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Interview mit Steffen Häuser

Programmierer von Quake 2










How did you get the idea of converting Quake 2 for the Amiga?

Recently we already converted two games based on the Quake 2 engine to different operating systems. We've always been fans of this gfx engine (not only from the point of view of the games but cause the code of ID is programmed simply great.

Who did work on the Quake 2 port?

At the beginning it was Thomas, Hans-Joerg and me. But later Thomas and Hans-Joerg had things to do which were more important than Quake 2 (in particular OS4 specific tasks) so they could not work on the development. Later Christian Michael joined the team on which work the whole optimizing is based (he already was experienced in the Quake 1 engine and in optimizing MiniGL). A direct comparison between the untweaked and the optimized engine resulted a speedup of factor 2.3 at least at certain places in the game. Christian did a great job. But in the end everybody of us four been involved a lot.

Which system requirements does the game have?

150 MHz PPC, 64 MB RAM.

And which is the perfect hardware configuration for the game?

The game runs perfect on any PPC computer with 3d card. A 604e would be good but not absolut necessary. Like I told you Quake 2 is our fastest game. The game comes with a good software renderer, too. But of course you should limit the resolution to 320x240. The software render machine runs obviously faster than the one from Heretic II or Shogo, cause Quake 2 uses an eight bit software renderer while H2 for examples is using a 16 bit one, which is obviously slower (software without 3d hardware), of course. Of course the 3D hardware renderer of Quake 2 is 16 bit, too. But on a 3D card is doesn't disturb the speed.

Quake 2 includes a lot of "mods" which have been converted, too. What about the PC modcrews? How did they react to the Amiga versions of "their" mods?

Most of them were enthusiastic cause at all it increases the number of players. The source code of a few mods was lost. The negotiations of a few mods been more protracted then those of the conversion of a commercial game with a commercial company. A few mod crews believed I would be kidding when I was talking about "Amiga version" even when I affirmed this would not ne a joke and Quake 2 really runs on a Amiga. But overall the mod teams been very cooperatively.

Is it true that you are collaborating on AmigaOS4?

Yes but only in a few areas. I am involved in the AmigaInput for example. My main work are the games.




You can find the whole Interview in the Amiga Future Magazine 39 (november/december 2002)