Software renderer

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A software renderer, such as those available in GoldSrc and id Tech 2, uses the CPU to render 3D geometry, instead of a GPU. A 3D application using a software renderer can be considered to be running in software mode.

Software renderer often have limitations, and with the usage of CPU instead of GPU for rendering usually causes performance hit (especially for hardware at the time), thus, software renderer are largely deprecated in most games since early 2000s (and the Source engine requires DirectX (or OpenGL, Vulkan) compatible graphics card in order to play the game.

The GPU is still used for processing the 2D image generated from the software renderer, but no 3D hardware is used.

Id Tech 2 Engine (VQuake) Software Renderer

Screenshot in-game of Quake VQuake^[1][2], using Software renderer.

Features

• Visual improvements
• Full 16-bit color
• Bilinear filtering (reducing pixelation)
• Improved dynamic lighting
• Optional anti-aliasing

GoldSrc Engine Software Renderer

Screenshot in-game of Half-Life, using Software renderer.

Features

• Colored lighting - Quake simply had monotone lighting
• Transparent textures - Glass can now be used in maps
• Water ripple

Since 25th Anniversary

Software renderer support on Linux

Missing Features and Limits and Problems

• Lack of texture filtering
• 256x256 texture size limit
• No Stencil Shadows support
• Lower limits for drawing geometry
• No Water waves
• No Detailed textures
• Overdraw from brush entities and func_detail is more problematic
• Overbright lighting on MDLs (instead of only map geometry)

See also

• Direct3D
• OpenGL
• Vulkan

External links

•  Software rendering
•  VQuake on Wikipedia
• Quake fandom wiki