(Credit:
CNET / Josh Lowensohn)
Ever wondered what some of the graphical differences are in games that make use of the newer hardware in the latest versions of Apple's iPhone and iPod Touch? So were we. That's why we put together a screenshot comparison gallery of 13 games, all of which are either packing extra OpenGL ES 2.0 goodies, or that more complicated graphics modes that run a whole lot better on the beefier hardware spec.
As for our testing, we ran each title on an iPhone 3G and a third-generation iPod Touch, the latter of which packs the faster innards required for some of the advanced OpenGL effects.
To our surprise, there were very few apps on the App Store that made use the new graphical spec, and even fewer that required a standalone version of that application to do so. However, many of the developers we talked with said that they were cooking up new titles that would be pushing these new devices a little further than what they had already created. That's good news for those with a newer iPhone or iPod Touch, but a definite thorn in the side of those who might not be able to play some of near-future App Store releases on their original iPhone or iPhone 3G.
Click on our slideshow link below to get started. We've also included links to each version of each app (in case there are variations), all of which open up in iTunes. Also, in case we missed any, feel free to leave them in the comments and we'll try to add them later.
Update: We've added bonus screenshots of Ravensword, the upcoming 3D RPG, as well as top-down pinball game Wild West Pinball.
See also:
The future of iPhone games
For games, no big rush to speedy iPhone 3GS
iPhone developer: 3G S graphics will be sooo much better than PSP's
Wish you could play Crysis in your Web browser? Two influential organizations are banding together to try to bring accelerated 3D graphics to the Web, a move that eventually could improve online games and other Web applications.
The Web is gradually becoming a better foundation for applications with splashy, sophisticated interfaces, but 3D graphics on the Web remain primitive. Now, though, Mozilla, the group behind the Firefox browser, and Khronos, the consortium that oversees the widely used OpenGL graphics interface technology, are trying to jointly create a standard for accelerated 3D graphics on the Web.
In response to a Mozilla proposal, Khronos established an Accelerated 3D on Web working group to create a royalty-free specification. The goal is to produce a first public version within 12 months, Khronos said in an announcement at the Game Developer's Conference in San Francisco.
Underpinning the proposal is a trend toward significant speed improvements in JavaScript, the programming language used to write many Web-based applications. The proposal involves a mechanism to let JavaScript tap into the OpenGL standard to produce the accelerated graphics.
"Accelerated 3D graphics with the super-fast next-generation JavaScript engines from nearly every Web browser vendor means that we're going to be able to start to see more and more advanced applications written using open Web technologies," said Mozilla evangelist Chris Blizzard in a blog post Tuesday. "3D is a huge part of that story and we're happy to bring our proposal to the table."
Mozilla plans to release the technology first as an extension to its browser sometime after Firefox 3.5 is released.
Added Mozilla's Vladimir Vukicevic, who's been involved in 3D Web experimentation:
The intense focus on Javascript performance over the past year has seen tremendous improvements across all browsers. Raw language performance is getting to the point where it can keep up with the raw computational requirements of 3D. It will only continue to improve, spurred on by 3D and other use cases. Second, the hardware required for accelerated 3D is becoming pervasive; hardly any desktop computer ships without some form of hardware acceleration, and the latest crop of smartphones almost uniformly have at least OpenGL ES 1.1, if not 2.0 available. Starting this work now ensures that a standard will be ready when Web developers want to take advantage of the capabilities available in hardware.
Finally, people are doing more and more on the Web, and are coming to expect more from the applications that they use. Web applications already have access to features that have traditionally been reserved for desktop apps, including being able to work while offline, storing data locally, multiple choices for 2D graphics, and native audio & video support. Adding 3D to this mix ensures that current Web apps can experiment with new user experiences, while also enabling new classes of Web applications.
There's a long distance between a draft specification, a real standard, and incorporation into enough browsers that Web developers will be able to count on it, so don't expect anything revolutionary immediately. Meanwhile, Adobe is working to build 3D technology into its Flash plug-in for browsers, so other alternatives already popular with online gaming programmers exist.
But as the Internet matures, a number of allies are making gradual progress through HTML 5 and other efforts to build sophisticated technology into open Web standards that don't need a plug-in.
Advanced Micro Devices on Monday announced that the U.S. Department of Justice has closed its nearly two-year antitrust investigation into ATI Technologies, a graphics chip company it acquired shortly before the investigation began.
The Justice Department has decided not to take action against the company regarding ATI's pricing and marketing practices.
In December 2006, antitrust regulators began to investigate ATI and Nvidia, the two largest add-in graphics technology players, for possible antitrust violations within the graphics processing unit and cards industry. AMD acquired ATI for $5.4 billion in October 2006, and within weeks of that merger closing, Nvidia debuted its GeForce 8800 graphics card.
At the time, one industry analyst noted that because ATI and Nvidia were the two main players in the graphics chip market, the pricing was often similar for products of theirs offering comparable performance.
Nvidia confirmed that on Friday the DOJ notified the graphics chipmaker that it had closed the investigation and no action was taken.
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