GZDoom 4.7.0 released

[dpJudas]

Vulkan doubles the memory usage

This has been fixed. It doesn't do that anymore.

and can potentially trigger stack smashing protection put into place by the compiler

The vulkan backend doesn't use more stack space than the OpenGL backend.

and makes it impossible for me to use nearest neighbor with mipmaps (it just renders everything with linear interpolation if any form of mipmaps are enabled)

This sounds like a driver bug. Maybe vkQuake has specific detection for Intel hardware and disables mipmaps altogether? Just because something works in one vulkan application doesn't mean it can't be the driver breaking it in another.

[KynikossDragonn]

The vulkan backend doesn't use more stack space than the OpenGL backend.

I haven't attempted loading this recently but Total Chaos was one of the things that caused GZDoom to abort with that "stack smashing protection" message around when the memory usage went past 16 GB. It loaded fine at the time in OpenGL though. I might attempt testing this someday when I get time for it.

Maybe vkQuake has specific detection for Intel hardware and disables mipmaps altogether?

I'm not sure how it might be doing it. I definitely notice mipmap levels when I move towards and away from distant walls, but everything is all nearest-neighbor filtered like it would be if you picked GL_NEAREST_MIPMAP_NEAREST in OpenGL ports. I have absolutely no understanding of C/C++ or the Vulkan API to see what's different between codes, I'm too inpet with that low-level stuff...

[Graf Zahl]

Please don't use Total Chaos as benchmark for anything. That mod just exceeds all sane boundaries with its amount of texture data. To deal with such amounts you really need a modern engine with automatic texture memory management. I never was able to run that thing at all on my system.

[Nash]

Yeah, Total Chaos doesn't run smoothly even on my system (RTX 2080, i7 8700 3.2 GHz, 16 GB RAM). It's an impressive project but unfortunately didn't use the right engine for it... a game like TC would normally run like a dream on modern engines.

[drfrag]

I tried the lowres version and it hung my windows machine when i picked some diary, may be it was something related to the GC. I had to press the power button, i have a HDD and disk activity was very intensive.

[Redneckerz]

For the most part, it is pointless to describe it, because even if it were adapted to the Vulcan, it still literally lives out its last days as a more or less "modern card".

This is a bunch of goobledigook. If you are going to raise a complaint (Which you do), then you may aswell just tell people what that GPU is. Because there are GPU's out there that actually have the grunt to run GZDoom but not the API's to do so.*

*Well, they used to. Now they could just use the GLES renderer and additionally the separate GLES build of 4.6.1 for compatibility testing.

I literally ran GZDoom using the GLES renderer with a 2010 rig with the equivalent of a 2005-era GPU (Geforce 6150 SE). It ran absolutely fine on that (60 fps, even!), but you are missing post-processing and perhaps dynamic lights. If you want that in your GZDoom, you would need GZDoom 1.8.10, or ZDoom32, or even the recent 64-bit update to GLOOME.

All of these are far behind current GZDoom's scope and target older hardware by default, or are just plain unsupported at worst. Because we have developers here caring about these things, the ZDoom-family and its extended kin have enough sub ports available that atleast some[/] will run on even the most outdated rig when in software (Think 20+ years ago) and 15 years ago if you want GL-rendering.

No other port family has this kind of vendor support unofficially, so there is always a (G)ZDoom build around that is both running on modern systems yet only requires antique hardware.

Its just that Graf and co look at the survey, see how little people actually make use of that, and they also target current-day systems. Even so, the GLES renderer covers your need for all hardware that can drop to OpenGL 2.1. Which is what, 2005? Heck, i wouldn't be surprised if GZDoom still ran accelerated on a Radeon X800 or 9800 from 2004 or 2003 when using that renderer.

I have never understood the attitude of "my hardware is old, but new software must run on it".

If your hardware is old, then you pick old programs that were current when your machine was new/the norm. That's what I do with older machines. Why on Earth would anyone expect people to be making software for out-dated hardware?

What is however a thing are remakes where said game looks the same but requires DX11 equivalent hardware to provide the same look and feel on modern systems. I can imagine people get disappointed for that:The game looks the same but it requires a lot more hardware oomph to provide that look.

