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Baker Joined: 14 Mar 2006 Posts: 1538 |

Posted: Tue Dec 29, 2009 5:03 pm Post subject: Defending The PSP and other alternate platform mods ... |

Modern "Modding" Over the course of the last 18 months there have been quite a few people who have taken an interest in modding using the Quake engine. You might consider MDave the progenitor of modern Quake modding when he made Kurok for both the Sony Playstation Portable and Windows using a modified FitzQuake, this introduced the idea of the Quake engine being used as the vehicle for creating single player 3D games via total conversions that are very non-Quake in nature (i.e. not of the Quake 3 mindset like, say, Nexuiz).
Solitude and Beyond
Look at the high ethics projects like MDave's Kurok and the Solitude project. Yes there are grubby little unprofessional PSP/iPhone/PSP projects out there breaking da GPL and using trademarks and stealing models and sounds -- Just like many Quake modders in 1996-2000 (Eternal War (theft)? QuakeLives engine (GPL)? Aliens Quake (trademark)?). Don't judge all the new modders based on this. Instead look at the role model projects like Solitude and Kurok.
The Solitude project is very professional and they've been at it for 18 months. They've made a ton of models, implemented a lot of QuakeC, made tons of maps and textures, follow the GPL and strive to have a clean and respectable project. They have made everything from scratch and although they are openly making the game very Halo like, as fans of that game, they have made all content themselves.
Beyond
I saw this on the Left4Quake site:
http://left4quake.com/forum/viewtopic.php?f=5&t=237
Take a look. Ironically people have actively resumed an interest in Quake mapping and modelling. Mostly because projects like Kurok and Solitude have opened eyes.
Bottleneck: The Quake community is resource empowered, but documentation-averse
Closed source communities where you are supposed to be a servant to some closed-source corporate entity and be their slave (Unreal, Valve, <insert name>) most amateurs are pretty much limited to making media.
Models, maps, sound.
Maybe some elementary game logic like scoring systems. Possibly some elementary freedom to make their own effects or other limited control via dlls or scripting of some sort.
And they live on the DirectX island --- an island that unlike OpenGL isn't multiplatform or even very portable to other 3D APIs.
As a result, those communities don't have any sort of deep engine expertise or game mechanics understanding like you have to have for QuakeC.
Engine Portability
Quake 1 has 153 files of engine source, many of them unnecessary for any given build. Maybe 100 total. Quake 3 had something like 1500 source files of code. I don't know if Quake 3 is very portable to non-traditional platforms, but weighing in at 1500 files is a big manageability problem not suited to mastery.
DarkPlaces, if I recall, weighs in than less than the original Quake in C files (and half the code is so well written it is a source of personal envy) but is weighed towards desktop strength memory, video and performance and an array of library availability and forward looking graphics API availability to function and very locked to OpenGL functionality. DarkPlaces represents a technical and performance problem for porting to non-traditional platforms. GLQuake uses, I believe, less than thirty different OpenGL API calls ... maybe it is less than twenty (I am thinking 13, but I don't feel like looking right now and don't want to be wrong. MH would know without looking, heh ).
If you want a decent 3D game that is fully "yours" that runs on these new non-traditional platforms, Quake is a highly viable candidate with features like Half-Life map support extending the palette, especially since it is always about the first thing to get ported to any platform.
Enabling Quake
I think the following new developments in the last few years will help enable Quake modding to flourish:
1. This place, especially the great QuakeC tutorials section and all the concentrated expertise here.
2. ZQuake (NetQuake compatible Quakeworld engine. No bells and whistles or bullshit to remove, versus, say the eZQuake engine that is so oriented towards a single mod as to be walking out in the wilderness). Face it, people don't want lag when playing online and that one thread says how to kill the bunny in QW
3. Spike's CSQC WinQuake prototype.
4. Quake Remake. A whole horde of QuakeC goodness.
4a. New Soul of Evil, RQuake and every other open source mod created in recent history like Forwards Compatible, TransloQuake and "My AISquad Thing".
5. Worldcraft 3.3 + QAdapter. The "non-traditional" Quake modders love the thing.
6. Quoth. It was a prototype mod of packing in a lot of good [and some rare] features in a Quake mod (breakables, earthquakes, flashlight, func_ladder, precache model and sound) under one solid roof.
7. Quake-Life. Avirox lighting up the imagination by emulating tons of Half-Life features in an open source mod. Quake MVP for 2008, IMHO.
8. Alpha support and fake vwep. Yes this matters, people like glass. And fake vwep allows crappy vwep in QW while the "right" way to do it is discovered.
9. "Enhanced color in maps". At the present time, via Half-Life map support. Likely in the future, PCX will be added into the Quake map compiler I suspect.
10. MH's Direct3D Wrapper - Fine, Microsoft and video card companies --- break OpenGL on Windows 7 or release crap drivers. At least the engines will still run as long as Microsoft doesn't figure out how to break Direct3D8 or foobar mouse support yet.
11. DarkPlaces and FTEQW: Seemingly infinite R&D and experimentation. Before taking up engine coding, I just didn't "get it". Then you look under the hood and you do.
12. aguirRe, metlslime and MH: Super high capacity maps.
13. R00k: Frankly, Qrack just has so much awesome stuff in it.
14. R00k. R00k has done more to take complex concepts requiring great expertise and reduce them to plug-and-play code than anyone since QuakeSrc.org. Anti-Wallhack as 1 function? CURL download as a trivial modification? I mean seriously!
15. FTEQCC. I couldn't tell you the differences between the different compilers, but just the #IFDEF capability alone is killer.
16. Active efforts to preserve, categorize and protect Quake's history and the large body of work invested in it: This includes Quaddicted, Chip's QuakeWiki.net and other similar works. I'll shoehorn the QuakeOne Navigator in there, plus everyone who contributes to the QuakeWiki and acts like Func_Msgboard having a comprehensive links sections and so forth.
By the way, the reason that the new modders ask for help a lot is that it is really, really hard to figure out how to mod in Quake with the lack of good docs. Don't blame them, it isn't their fault! As a guy that was bombing this place with questions in 2006 and Func_Msgboard in 2005, believe me I know.
There is a lot of unseen momentum and I really think it is going to hit the boiling point eventually.
What do you think will happen if, say, a truely open platform like OpenPandora emerges as a portable device?
http://www.open-pandora.org/

