12 What if... Things You Think Would Be Cool The development team has made a straightforward racing game, but you realize that it would be cooler if... -a. You could run over pedestrians -b. It was more "Walmart-ready" -c. It used the new X-Men license you negotiated *d. You had any talent and/or a clue Question -a. -b. -c. -d. Question -a. -b. -c. -d. Question -a. -b. -c. -d. Question -a. -b. -c. -d. Back in Your Q.A. Days Ignored Question -a. -b. -c. -d. Question -a. -b. -c. -d. Question -a. -b. -c. -d. Question -a. -b. -c. -d. Question -a. -b. -c. -d. I Have To Take This Call Ignored Question -a. -b. -c. -d. Question -a. -b. -c. -d. Question -a. -b. -c. -d. Question -a. -b. -c. -d. Question -a. -b. -c. -d. Selling Your Soul Ignored Question -a. -b. -c. -d. Question -a. -b. -c. -d. Question -a. -b. -c. -d. Question -a. -b. -c. -d. Question -a. -b. -c. -d. Quotables Questions about Recent Industry Statements ATI recently announced their new 9800 series graphics card, which boasts what highly anticipated new feature for an ATI card? -a. Rock-solid drivers -b. "Rock-solid" drivers -c. Rock-solid "drivers" *d. New drivers Microsoft recently announced the purchase of Rare for over $300 million. What possessed them to pay so much for a developer who's last title was "Conker's Bad Fur Day"? -a. They sent somebody to the UK to buy Rockstar Studios, and they got the wrong address -b. Because of their highly valuable properties including Donkey Kong, StarFox, and 007 - oh wait... -c. Actually, $250 million of it was in Digital Anvil stock *d. Your guess is as good as ours Which of the following reasons did nVidia NOT give for denouncing the new 3DMark benchmark? -a. They have to pay to participate in it -b. It uses pixel shaders that are too new (PS 1.4 instead of PS 1.3) -c. It uses pixel shaders that are too old (PS 1.4 instead of PS 2.0) *d. Their cards don't get the highest scores Due to the success of Tony Hawk's Pro Skater, Activision has gone crazy with licensing in all sorts of sports no one has ever cared about. Which of the following is an actual Activision licensed title? -a. Tanya Harding's Pro Female Boxing *b. Travis Pastrana's Pro MotoX -c. Mike Tyson's Relationship Manager 2003 -d. Wilt Chamberlain's Extreme Knock-Up 20K What was hardware manufacturer VisionTek's post-foreclosure marketing slogan for the ATI Xtasy 9100 video card? *a. "BI-A-TCH. GO MAKE ME A SAMWICH." -b. "It's the Shizzle Nizzle, yo." -c. "Ever have TWO MONITORS at one time? Throw in DVD support and you have yourself a threesome." -d. "Now that's what we call bowel-loosening frame-rates." Colorspace Questions Dealing with Color Space Conversions (8-bits per channel) Name the following RGB color: [255, 255, 0] -a. Cyan -b. Pink *c. Yellow -d. Burnt Sienna with Chartreuse highlights Name the following HSV color: [0, 255, 255] -a. Green *b. Red -c. Blue -d. Orange Name the following YCrCb color: [16, 128, 128] -a. Yellow -b. Grey *c. Black -d. Cyan What is the corresponding RGB for the following HSV color: [85, 255, 255] -a. [255, 0, 255] -b. [0, 255, 255] -c. [0, 0, 255] *d. [0, 255, 0] If you consider the RGB colorspace to be a cube, what shape would form an isosurface of constant saturation? *a. Cone -b. Sphere -c. Torus -d. OK dude, hand over the bong Violently Graphic Questions about Common Graphics Issues The ROAM algorithm uses what kind of data structure? -a. A quadtree -b. An octree -c. A k-d tree *d. A bintree AGP memory has the following characteristics: -a. Write-combined and cached -b. Write-through and cached *c. Write-combined and uncached -d. Write-through and uncached Which of the following pairs of inventors and their algorithms is NOT correct? -a. Henrick Wann Jensen / Photon Mapping -b. Bruce Nailer / BSP -c. Alvie Ray Smith / Alpha Channel *d. Hughes Hoppes / Normal Mapping The quaternion [0, sin(Pi/2), 0, cos(Pi/2)] is what kind of rotation? *a. 180 degrees around the Y axis -b. 90 degrees around the X axis -c. 90 degrees around the Y axis -d. It is the kind of rotation I don't understand because I cut-and-pasted Shoemake's code into my app and I have no friggin clue how it works Which of the following pixel shader instructions would give correct results for a standard normal-mapped surface? -a. dp3 r0, t0, v1 -b. dp3 r0, t0, v1_bx2 *c. dp3_sat r0, t0_bx2, v1_bx2 -d. hlsl->IsRenderMonkey()::CG(Pixel Shader 3.0 ? ARB2 : Carmack) Industrial Strength Questions about the Game Industry at Large Valve Software is pioneering a new style of game development where they actually don't develop games themselves and instead just