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Sep 29, 2001, 8:03am

Best thing about AW 3.2 is that it works even without a 3D card and on Windows NT,
so those users can finally get all the features that have been added since 1999:
- light, rotate, move and examine commands
- building with mouse, duplicating with Ctrl, precise object placement
with Ctrl and Shift, seeing cell grid
- sharper sign texts and realistic textures with bilinear filtering,
mipmapping and greyscale masks
- prelit objects, world lights, fog
- multiple simultaneous sounds, support for MP3 files
- automatic URL detection and right click menu in chat window
- F7 and F9 to hide or open web and tab windows, show web button
- getting to AW from behind firewall
- download progress bar
- 200 m visibility
- etc.

Some concerns raised:

* Blurriness
- Criterion's software mode for RenderWare is still lacking,
like the maximum texture size is only 256x256 pixels.
Backdrops scaled down to that and then stretched look just awful.
But you can make a skybox, e.g. a cylinder with 6 sides, each with its own
256x256 texture. And you can even add a ceiling and floor to it, to hide
the previous seam between the backdrop picture and background color.
- Bilinear texture filturing makes textures look smoother instead of
"comic book style" sharp they were in 2.2
- Mipmapping makes textures blurrier in the distance, so that
they are faster to render, and also look a bit more realistic.
You can take that option off from the settings if it bothers you.

* Slowness
- Software rendering of graphics needs power from the processor;
that is why there is 3D cards, to take care of those calculations.
Especially avatars, light and move commands make the scene slow.
AW 3.2 supports the fast T&L light rendering system in 3D cards like GeForce,
but even they take only 7 lights, more than that are shown with slow software mode.
- Visibility is floating by default, so it rises as the frame rate rises.
Set it at some fixed value from the Visibility menu.
You can set the minimum limit down to 30 meters from the performance settings.
- Some slowness may be caused by fragmented file system.
It is good to clean the cache completely and let 3.2 create it again.
- If you have a 3D card and want to use the Direct3D mode, run (Start - Run) dxdiag
and make sure that all the DirectX features under Display tab are enabled.

* MIDIs
- AW 3.1 started using Microsoft's DirectSound, which plays MIDIs
using a software synthesizer. But it caused many crash bugs,
so MIDIs are now played by Windows Media Player, like MP3 files.
Good thing is that people with a wavetable card like SoundBlaster Live
can use their custom sound font banks (digital samples of instruments).
But systems with old or cheap sound cards sounded better with DirectMusic.
Maybe they can put software synthesizing back as an option when it is more stable.

* No jpgs and bmps in cache
- RenderWare needs textures to be in .ras format, an uncompressed pixel raster
that the 3D card can use directly, so the textures load faster on the fly.
- I suppose some worldowners are pleased that people can't "steal"
their custom textures straight from the cache anymore.
- Downside is the increased disk space usage. FAT32 file system (available
in W95 OSR/2 and higher) can pack small files tighter than FAT16 though.

There are also many other features - not bugs since they were intentional
for some reason or other - that us 3.x users have needed to get used to, like
- some textured or animated models show a different color or texture
- some models look darker because specular lighting is not supported anymore
- transparent texture animations need a mask argument to get rid of the black box
- masked textures show a row of pixels across the top edge of some models
- transparent textures tile wrong on some models, like tree textures on tree0x.rwx's
- overlapping transparent models may have parts clipped out or sorted wrong
- sprites are solid
- etc.

But the complaints about not knowing that AW would be upgraded to 3.2
when clicking OK... Errr do you open unknown email attachments too? ;)
I always click Cancel to those and make backups first.

For me, 3.2 works better than 3.1 because the MIDI crashes are gone,
it supports the fast T&L in my GeForce 3D card, and I can use it
on my other system with NT behind a firewall that couldn't run 3.x before.
200 m visibility is a nice plus for screenshots and immersion.

