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Karlos 
Re: Updated Alien Breed 3D 2
Posted on 19-Aug-2022 13:51:47
#61 ]
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@Hypex

PPC680x0... There's a blast from the past. Was anything ever successfully ported with it?

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Hypex 
Re: Updated Alien Breed 3D 2
Posted on 19-Aug-2022 14:57:40
#62 ]
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@BigD

Quote:
That's what it became though; a glorified tech demo. The game design wasn't strong enough to warrant playing the 2x2 pixel version and even a 060 50MHz machine struggled with thex1x1 pixel version.


Blood flies faster in a Blizzard!

However the original 2x2 mode was the most famous. Didn't look that great. But it was the chunky copper! It put chunky copper on the map. Likely using 12-bit truecolour, so up to 4096 colours in 4 bit RGB, but "super" low res.

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BigD 
Re: Updated Alien Breed 3D 2
Posted on 19-Aug-2022 15:08:14
#63 ]
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@Hypex

It worked fine for AB3D but the levels, collision detection and boring robot adversaries didn't warrant the effort the 2nd time IMHO. Project Osiris is the perfect tribute to the whole saga. Karlos' Mod coupled with the cleaned up AVB3D2 sourcecode has merit however.

Last edited by BigD on 19-Aug-2022 at 03:12 PM.

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Karlos 
Re: Updated Alien Breed 3D 2
Posted on 19-Aug-2022 15:19:18
#64 ]
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@Hypex

I'm hopeful the original version can be reworked for RTG. It should be quite trivial to convert the 12 bit values to 15 bit (it's a bit of shifting work that can be done quite readily), or better still calculated to that precision. And hopefully, improved the resolution after that. This isn't to throw any shade on Project Osiris, which I can attest is an extremely good conversion. Nostalgia will make you do strange things.

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NutsAboutAmiga 
Re: Updated Alien Breed 3D 2
Posted on 19-Aug-2022 15:36:22
#65 ]
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Joined: 9-Jun-2004
Posts: 12795
From: Norway

@Karlos

Quote:
12 bit values to 15 bit. (it's a bit of shifting work that can be done quite readily),


You don’t need to do any shifting work, just create a lookup table. It does get any faster than that.
upscaling 12bit to 15bit / 16bit or 32bit becomes a walk in the park, and it work well for BE and LE (only the table needs to be different).

12bit lookup table is only 4095*sizeof(dest), 8190 bytes for 15/16bit, 16380 bytes for 32bit.

I found that converting 15bit to 16bit with lookup table in Basilisk II, give more acceptable rendering speed.

Of cause if bottle neck is RAM, access speed, doing more instruction cache can be better, at least modern RAM, it’s not a problem,

Last edited by NutsAboutAmiga on 19-Aug-2022 at 03:51 PM.
Last edited by NutsAboutAmiga on 19-Aug-2022 at 03:46 PM.
Last edited by NutsAboutAmiga on 19-Aug-2022 at 03:37 PM.
Last edited by NutsAboutAmiga on 19-Aug-2022 at 03:36 PM.

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Karlos 
Re: Updated Alien Breed 3D 2
Posted on 19-Aug-2022 15:52:43
#66 ]
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@NutsAboutAmiga

Lookup tables are fast on CPUs that are slow, e.g your basic 68000 - or on CPUs with large enough caches to make the lookup fit. The 68040/060 don't fit here, because they aren't as slow but don't have big enough caches.

You can convert a pair of 12 bit RGB pixels expressed in a 32-bit word to a pair of 15 bit ones, with a few logic operations and save your L1 cache.

I used to write RGB pixel conversions a lot because I was utterly disappointed with the performance of the basic RTG routines on my 040. The best way to do this one for 040/060 IMHO, is to cache align a 16 byte buffer on the stack. You'd then move16 8 pixels into it (assuming they are still represented as 16-bit words), do the transformation on 4 successive 32-bit pairs, then move16 the whole transformed line to the locked RTG bitmap in display memory. This approach doesn't do any memory accesses that aren't part of data transfer (we assume the hot line on the stack is cached) and it doesn't pollute the data cache either.