[sinisterseed]

What is however a thing are remakes where said game looks the same but requires DX11 equivalent hardware to provide the same look and feel on modern systems. I can imagine people get disappointed for that: The game looks the same but it requires a lot more hardware oomph to provide that look.

Not really. There are exceptions to this, such as Doom 64's bilinear filter which, based on what some devs said, actually really pushed GL to its limits, but not Vulkan and apparently the DX11 which had unresolved issues.

That aside, these remakes often offer new additions which absolutely make it worth the bump in requirements. For instance the Shadow Man remaster has real-time lightning which absolutely makes a noticeable difference for its maps and atmosphere, one arguably for the better based on what I've seen of the original release.

Either way, the point is moot. The original and a remastered version of it are different things. If somebody wants the original look and feel, complete with the bugs and jank, well, that's what they should be going for, the original, and not a modern-day remaster that they expect to be stuck in time.

[Graf Zahl]

What is however a thing are remakes where said game looks the same but requires DX11 equivalent hardware to provide the same look and feel on modern systems. I can imagine people get disappointed for that:The game looks the same but it requires a lot more hardware oomph to provide that look.

Remember: To get even close to the software renderer's lighting with a hardware renderer you need decent shader performance. That essentially means hardware that is DX10/OpenGL 3.x compliant. And it's not a coincidence that this is where we currently set the cutoff point. On everything older you will have to compromise too much, and disable some features to make the renderer perform well.

With this cutoff point we got a low end that still runs shaders well enough so that we don't have to keep costly low end render paths alive. The main feature of the GLES branch is that it disables the postprocessing stage. I am fairly certain that for low end desktops we can get more mileage out of the engine by replacing GLES with a full GL backend that merely disables its postprocessing stage and the multiple framebuffer copies this necessitates.

I still remember the pathetic shader performance of the Geforce 6800 I had before shaders became commonplace.

[SLON]

Are Fermi generation cards capable of supporting Vulcan in principle, if modern Android devices can do it? You need to understand that when I bought this (Kepler, of course, was then, but specifically my variation was still at Fermi), Vulcan was still in its infancy, and in principle no one heard or cared about it, the main thing is that the current games go well. In principle, if need to understand that, I do not care about a new PC, because I simply do not see those new AAA games for which it would be care (and those 2-3 that are more or less good, sorry, it is can be just look at YT, and even there is nothing really innovative about them).
It will just be a little ironic if the GZDoom modifications are left out for past gen, despite the fact that there will be nothing fundamentally different from what was in 2015 or so (I'm not talking now from Total Chaos or something like that).
I can even say that now the percentage of new "hobo-class" computers has even grown, at least from what I have seen personally. The crisis, of course, does not help with this, and many people just need only to surf the Internet, and MS Office work (although, this is already a bit offtopic, ofc).

[Graf Zahl]

Fermi is one generation too old for Vulkan support.
You are at the mercy of the OS suppliers here. Windows 11 won't support your card anymore, for example, and NVidia has already discontinued driver development for it.
As long as there's a way to install the existing driver and run OpenGL on such a card you will be safe, but you have to be aware that you are on a technologically obsolete setup here.
It won't be GZDoom to cut you off but the advancements of technology that may render your setup part of the low end background noise. Just like any other obsolete tech it will eventually be relegated to background noise.
Right now the user share of non-Vulkan compatible hardware is roughly 15% - two years ago it was 20%. The advent of Windows 11 will only hasten the decline. In 4 to 5 years it'll be around 2-3% and then comes the time when we have to ask ourselves what is more important: Take full advantage of modern APIs (which right now we can't because we still need OpenGL) or continue to support old hardware at the expense of the vast majority.

[sinisterseed]

I do not care about a new PC, because I simply do not see those new AAA games for which it would be care (and those 2-3 that are more or less good, sorry, it is can be just look at YT, and even there is nothing really innovative about them)

Then even when it comes to video games, as I mentioned in my walls of text, the recent remasters of classic titles all require DX11/Vulkan capable hardware to run at all as well, the bump in requirements is in no way limited only to fancy triple-A titles.

Not just that, but I also noticed emulators have also started going the DX12/Vulkan route a while ago. Duckstation, CEMU, RPCSX2 and so on have all started taking advantage of modern APIs for their features and performance. So regardless of how you look at it, old is old, and is rapidly getting relegated to ancient status too. There's a reason why old tech is getting dumped, and it definitely isn't "just because".

