SE: How do you think OpenGL compares to QD3D and RAVE?

BG: No comparison really. I mean QD3D was the ultimate high-level 3D API. Nothing even came close to it. RAVE was a great low-level hardware abstraction layer for 3D. It was very flexible and let 3D card vendors add their own specific capabilities. OpenGL is more of a mid-level API. Its nowhere near as powerful as QD3D, but more powerful than RAVE, yet less extensible and customizable.

Also, OpenGL is very Mac-unfriendly. It doesn't support (yet) any of the texture formats that are native to the Mac and the way it deals with matrices is very un-Mac-like. Nonetheless, it's a great API for people just learning 3D. It is very easy to learn and use.

SE: What do you think the "next big thing" will be in computer games, either technology wise or play wise?

BG: If I knew that I'd be a fortuneteller. Many people think it will be online multi-player gaming. This may be true in some areas, but I don't think so in general. I think the best chance we have for something big is the return of creative games. Remember Earthworm Jim and all of those really amazing and creative games from the early 90's? What happened to those? 3D killed them, that's what. Back then, it would take a weekend to write a good 2D engine. But now, everyone spends most of their time working on 3D engines and tools that really have nothing to do with the game itself. This leaves very little time to design and create the "game". Once 3D stabilizes I think developers will return to their roots and start coming up with great stuff again.

SE: Now that the Quake, Unreal, and Lithtech 3D engines (among others) are being licensed, do you think the return to concentrating on the "game" is happening now? Half-life was an awesome game.

BG: Well it's "returning", but it hasn't quite "returned". Think about it. Earthworm Jim or Contra III are like 5 or 6 years old now. Yet nothing done in 3D has come even close to those games. There are dozens of Super Nintendo and Genesis games I could list off which are many years old yet have nothing to compare with in 3D. That kind of originality and creativity has simply not come back yet. Give it a few more years and I think it will.

SE: What kind of 3D sound support is there on the Macintosh? What do you use for Bugdom? How do you feel it compares to PC standards like A3D and EAX?

BG: Sound Sprocket is the only thing that exists right now. I was originally using it in Bugdom, but the performance and sound quality was not good enough so I stripped it out. I'm basically just calling the Sound Manager and doing some distance volume effects by hand.

The PC 3D stuff is more advanced than Sound Sprocket, but it still all sounds bad and really doesn't seem 3D when used in a real-world app. Sure, some of the demos are impressive, but in reality they just don't work all that well.