other versions have been in development for over a year now, Android is about 4 months old.
You uh........kinda just made my point.........they don't seem all that interested in launching on android. Also how was development going quite fast when they realized that had to start over from square one? The game itself is already done. They only had to port it into a system that the android could run..........which they did...n't. All Im saying is that on the list of "things we want to get done" android seems to be on the other list of "things that will get done........someday". Which brings a whole new flood of issues for the people waiting on an android release, if its the red headed step child of the bunch then its going to be the first system dropped(in terms of bug fixes) when they move on to BG2, so last one out, first one dropped means the android release is probably going to be stuck with alot of bad bugs, and because its hard if not impossible for third party(aka modders) to push bug fixes onto an android game........well you get the idea.....
Comments
Trent: "On the Android front, Cam has the engine file system all apart. It will be a while yet."
to me, this sounds excessive
Anyway, we can only sadly wait
sources:
Asolutely agree, better doing something definitive than keeping to apply patches over patches.
Just to cast more light on what Trent insists to write over Twitter (instead of his own forum...):
the Render Engine is a whole different part respect to the Filesystem engine, the first has serious performance impact over the whole game if made wrong, the second does only in very specific parts (loading time)... and the two have nothing to share with each other.
First tweet:
"Entangle is a pretty special spell in terms of fixes. It will be fixed in the upcoming render re-write (yes, it is that bad)"
True, the render is something executed 30 times per second, the problem with the famous spell which causes FPS to drop to near zero is all about this.
Second tweet:
"The file system re-write and renderer re-write will both be brought to all platforms. Should really help performance"
True, note Trent does not relate the two systems in any way.
Final consideration:
IMHO, rewriting the entire filesystem is an excessive action, it can't be that bad.
Instead revisiting the rendering loop is beneficial over all platforms, including our Androids where the video card models is much more varied than Apple ones (they have only two).
EDIT: if anyone wants a more tech explanation over the opengl rendering problems, just ask
let me try
Filesystem: it's the way files are organized on the disk and the mentioned "engine" is the part of BG:EE which know how to look for them and loads the data. The difficult part here is that on mobile devices files can be forced to be zipped, then BG:EE must be aware of this or all loading will badly fail.
Rendering: this is the complicated part, it's the part which draws the screen
the rendering loop is made with OpenGL which is all about 3D graphics, what BG:EE does is drawing a lot of 3D rectangles in orthographic mode (flat right in front of your eyes) with all the 2D graphics painted on them.
Because of the nature of OpenGL, it requires that all graphic elements to be loaded in memory before trying to start the scene painting, for a scene with 3 objects (a man, a goblin and the backdrop) one can do: load,load,load, draw,draw,draw... but NOT load,draw,load,draw,load,draw) This is usually repeated 30 or 60 times per seconds, the famous FPS measurement.
this is the bad part, on even the most average PC, doing a load in the middle of the draw process does not impact the speed (it does, but it's hardly noted APART on Intel HD chipsets where it's a pain)
but on mobile devices, a load in the middle forces a stop in the video system and slows things down to a dead snail level
I hope this is understandable
Just hope the game gets released soon.
Not getting anxious here, but to quote my little-brother(long time ago
repeat till dad goes crazy: YES!!!!
Trent:"Cam is cooking on Android. He's getting there. On the Mac front, we're hoping to announce something soon"
But, I can easily wait until Android BGEE is "done right" -- and don't want it if it has any known problems.
And I think avoiding a certain spell is a big deal in terms of gameplay. :P
Linux version? Still in doubt if it would be done.
but I may be wrong.
well but at least a count down is up on the site for the mac version :P
It's highly unlikely the v. 2014 patch will be out at March the 14th.
So I guess we should wait for the Android version longer. I hope it will be out sooner than 2024 ;-)
"Android-jam is a bit of a mess at the moment. We've got some work lying ahead of us."
Also the next patch is a big one and will raise the version number a few notches.
So it is vary possible that we will have patch v. 2015 by the time android is released. And seeing as they are now concentrating all their effort (or at least a majority of it) on android I am holding out hope they can finish it in another 3-4 weeks.
I still think we'll see v2014 along with Android in late March, then Linux a month or two after that.
Android was not originally planned and was added very late in the project, October or November last year.
Development was actually quite fast until the problem with the I/O routines and pkg files was discovered, leading to the need of a complete rewrite of the I/O code.
So while the other versions have been in development for over a year now, Android is about 4 months old.
You uh........kinda just made my point.........they don't seem all that interested in launching on android. Also how was development going quite fast when they realized that had to start over from square one? The game itself is already done. They only had to port it into a system that the android could run..........which they did...n't. All Im saying is that on the list of "things we want to get done" android seems to be on the other list of "things that will get done........someday". Which brings a whole new flood of issues for the people waiting on an android release, if its the red headed step child of the bunch then its going to be the first system dropped(in terms of bug fixes) when they move on to BG2, so last one out, first one dropped means the android release is probably going to be stuck with alot of bad bugs, and because its hard if not impossible for third party(aka modders) to push bug fixes onto an android game........well you get the idea.....