publish other people's mods (a process they call "steam", or informally, "hot air"). What is the correct release date order? *a. Team Fortess, Counterstrike, Day of Defeat -b. Day of Defeat, Team Fortress, Counterstrike -c. Counterstrike, Day of Defeat, Team Fortress -d. Barney Sunshine, Gordon's Bad Fur Day, Black Mesa After Dark From which regulatory agency does John Carmack need to obtain approval prior to transporting 5,000 gallons of hydrogen peroxide to his launch site? -a. Texas Cosmetology Commission -b. UN Security Council *c. Texas Department of Transportation -d. Texas Department of Mental Health ATI printed pompous shirts for the GDC show floor that have what catch phrase? -a. We make videocards, not drivers *b. We make videocards, not hairdryers -c. We make videocards, not leafblowers -d. Now hiring - anyone familiar with the Win32 DDK Freelancer is in serious danger of shipping. Which of the following Digital Anvil titles received a mercy killing so they would not have to endure being so painfully outdated? (not that the market isn't clamoring for a mouse-controlled space combat simulator in 2003...) -a. Kilrathi XTreme Litterbox Volleyball -b. Battlecruiser ShipDate 3000 AD -c. Used Office Furniture Tycoon *d. Loose Cannon The Final Fantasy compilation soundtrack was recently released in Japan. Which of the following songs did NOT appear on that soundtrack: -a. Dancing Mad *b. Who's Chocobo is This? -c. Force Your Way -d. Fight with Seymour Hardly Consoling Questions about Console Hardware Which of the following chips is NOT a coprocessor on the PS/2? -a. VU0 -b. Graphics Synthesizer *c. DRAM1 -d. You can't say, because Sony's draconian contracts forbid you from talking about it Calling Stop() on a DirectSound buffer on XBox does what? -a. Stops the playback and waits the hardware to stop accessing the sound memory. *b. Stops the playback and immediately returns. -c. Stops the playback so that calling Play() restarts at the beginning of the buffer. -d. How is possible that a function called Stop that takes no parameters is confusing?! Which of the following is NOT an analog button on the XBox? -a. XINPUT_GAMEPAD A *b. XINPUT_GAMEPAD_RIGHT_THUMB -c. XINPUT_GAMEPAD Y -d. That one you can't reach because your hands aren't big enough - oh wait, that's all of them What format is the GameCube's frame buffer? *a. YCrCb subsampled by 2 along the width -b. YCrCb subsampled by 2 along the width and the height -c. RGB -d. Who cares? What frequency is the GameCube's audio out vs. its audio DSP? -a. 32 kHz vs. 22 kHz -b. 32 kHz vs. 32 kHz *c. 48 kHz vs. 32 kHz -d. Why are there are more GameCube questions in this category than there are people who bought GameCubes? Videophile Questions About Common Video Cards Which of the following generates the most heat? -a. ATI Radeon 9700 -b. Thermite -c. The Sun *d. nVidia GeForce FX 5800 Ultra Which of the following does NOT have a stencil buffer? *a. ATI Radeon (original) -b. ATI Radeon Mobility 7500 -c. nVidia TNT (original) -d. Matrox Paraphenalia Which of the following has the MOST number of textures per pixel? -a. Matrox Parhelia *b. Kyro Prophet 4500 -c. GeForce4 Ti 4800 -d. Nokia nGage Which of the following has a PURE ALPHA (A8) texture format? -a. nVidia GeForce4 Ti 4600 -b. 3DFX VooDoo5 5500 *c. Kyro Prophet 4500 -d. ATI Radeon 8500 Which of the following has the LOWEST core clock frequency? -a. ATI Radeon 8500 -b. nVidia GeForce2 Ti 200 *c. Matrox Parhelia -d. Intel Itanium Processor King Size Binary Questions about Bit-wise Operations on Sugary Snacks [Nougat Caramel Chocolate Peanuts] [Nougat Caramel Chocolate Peanuts] Milky Way >> 1 -a. Snickers -b. Three Musketeers -c. Reese's Peanutbutter Cup *d. Baby Ruth [Nougat Caramel Chocolate Peanuts] Snickers << 1 *a. Milky Way -b. Hershey Bar -c. Sugar Babies -d. Intel Hypernougating [Nougat Caramel Chocolate Peanuts] Milky Way && ~Three Musketeers -a. Snickers *b. Sugar Babies -c. Milky Way -d. Microsoft Bar for Windows [Nougat Caramel Chocolate Peanuts] ~Baby Ruth | Caramello -a. Reese's Peanutbutter Cup *b. Milky Way -c. Three Musketeers -d. Snickers [Nougat Caramel Chocolate Peanuts] (Milky Way ^ Caramello) >> 2 -a. Sugar Babies -b. Baby Ruth *c. Hershey Bar -d. nVidia CineYum (let cool before eating) Likely Story The Infamous Story Problems Category Suppose that there was actually a game produced at some point that actually used DirectMusic for the XBox. Once they link in the 37 megabyte DirectMusic library, and accounting for a 4 megabyte framebuffer, how much room would they have for their actual