Thread: Game console programming

  1. #1
    Its hard... But im here swgh's Avatar
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    Game console programming

    This is just an idea...

    When a large co-orp game has been made like Zelda, when it has been debugged and compiled and stuff, do the game programmers have to change the program code in anyway to get the PS2, XBOX GCUBE to read the code?

    Reason I am asking is because of this quote from a book

    Code:
    In console programs, memory and variable managment 
    is not a big issue if you have a large machine. Game console 
    programming is a different matter
    I was wondering why this is different?

  2. #2
    Devil's Advocate SlyMaelstrom's Avatar
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    I believe game consoles have their own set of assembly instructions for pipelining the data to and from the processor. Either that or they simply digitally sign their applications in order to get them to run on their system.
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  3. #3
    carry on JaWiB's Avatar
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    Memory management should be an issue in any professional game, whether on a game console or on a PC. In fact, any good program should be careful with the way it handles memory, but for small projects, if there are memory leaks it won't be noticeable.

    >>When a large co-orp game has been made like Zelda, when it has been debugged and compiled and stuff, do the game programmers have to change the program code in anyway to get the PS2, XBOX GCUBE to read the code?

    I don't know how this relates to your second question, but AFAIK, a lot of the code has to be written specifically for each console.
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  4. #4
    Yah. Morgul's Avatar
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    Consoles generally have different ways of getting input and displaying graphics.
    Sic vis pacum para bellum. If you want peace, prepare for war.

  5. #5
    Crazy Fool Perspective's Avatar
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    They need to code using the consoles APIs then cross-compile to the console platform.

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    I think I've figured out the different graphics APIs that work on different systems:

    OpenGL: Mac, PC, Linux, PS2, Xbox, GameCube, ......
    DirectX: PC, Xbox

    The choice is probably pretty easy if you're trying to figure out which graphics API to use on your cross-platform game. Of course, just because the graphics API works on all these systems doesn't mean that the game will without porting. There are subtle differences between graphics API ports, and even when you're done that, you've still got to handle things like (memory management), getting controller input, and outputting sound.

    However, the graphics is probably where most of the work of coding is spent in a game, so getting a cross-platform library like OpenGL is a good step.

  7. #7
    Crazy Fool Perspective's Avatar
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    OpenGL works on the Xbox? I though it used DX 8+ (notice the plus, not the normal DX 8). And i also though the entire playstation line had a custom rendering API?

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    Yeah, no OGL on Xbox. I'm not sure about PS2 but I thought it was a custom API also.

  9. #9
    Supermassive black hole cboard_member's Avatar
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    I've done some fiddling with the GBA and the programming is a little different. Mainly because t'was the first time I had to work under severe limits, mainly regarding memory.
    Good class architecture is not like a Swiss Army Knife; it should be more like a well balanced throwing knife.

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  10. #10
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    Oops, you're right about Xbox having no OpenGL. But I do know that PS2 and GameCube has support for OpenGL (somebody ported it).

    http://www.devmaster.net/wiki/Direct3D_vs._OpenGL

  11. #11
    vae victus! skorman00's Avatar
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    Perspective, you're talking about the OpenGL-esque library that Sony distributes with the PS2 dev boxes, ps2gl. Lots of time went into the name.

    And like he said, you can use different compilers to compile your code for a specific console. It's not a bad idea to have a bunch of #ifdef statements when you know you can pull special tricks on a particular machine.

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