近日,创新和id Software一直存在着阴影技术之争。这一阴影技术为创新的专利技术,当然不会让id Software吃免费的午餐,昨天创新和id Software达成合作协议,id Software将在Doom3引擎当中采用创新EAX HD ADVANCED声效技术,以此作为使用这一专利技术的补偿。 但事情并不是这么简单的,POP特为各位读者挖到了消息源头——beyond3d的技术论坛。原来创新和id之间有着不为人知的秘密。创新在收购3Dlabs之后,同时获得3DLabs的一项有关3D阴影技术,并申请了专利来保护这一技术。而id Software在开发Doom3过程当中,也采用类似的阴影技术,但是实现阴影效果需要2个pass,id希望免费使用创新的阴影算法技术,以进一步提升Doom3运行速度,但是创新以技术申请了专利为由,拒绝了id的要求。 id Software John Carmack为这一争议发表了看法,以下是原文发表。 We were prepared to use a two-pass algorithm that gave equivalent results at a speed hit, but we negotiated the deal with Creative so that we were able to use the zfail method without having to actually pay any cash. It was tempting to take a stand and say that our products were never going to use any advanced Creative/3dlabs products because of their position on patenting gaming software algorithms, but that would only have hurt the users. 从以上的情况可以看出,专利技术能够保证技术拥有者的权益,但是如同John Carmack最后的那句话,作为游戏开发的成本最后必将转嫁到各位游戏玩家的头上,增加我们的支出。
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