You could even claim this is SIMD since it's possible to convert a pair of pixels at a time :)

It may be the case that this is unnecessary anyway since we're assuming the 12-bit data are already in the form 0000rrrrggggbbbb which may not be the case. And furthermore it may also be the case that we can render the colour depth to 15 or even 24 bit precision regardless.

Last edited by Karlos on 19-Aug-2022 at 04:22 PM.
Last edited by Karlos on 19-Aug-2022 at 04:09 PM.
Last edited by Karlos on 19-Aug-2022 at 04:05 PM.
Last edited by Karlos on 19-Aug-2022 at 04:03 PM.

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NutsAboutAmiga 
Re: Updated Alien Breed 3D 2
Posted on 19-Aug-2022 18:44:01
#67 ]
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Joined: 9-Jun-2004
Posts: 12795
From: Norway

@Karlos

Quote:
You could even claim this is SIMD since it's possible to convert a pair of pixels at a time :)


yes and thats what I do, for 8bit, made major difference for the warcraft ii movie, for 8 to 16bit/32bit convertion.

A lookup table is load half word index instruction (lhzx dr,rA,rb)
and then a stw, 2 x instuctions

or you can use

1 x ldh, 3 x and, 3 x rotl, 3 x or, 1 x stw,
maybe you combine and & rotl, with speical instuction (rlwinm).
~ 11 or 8 instuctions.

Last edited by NutsAboutAmiga on 19-Aug-2022 at 06:48 PM.
Last edited by NutsAboutAmiga on 19-Aug-2022 at 06:47 PM.
Last edited by NutsAboutAmiga on 19-Aug-2022 at 06:46 PM.

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NutsAboutAmiga 
Re: Updated Alien Breed 3D 2
Posted on 19-Aug-2022 18:54:00
#68 ]
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Joined: 9-Jun-2004
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From: Norway

@Karlos

Quote:
PPC680x0... There's a blast from the past. Was anything ever successfully ported with it?


Does it respect the ABI?
Some registers are reserved, maybe text replace can fix issues.

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Karlos 
Re: Updated Alien Breed 3D 2
Posted on 19-Aug-2022 19:34:47
#69 ]
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From: As-sassin-aaate! As-sassin-aaate! Ooh! We forgot the ammunition!

@NutsAboutAmiga

Your lookup table code is running on PPC, so it's a different ball game. Larger caches and L2 cache mean it's a viable strategy. Still, it's probably even faster to leverage some SIMD if you have altivec available.

On the 68040 and probably the 060 too, the lookup table of 4096 16 bit words is just too big. Twice the size of the datacache on the 040 and the same size on the 060. It's also going to be pretty randomly accessed. There will always be cache churn even on 060 since unless you disable caching for literally everything other than the lookup, every read of the next pixel is going to want to transfer a cache lines worth of data in.

This is why I tend to work with a small cache line friendly buffer that's easily allocated on the stack. You can move16 data from the source into it without contaminating the cache and do the work in place, where we are already cached. Then you can move16 the data back out again to the destination, again without cache disruption. If I do use a lookup table it's generally tiny and on the stack, such as a nybble indexed lookup

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cdimauro 
Re: Updated Alien Breed 3D 2
Posted on 20-Aug-2022 4:55:47
#70 ]
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Joined: 29-Oct-2012
Posts: 3621
From: Germany

@Karlos

Quote:

Karlos wrote:

It should be quite trivial to convert the 12 bit values to 15 bit (it's a bit of shifting work that can be done quite readily), or better still calculated to that precision.

Do you use the logarithmic scaling when converting from 12 to 15 (or higher bits)? I mean: copying (again) the MSB(s) to the lower bits, to make the colors transition more smooth.

For example, from 12 to 15 bits:
7,7,7 -> 14,14,14
8,8,8 -> 17,17,17
and so on.

