Original Age of Empires 2 dev talks about its usage of assembly code • Hacker News Board

Re: Original Age of Empires 2 dev talks about its usage of assembly code

#11

Post by tom_ » Sun, Jan 07, 2024, 2:06 AM UTC

puttycat wrote: post #7

> A key speedup technique AoE used was realized during discussions I had with iD software programmer and optimization guru Michael Abrash over lunch at Tia's Mexican Restaurant in Mesquite, TX. How many freeform interactions like this did we lose because of the Internet's illusion of being connected?

NEVER FORGET WHAT THEY HAVE TAKEN FROM US. WE WERE ONCE A CULTURE. NOW WE ARE LOST, FOREVER. WHITHER OUR SENSE OF BEAUTY. (etc., etc., insert architecture pics to taste)

C'mon dude. The opportunity for people to talk to one another about this stuff is unimaginably better than it was back then. Like, here we are, right now, me telling you you're full of shit. What are the chances of us being able to do that in 1999?

(I'm sorry to be mean, but I remember 1999 very well and it was much harder to get good information about things, and discuss things with others interested in the same topics, than it is today. And it was already markedly better then than it was even 5 years prior to that!)

Re: Original Age of Empires 2 dev talks about its usage of assembly code

#12

Post by malkia » Sun, Jan 07, 2024, 2:21 AM UTC

zeusk wrote: post #6

malkia wrote: post #4

I worked on port of a Konami game from PSX to PC, that was 1999-2000 - the code (C) had lots of #ifdefs like where inline assembly was placed, and the original "C" code was kept. It seemed all done by one specific programmer, and what really saved us (in porting) the game was the originallly kept "C" code. My mips knowledge was never as good as x86. So yes, it was the norm back then. My second job (1998), was working…

Are there any good resources on using mipmapping and swizzling effectively?

I was actually trying to find it - there were lots of .txt files published back then - and there was one about texture mapping from 1992... 1994? - and it explained swizzling and why it was efficient with caches.

Re: Original Age of Empires 2 dev talks about its usage of assembly code

#13

Post by [deleted] » Sun, Jan 07, 2024, 2:24 AM UTC

necubi wrote: post #5

Havoc wrote: post #2

>The use of assembly in the drawing core resulting in a ~10x sprite drawing speed improvement over the C++ Wow that's a chunky improvement over an already fast lang

This was in 1999. C++ compilers have come a long ways since then. While there are still opportunities for hand-written asm to go and order of magnitude faster than C++, they're mostly around manual vectorization where the auto-vectorizer fails.

[deleted]

Re: Original Age of Empires 2 dev talks about its usage of assembly code

#14

Post by akoboldfrying » Sun, Jan 07, 2024, 2:33 AM UTC

malkia wrote: post #4

I worked on port of a Konami game from PSX to PC, that was 1999-2000 - the code (C) had lots of #ifdefs like where inline assembly was placed, and the original "C" code was kept. It seemed all done by one specific programmer, and what really saved us (in porting) the game was the originallly kept "C" code. My mips knowledge was never as good as x86. So yes, it was the norm back then. My second job (1998), was working…

It was always so disappointing, spending hours coding up a tightly wound assembly language version of some inner loop that uses half the instructions generated by the C++ compiler, only to find that your slaved-over version is actually 5% slower. But OTOH... the thrill when it actually was faster!

This was back in the Pentium 4 era, where there were deep pipelines and oddities like some simple ALU instructions (ADD, SUB, etc.) taking 0.5 cycles(!), while others (ADC, SHR) took 4 cycles IIRC.

Re: Original Age of Empires 2 dev talks about its usage of assembly code

#15

Post by malkia » Sun, Jan 07, 2024, 2:38 AM UTC

malkia wrote: post #12

zeusk wrote: post #6

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Are there any good resources on using mipmapping and swizzling effectively?

I was actually trying to find it - there were lots of .txt files published back then - and there was one about texture mapping from 1992... 1994? - and it explained swizzling and why it was efficient with caches.

Now I remember - back then these texture mappers were called roto zoomers, Alex Champandard did excellent series here ->

https://www.flipcode.com/archives/The_Art_of_Demomaking-Issu... - look for zip file with the source code.

