Mesa 22.3 Lands S3TC Texture Compression Software Fallback

As a follow-up to the recent article about Mesa preparing a software fallback for S3TC, that code was merged for next quarter's Mesa 22.3.

Mesa 22.3 has added an S3 Texture Compression (S3TC) software handling fallback for cases of smaller, embedded GPU hardware or drivers lacking support for that formally-patent-encumbered texture compression algorithm. In turn this handling should get S3TC-dependent games working on those drivers. This now-merged code is able to get more games running on the likes of the Raspberry Pi VC4 driver and the Arm Mali Panfrost code.

See the merge request for more details if interested in the S3TC fallback primarily for benefiting the smaller, embedded-type Mesa drivers.

Meanwhile, Erik Faye-Lund yesterday opened another merge request for LATC software fallback as "the last piece of the puzzle" for BC1-7 emulation in the Mesa state tracker.