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Karlos 
Re: Updated Alien Breed 3D 2
Posted on 20-Aug-2022 8:10:25
#71 ]
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Joined: 24-Aug-2003
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From: As-sassin-aaate! As-sassin-aaate! Ooh! We forgot the ammunition!

@cdimauro

No, but I could. Routines like this were generally about speed, so in the example given I'd be looking to convert 0000Rrrr GgggBbbb to 0Rrrr0Gg gg0Bbbb0.

Based on what you're saying I should be aiming for 0RrrrRGg ggGBbbbB

I can definitely see the benefit when any given gun is maximum.

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Karlos 
Re: Updated Alien Breed 3D 2
Posted on 20-Aug-2022 8:14:12
#72 ]
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Joined: 24-Aug-2003
Posts: 4394
From: As-sassin-aaate! As-sassin-aaate! Ooh! We forgot the ammunition!

@cdimauro

No, but I could. Routines like this were generally about speed, so in the example given I'd be looking to convert 0000Rrrr GgggBbbb to 0Rrrr0Gg gg0Bbbb0.

Based on what you're saying I should be aiming for 0RrrrRGg ggGBbbbB

I can definitely see the benefit when any given gun is maximum. I've not had to deal with expanding 12 bit in previous RTG, since the narrowest RGB format I've had to work with is 15-bit.

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cdimauro 
Re: Updated Alien Breed 3D 2
Posted on 20-Aug-2022 9:16:41
#73 ]
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Joined: 29-Oct-2012
Posts: 3621
From: Germany

@Karlos

Quote:

Karlos wrote:
@cdimauro

No, but I could. Routines like this were generally about speed, so in the example given I'd be looking to convert 0000Rrrr GgggBbbb to 0Rrrr0Gg gg0Bbbb0.

Based on what you're saying I should be aiming for 0RrrrRGg ggGBbbbB

Correct.
Quote:
I can definitely see the benefit when any given gun is maximum. I've not had to deal with expanding 12 bit in previous RTG, since the narrowest RGB format I've had to work with is 15-bit.

Try to display a gradient with the two different color scaling, and you'll see the differences.

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Karlos 
Re: Updated Alien Breed 3D 2
Posted on 20-Aug-2022 9:38:20
#74 ]
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Joined: 24-Aug-2003
Posts: 4394
From: As-sassin-aaate! As-sassin-aaate! Ooh! We forgot the ammunition!

@cdimauro

No need, I totally get it. If I were converting for accuracy, I'd be looking to guarantee 15 comes out as 31 in this specific example. Certainly if converting to 24 bit, you can see that 255/15 = 17. Multiplication by 17 is shift left 4, plus one. Which amounts to just duplicating each nybble into pairs to scale 4 bit per gun to 8.

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Hypex 
Re: Updated Alien Breed 3D 2
Posted on 20-Aug-2022 11:23:14
#75 ]
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Joined: 6-May-2007
Posts: 11180
From: Greensborough, Australia

@Karlos

Quote:
I am interested to try pipper's build in OS4 on my A1200. As a more system friendly executable it's possible it will run. I haven't turned the machine on in over a year or so. The hard disk got taken out to be imaged and I've still not put it back in.


Sounds like my A1200. Except I broke my IDE pins but did backup my drive years after I broke it free from mechanical freezing. And my A1200 can't run OS4 but my other machines can.

Quote:
My specific interest is in an RTG version, especially if I can get an RGB rendering. I've forked the repo but haven't made any significant exploration yet.


Might be worth going the whole 24 bit except for classic if it's too much.

Quote:
PPC680x0... There's a blast from the past. Was anything ever successfully ported with it?


I've no idea! When PPC was the NKOTB it was one of those things. Something else supporting PPC. Looking back I think PPC was somewhat good for the Amiga, as there was all this excitement and development, with comparisons from 68K to PPC.

I've read some comments where some people didn't think it was that good. But descriptions like a mathematical model of the 68K on PPC sounded cool. It did convert library calls but in the old PUP/WUP way I suppose.