I've also found Go version (and there were 2 java ones)

https://github.com/search?q=BlockTextureScreen

So it's not as neat as swizzling (quickly looking at it) - but essentially same goal - keep pixels that have to be drawn together at close (e.g. blocks). Mipmapping helps too, as then you don't "skip" too many pixels - and you both gain better quality and less cache misses.

Re: Original Age of Empires 2 dev talks about its usage of assembly code

#16

Post by philistine » Sun, Jan 07, 2024, 2:56 AM UTC

malkia wrote: post #4

I worked on port of a Konami game from PSX to PC, that was 1999-2000 - the code (C) had lots of #ifdefs like where inline assembly was placed, and the original "C" code was kept. It seemed all done by one specific programmer, and what really saved us (in porting) the game was the originallly kept "C" code. My mips knowledge was never as good as x86. So yes, it was the norm back then. My second job (1998), was working…

You worked on the port of Metal Gear Solid?! OH MY GOD THIS IS SO COOL!

Edit: Looking it up you might have worked on a larger amount of games than I thought. Very awesome nonetheless. https://www.mobygames.com/game/company:99/from:1998/platform...

Re: Original Age of Empires 2 dev talks about its usage of assembly code

#17

Post by lucb1e » Sun, Jan 07, 2024, 3:09 AM UTC

ahstilde wrote: post #8

puttycat wrote: post #7

> A key speedup technique AoE used was realized during discussions I had with iD software programmer and optimization guru Michael Abrash over lunch at Tia's Mexican Restaurant in Mesquite, TX. How many freeform interactions like this did we lose because of the Internet's illusion of being connected?

We've gained many. Chatting in a discord is similar to this.

Well, yes, but I also see their point (even if I'm not sure I agree with it): by being forced to meet IRL, you're also forced to make real contact and seem more likely to form strong relations, and it is off-the-record by default so you can share more things

Of course, the (massive) counterpoint is that you get to talk to way fewer people, particularly if they're more than half an hour traveling away. Quantity versus quality, but by having a lot of quantity through more diverse online interactions, you can find the conversations that have a lot of quality for you (overlapping fields of work, hobbies, or just a personality match).

Which is better? Probably something in the middle, where you hang out in chat rooms but are also conscious of the advantages of arranging to meet up. I do find it inspirational (too strong a word, but you get the idea) to hear of other times or cultures where things are done differently

Re: Original Age of Empires 2 dev talks about its usage of assembly code

#18

Post by mysteria » Sun, Jan 07, 2024, 3:55 AM UTC

necubi wrote: post #5

Havoc wrote: post #2

>The use of assembly in the drawing core resulting in a ~10x sprite drawing speed improvement over the C++ Wow that's a chunky improvement over an already fast lang

This was in 1999. C++ compilers have come a long ways since then. While there are still opportunities for hand-written asm to go and order of magnitude faster than C++, they're mostly around manual vectorization where the auto-vectorizer fails.

And when that happens SIMD intrinsics are often used rather than going straight into raw assembly.

Re: Original Age of Empires 2 dev talks about its usage of assembly code

#19

Post by frozenport » Sun, Jan 07, 2024, 4:07 AM UTC

Havoc wrote: post #2

>The use of assembly in the drawing core resulting in a ~10x sprite drawing speed improvement over the C++ Wow that's a chunky improvement over an already fast lang

Functionality should have been provided by directx though

Re: Original Age of Empires 2 dev talks about its usage of assembly code

#20

Post by chii » Sun, Jan 07, 2024, 4:22 AM UTC

akoboldfrying wrote: post #14

malkia wrote: post #4

I worked on port of a Konami game from PSX to PC, that was 1999-2000 - the code (C) had lots of #ifdefs like where inline assembly was placed, and the original "C" code was kept. It seemed all done by one specific programmer, and what really saved us (in porting) the game was the originallly kept "C" code. My mips knowledge was never as good as x86. So yes, it was the norm back then. My second job (1998), was working…

It was always so disappointing, spending hours coding up a tightly wound assembly language version of some inner loop that uses half the instructions generated by the C++ compiler, only to find that your slaved-over version is actually 5% slower . But OTOH... the thrill when it actually was faster! This was back in the Pentium 4 era, where there were deep pipelines and oddities like some simple ALU instructions (ADD,…

> uses half the instructions generated by the C++ compiler

is there a tool that could profile/predict ahead of time, so that one does not attempt to hand write assembly before knowing for sure it will beat the compiled version?