Stef wrote:I'm very interested by all these 3D raycast game on genesis, they all have their own method to handle the thing =)
I'm very interested in raycasting and other 'fake 3d' fast rendering techs too, not only for genesis, but for any small-powered systems. Even today these methods of rendering can be useful, for mobile platforms for example.
Some time ago I thought what is possible to implement on SMD, superior to ZT/BS/DN3D/TS, with balance of good framerate and enough features to playable game. I have come to conclusion that fastest way can be simplest tile-based raycasting engine (maybe with walls on edges of grid instead of 'cubes'), but it's not enough to create playable game. Tile-based engine takes too much RAM (or ROM, depending where levelmap will be stored), so levels can't be big, and only poor clone of Wolf3D is possible. More perspective way will be sector-based raycasting engine (much less memory required to store levels, non-orthogonal walls is possible), but it will be also slower, and it's too hard for me to implement such engine (I'm not good in math).
There is another method of raycasting-like rendering exists. I don't know it's name and details of algorithm. It was used in game demo 'Citadel 3D' for ZX Spectrum. Game looks like raycasting game, with non-orthogonal walls (45g walls are present) and walls with two different heights; with up/down look; and dynamic wall textures (texture animation is possible). Game engine not based on raycasting, it's something like sector-based engine where renderer works with pieces of walls instead of slices.
About 'mode7'. I think, it's possible to make Mario Kart-like racing game on SMD, but there is very big problem with making of good graphics for such game (racing track itself).