woohoo!

[Quindo Ma]

The 64 bit systems biggest issue is currently driver compatibility. Once you get past that, you encounter the fact that outside of certain programs (usually high end graphics and database stuff) most things don't even support 64 bit.
Windows, and the 64 bit cores themselves, are set up to work perfectly fine with 32 bit applications though, as they will simply step down into an emulation mode for that stuff, so tend to run without problems.
Those that do have them are again usually because of said driver issues.

Thing is, using a 64 bit OS for anything except specific applications that require (or at least support it), or for cases where you want to use large blocks of RAM greater than 4GB, is quite pointless, as there will be almost no gain at all in processing power (sometimes even a loss, due to the emulation limits).

Mainstream games nowadays are all set to run on 32 bit systems. I can think that within the next 5ish years we will at least see a large support for 64 bit systems, so that those games can utilize the extra power behind them, but in my personal opinion you won't be seeing a lot of exclusive 64 bit games (if any) within the next few years.
And by then, especially if you're gaming, you'll probably want another system upgrade anyway, just to keep up.


So, unless you want to use one of those few things that require 64 bit, just install a 32 bit OS. You'll be more than fine with it, and have far less hassles.

[Blyker]

New Age of Conan game thats coming out in the next couple of weeks (preorder and you get a nice mount) is supposed to support 64 bit vista.

[Fawks]

New Age of Conan game thats coming out in the next couple of weeks (preorder and you get a nice mount) is supposed to support 64 bit vista.

My system -
Intel 2.4Ghz Quad core,
Dual nVidia 8800GTS 640MB,
8GB 800Mhz ram,
X-Fi sound,
4HD's totaling 1.9TB.

Currently I'm running a dual boot Vista64 / XP system. I like to have both. Vista64 because of the DirectX 10 and the 4+ Gig compatibility.

Vista sucks on some things, especially file manager. I can delete a file in Vista64 file manager and 30 seconds later the icon is still there. Searching is very problematical also. I have searched a directory for files that have the © sign or the ® sign in the file name. Search results in ZERO finds, while I stare at multiple files in the directory, on the screen. Also, ANY little change you do (change one filename, reorder the files by Name/Date/Type) will cause the WHOLE search to repeat. Which is very annoying in a multiple directory 10k+ file search.

Good caliber 64bit programs is on the way soon. Adobe has a 64bit Lightroom 2 beta out right now, and already has some 64bit CS4 programs for windows out at this time. I really do not see any 64bit games anytime soon. There may be some that take advantage of some 64bit aspects, but no all 64bit coding for the foreseeable future. There is too much of an installed base of 32bit computers to warrant that anytime soon. Remember how long it took Warcraft II and Command And Conquer to move from DOS to Winders 95? I know Vista has been out over a year, but essentially it has been a beta program until SP1. Maybe even still a beta program.

http://news.cnet.com/8301-13580_3-9909725-39.html
http://www.macworld.com/article/132810/ ... hop64.html

[GBLW]

I really do not see any 64bit games anytime soon. There may be some that take advantage of some 64bit aspects, but no all 64bit coding for the foreseeable future. There is too much of an installed base of 32bit computers to warrant that anytime soon.

Yes and no. My son works for Entertainment Arts and does game programing, in fact he did a lot of work on "Fifa08."http://fifa08.ea.com/us/ He wants to use 64bit as soon as possible, but realizes that he's going to have to make two versions of the games if he does, because it would be difficult if not impossible to make them 'backward compatible' to 32bit. (To be honest, I don't see how it would be possible.)
Anyway, I'll keep my ear to the ground and if I get any feedback, I'll pass it on.

[michaelsuave]

I really do not see any 64bit games anytime soon. There may be some that take advantage of some 64bit aspects, but no all 64bit coding for the foreseeable future. There is too much of an installed base of 32bit computers to warrant that anytime soon.

Yes and no. My son works for Entertainment Arts and does game programing, in fact he did a lot of work on "Fifa08."http://fifa08.ea.com/us/ He wants to use 64bit as soon as possible, but realizes that he's going to have to make two versions of the games if he does, because it would be difficult if not impossible to make them 'backward compatible' to 32bit. (To be honest, I don't see how it would be possible.)
Anyway, I'll keep my ear to the ground and if I get any feedback, I'll pass it on.

I just bought a gaming laptop so I could "take the bar exam on it," yeah, um sure, its for taking the bar exam on it... But anyway, I had really wanted a 64 bit computer, but settled for the 32 bit. Good thing though, I just found out that the software that most bar exams is run through ,it boots you out of your computer and locks you out of your hard drive for the testing period with just a word processor to work with, turns your laptop into a brick/doorstop if your computer is 64bit. I nearly had a heart attack when I realized that I could have purchased a couple thousand dollar brick...

