| 1.1 | What is GLQuake? | |
| 1.2 | What's so great about it? | |
| 1.3 | What do I need to run it? | |
| 1.4 | How do I get the latest version of GLQuake? |
GLQuake is a special enhanced version of Quake designed to run on computers with 3D accelerator cards using the OpenGL API. It features some nice tricks that you won't find in Quake, and also improves performance on 3D accelerated systems...
The performance increase from GLQuake can be spectacular - the table below gives the results of timedemo tests on Quake before and after I added a 3Dfx card to my two year old P90 (40Mb RAM, Diamond Stealth 2000). Results are given for WinQuake, and for GLQuake with a 3Dfx card. The numbers given are the frames-per-second recorded for that demo. You can run your own test using the command 'timedemo demo' from the console, where demo is the name of your demo file (demo1, demo2 and demo3 are the standard Quake demos)...
| DEMO | WinQuake v1.1
320x200 |
WinQuake v1.1
640x480 |
GLQuake v0.96
UNTWEAKED 640x480 |
GLQuake v0.96
TWEAKED 640x480 |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| DEMO1 | 9.7 | 2.8 | 17.6 | 21.9 |
| DEMO2 | 9.9 | 3.1 | 18.7 | 21.3 |
| DEMO3 | 9.3 | 2.8 | 11.1 | 18.1 |
As you can see, in general GLQuake with a 3Dfx at 640x480 runs about twice as fast as normal Quake at 320x200 without a 3Dfx on my computer. The poor time for GLQuake in DEMO3 is probably because of the way GLQuake treats explosions. DEMO3 includes a lot of grenade and rocket explosions, which explains the slowdown. GLQuake includes an option called "flashblend". Using the faster flashblend setting gave an extra 3 fps, but you get ugly balls of light around the explosions.
To find out how I achieved the tweaked results, see my GLQuake troubleshooting guide.
GLQuake is designed to run using a subset of OpenGL. You can run GLQuake on most good 3D accelerators. Check the table below for a list of some of the cards and chipsets which are capable...
| Chipset | Card | Manufacturer |
|---|---|---|
| 3Dfx Voodoo | Canopus Pure 3D | Canopus |
| Deltron Flash 3D | Deltron | |
| Diamond Monster 3D | Diamond | |
| Guillemot MaxiGamer 3D | Guillemot | |
| Intergraph Intense 3D Voodoo | Intergraph | |
| Orchid Righteous 3D | Orchid | |
| Quantum 3D Obsidian | Quantum 3D | |
| Skywell Magic 3D | Magic-3D | |
| TechWorks Power 3D | TechWorks | |
| 3Dfx Voodoo Rush | Hercules Stingray 128-3D | Hercules |
| Jazz Multimedia Adrenaline Rush | Jazz Multimedia | |
| Riva 128 | Velocity 128 | STB |
| Diamond Viper 330 | Diamond | |
| Victory Erazor | ELSA | |
| PowerVR PCX2 | Matrox m3D | Matrox |
| Apocalypse 3Dx | Videologic |
At the moment the 3Dfx Voodoo chipset cards provide the best performance on most PCs, although the PowerVR PCX2 cards allow higher resolutions and should perform well on high spec (Pentium II) systems.
3Dfx's Voodoo 2 should appear in the spring of 1998, and is alleged to give two to three times the frame rate of a Voodoo. You will also be able to link two Voodoo 2 cards together i