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goldenboy Joined: 05 Sep 2008 Posts: 310 Location: Kiel |

Posted: Tue Dec 29, 2009 6:19 pm Post subject: |

Kurok: http://www.bladebattles.com/kurok/ Solitude: http://www.moddb.com/games/solitude Have to try the latter. I have respect for Kurok, but it didn't run very well on the PC last time I tried and it seemed a bit unfinished.
Solitude's official site seems to be down.
I will gladly help anyone as far as my comparatively limited knowledge allows. I guess that goes for most people here, so I don't fully see the point of defending them.
Also, there is nothing playable yet from Solitude it seems... people should have something to show before making a damn website with game of the year awards on it. A demo perhaps?
What about this

Quote:
hlbsp support has given us a massive jump framerate wise

Fact or fiction?
This
http://left4quake.com/forum/viewtopic.php?f=5&t=237
I like, it's great seeing new mappers!1!11! (Just put on the environmental suit before you enter certain elitist mapping forums)
Okay, and now I also know what Left4Quake is...
http://www.moddb.com/games/tsluecke
What all those new projects need is a proper description in a few sentences at the top of their websites. When I followed your link to the left4quake forum, I had no idea what that was supposed to be about (yeah, I'm a little slow like that) and I found myself wishing for a big fat ABOUT: link that I could click.
Please folks, take a moment to explain to the oldies what exactly you are doing there and why it is cool.
All right, some model shots from l4q that I thought were cool...
http://left4quake.com/forum/viewtopic.php?f=12&t=129&start=50
their team seems surprisingly active O_o
this is great to see!
_________________
ReMakeQuake
The Realm of Blog Magic
Last edited by goldenboy on Tue Dec 29, 2009 6:53 pm; edited 1 time in total

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ceriux Joined: 06 Sep 2008 Posts: 969 Location: Florida, USA |

Posted: Tue Dec 29, 2009 6:52 pm Post subject: |

if your refering to solitude saying hlbsp gave them a big framerate jump its because downsider came up with a better way to handel the textures, in doing so, the frame rate went way up. as far as i can remember. _________________ QuakeDB - Quake ModDB Group

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Baker Joined: 14 Mar 2006 Posts: 1538 |

Posted: Tue Dec 29, 2009 6:55 pm Post subject: |

goldenboy wrote:
Kurok: I have respect for Kurok, but it didn't run very well on the PC last time I tried and it seemed a bit unfinished.

Kurok is almost unmodified FitzQuake 0.80 with interpolation. It runs like lightning on Windows.

goldenboy wrote:
Solitude's official site seems to be down.

http://www.moddb.com/games/solitude/
They let www.halosolitude.com expire after letting go of the idea of using the name "Halo" in the mod name.

Quote:
Also, there is nothing playable yet from Solitude it seems... people should have something to show before making a damn website with game of the year awards on it. A demo perhaps?

