|
|
Post by Cory Trese on Jul 11, 2014 18:37:51 GMT -5
Cory Trese. What exactly do you mean by "test hardware". Aka how much would test hardware cost, (roughly)? What's this about Intel, not being interested? :/ I've spent several thousands of dollars buying a two foot tall stack of phones. Test hardware is extremely expensive because no companies (except NVidia and Sony) provide "developer discounts" they treat developers like consumers. Heck, to get a new Amazon Phone I need to sign up for an AT&T contract. We've asked Intel for help and they have indicated they are not providing loaner or test hardware. NVidia Fed Ex'd us (next day air, no less) hardware to use for testing. |
|
|
|
Post by Cg on Jul 11, 2014 18:49:49 GMT -5
Cory Trese. And of course, it's not just the ability to generate x86 native code. You also need EVERY x86 device, as a test unit, so you can cover all the users device needs/quirks. Very expensive. 
|
|
|
|
Post by VincentD on Jul 11, 2014 18:50:43 GMT -5
So bottom line is your games will work on a x86 device via the ARM emulator, but you won't officially support it. Am I getting this right? Because I've been reading on the subject for about an hour and, no offence I love you guys, it looks like you're used to ARM coding and don't see the point in x86 devices?
|
|
|
|
Post by Cory Trese on Jul 11, 2014 19:04:09 GMT -5
So bottom line is your games will work on a x86 device via the ARM emulator, but you won't officially support it. Am I getting this right? Because I've been reading on the subject for about an hour and, no offence I love you guys, it looks like you're used to ARM coding and don't see the point in x86 devices? Bottom line -- I don't have test hardware so I cannot say for sure that they will or will not work. Google Play and Amazon both inspect uploaded Android applications and determine Native Platform support. For Google, they list our Native platforms as armeabi and armeabi-v7a. So I suspect that they filter out x86 devices, but I don't have any devices so I really don't know (just going on what Google says they will do.) I'm glad you've been doing some research, I have also put some weeks of effort into this area. To answer your question: Yes, our primary target is ARM. That is what Google's statistics indicates as market leader at this time. But no, I'm definitely not "used to ARM coding" by any stretch of the imagination. Heroes of Steel and Star Traders 4X contain a good bit of ARM assembly code but I only learned thumb instructions in the past year or so. I've been doing x86 assembly for almost 20 years (yikes!) The bottom line is this: I do not know, nor am I able to test, our games on x86 devices without test hardware. Yes, I do use HAX and I have tested on virtual machines but trust me, that is meaningless compared to real world results. Yes, I could build and blindly deploy the games to x86 chipsets and we might get a few more downloads. But I would not have first hand, reliable results that indicated the code was giving the players a great experience. If I cannot be certain of a great experience, then I would rather not make the sale than risk taking someone's money for a product that isn't worth the asking price. |
|
|
|
Post by VincentD on Jul 11, 2014 19:12:44 GMT -5
Awesome! Thanks for the clear response. While benchmarks clearly indicate Intel Atom devices are faster they seem to rely way too much on their domination of the PC and laptop market and expect the mobile world to get behind then blindly.
|
|
|
|
Post by VincentD on Jul 11, 2014 19:18:54 GMT -5
Also from what I read, ARM aren't "better" than Intel in this whole thing. They have the mobile market by the balls and like Intel they'll say anything to discredit the other.
|
|
|
|
Post by fallen on Jul 11, 2014 19:24:58 GMT -5
Two brothers, six games, four platforms and the support matrix grows inexorably. We have to make priority decisions and stick to them.
|
|
|
|
Post by Officer Genious on Jul 11, 2014 19:39:17 GMT -5
Cory Trese. What exactly do you mean by "test hardware". Aka how much would test hardware cost, (roughly)? What's this about Intel, not being interested? :/ I've spent several thousands of dollars buying a two foot tall stack of phones. Test hardware is extremely expensive because no companies (except NVidia and Sony) provide "developer discounts" they treat developers like consumers. Heck, to get a new Amazon Phone I need to sign up for an AT&T contract. We've asked Intel for help and they have indicated they are not providing loaner or test hardware. NVidia Fed Ex'd us (next day air, no less) hardware to use for testing. That's... quite sad, actually. |
|
|
|
Post by grävling on Jul 12, 2014 13:43:10 GMT -5
What I meant by update was new engine but since you just said that your 2 new games don't run on Atom then it doesn't matter anymore... So... So sad right now... Worst thing is I have a deal at Staples meaning the new MeMo 7 is free if I trade in my old HD7. Dammit... I have an HD7. What is this 'Staples deal' thing? There are Staples in Sweden ... |
|
|
|
Post by VincentD on Jul 19, 2014 23:15:35 GMT -5
What I meant by update was new engine but since you just said that your 2 new games don't run on Atom then it doesn't matter anymore... So... So sad right now... Worst thing is I have a deal at Staples meaning the new MeMo 7 is free if I trade in my old HD7. Dammit... I have an HD7. What is this 'Staples deal' thing? There are Staples in Sweden ... It's an option you can get if you buy a warranty. If it's less than a year old I can exchange it for another tablet for almost full value. |
|
|
|
Post by grävling on Jul 20, 2014 13:50:59 GMT -5
Aha. So not applicable for me. But it is an interesting idea... Thank you. Do you know what staples is doing with those used-for-less than a
year Asus HD's? I know many people who would like one.
|
|
|
|
Post by Cory Trese on Jul 20, 2014 14:02:13 GMT -5
All of the Asus Memo Pad HD7 specs that I can find list the processor as Cortex-A7 or Cortex-A9.
The ARM Cortex-A7 MPCore is a processor core designed by ARM Holdings implementing the ARM v7 instruction set architecture.
It seems like we would support it no problem for all our games.
|
|
|
|
Post by Cory Trese on Jul 20, 2014 14:05:00 GMT -5
Sorry, I spoke too soon. This 'ASUS MeMO Pad 7 ME176C 7-in Atom Z3745' was just released and is an Intel chipset that we don't yet support.
|
|
|
|
Post by Cory Trese on Jul 23, 2014 19:04:50 GMT -5
"ASUS MeMO Pad 7 ME176C 7-in Atom Z3745"
Is supported, runs all TBG applications flawlessly.
|
|
|
|
Post by fallen on Jul 23, 2014 19:18:14 GMT -5
Thanks to the awesome community members who helped us get the test hardware!
|
|
