What is GL

[Malice Rancor]

What is the differance between a source port that is GL and one that is not

[Guest Fanatic]

"GL" usually means hardware accelerated. A non-"GL" source port (or game engine in general) uses software rendering, which is much slower and 'low quality' compared to a hardware accelerated engine.

Required some kind of GL/D3D capable video card, like a Voodoo 2 (amongst dozens of others).

Biggest difference is quality, resolution, and framerate between GL and non-GL.

[bitstate]

i'd hardly consider vodoo 2 of higher *image* quality then software rendering, just a blur ;o)

[Guest Fanatic]

You must not have your Voodoo2 configured correctly then. It always looks amazing to me, even compared to my latest video card (which eats my old Voodoo 2's). Even the old Monster 3D looked really good, much better than any software rendering.

But that's not the point of this post. A Voodoo2 is a hardware video accelerator, which is one of the video card types required for a source port engine to utilize 'GL' mode/rendering.

[Test-0]

I have a Voodoo Banshee. It may be a bitch (heh ;) to get working half the time, but wow, does it do good when it works! =) It actually works better in the highest settings then the lower ones, and I mean HIGH settings. Too bad it ain't the best to have working, but oh well.

=^)

Test-0

[Katarhyne]

GL represents OpenGL, usually, which stands for Open Graphics Library, a 3d graphics HAL, or Hardware Abstraction Layer, developed by Silicon Graphics Incorporated, for use on their super-high-end 3D rendering workstations. It is now commonly supported by consumer-level 3D accelerators and is used mostly for CAD and experimental work, but is quickly becoming more accepted by the gaming community, muchly in thanks to John Carmack's support.

Feature-wise, it is inferior to Direct3D, however, it is easier to write for, and more versatile, as well as performing faster, given equal conditions.

Anyway, that's probably more than you needed to know. Bleh.

[Drat]

Test-0 said:

I have a Voodoo Banshee. It may be a bitch (heh ;) to get working half the time, but wow, does it do good when it works! =) It actually works better in the highest settings then the lower ones, and I mean HIGH settings. Too bad it ain't the best to have working, but oh well.

=^)

Test-0

Well, there is one thing to be said for software.

Anyone ever seen some of those levels for quake 2/3/UT that are made by stupid little lamers? There are many idiots who think that if they put in heaps of coloured lighting in lots of clashing colours, that flash and strobe, people will really like their levels. The results are sanity destroying or seizure inducing.

Those of us without 3d cards get to miss out on these dangerous misuses of coloured lighting. Yay!

That's the only advantage. A 3d card can make an unplayably choppy map real smooth, among other things.

[Quasar]

Katarhyne said:

GL represents OpenGL, usually, which stands for Open Graphics Library, a 3d graphics HAL, or Hardware Abstraction Layer, developed by Silicon Graphics Incorporated, for use on their super-high-end 3D rendering workstations. It is now commonly supported by consumer-level 3D accelerators and is used mostly for CAD and experimental work, but is quickly becoming more accepted by the gaming community, muchly in thanks to John Carmack's support.

Feature-wise, it is inferior to Direct3D, however, it is easier to write for, and more versatile, as well as performing faster, given equal conditions.

Anyway, that's probably more than you needed to know. Bleh.

Plus OpenGL is, well, open, while DirectX is a proprietary standard that only exists on Windows platforms :->