They want any releases to be a fairly polished and respectable release.

Quote:
hlbsp support has given us a massive jump framerate wise

With the PSP, who knows! Could very well be true. I have no clue how 8-bit vs. 24 bit works with the 3d api and performance.

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goldenboy Joined: 05 Sep 2008 Posts: 310 Location: Kiel |

Posted: Tue Dec 29, 2009 7:25 pm Post subject: |

Quote:

Quote:
Also, there is nothing playable yet from Solitude it seems... people should have something to show before making a damn website with game of the year awards on it. A demo perhaps?

They want any releases to be a fairly polished and respectable release.

But like I said, having a complete website with something that looks like an award on it, before there is something to show, is a bit misleading.
I have been getting bitch-ad comments for MUCH less.
It should be a little clearer marked as being in development or upcoming, ie as an announcement. As it is now, you think "Cool! Where is the download link?" and then there is none.
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ReMakeQuake
The Realm of Blog Magic

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Downsider Joined: 16 Sep 2008 Posts: 478 |

Posted: Tue Dec 29, 2009 11:56 pm Post subject: |

While I'm a bit upset that Cobalt Runner didn't get a mention (<- Shameless plug here), I can't help but agree that MDave is the father of Quake modding on the platform. I also give major credit to Baker for the modernizing of Quake. I have no clue as to why the framerate jump happened.
They're still being handled as 8-bit textures with a CLUT each, and 24-bit textures with the PSP's API are actually slower.
I blame it on more effective compiling tools (Specifically RAD) by Zoner, but I could be wrong.
Also, the screenshot you posted for Kurok is interesting, because I've played Kurok to Hell and back and I've never seen the box on the left.

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Team Xlink Joined: 25 Jun 2009 Posts: 320 |

Posted: Wed Dec 30, 2009 12:11 am Post subject: |

Baker, this is a very nicely written topic and made me feel good inside that people from deep within the Quake Scene are interested in and care about other Quake projects such as the ones you have mentioned. The frame rate jump is huge. A 19 fps map (20-30 with Beng T's vVis tool ) jumped to 60+ fps.
Solitude has many people from here. Baker, Avirox and I are all on the team and Downsider is working with us as well.
MDave started the a trend with PlayStation Portable Quake Total Conversions.
Solitude is still in development and the leader, SamUK, is actually MDave's nephew, and he is doing a great job. I am truly amazed at the amount of things the both are and have done with the Quake Engine.
Some projects aren't very far into development, such as Left4Quake, Call of Quake, GateWay, Golden 008 and many more are all total conversions for the PlayStation Portable using the Quake Engine.
They are all lacking a key element.... Coders.
Solitude has a few coders and has made a lot of progress, one of the reasons why we haven't released yet is because we strive to do a quality, complete and good release.
We have our morals set and the dedication to release a quality game.
The beta is a multiplayer beta and utilizes online multiplayer which is nearly impossible without dedicated servers. Here is a quote that explains it very well.
[quote=Baker]
Public Server Success #3: No Home Jobs!
Again, if you are doing this for personal pleasure or some other reason, this doesn't apply. But for a public server, unless you have an very abnormal home connection, you don't have the fat pipes required for smoothness.[/quote]
The fact that our main platform is the PlayStation Portable emphasize that quote. The PlayStation Portable provides a lot of obstacles to overcome, network play without the high lag/delay from button presses is hard to do.
Thank you for posting this, Baker.
_________________

Anonymous wrote:
if it works, it works. if it doesn't, HAHAHA!

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goldenboy Joined: 05 Sep 2008 Posts: 310 Location: Kiel |

Posted: Wed Dec 30, 2009 12:40 am Post subject: |

This is all pretty cool. I was only half-aware of it I love it when stuff is happening! _________________ ReMakeQuake The Realm of Blog Magic

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Wazat Joined: 15 Oct 2004 Posts: 732 Location: Middle 'o the desert, USA |

Posted: Wed Dec 30, 2009 3:02 am Post subject: |

I agree that it's very cool that this kind of stuff is happening. At first I actually ignored it (unfortunately). I've always been in favor of advancing the engine capabilities as Darkplaces has done, and putting those capabilities to work. For a while I chaffed at the idea of having to take huge steps backwards for engines/platforms that couldn't run it. It's hard to make a mod when you have to comply to the lowest common denominator. So, I did a bad thing by not paying much heed to what others were doing.
That said, I've since grown some interest in the mods coming out for, say, the PSP. People are doing some awesome stuff! I can see a definite market for engines and mods that will run on multiple platforms of varying capabilities. I'm looking forward to what else comes out.
And hell, I just think it's damn cool that we're attracting new people to the Quake community by having a wide variety of engines that can do different things quite well.
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When my computer inevitably explodes and kills me, my cat inherits everything I own. He may be the only one capable of continuing my work.

