- Console game development will no longer require expensive fees to publish and update games. If you can get your game on Steam, it can go on a console.
- Hardware manufacturers can compete to deliver better Steam-powered consoles. Gaming hardware will never again stand still for nearly ten years (as it did with the last generation of consoles).
- Steam-based game consoles will be backwards compatible and future-proof. Games you buy now on Steam will still be playable on consoles three generations in the future.
[color=rgb(11,25,2)][font=arial][font='Helvetica Neue']I am very excited about this development and the future of open console gaming. Since we are already building Leadwerks for Linux, Leadwerks will be available for SteamOS as soon as possible.[/font][/font][/color]
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[/font][/font][/color]Tech Progress
[color=rgb(11,25,2)][font=arial][font='Helvetica Neue']The Leadwerks 3 engine has been successfully compiled for Ubuntu 13.04. However, when running the application, all I saw was a blue screen. I decided to focus on the OpenGL 4 deferred renderer for a while. While working out the depth reconstruction for the deferred renderer, I realized I was making unnecessary calls to glDepthRange(), which weren't needed at all. After removing these calls my depth reconstruction code worked correctly; this was the cause of the errors I experienced when developing adeferred renderer on iOS for GDC 2013. I also believe the calls to glDepthRange() were what caused the engine to not render anything when running on Ubuntu, though I won't know for sure until I try it out.[/font][/font][/color]
[color=rgb(11,25,2)][font=arial][font='Helvetica Neue']Leadwerks 3.1 features an OpenGL 4 deferred renderer with support for up to 32x MSAA. I was able to get this running in just a few days. I already had parts of the OpenGL 4 renderer done, and I've been working with deferred renderers since 2008, so it all came together quickly. It's easier today to write a deferred renderer for a couple of reasons.[/font][/font][/color]
[color=rgb(11,25,2)][font=arial][font='Helvetica Neue']First, the state of OpenGL and driver support has gotten much better. Leadwerks 2 was written against the OpenGL 2.1 specification, which was not designed for deferred rendering. I relied on many vendor-specific extensions (some of which changed behavior halfway through the engine's life). OpenGL 4 was specifically designed for the type of things I am doing with it, so I am no longer fighting the spec. If a graphics driver has a problem, it's easier to get it fixed today than a few years ago, now that the rest of the industry has realized the benefits of deferred rendering.[/font][/font][/color]
[color=rgb(11,25,2)][font=arial][font='Helvetica Neue']Second, hardware today is much more powerful than when Leadwerks 2 was developed. Leadwerk 2 was written for GEForce 8800-level hardware, and used a lot of optimizations to favor speed over quality. With modern hardware I don't have to rely on so many hacks and I can push the upper limits higher. For example, Leadwerks 2 used a random edge jitter that gave a grainy approximation of soft shadow edges. With Leadwerks 3 I can increase the blur kernel and display beautiful soft shadows that look more like an offline cg render than real-time graphics:[/font][/font][/color]
Leadwerks Shwag Surfacing
[color=rgb(11,25,2)][font=arial][font='Helvetica Neue']Leadwerks Shwag is beginning to appear in the real world. Post your photos of you modeling a stylish Leadwerks shirt or sticker so the rest of the community can see![/font][/font][/color]
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