March 15, 2007:

Framerate optimization is still under way, a new shader has been coded for PreVa so the skins not only have "baked" specular lighting, but they also have it with a shader. Just today we have done a framerate and collision test with the updated version of the engine and the optimized hover mecha with a 1024x768 skin as well as some "buildings" which have the same size skin, to test the framerate with over 200 models and over 116,000 polies on screen and the shader running with 1024x768 resolution at the same time, on an off-the-shelf pc, it's stats are as follows:

AMD Sempron Processor +3100, 1.80 Ghz 256kb L2 Cache w/ 512 DDR SDRAM and a nVIDIA GeForce 6100

so in other words, today's "basic" or "bare minimum" pc. Here are 3 screenshots showing our results:

Yes, the fps is 28, and that is 117,118 polys, exactly 225 models, all with the shader (except the black ground and wall)






Needless to say, we got what we were going for, the game was running every bit of code from the demo version, plus the shader and some updated code. To point out the fact that we don't see any part of the game where there will be over 200 models on screen at a time the framerate optimization is proceeding as we hoped, and is becoming a success, quickly. We've also been talking about adding a bloom shader for pcs that can handle it, as an option, which would kick up some of the look to the game. We may be posting a video showing the shader off, we'll keep you informed.

Also a note to our beta testers, we will be sending you the test and will look forward to your results as well. Sorry we haven't been in touch with you as much lately, it's because we have been extremely busy, but we're not hanging up the phone on you yet.

We are still open for more beta testers if any wish to help, we really could use them, lately we have been very busy on updating the game, and we could use some beta testers to keep in touch with in case we have problems and wish to get a quick answer, you may post here or pm/email me if you wish to be a beta tester.