@LovesTha @alcinnz yeah, mainly sprites, reused, rotated, duplicated and with different color palettes. Also, while the first 3dfx graphics cards supported polygons, there were competing technologies like raytracing. Btw. I bought my first dedicated graphics card for video playback, not gaming. It was a tseng et3000? Before: max 200*150px video. After: 800*600px smooth playback.
Btw. there was a ms/dr-dos competitor named novell-dos with a 3d network shooter. Limited graphics but really good.