[Redneckerz]

What is however a thing are remakes where said game looks the same but requires DX11 equivalent hardware to provide the same look and feel on modern systems. I can imagine people get disappointed for that: The game looks the same but it requires a lot more hardware oomph to provide that look.

Not really.

I'd love to hear an elaboration. Because usually the remakes (or remasters) that get the treatment are games that have substantially lower system requirements than what you have today.

And yes, Shadow Man's real time lighting is awesome, but its also not something that should bump the specs to where they are now, just for that effect alone.

Remember: To get even close to the software renderer's lighting with a hardware renderer you need decent shader performance. That essentially means hardware that is DX10/OpenGL 3.x compliant. And it's not a coincidence that this is where we currently set the cutoff point. On everything older you will have to compromise too much, and disable some features to make the renderer perform well.

That is strictly about Doom's core look, i realize. I am not contesting that.

I still remember the pathetic shader performance of the Geforce 6800 I had before shaders became commonplace.

Weren't they commonplace already at the time of the 6800 (2004/2005)? The Geforce FX, its predecessor, was notorious for its abysmal shader model 2 performance to the point you would be better off with SM 1.1. Shader Model 2 hardware already existed as far back as the 9700 Pro (2002) although no games really used that. But shaders circa 2005 were atleast common: Requiring a Geforce 3/Radeon 8500 was a common requirement back then (Shader model 1.1), somewhat related to the fact the OG Xbox supported that level of shaders (in 2001).

Note: this is taking account the notion that hardware requirements on PC take a longer time to stablize. The presence of Shader hardware was already common on PC as early as 2001, but games using it would only took in form quite a bit later.

[Rachael]

If you want to argue this can we at least please not do it in a news thread?

[Graf Zahl]

I still remember the pathetic shader performance of the Geforce 6800 I had before shaders became commonplace.

Weren't they commonplace already at the time of the 6800 (2004/2005)? The Geforce FX, its predecessor, was notorious for its abysmal shader model 2 performance to the point you would be better off with SM 1.1. Shader Model 2 hardware already existed as far back as the 9700 Pro (2002) although no games really used that. But shaders circa 2005 were atleast common: Requiring a Geforce 3/Radeon 8500 was a common requirement back then (Shader model 1.1), somewhat related to the fact the OG Xbox supported that level of shaders (in 2001).

Back then shaders could be used for small effects, but barely for rendering an entire scene with them. I still remember that I tried using a very simple assembly shader to render Doom's invulnerability effect without creating new textures on that Gefore 6800, and it cut frame rate by half. In the end I used the shader only for camera textures.

[edward850]

Oh hey, my account does still work. Seems a couple of pieces of confusion is floating around, let's clear those up;

Not really. There are exceptions to this, such as Doom 64's bilinear filter which, based on what some devs said, actually really pushed GL to its limits, but not Vulkan and apparently the DX11 which had unresolved issues.

Seems you've crossed a few wires. Doom64 doesn't have a bilinear filter, it has a three point filter. If it was just bilinear it wouldn't have needed a custom shader implementation.
However more to the point, the OpenGL renderer had absolutely no problem with the shader at all. No in fact the real problem with OpenGL is just that it was OpenGL, it was causing design conflicts with the RHI between the other renderers, which included GNM on the Playstation (it doesn't use OpenGL or Vulkan), and DirectX12 on the Xbox. There was also barely any hardware that was using it anymore (cards with only OpenGL 3.2 in computers that could still run our games in the first place were few and far between), DirectX made for a better legacy fallback in the end, which is what caused OpenGL to get tossed out in Shadow Man, which brings me to...

And yes, Shadow Man's real time lighting is awesome, but its also not something that should bump the specs to where they are now, just for that effect alone.

No that's straight up not how that works. Shadow Man's lighting isn't what's driving up the spec, hell we probably could still run that on OpenGL 3.2, the problem is however that OpenGL basically required having its own renderer at this point given all the other graphics APIs we needed to support. OpenGL made the least amount of sense to support going forward as it was just creating design conflicts with all the various memory management and render context functions we needed throughout the core of the renderer.

The minimum requirement would still be DirectX11, even if the shadow maps weren't there. Hell you can even disable them so it's blatantly not even a feature requirement.