Building a Tiny 3D Renderer for the Playdate Handheld
Building a Tiny 3D Renderer for a Tiny Handheld
I started by testing the Playdate's limits with a raycaster, quickly realizing it couldn't match early 3D accelerators. However, its low-resolution 1-bit screen offered hope for a 3DO or Sega Saturn-like experience. Since the device lacks a GPU, I built a software renderer from scratch using Quake BSP files to handle all geometry, clipping, and shading on the CPU, proving real-time 3D is feasible with clever optimization.
The problem is not just 'can it draw 3D?'. Even a ZX Spectrum can draw 3D, if you give it enough time. The real question is 'can it do it fast enough to be playable in real time?'.
- wewewedxfgdf
Highly relevant:
Surface-Stable Fractal Dithering
- busfahrer
For anyone who enjoys this sort of thing, I found this postmortem of an Alone in the Dark clone for PICO-8 highly informative:
- alex-moon
What an excellent example of designing for the medium instead of trying to make the medium do something it's not good at! Your whole approach shows a real love, like a delicate respectfulness, that I think characterises early games and is less apparent as the systems get better (though I am sure it is still there).