Doom’s 386 Trick: The Lie That Made 3D Run Without a GPU
Doom ran on a 386 with zero 3D hardware because it was never truly 3D. Every wall is a column of pixels, every floor a row. Carmack didn’t build a 3D engine. He built the best lie in gaming. What’s the cleverest cheat you know?
https://playstationcouch.com/post.php?id=817Open linkView original on sh.itjust.works
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The fast inverse square root used for Quake III Arena
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Fast_inverse_square_root
From back when developers were actually coming up with clever optimsations rather than treating customers like poors who needed to upgrade their PC to play.
That thing is black magic!
My favorite is Level of Detail algorithms. Invented with Spyro, it creates a great illusion of a much larger world. Only downside are LOD pops