Performance Optimization on Game Consoles: Modern Solutions to Classic Problems

摘要

Game programming, especially console game programming, represents one of the best real-time programming challenges available. A complex new frame must be delivered every 16.6 ms or 33.3 ms in order to maintain the illusion that the game world is real. A delay of just a few milliseconds is visible to the player as tearing or stuttering and must be avoided at all costs. These real-time constraints must be met while trying to simulate and render increasingly complex worlds, with each year's games improving enough to convince consumers to buy them. While failure to hit these real-time targets won't endanger anyone's life, it will affect sales of the game and the associated hardware. This paper discusses some of the challenges of console game programming, and the techniques used to extract maximum performance from the fixed hardware of a gaming console. The associated presentation goes into more detail about the advanced tools and techniques used in modern console games, and demonstrates how they are used to improve performance.