game? -a. 21 megabytes *b. 23 megabytes -c. 32 megabytes -d. Wait, wait - 37 MB is the debug version! The retail lib is only 21 MB. Valve's games register 3.5 billion "player-minutes" a month. How many of these player minutes have accumulated during their current five-year development cycle? -a. 35.5 billion -b. 28.0 billion -c. 67.5 billion *d. 17.5 billion The average human can comfortably hold about .32 XBox controllers in their hands at once. In order to hold exactly one XBox controller comfortably, how big did the alien species they focus-tested it on have to be? *a. 3.125 times larger than a human -b. 3.250 times larger than a human -c. 3.325 times larger than a human -d. Humans cannot fully comprehend the size of an alien that would be able to comfortable use an XBox controller The GeForce FX is 20 db louder than the ATI Radeon 9700 Pro. How much louder does that mean it sounds to a listener? *a. 4 times -b. 5 times -c. 20 times -d. Wait - does that count the noise from BOTH slots, or just the AGP one? Electronic Arts spent $10 million dollars to launch Majestic. Because they accidentally forgot to launch a game along with it, they ended up with only 300 paying "players". At $10 a month, how many years would they have to play before the launch money was recouped? -a. 234 -b. 257 *c. 278 -d. 298 TODO: What s the right answer to the GameCube DSP question??? Give away joke prizes (like GeForce2 MX) Have RGB / HSV / etc. questions "Find the hotspot" with a VTune screenshot! How long after Carmack's first successful manned spaceflight will Tim Sweeney launch his? Candy bar logic category, where you do stuff like "Milky Way & Three Musketeers | Snickers" MilkyWay = Nougat | Caramel | Chocolate 3Musket = Nougat | | Chocalate Snickers = Nougat | Caramel | Chocolate | Peanuts ReesesCup = Chocolate | Peanuts baby ruth = Caramel | Chocolate | Peanuts sugar babies = Caramel hershey bar = Chocolate caramello = Caramel | Chocolate ?? Big Hunk = Nougat | Peanuts 100 grand = Caramel | Chocolate | Krispies Almond Joy = Almonds | Coconut | Chocalte Mounds = Coconut | Chocalte peppermint patty reese sticks reese pieces chunky cadbury fruit and nut cadbury almond necco wafers sourpatch kids caramellos butterfinker kit kat nestle crunch m&ms peanut m&ms peanut butter m&ms rice cripsy m&ms spree gobstoppers sweet tarts wonka nerds lemonheads tic-tacs Zours Gummy bears gummy worms skittles sour skittle sweet tarts dove bars hershey's hershey's with almonds krackle Mr. goodbar nutter butter planter's peanuty bar chic-o-sticks boston baked beans fast break whoppers milk duds nibs fun dip cadbury mini eggs pixie sticks cadbury caramel eggs cadbury eggs Likely Story 70 dBs of separation FX joke Freelancer from Digital Anvil about to ship (prepare for the dead to rise) Unreal naming question: Championship, Tournament, II/III, 2002/2003/2004 Size of the Xbox volume question Value registers 2 million "player-minutes" a day - they report this is more than is spent watching the sitcom Friends. Just how long is this? -a. 33333.3 "player-hours" per day -b. 1388.8 "player-days" per day -c. 3.8 "player-years" per day *d. Not quite enough time to ship Half Life 2 Sequelitis Questions about Game Sequels and Franchises Which is not a Tom Clancy game? *c. W vs. Saddam Steel Cage DeathMatch Wrestling 2003 Which is not an Unreal title? -a. Unreal Championship -b. Unreal II -c. Unreal Tournament 2003 *d. Unreal McSweeny: A Heartbreaking Work of Fraggering Genius Honorary Question - Duke Nukem Forever has been made fun of 4 straight years The Final Fantasy sound track recently shipped in Japan. Which is not a song title: -a. Dancing Mad -b. Battle Scene *c. Wow, what an sword! -d. Fight with Seymour The Hard Stuff Questions about Today's Hardware Which texture format does the Xbox not support? What format is the GameCube frame buffer? Which is not a co-processor on the PS/2? Which is not an analog button on the Xbox controller? How large is the PS/2 texture cache? Graphics Techniques Described an algorithm, you give the common name. Render polys that were projected from lights off other polys. -a. Shadow maps. -b. Light mapping. *c. Shadow volumes. -d. Captain Eatmyfill. Matrix question - negating the [0][2] value of a 3x3 does what, kind of thing. Quat question - negating the xyz values in q is the: conjugate inverse transpose normal stuff: Sims Grand Theft Auto Doom3 system requirements LithTech/MonoLith/NOFL2 Matrix press joke Infogrames theme song Sega getting out of hardware Dead or Alive Vollyball/BMX XXX America's Army Civilation III sucking