Java Reference
In-Depth Information
Table 8.1 Game Terminology
Term
Definition
Culling
An optimization technique used to avoid processing objects
that fail to meet certain criteria; examples include viewport
culling, polygon culling, and back face culling
Double buffering
A technique used to avoid flicker: drawing is done to an
offscreen buffer which is then copied to the display all at
once
Field of view (FOV)
A vertical angle defining the portion of the game world
currently viewable by the camera
Frames per second (FPS)
The number of times the game screen is repainted each
second; television runs at around 25 FPS; an acceptable
minimum for mobile games is about 15 FPS although this
depends on the type of game
Floating-point unit (FPU)
Hardware that provides fast implementations of floating-
point operations: square root, division, addition, etc.
Frame rate
See frames per second
Graphics processing unit (GPU) Dedicated graphics hardware that provides fast implemen-
tations of common graphics primitives specifically for use
in games
Heads-up display (HUD)
The area of a game screen where player information is
displayed (score, health, weapons, etc.)
Level of detail (LOD)
The amount of detail in a scene: a complex model shown
at a distance from the viewer can sometimes be replaced
by a simpler one without obvious loss of quality
Mesh
A description of an object in 3D space. It consists of vertices,
faces, surface normals, etc. and is usually produced by a
modeling tool such as 3D Studio and imported into the
game code base where it can be manipulated and rendered
Refresh rate
The frequency at which the frame buffer is flushed to the
display; this is outside the control of the game and is a
property of the display hardware measured in Hz
Save point
A point in a game where the complete game state is saved;
it can later be loaded and the game resumed
Simulation rate
The number of times per second that the physics model of
the game world is updated, measured in Hertz (Hz); it is
independent of the frame rate and is based on real time
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