It's A Good Thing Doom 3 Is

Sometimes, The Elegant Implementation Is Just A Function. Not A Method. Not A Class. Not A Framework. Just A Function.

Note To Self: Pasty-skinned Programmers Ought Not Stand In The Mojave Desert For Multiple Hours.

The Idea That I Can Be Presented With A Problem, Set Out To Logically Solve It With The Tools At Hand, And Wind Up With A Program That Could Not Be Legally Used Because Someone Else Followed The Same Logical Steps Some Years Ago And Filed For A Patent On It Is Horrifying.

It's A Good Thing Doom 3 Is Selling Very Well.

The Important Point Is That The Cost Of Adding A Feature Isn't Just The Time It Takes To Code It. The Cost Also Includes The Addition Of An Obstacle To Future Expansion. Sure, Any Given Feature List Can Be Implemented, Given Enough Coding Time. But In Addition To Coming Out Late, You Will Usually Wind Up With A Codebase That Is So Fragile That New Ideas That Should Be Dead-simple Wind Up Taking Longer And Longer To Work Into The Tangled Existing Web. The Trick Is To Pick The Features That Don't Fight Each Other.