Are you good enough to make 3D games?

If you’re going to be looking to make 3D games, you’re going to need the best programmers you can find, or strip your artwork down to nothing.

I’m sure you’re familiar with the basic tech: you wear glasses that control which eye sees the view from a slightly different angle giving the illusion of 3D.

There is of course a massive technical consideration for 3D games, that they have 1/2 your frame rate as you’re now rendering twice as much as you were before. (This is a gross assumption based on the fact that you’re render bound)

Those beautiful silky games that did run at 60fps, drop a frame and you’re now run at 30fps tops (2 frames at 60fps). There is no 50fps or 40fps, it’s straight down to 30fps. The next jump down is 20fps (3 frames at 60 fps) and it goes on from there but in less damaging leaps.

I know from experience that it takes a lot of effort to hit 60fps and most games only just scrape through as they try to balance content with frame rate so this jump is going to hit them hard. After all, why waste empty frame time when you can make your game look even better.

Optimising your game engine and balancing your content to hit the required throughput is going to take some effort, and of course this is effort your not spending on adding game content. It’s just a slog to get through.

On top of these there’s the aesthetic game design to get through to maximise the sensation of 3D and to avoid the problems it brings with it. The added sense of realism can amplify sensations of motion sickness and it can all go wrong when that sense of illusion is shattered when the shark coming out of the screen at you clips the edge of the screen and your brain knows it’s fake.

The 3D games I’ve played have been hit & miss and some haven’t made the transition to 3D well and need to go back to the drawing board for some optimisation and design improvements.

There are some fantastic opportunities out there for 3D games and it takes talent and expertise to make 3D game sing.

Further Reading

Housemarque - SuperStardust HD at 120fps The inspiring post

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