Exhumed / Powerslave Amiga port

[DamienD]

@BSzili; no biggie but on occasion I'm getting crashes with "Return to Ruins":

This happens on the first stage, after the moving platform on rails, and if I fall into the lava / die.

[BSzili]

Oh boy, that doesn't look too good. That error means the player somehow ended up in the void. Could you make a screenshot of the place where this happens?

[rabidgerry]

Runs really good on my Apollo 1260. Probably better than Duke 3d and Shadow Warrior. I aint dabbled with any music files for any of those games but I will get round to it. Amazing work BTW, this game seems really cool. I don't see a save feature, isn't there one? Or am I blind?

[BSzili]

Thanks! Exhumed has a bit simpler levels, and it doesn't use sloped floors, so probably that's why it runs a bit faster. There are no in-level saves, it uses lives and checkpoints similar to Dark Forces. I definitely recommend playing with music, Scott Branston composed some amazing tracks for the game. I could listen to the menu music for hours.

[DamienD]

Originally Posted by BSzili

Oh boy, that doesn't look too good. That error means the player somehow ended up in the void. Could you make a screenshot of the place where this happens?

Sure

It's basically this part:

...and then when I fall into the lava and walk forward I should usually die, which worked this time without the crash:

I guess it occurs sometimes when you hands are morphing into the dead ones.

[rabidgerry]

I just played it for half an hour there, really good game!! Interesting them as well. Ok I shall have to sort the music out then

[Estrayk]

Originally Posted by BSzili

similar to Dark Forces.

OFFTOPIC:

https://github.com/Mindwerks/XLEngine

I dont like to make requests to the coders, but this time I have to ask, any possibility of having dark forces one day in Amiga BSzili?

[BSzili]

Originally Posted by DamienD

Sure

It's basically this part:
...and then when I fall into the lava and walk forward I should usually die, which worked this time without the crash:
I guess it occurs sometimes when you hands are morphing into the dead ones.

Drats. As expected it didn't crash for me there. I once encountered this in one of the original levels, so I was hoping I'll be able to catch it this time. I guess the best I can do is add some checks to prevent moving the player's sprite to an invalid sector. Hopefully the side-effects won't be too bad.

Originally Posted by Estrayk

OFFTOPIC:

https://github.com/Mindwerks/XLEngine

I dont like to make requests to the coders, but this time I have to ask, any possibility of having dark forces one day in Amiga BSzili?

No, at least not based on XLEngine, as it was built using then modern techniques.

[DamienD]

Originally Posted by BSzili

Drats. As expected it didn't crash for me there. I once encountered this in one of the original levels, so I was hoping I'll be able to catch it this time. I guess the best I can do is add some checks to prevent moving the player's sprite to an invalid sector. Hopefully the side-effects won't be too bad.

It seems to be intermittent; I guess out of 6 tries it occurred 3 times.

[BSzili]

I tried about a dozen times, but nothing happened. I guess catching it early can't be as bad as exiting the game with the error.

[Havie]

Had a very quick go on my V1200 - really fast and smooth. Will be spending some time on this at the weekend.

[utri007]

Works as expected both of my 68060 Amigas Apollo 80mhz and Blizzard 66mhz

Bad that there is no timedemo option. Apollo has a Idefix Express and Blizzard has FastATA so hard drive should not be a limit.

[Havie]

OK - had to have another go before going to bed! Tried 640x480 and seems pretty fast. Enjoying the game and you are right, nothing like the PS1 version I remember.

[TjLaZer]

Nice port and game! Runs very nice on my V2 A1200. But I did notice on the left side of the screen a single white pixel running vertical. (Using NTSC mode)

[BSzili]

Originally Posted by utri007

Works as expected both of my 68060 Amigas Apollo 80mhz and Blizzard 66mhz

Bad that there is no timedemo option. Apollo has a Idefix Express and Blizzard has FastATA so hard drive should not be a limit.

I don't think any of the Build games had a timedemo or benchmark feature.
If you have enough memory, the game preloads 99% of the graphics by the time you start a level, so disk speed shouldn't be an issue either way.

Originally Posted by Havie

OK - had to have another go before going to bed! Tried 640x480 and seems pretty fast. Enjoying the game and you are right, nothing like the PS1 version I remember.

The setting, weapons and enemies are the same for the most part, but it has its unique levels and game mechanics. This was also the first version to start development, originally under 3D Realms, but later they split off.

Originally Posted by TjLaZer

Nice port and game! Runs very nice on my V2 A1200. But I did notice on the left side of the screen a single white pixel running vertical. (Using NTSC mode)
(...)

That's a side effect of color #0 being a bright color in Exhumed's palette. I did my best to get rid of it, I clear the whole native screen with a black color after opening and I turn on the border blanking. My guess is that there's a slight timing issue with the monitor driver that turns on the "electron beam" a little too early. Unfortunately there's not much I can do here, maybe some tweaking of the monitor values can get rid of it, but I never touched those.

[AmyMor]

I played a bit without going into it and I must say it looks very interesting!

Tested on AMIGA1200 with VampireV2 I confirm that both executables 040-060 work in the same way.

Very fast and super-fluid!

[Havie]

Originally Posted by AmyMor

I played a bit without going into it and I must say it looks very interesting!

Tested on AMIGA1200 with VampireV2 I confirm that both executables 040-060 work in the same way.

Very fast and super-fluid!

I tried both executables and 060 ran in wrong screen mode with doubled graphics. Changed this from the console and it was ok but had graphic glitches appearing. But not really an issue as 040 version is nice and fast.

[BSzili]

A new version is up. I added a workaround against the occasional "DoKenTest" error and fixed the Caps Lock key shifting behavior in the console. Unless any major issues crop up, this is going to be the release candidate.

[Evillord68]

@BSzili: thank you great work.

[Havie]

One question about the CD32 controls! What are they?

I have psx to Amiga adaptor and when I put it in CD32 mode it works but I can only move, fire and if I hold down circle button I can strafe left/right. Should I be able to crouch, jump and pull switches via the pad?