There are few individuals as mysterious as Helldivers 2's galactic game master Joel – the man pulling all the strings of the war, constantly working to evolve the third-person shooter's evolving narrative, as well as issuing Major Orders to us all.
05.03.2024 - 17:45 / gamesradar.com / Catherine Lewis / Obbe Vermeij / Of A
Grand Theft Auto: San Andreas is an all-time classic, but there's no doubt that its in-game mirrors have always been slightly wobbly in places. Now though, we finally know why, and it centres around a workaround put in place due to a lack of video memory – at least in the PS2 version.
Former Rockstar Games technical director Obbe Vermeij took to Twitter to share that the PS2 version of San Andreas never had enough video memory to render mirrors "the proper way." Vermeij explained that the standard method has developers "render the scene twice", taking the "point of view of the mirrored camera" and using it as a texture for the mirror. However, in the case of San Andreas on PS2, Rockstar "simply didn't have that spare video memory" in order to store this render.
Instead, Vermeij "rendered a mirrored version of the scene, at the same time as the scene itself." While this was certainly effective, it did have some problems that you'll have likely seen if you've spent a lot of time in the game. For a start, characters and objects can appear to reach out from inside the mirror "horror movie style", which is a bit creepy, to say the least.
Otherwise, the method in San Andreas also makes back-face culling – a process which determines whether polygons are drawn and displayed when you're not supposed to see them – go "the wrong way round". This can lead to some models in the mirror showing their "back surface" rather than the one you're actually meant to see. Vermeij gave an example of this in a screenshot on Twitter – if you look at the shelf in the background, you can see that the two images don't look the same due to their models displaying differently.
Glitchy mirrors in GTA San Andreas.We didn’t have the video memory to render mirrors the proper way.Instead, I rendered a mirrored version of the scene, at the same time as the scene itself.This method has a few problems:- Mirrors can only be on the outer wall of the room.… pic.twitter.com/0fkt2mtrVaMarch 5, 2024
In the replies to the Twitter thread, Vermeij also acknowledged that looking at San Andreas' mirrors could sometimes allow you to see other interiors in the game, which, back in the day, some believed to be a kind of underworld. "There never was an underworld," Vermeij clarified.
All in all, describing San Andreas' mirror-rendering technique, Vermeij said that it's "not ideal but better than mirrorless barber shops," which is certainly fair enough, but after all these years, it's fascinating to have some answers.
If you're on the lookout for a new game to dive into, be sure to check out our recommendations for the best RPGs .
There are few individuals as mysterious as Helldivers 2's galactic game master Joel – the man pulling all the strings of the war, constantly working to evolve the third-person shooter's evolving narrative, as well as issuing Major Orders to us all.
It's only been a few days since Dragon's Dogma 2 finally launched, and despite receiving some incredibly positive critic reviews and breaking records for Capcom on Steam, it's not all been smooth sailing. There's been backlash over the microtransactions on offer, and now, there's also mass panic over the existence of a deadly plague that can result in the death of all the NPCs in a town.
Greetings, Polygon readers! Each week, we round up the most notable new releases to streaming and VOD, highlighting the biggest and best new movies for you to watch at home.
Stardew Valley's new 1.6 update has completely taken over the internet, with cozy gaming fans and farming enthusiasts alike barely able to handle the sheer excitement that can only be triggered by a content update that allows you to put hats on dogs.
Apex Legends' developers have deployed the "first of a layered series of updates" designed to protect players from hacks after two professional players fell victim to foul play mid-tournament over the past weekend.
It's a great day for free-to-play Overwatch 2 players, but not so much for those who've been spending money on the first-person shooter to get access to new heroes as soon as possible. Blizzard has confirmed that from Season 10 onwards, new playable characters will be distributed to everyone instantly, preventing paying players from accessing new heroes faster than free-to-play users.
It's finally happening—around a year and a half after its early access launch, Overwatch 2 is removing all of its heroes, new and old, from its Battle Pass. This means that free-to-play players will soon be able to instantly access new heroes at the same time as those paying for the Premium Battle Pass without spending a penny.
Helldivers 2's opening cinematic is iconic, and does an incredible job of setting up the third-person shooter's humorous satirical tone. In under two minutes, the in-universe recruitment ad tells you everything you need to know about the fight for sweet liberty and the camaraderie of Super Earth citizens, complete with dramatics that are so bad they're good.
The Helldivers 2 community is a fun place, especially when players remain as enthusiastic about the prosperity of Super Earth on social media as a real Helldiver would out on Erata Prime. There's no doubt the developers encourage this, with game director Johan Pilestedt recently branding the footage of flying Terminids as "propaganda from bug sympathizers" and refusing to acknowledge their existence.
This week, Minecraft added a brand new melee weapon for testing via Snapshot and Preview, and it's not taken long for players to discover that it's ridiculously strong.
Old emails uncovered in a lawsuit against Valve have revealed that Epic Games CEO Tim Sweeney was previously very disgruntled with the changes to Steam revenue splits announced in late 2018, and went as far as to call Valve "assholes" in a message to president Gabe Newell.
EVE Online developer CCP Games has revealed more details about its upcoming "survival experience," Project Awakening, which has a playtest on the way soon. It's on the whole still very mysterious, with no in-game screenshots to indicate what it's actually meant to look like, but we do at least know a little bit more about its setting and concept.