"Developing Tao Feng exclusively for the Xbox is unquestionably the single biggest factor in the game's graphic quality. By focusing on what the Xbox can do best, we were able to take advantage of its performance capabilities, without concern for whether lesser platforms could support it. The results are the highly detailed models, our complex lighting system, the character damage, expansive environments, and destructible objects. It also affords us attention to details like adding veins to muscles, wrinkles to clothing, or cuts and bruising to our characters. These are things that really make the brutal realism of our game stand out."
—John Tobias, Tao Feng: Fist of the Lotus designer, Studio Gigante
Tastes great. Less filling. Better graphics. Faster speed. Everybody knows what Xbox has going for it. But, do you know exactly what that means for us—the folks who play the games? Tao Feng: Fist of the Lotus gives me the perfect opportunity to tell you because it really is a game that wouldn't work on any other platform.
Polygons Computer-generated, 3-D graphics are made by gluing together a bunch of tiny polygons. It's a geometry thing. They fit together neatly. Each polygon is a building block. The smaller the polygons, the more realistic the graphics. The greater the number of polygons that make up a face, for example, the smoother the features appear.
We don't want flat images. We want billowing images that leap out at us in three dimensions. That's why we use polygons. By varying the angles on the polygon (triangle), we manipulate perspective to make the image appear as if the surface is rising and falling, concave and convex. Polygons fool the human mind into seeing three dimensions on a flat screen.
Processors The trick is that, each time a character moves on the screen, the program must redraw all those polygons. That takes time. Some systems can't handle a high polygon count. Certain computer games, for example, allow you to adjust your PC's graphics settings so the game doesn't slow your computer. When you choose this option, you're basically reducing the number of polygons used to form your 3-D environment.
Fortunately, on the Xbox, you don't need this option because the Xbox is optimized to accommodate a massive number of polygons. Tao Feng uses 10,000 to 15,000 polygons per character. This makes it one of the industry leaders in 3-D realism.
Transistors It does you no good to have all those tiny polygons making up your characters, if your box is too slow to draw them at a reasonable rate. Well, the Xbox performs one trillion operations per second. It uses a special video card designed by nVidia (called "the Intel of the graphics chip industry" by Wired magazine) that injects the Xbox with super powers.
The NV25, the Graphics Processing Unit inside your Xbox, has more than 60 million transistors lined up on it. The Xbox CPU—and every other mass-production chip on the market—has only half that many. This is significant. It means that the NV25 is a minor miracle. You're getting leading-edge technology.
Velociraptors Let's put all this into perspective. The Xbox can draw 2.1 million polygons onto the screen per second. Steven Spielberg employed 300,000 polygons in the construction of each velociraptor in Jurassic Park. Back in 1993, each frame of film took hours to render. Today, the Xbox has the power to send a fat handful of raptors roaring across your screen, in real time.
The graphics in Tao Feng take full advantage of this cutting-edge technology. You can see the subtleties in the character designs, including wrinkles and facial expressions, not to mention the bruises and cuts that result from the beatings the fighters receive. Some day, as with Spielberg's Jurassic Park, I will look back on the special effects featured in Tao Feng with sentimental fondness. For now, however, I'm still blown away by it all. I suspect you will be, too.
