Crystal Space

Crystal Space is a framework for developing 3D applications written in C++ by Jorrit Tyberghein and others. The first public release was on August 26, 1997.^[1] It is typically used as a game engine but the framework is more general and can be used for any kind of 3D visualization. It is very portable and runs on Microsoft Windows, Linux, UNIX, and Mac OS X. It is also free software, licensed under GNU Lesser General Public License, and was SourceForge.net's Project of the Month for February 2003.^[2]

It can optionally use OpenGL (on all platforms), SDL (all SDL platforms), X11 (Unix or Linux) and SVGALib (Linux). It can also optionally use assembler routines using NASM and MMX.

Engine design

Crystal Space is programmed in object oriented C++. It is very modularly built with a number of more or less independent plugins. The client programs use the plugins, such as the OpenGL 3D renderer, by registering them via Crystal Space's Shared Class Facility (SCF).

Features

Crystal Space has modules for 2D and 3D graphics, sound, collision detection and physics through ODE and Bullet.

• Graphics:
  • OpenGL rendering
  • Supports hardware acceleration from all major card vendors
  • Allows use of shaders
  • Library of common shaders like normal mapping, parallax mapping and hardware skinning
  • Supports software rendering with limited features
• Mesh objects:
  • Plugin-based mesh system
  • Triangle-based meshes with frame and bone animation support
• Collision detection and dynamics:
  • ODE and Bullet dynamics
  • Simplified collision detection when full dynamic simulation is not needed

See also

• CELstart
• Crystal Entity Layer
• Game engine

References

1. ^ Release history of Crystal Space from the Internet Archive
2. ^ SourceForge.net Project of the Month, February 2003

External links

• Official Crystal Space site
• Crystal Space Community site
• Crystal Space engine details and reviews