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Downsider Joined: 16 Sep 2008 Posts: 478 |

Posted: Wed Dec 30, 2009 4:02 am Post subject: |

Wazat wrote:
People are doing some awesome stuff!

Well, the unfortunate part is that most of this awesome stuff isn't going to work on the PSP, they just chuck high-poly models and maps at you and expect you to gag on it, but a lot of it just won't render at speed on the PSP

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r00k Joined: 13 Nov 2004 Posts: 483 |

Posted: Wed Dec 30, 2009 4:47 am Post subject: |

I would like to see more modders supporting darkplaces/fte/qsg extensions. I myself would like to get a unified uptodate built:in list. I know FTE/ezquake/zquake can host same platform, though DP and FTE can also share same server->client. FTE also supports web based QTV spectate brainwashing/rinse/repeat...
either way, i wish we could merge all the great-ness into a new standard.

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Baker Joined: 14 Mar 2006 Posts: 1538 |

Posted: Wed Dec 30, 2009 12:29 pm Post subject: |

Really, the more I see of things like Cobalt Runner, Left4Quake, Solitude and Kurok and yet other ideas like Golden 008 ... the more I want. Quake is really awesome in that the engine has supported things like jetpacks, lifts, grappling hooks, "snow boards" (skiing, which is essentially what Slide is) since day 1.
If you think about all the things Quake can do, and has been able to do since 1996 ... and then think about all things that it can do with mild modification ... it was quite a revolutionary advancement EVEN for a game that has long been viewed as such.

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MDave Joined: 17 Dec 2007 Posts: 75 |

Posted: Wed Dec 30, 2009 8:30 pm Post subject: |

All hail Quake!

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Urre Joined: 05 Nov 2004 Posts: 1073 Location: Sweden |

Posted: Wed Dec 30, 2009 9:31 pm Post subject: |

Great and inspiring thread Baker! I love this kind of stuff, not only do I learn about great mods in the making outside of this I3D/func bubble I live in, but I also see someone else pointing out one very important point: Quake as a game-dev platform, not only as a modder-friendly game. Why has it been so hard to get for so long? I mean sure, expanding the Quake universe with new maps, monsters and weapons is cool, I like Quake as much as the next guy, but why are people so afraid of making a new palette, and doing something new? Seriously, it doesn't even have to be big to be interesting. Most of the mods listed here are pretty huge undertakings, and I'm happily surprised to see them having survived this long. I mean, just look at indie games, or indie games, or indie games. It's a huge world of both big and small games, all of them standalone. Why does it have to be different for Quake? It's a great platform damnit! Have we, the Quake modding community, become too narrow minded from running around in brown corridors for soon 14 years?
Further along in the thread, speaking of important points, r00k made perhaps the most important point of all: a new modding-feature standard. I briefly mentioned this to xavior the other day, that QSG is fine and all, but limited by design. Engine coders pick the extensions they like and ignore the rest. What if there existed a list or lists of extensions which you as an engine developer could boast being compatible with? Like an ISO standard of sorts. This needs to be done. I'm starting a thread about it right away.
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SamUK Joined: 17 Dec 2008 Posts: 98 Location: United Kingdom |

Posted: Wed Dec 30, 2009 10:30 pm Post subject: |

Ah, I never would've thought PSP quake mods would ever be accepted over here. Glad to see it. There is one little hitch, there's around 100 "indie games". That aren't indie games, hell, I would've always called solitude a mod, but since we've completely abandoned the ID folder, I thought it only makes sense since you don't have to actually own anything to play Solitude. Apart from the obvious mouse, keyboard... Oh! and the psp/computer.
I don't blame the majority for thinking the PSP Quake modding scene sucks, because it mostly does. "I made a map, I've finished my indie game!"
Anybody these days think they are elite modders when they just do the most simplest of things. /Rant
I think the main reason is the fact all the indie games mentioned are somewhat copywritten (That even a word?). Solitude, lets face it, is a halo clone.
Kurok is a turok/golden eye clone.
Left 4 quake, yep you guessed right. Is a left 4 dead clone.
That's why they aren't listed on the Indie websites. But when I finished Solitude (hopefully with in the next 25 years of my life :p), and if my team are still up for it, I'd love make a completely indie game, everything from designs, to game play. There won't be a trace of quake left. That's if all goes to plan
Oh, and thanks baker for mentioning Solitude
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