Could be worth porting it to OS4 and MOS so it can generate native executables. It still needs an assembler. So not quite up to the level of ECX for example where you can plug in some code and compile for 68K, MOS or OS4.

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Karlos 
Re: Updated Alien Breed 3D 2
Posted on 20-Aug-2022 12:25:03
#76 ]
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Joined: 24-Aug-2003
Posts: 4394
From: As-sassin-aaate! As-sassin-aaate! Ooh! We forgot the ammunition!

@Hypex

There's no question that putting a 603 into my A1200 allowed me to do things that where impractical on the 040, and only became more obvious after I added the BVPPC on top. As a hobby coder there was lots fun to be had. Optimising code for minimum context switching under 3.x/WarpOS and PowerUp was also an interesting challenge.

OS4 is "ok" on the machine, but there's no doubting that it's intended for faster hardware. The PIO IDE interface hampers it. Ironically I have the SCSI controller but no hardware for it. I did start a driver project but without real HW and time, it withered on the vine.

It runs 68K Doom (DoomAttack020+) at 640*400 though, so there is that. If TKG runs, it would be interesting to see how well.

Regarding RTG, I'm definitely interested to see if I can bypass the whole colour reduction and see if 24-bit RGB is doable. Or at least 16 bit, if data transfer is an issue.

Last edited by Karlos on 20-Aug-2022 at 12:42 PM.
Last edited by Karlos on 20-Aug-2022 at 12:25 PM.

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Karlos 
Re: Updated Alien Breed 3D 2
Posted on 20-Aug-2022 15:37:47
#77 ]
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Joined: 24-Aug-2003
Posts: 4394
From: As-sassin-aaate! As-sassin-aaate! Ooh! We forgot the ammunition!

Quick playthrough of level B, this time without getting my arse kicked. https://youtu.be/Nd5kteztSbc

This gives me an idea. The big spotlight robot should be a mandatory takedown to open the exit area.

Last edited by Karlos on 20-Aug-2022 at 03:58 PM.

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NutsAboutAmiga 
Re: Updated Alien Breed 3D 2
Posted on 20-Aug-2022 17:24:21
#78 ]
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Joined: 9-Jun-2004
Posts: 12795
From: Norway

@Karlos

I guess 12bit is faster to color reduce, maybe it has to do with cache sizes.

4bit per color channel 16 bytes fits nice in 4KB 68040 data cache.

Maybe even place for etch per channel, also have final shifting in there.
then need 16bit array 16*8 = 32 bytes *3 = 96 bytes,

must be better then lots of muls and divs you where talking about.

if replace the 12bit with 16bit that be better, for RTG. no conversion.
yep 24/32bit cost more then its worth.

Last edited by NutsAboutAmiga on 20-Aug-2022 at 06:15 PM.
Last edited by NutsAboutAmiga on 20-Aug-2022 at 05:38 PM.
Last edited by NutsAboutAmiga on 20-Aug-2022 at 05:30 PM.

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Karlos 
Re: Updated Alien Breed 3D 2
Posted on 20-Aug-2022 19:05:48
#79 ]
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Joined: 24-Aug-2003
Posts: 4394
From: As-sassin-aaate! As-sassin-aaate! Ooh! We forgot the ammunition!

@NutsAboutAmiga

Quote:
must be better then lots of muls and divs you where talking about


Fun fact, if the multiplication is floating point, it can be quickest on modern CPUs, even with conversion. You always have to test and measure carefully.

Last edited by Karlos on 20-Aug-2022 at 07:24 PM.

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NutsAboutAmiga 
Re: Updated Alien Breed 3D 2
Posted on 20-Aug-2022 20:48:55
#80 ]
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Joined: 9-Jun-2004
Posts: 12795
From: Norway

@Karlos

yes, you can get quirky cases where FPU and CPU is working in parallel. Or out of order. That was downfall of one major CPU manufactures, Cyrix, there CPU can’t run quake, because it can’t do that.

Last edited by NutsAboutAmiga on 20-Aug-2022 at 08:49 PM.

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