quakeforge/doc/data/docs/readme.glquake

Linux Glquake v0.98, Quake v1.09 release notes

Requirements
------------

For 3DFX based hardware, you must download and install Linux GLIDE from 
http://glide.xxedgexx.com/3DfxRPMS.html and install as per the
instructions.

Running GLQuake
---------------

There are three different ways to execute GLQuake:

1. The binary "glquake" requires Mesa 3-D 2.5 or later installed and compiled
with 3DFX support (fxMesa..() function interface).  It also requires
svgalib 1.3.0 or later for keyboard/mouse input.  This binary is a console
application.  Mesa 3-D requires GLIDE to be installed.

2. The shell script "glquake.3dfxgl" runs the "glquake" binary after
preloading the lib3dfxgl.so library.  This is a port of 3DFX's Win32
OpenGL MCD (Mini Client Driver) to Linux.  It is faster than Mesa 3-D
since it was written specifically with supporting GLQuake in mind.
lib3dfxgl.so requires that GLIDE be installed.

3. The binary "glquake.glx" is linked against standard OpenGL libraries.
It should run on many different hardward OpenGL implementations under
Linux and X11.  This binary is an X11 application and must be run under
X11.  It will work with Mesa 3-D as a standard glX based OpenGL 
applications.  If the Mesa 3-D library is compiled with 3DFX support,
you can have Mesa 3-D support 3DFX hardware under X11 by setting the
enviroment variable "MESA_GLX_FX" to "fullscreen" for fullscreen mode
and "window" for windowed mode.

You must also have SVGALib 1.3.0 or later installed.  GLQuake uses SVGALib
for mouse and keyboard handling.

If you have gpm and/or selection running, you will have to terminate them
before running GLQuake since they will not give up the mouse when GLQuake
attempts to run.  You can kill gpm by typing 'killall gpm' as root.

You must run GLQuake as root or setuid root since it needs to access things 
such as sound, keyboard, mouse and the 3DFX video.  Future versions may not 
require root permissions.

resolution options
------------------
glquake -width 512 -height 384
Tries to run glquake at the specified resolution.  
Only highend VooDoo cards support such high resolutions (most
cards on the market right now do not).  Another popular and supported mode
is 512x384 (-width 512 -height 384) which can offer a faster speed than
the default 640x480.

You can also specify the resolution of the console independant of the screen
resolution.

glquake -conwidth 320
This will specify a console resolution of 320 by 240 (the height is
automatically determined by the default 4:3 aspect ratio, you can also
specify the height directly with -conheight).

In higher resolution modes such as 800x600 and 1024x768, glquake will default
to a 640x480 console, since the font becomes small enough at higher 
resolutions to become unreadable.  If do you wish to have a higher resolution
console and status bar, specify it as well, such as:
glquake -width 800 -height 600 -conwidth 800

texture options
---------------
The amount of textures used in the game can have a large impact on performance.  
There are several options that let you trade off visual quality for better 
performance.

There is no way to flush already loaded textures, so it is best to change 
these options on the command line, or they will take effect on only some of 
the textures when you change levels.

OpenGL allows textures to repeat only on power of two boundaries (32, 64, 
128, etc), but software quake had a number of textures that repeated at 24 
or 96 pixel boundaries.  These need to be either stretched out to the next 
higher size, or shrunk down to the next lower.  By default, they are filtered 
down to the smaller size, but you can cause it to use the larger size if you 
really want by using: 

glquake +gl_round_down 0
This will generally run well on a normal 4 MB 3dfx card, but for other cards 
that have either worse texture management or slower texture swapping speeds, 
there are some additional settings that can drastically lower the amount of 
textures to be managed.

glquake +gl_picmip 1
This causes all textures to have one half the dimensions they otherwise would.  
This makes them blurry, but very small.  You can set this to 2 to make the 
textures one quarter the resolution on each axis for REALLY blurry textures.

glquake +gl_playermip 1
This is similar to picmip, but is used only for other players in deathmatch.  
Each player in a deathmatch requires an individual skin texture, so this can 
be a serious problem for texture management.  It wouldn't be unreasonable to 
set this to 2 or even 3 if you are playing competatively (and don't care if 
the other guys have smudged skins).  If you change this during the game, it 
will take effect as soon as a player changes their skin colors.

run time options
----------------
At the console, you can set these values to effect drawing.

gl_texturemode GL_NEAREST
Sets texture mapping to point sampled, which may be faster on some GL systems 
(not on 3dfx).

gl_texturemode GL_LINEAR_MIPMAP
This is the default texture mode.

gl_texturemode GL_LINEAR_MIPMAP_LINEAR
This is the highest quality texture mapping (trilinear), but only very high 
end hardware (intergraph intense 3D / realizm) supports it.  Not that big of 
a deal, actually.

gl_finish 0
This causes the game to not issue a glFinish() call each frame, which may make 
some hardware run faster.  If this is cleared, the 3dfx will back up a number 
of frames and not be very playable.

gl_flashblend 0
By default, glquake just draws a shaded ball around objects that are emiting 
light.  Clearing this variable will cause it to properly relight the world 
like normal quake, but it can be a significant speed hit on some systems.

gl_ztrick 0
Glquake uses a buffering method that avoids clearing the Z buffer, but some 
hardware platforms don't like it.  If the status bar and console are flashing 
every other frame, clear this variable.

gl_keeptjunctions 0
If you clear this, glquake will remove colinear vertexes when it reloads the 
level.  This can give a few percent speedup, but it can leave a couple stray 
blinking pixels on the screen.

novelty features
----------------
These are some rendering tricks that were easy to do in glquake.  They aren't 
very robust, but they are pretty cool to look at.

r_shadows 1
This causes every object to cast a shadow.

r_wateralpha 0.7
This sets the opacity of water textures, so you can see through it in properly 
processed maps.  0.3 is very faint, almost like fog.  1 is completely solid 
(the default).  Unfortunately, the standard quake maps don't contain any 
visibility information for seeing past water surfaces, so you can't just play 
quake with this turned on.  If you just want to see what it looks like, you 
can set "r_novis 1", but that will make things go very slow.  When I get a 
chance, I will probably release some maps that have been processed properly 
for this.

r_mirroralpha 0.3
This changes one particular texture (the stained glass texture in the EASY 
start hall) into a mirror.  The value is the opacity of the mirror surface.