~Michael

[Mistra]

just so you know, almost all hardware these days is 64 bit, it's just the os that's 32 bits, and that can be replaced, i us xp64 for 3dstudio max and it runs perfectly. It also runs every game i've tried on it, from a 1990's strategy game to lost planet(i had to wreck the install file of that last one, cause it refused to install..stupid microsoft)

[Fawks]

Yes and no. My son works for Entertainment Arts and does game programing, in fact he did a lot of work on "Fifa08."http://fifa08.ea.com/us/ He wants to use 64bit as soon as possible, but realizes that he's going to have to make two versions of the games if he does, because it would be difficult if not impossible to make them 'backward compatible' to 32bit. (To be honest, I don't see how it would be possible.)
Anyway, I'll keep my ear to the ground and if I get any feedback, I'll pass it on.

Yeah, That would be VERY costly to do and there are not enough Vista64/XP64 systems out there to warrant that. Yet. Do keep us posted on that though. Especially if it is a Battlefield game... ( /me plays the buggy EA Battlefield 2142 and enjoys it most of the time. )

[GBLW]

Actually I was talking to him tonight and one of his present buggaboos is what he calls the 4gig limit and I think he said that was the MINIMUM ram that would be needed. In other words whatever he's working on must be HEAVY DUTY!

[Spec8472]

I really do not see any 64bit games anytime soon. There may be some that take advantage of some 64bit aspects, but no all 64bit coding for the foreseeable future. There is too much of an installed base of 32bit computers to warrant that anytime soon.

Yes and no. My son works for Entertainment Arts and does game programing, in fact he did a lot of work on "Fifa08."http://fifa08.ea.com/us/ He wants to use 64bit as soon as possible, but realizes that he's going to have to make two versions of the games if he does, because it would be difficult if not impossible to make them 'backward compatible' to 32bit. (To be honest, I don't see how it would be possible.)
Anyway, I'll keep my ear to the ground and if I get any feedback, I'll pass it on.

It's quite easy to include compiler instructions in your code to do certain behaviour depending upon the build target. You don't really need to write two seperate copies of the game.

Code: Select all

 public static void DoSomething() 
  { 
#if BUILD_x86_64
      // This is only going to be in the 64bit version of your method
#else
    // This is only going to be in the 32bit version 
#endif
  }  

At build time I include a flag if I'm building binaries for x86-64, and the source code gets altered appropriately. The vast majority of code will be pretty much identical between architectures, it's only certain bits that will need to be rewritten.

The major cost of developing against 64bit is that you've at least doubled the amount of testing you need to do - not only is there 60 something hardware configurations, but there's also now two OSs, and the 32/64bit drivers for the hardware will behave differently.

You also need to consider the performance impacts. I don't yet know situations where going to 64bit will help games, but then again - I'm not a game developer. Perhaps it's just in being able to address more memory to keep more/bigger things in RAM. They will need to consider the cost of pushing around instructions that are suddenly doubled in size though, and the additional IO time they will take to decode and process.

But, developing against multiple architectures is something the game industry has already solved - after all, how do you think they build games for the PC, Xbox 360, Wii and PS3? They sure as heck are NOT writing 4 copies of almost the same code. There's some customisations for each platform, but overall it's the same codebase.

I can understand him wanting to shift his development platform to a 64bit OS - I've done that at work so I can push that 4GB limit. Windows Server 2008 has been fantastic as a desktop OS.

[GBLW]

You also need to consider the performance impacts. I don't yet know situations where going to 64bit will help games, but then again - I'm not a game developer. Perhaps it's just in being able to address more memory to keep more/bigger things in RAM. They will need to consider the cost of pushing around instructions that are suddenly doubled in size though, and the additional IO time they will take to decode and process.

I think that's part of the problem. You have to realize that one very expensive part of a game's production is the testing, debugging and correction period. The manufacturer has to make certain that the game will operate flawlessly on a large variety of platforms and an even larger variety of individual configurations. That's what I meant by mentioning backward compatibility, someone is bound to try to run the game on a system that's four or five years old, find it fails, then jump online, flaming the company for their "rotten" game. I think his job would be a breeze if everyone that purchased the game had a top of line computer, crammed with ram, that ran on the latest operating system. Unfortunately this is the real world and people can't afford to be that up to date.

[Greymist]

The manufacturer has to make certain that the game will operate flawlessly on a large variety of platforms and an even larger variety of individual configurations.

And yet I see games which will only run on specific versions of windows and software companies which are constantly releasing fixes for their games...

The tongue in cheek aside, I do some testing for work and knowing how much effort is put into the projects I am involved in I can, or possibly can't, imagine the amount of work needed to be done to test a game extensively.