If you can't get 3.2 to work at all, keep bugging support about it so that
they fix it before 2.2 and 3.1 get disabled from the universe completely.
There will be patches released to 3.2 even after this first version.

--
Mauz
http://mauz.tnlc.com/

Sep 29, 2001, 5:05pm

Thank you, Mauz... That was very infomative and "just what the doctor
ordered" to help answer some of the "whys" users are asking.... I'll be
copying and saving that to help answer some of the 3.2 questions that are
put to me...

Thanks again!!!

*hugs*
Daphne

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Oct 1, 2001, 8:27pm

[View Quote] > Best thing about AW 3.2 is that it works even without a 3D card and on Windows NT,

Big deal. I would have rather done WITHOUT software rendering and WinNT support if it meant keeping lighting and transparency the same as in 3.1 (which is better). Now I have to change a lot of objects yet again. I tire of it! People aren't going to want to create objects for AW if this continues: having to redesign ones objects with each new AW version gets REALLY irritating REALLY fast...

> so those users can finally get all the features that have been added since 1999:
>
> Some concerns raised:
>
> * Blurriness
> - Bilinear texture filturing makes textures look smoother instead of
> "comic book style" sharp they were in 2.2

It's called "aliased", newbie; and the Direct3D driver could do bilinear texture filtering fine.

> * Slowness
> - Visibility is floating by default, so it rises as the frame rate rises.
> Set it at some fixed value from the Visibility menu.
> You can set the minimum limit down to 30 meters from the performance settings.

Lame considering the lowest possible setting is 25m...

> - Some slowness may be caused by fragmented file system.
> It is good to clean the cache completely and let 3.2 create it again.

AW is still slow; it's file management system just sucks.

> * No jpgs and bmps in cache
> - RenderWare needs textures to be in .ras format, an uncompressed pixel raster
> that the 3D card can use directly, so the textures load faster on the fly.
> - I suppose some worldowners are pleased that people can't "steal"
> their custom textures straight from the cache anymore.

uh, that hasn't been possible for YEARS, Mauz...

> - Downside is the increased disk space usage. FAT32 file system (available
> in W95 OSR/2 and higher) can pack small files tighter than FAT16 though.

So...what about all the empty directories left behind when the cache disk limit is reached? Talk about bad programming...

> For me, 3.2 works better than 3.1 because the MIDI crashes are gone,
> it supports the fast T&L in my GeForce 3D card, and I can use it
> on my other system with NT behind a firewall that couldn't run 3.x before.
> 200 m visibility is a nice plus for screenshots and immersion.
>
> If you can't get 3.2 to work at all, keep bugging support about it so that
> they fix it before 2.2 and 3.1 get disabled from the universe completely.
> There will be patches released to 3.2 even after this first version.

Oct 2, 2001, 1:35am

Tell that to Criterion, Eep. They're the ones who keep mucking around
with RW. I'm sure Roland would love to switch to a much more stable
rendering engine. Unfortunately, he would then probably have to rebuild
AW and all it's worlds from scratch, which I don't think is in the cards
any time soon...

[View Quote] [View Quote]
--
Goober King
Hell, the original Wolfenstein 3D engine is better than RW :P
rar1 at acsu.buffalo.edu

Oct 2, 2001, 2:56am

It's not just about Criterion. I doubt Roland even questions why Criterion does ANYTHING, let alone suggest to Rick and JP that AW develop its own 3D engine--but it's damn obvious Roland isn't capable of THAT either. The point is: AW isn't keeping up with 3D engines of even 5 years old. Oh, sure, NOW AW has hardware T&L but it's implemented so poorly in RW that it's not even worth using because of the inconsistencies.

I'm SERIOUSLY beginning to question continuing to create content (worlds et al) for AW because of its continuing and growing inconsistencies and hassles in having to redesign everything with each new build. What's the point? Perhaps if I was getting paid for it...but I'm not. As a hobby AW is becoming too much of a hassle to deal with.

