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#1 |
This cat is no more
Join Date: Dec 2004
Location: FRANCE
Age: 52
Posts: 8,454
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Crazy idea to improve speed on games for AGA machines
For some games that are slow, because lots of blitting / 32 colors / EHB and all, those could be sped up on AGA machines by changing FMODE = 0 to FMODE = 3 (and also adjusting modulo as possibly bitplane addresses)
I way trying to add FMODE=3 to my supercars 2 AGA hack (I lazily retained old FMODE=0 setting), and while testing on real hardware, I had the impression that the game was much smoother. Paraj already did such work in Killing Cloud (besides rewriting the part of the 3D rendering engine ![]() AGA games probably already use that mode (well, we could have surprises) but if you have ideas about games that are slow and could be made faster, please do tell. |
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#2 |
Registered User
Join Date: Dec 2016
Location: Italy
Posts: 795
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Great idea !
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#3 |
WinUAE developer
Join Date: Aug 2001
Location: Hämeenlinna/Finland
Age: 49
Posts: 26,611
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It should be relatively easy if game does not use horizontal scrolling.
Horizontal scrolling can make it very complex task. Bitplane pointers must be 8 bytes divisible, different BPLCON1 range (0-15 -> 0-63). Horizontal scrolling also requires smaller DDFSTRT (than OCS/ECS) = lost sprites. |
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#4 | |
This cat is no more
Join Date: Dec 2004
Location: FRANCE
Age: 52
Posts: 8,454
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Quote:
![]() One difficult part is to find proper modulo settings and DDFSTART/STOP but also if bitplane is not 8-byte aligned, or number of lines is not divisible by 8, this means that more memory is required for the screens, so all the constants after the screen data will be overwritten unless they're shifted... All this work is rather easy when you have the source, but without it, with all precompiled address calculations, this is not so trivial. If anyone can share some (good) titles that notoriously crawl/could be faster (ex: Prince of Persia, but that one runs much faster with fastmem reloc already), please yell. Maybe Bitmap Brothers games (Gods, Magic Pockets, Speedball 2). Not sure it would improve the framerate though. |
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#5 |
Registered User
Join Date: Dec 2020
Location: Italy
Posts: 2,012
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what about the slowdowns in Lotus3?
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#6 |
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Join Date: Dec 2004
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Lotus 3: one of the rare games of which I have the source code
When do those slowdowns occur? |
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#7 |
Registered User
Join Date: Sep 2005
Location: Peterborough
Age: 48
Posts: 862
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Am I right in thinking that Fighter Bomber uses the blitter in its 3D engine? Could that be made smoother?
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#8 |
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Join Date: Dec 2004
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Fighter Bomber was already heavily processed by paraj & me: relocation to fastmem and usage of fmode=3 if AGA chipset. Nothing to optimize further here. Game is just too ambitious or too badly written.
Maybe you didn't test the latest whdload version ? It "flies" at around 10 fps on my A1200/060. Not great but better than the previous slideshow of a game that it is originally. |
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#9 |
Registered User
Join Date: Sep 2005
Location: Peterborough
Age: 48
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I had not seen that!!! Cool. I managed to get your new version working (never done a WHDload install before - always used pre-done ones) and it's a HUGE improvement over the original. It's actually nice to play!
I've got an A1200 with ACA 1230/56 and the FPS fluctuates between around 10 & 25! I loaded up the original to compare and it is hideous. Thanks for this new version. Last edited by vroom6sri; 12 March 2023 at 20:24. |
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#10 |
Registered User
Join Date: Jan 2020
Location: oslo/norway
Posts: 1,645
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Could it work for Chaos Engine?
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#11 | |
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Join Date: Dec 2004
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Quote:
![]() Yes, but not sure I want to do it. The CD32 version is AGA and runs in fastmem already from whdload. I just checked and in-game already uses 64-bit fastest fetch mode too. Some argue that the ECS version is better color wise. It also runs from fastmem, but obviously doesn't use FMODE fetch optimization. Not sure if it's worth it. |
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#12 | |
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Join Date: Dec 2020
Location: Italy
Posts: 2,012
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Quote:
also with many tracks in the league, so pre-generated iirc all the 'future' setting tracks had issues too? too much time has passed from the last play with this one ![]() |
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#13 |
This cat is no more
Join Date: Dec 2004
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Age: 52
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On A500 I can't help. If it crawls on A1200 something could be done, specially running from fastmem (if CPU issue) & enabling fmode=3 (if DMA/blitter issue)
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#14 |
Registered User
Join Date: Mar 2012
Location: Norfolk, UK
Posts: 1,163
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I'm wondering whether Xenon 2 could be turbocharged? (And if so, would it become more or less playable?)
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#15 | |
Registered User
Join Date: Jan 2020
Location: oslo/norway
Posts: 1,645
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Quote:
Yes, exactly. The AGA version look horrible. That is not something I say cause I do not have AGA computers. Would love to see the OCS version without slowdowns. |
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#16 |
Registered User
Join Date: Oct 2007
Location: Athens , Greece
Posts: 1,863
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@jotd
Maybe the ICE racers could benefit from this (Turbo Outrun, Cisco Heat, Chase HQ II, Hydra) and make decent games out of duds! ![]() |
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#17 | |
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Join Date: Dec 2004
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Quote:
WinUAE is a good test as code running in chip or fast makes no difference in speed, and I can't say for sure but it's very likely that FMODE speed isn't emulated. FMODE is emulated because if you misalign bitplanes or sprites you get trashed graphics, but take Supercars 2 AGA for example, on WinUAE it's always been smooth even with FMODE=0 (ECS fetch). There's one way to know: play them under WinUAE and see if they're any faster this way. If they still suck in WinUAE then it's no use. It usually helps to decide which game is worth working on. |
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#18 | |
cheeky scoundrel
Join Date: Nov 2004
Location: Spijkenisse/Netherlands
Age: 43
Posts: 7,113
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#19 |
Thalion Webshrine
Join Date: Jan 2004
Location: Oxford
Posts: 14,646
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#20 | |
Registered User
Join Date: Oct 2007
Location: Athens , Greece
Posts: 1,863
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Sure, gonna try them out.
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