Thinking about some RPG..Android version.

[Thomas.]

Nice how fast is running on nexus 7?

[EgonOlsen]

Something between 35 and 60 fps.

[Thomas.]

Have you ever tried the game on SGS3? Is running faster?

[EgonOlsen]

No, i haven't. I've tried it on the Galaxy Note, which has the same 1280*800 resolution that the Nexus 7 has. It runs a little faster on that Mali chipset (but keep in mind that the Nexus 7 uses cheap ram. Other Tegra devices might be faster) and it even looks better because Tegra's texture accuracy is even lower than Mali's. It's more consistent in the way that it looks either good or bad on Tegra where the rendering quality is more unsteady on Mali, but i somehow like the Mali look better.

[K24A3]

I see you have taken a kind turn towards Mali devices, come on admit it, they aren't that bad

In saying that, the Tegra 3 tablet I have seems to have a few distance related flicker glitches here and there so every device has it's strengths and weaknesses.

*cough* except for nVidia desktop chipsets *cough* (long time fan, always delivered expectations)

[EgonOlsen]

I see you have taken a kind turn towards Mali devices, come on admit it, they aren't that bad

I'm undecided if Tegra or Mali is better...or worse...they are both inaccurate (every mobile chip is inaccurate, but PowerVR is still superior). The fact that Mali can't handle complex calculations with float numbers larger than ~65500 is really tricky and Tegra's default depth buffer accuracy is laughable (as you have experienced yourself).

In saying that, the Tegra 3 tablet I have seems to have a few distance related flicker glitches here and there so every device has it's strengths and weaknesses.

That's because Tegra's depth buffer behaviour is crap by default. You have to use some extension to improve it. The latest jPCT-AE version has a class in util that helps to choose a config that should fix this in most cases.

*cough* except for nVidia desktop chipsets *cough* (long time fan, always delivered expectations)

I used ATI/AMD for years and never had a problem. I bought the GTX 680 this time and seem to have a faulty memory chip...well....

[K24A3]

IMO the nVidia drivers are what sets it apart from ATI, they have always been superior. But if you use the 'correct' driver version, ATI cards are fine.

Latest jPCT version as in v1.26? I'll have a look...

[EgonOlsen]

Latest jPCT version as in v1.26? I'll have a look...

Yes...http://www.jpct.net/jpct-ae/doc/com/threed/jpct/util/NVDepthConfigChooser.html

[EgonOlsen]

I case you are wondering what i'm constantly talking about "accuracy", just have a look at this...it's roughly the same scene rendered on four different devices.

The desktop version on a GTX 680. This is how it's supposed to look: http://jpct.de/download/acc/desktop.png

PowerVR on a Nexus S. Not as good as the desktop and with some banding, but at least somehow filtered: http://jpct.de/download/acc/powevr.png

Mali on a Galaxy Note. Filtered, but fuzzy and inconsistent in movement: http://jpct.de/download/acc/mali.png

Tegra on Nexus 7: Just plain awful. It IS filtered, but accuracy is so low, that you don't notice this here: http://jpct.de/download/acc/tegra.png

Edit: Please note that you don't notice this that much in the normal game, because you usually don't stare at the ground. But it's ugly anyway...

[Thomas.]

Oh, it looks really horrible on Tegra 3... Why is this happening? Is it fragment shader accuracy?

[EgonOlsen]

No, it's texture/filtering accuracy. If you stretch a texture with little changes in u/v coordinates along a large polygon, it looks like this.

[EgonOlsen]

I've added an ugly world map in addition to the mini-map. You can place up to 5 colored markers (similar to and in preparation of quest markers) on the map which will show up on the mini-map too to easy navigation.
Chests now contain (totally random) items that can be dragged into your inventory or dropped onto the ground. I'll add stuff like a "take all" button later.

The main map:


The mini-map with markers and the chest content (as well as some dropped items):

[Thomas.]

Nice! the map is generated automatically or it is created by you?

[EgonOlsen]

It's created by Terragen according to my settings, largely reduced in polygon count by using the method mentioned in the wiki and then fixed with some ingame editing which is available in the desktop version of the game. In addition, it's modified in code too by placing houses and fences and stuff, which all flatten the underlying terrain. The splatting texture has been drawn by me based on the height map created by Terragen.
The geometry is more or less final, but the splatting texture isn't. It's missing a lot of additional locations, tracks etc.

Edit: And about the view of the map ingame...it's a simple image created by a stand-alone program that renders the whole terrain from above at once.

[Thomas.]

So, for what you have height map? For collisions with the terrain? It can be much faster than the real collisions ...