[View Quote] > Tell that to Criterion, Eep. They're the ones who keep mucking around
> with RW. I'm sure Roland would love to switch to a much more stable
> rendering engine. Unfortunately, he would then probably have to rebuild
> AW and all it's worlds from scratch, which I don't think is in the cards
> any time soon...
>
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Oct 2, 2001, 9:07am

hardware T&L sure isn't any good (at least the transparency bit),
interluscent objects looked much better in 3.1 (without opacityfix in 3.2
they can't be used, and with they lagg like hell and still look ugly)!

KAH

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Oct 2, 2001, 8:03pm

Interlucent? What exactly ARE "shining between" objects? <blink> Is English your native language, Kah? Cuz you got some odd word usage at times, bub...

[View Quote] > hardware T&L sure isn't any good (at least the transparency bit),
> interluscent objects looked much better in 3.1 (without opacityfix in 3.2
> they can't be used, and with they lagg like hell and still look ugly)!

Oct 3, 2001, 1:32pm

kewl that's the first good news i've seen in here all month!
when ya leaving? lol


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Oct 3, 2001, 1:33pm

"Cuz you got some odd word usage at times, bub..."
spoken like a real "bub" or is that boob?


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Oct 3, 2001, 1:48pm

I have less trouble with KAH's choice of words than with yours
sometimes and others seem to understand him quite well too.
If you had trouble with his postings in no.alt.activeworlds I
would understand that, hard to read for me too, but his English
seems quite clear and understandable to me.

Btw.: I'm sure you know where most of the frequent writers in
this NG come from, and be sure, a lot of AW citizens come from
Scandinavia.

[View Quote] --
"_
|
/\
\ /
__/ /_

Oct 3, 2001, 4:26pm

I seem to recall ppl using that word for objects with transpacency... oh,
well, maybe not then... no, English is not my native language, I don't think
you want me to start posting in Norwegian here ;-))

KAH

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Oct 3, 2001, 6:38pm

You mean translucent. :)
--
SW Chris
Eagle Scout, Philosopher, Peacemaker, and... Kung Fu Master?
http://www.winternet.com/~mikelr/flame1.html

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Oct 4, 2001, 4:39am

http://www.dictionary.com/cgi-bin/dict.pl?db=*&term=bub&x=13&y=11

[View Quote] > "Cuz you got some odd word usage at times, bub..."
> spoken like a real "bub" or is that boob?
>
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Oct 4, 2001, 4:40am

Learn the language better before attempting to communicate with it. It's that simple.

[View Quote] > I have less trouble with KAH's choice of words than with yours
> sometimes and others seem to understand him quite well too.
> If you had trouble with his postings in no.alt.activeworlds I
> would understand that, hard to read for me too, but his English
> seems quite clear and understandable to me.
>
> Btw.: I'm sure you know where most of the frequent writers in
> this NG come from, and be sure, a lot of AW citizens come from
> Scandinavia.
>
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Oct 4, 2001, 4:41am

The correct terms are "transparent" or "opaque". Probably other non-native English linguists incorrectly used "interlucent", too...

[View Quote] > I seem to recall ppl using that word for objects with transpacency... oh,
> well, maybe not then... no, English is not my native language, I don't think
> you want me to start posting in Norwegian here ;-))
>
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Oct 4, 2001, 11:39am

I was more so referring to your use of "Cuz" hehehehehe Learn the
language, bub! hehe
damn idiot.

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Oct 5, 2001, 11:22am

Um, dipshit, "cuz" is slang for "cause" which is short for "because". Duh. I tire of your ineptness. Suck filter, twat.

[View Quote] > I was more so referring to your use of "Cuz" hehehehehe Learn the
> language, bub! hehe
> damn idiot.
>
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Oct 5, 2001, 11:25am

". Duh. I tire of your ineptness. "

LOL ditto, although, i do consider you cheap entertainment...lol and a
challenge to figure out mentally lol you weird little dude.


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