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The Icon Bar: Games: Conversions (mostly games)
 
  Conversions (mostly games)
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Andrew Message #96825, posted by andrew at 14:36, 7/1/2007
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How feasible are these for RISC OS?:

Quake 2: does RISC OS have suitable libraries or whatever yet?

and a Bit torrent client : I notice that when you click on the link for download you get a ~13K file downloaded. Is this all that is needed? Surely that would be an afternoon's work for any decent RISC OS programmer?
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Phil Mellor Message #96826, posted by monkeyson2 at 14:43, 7/1/2007, in reply to message #96825
monkeyson2Please don't let them make me be a monkey butler

Posts: 12380
and a Bit torrent client : I notice that when you click on the link for download you get a ~13K file downloaded. Is this all that is needed? Surely that would be an afternoon's work for any decent RISC OS programmer?
Link?

I suspect it may need additional libraries porting too. Also depends on the language it's written in - isn't the standard client written in Python?
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Jeffrey Lee Message #96827, posted by Phlamethrower at 14:54, 7/1/2007, in reply to message #96825
PhlamethrowerHot Hot Hot Hot Hot Hot Hot Hot Hot Hot Hot Hot Hot stuff

Posts: 15100
Quake 2: does RISC OS have suitable libraries or whatever yet?
I think speed is more of an issue than libraries. With the right level of optimisation, an Iyonix (or A9?) could probably run it at an acceptable speed. 3D acceleration via IyonixMesa should be possible - and should save a lot of time spent hand-optimising the code. But AFAIK Simon still hasn't worked out how to get IyonixMesa running on the new GeForce cards, so don't expect me to provide any help in porting anything 3D :P

[Edited by Phlamethrower at 14:55, 7/1/2007]
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Andrew Message #96834, posted by andrew at 19:45, 7/1/2007, in reply to message #96827
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Can't remember the link, just when you look at music videos (etc) you get this small file to download first. I'm not exactly sure what Bit torrent is, whether it's a standard or not but Python exists on RISC OS.
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Adrian Lees Message #96845, posted by adrianl at 08:51, 8/1/2007, in reply to message #96834
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Posts: 1637
Can't remember the link, just when you look at music videos (etc) you get this small file to download first. I'm not exactly sure what Bit torrent is, whether it's a standard or not but Python exists on RISC OS.
It's not too much work and it has actually been done, at least as a prototype. No, not by me.
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Dave Brown Message #96873, posted by daveb at 00:14, 9/1/2007, in reply to message #96827
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Posts: 41
Quake 2 can just about run on an Iyonix. I did a very minimal port some years ago on my RPC but left it for some time when the computer broke. I returned to it recently when I bought an Iyonix and did some of the work to 32bit it.

It's currently not in a playable state as I was using the GameSupport module (I think that's the modules name) as used by the original Quake port for keyboard support and I don't have a 32bit version of it. I also briefly looked at using IyonixMesa but didn't get very far with it (can't remember exactly why.)

If anyone can provide some webspace I'd be happy to provide the code in the state it's in so far. There are various other really nasty bits in it at the moment (such as using lots of tiny 4-8kb dynamic areas) but I'm sure they could be tidied up if someone felt so inclined.
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Jeffrey Lee Message #96874, posted by Phlamethrower at 00:30, 9/1/2007, in reply to message #96873
PhlamethrowerHot Hot Hot Hot Hot Hot Hot Hot Hot Hot Hot Hot Hot stuff

Posts: 15100
If the source is small enough to be emailed (A quick check on ID's website shows the original as being 1.4MB zipped) then feel free to send a copy my way, and I'll put it in the download section. If I have time I may also be able to remove the GameSupport (GameUtils?) dependency.

Of course if you or anyone else is interested in actively developing the code, then I suspect Peter Naulls will be happy to provide some space on his SVN server.
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Chris Message #96876, posted by cterran at 00:46, 9/1/2007, in reply to message #96873
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Posts: 163
It's currently not in a playable state as I was using the GameSupport module (I think that's the modules name) as used by the original Quake port for keyboard support and I don't have a 32bit version of it.
If you mean this module:

http://www.zarquon.homepage.t-online.de/Software.html#gamesupp

..it is 32-bit.
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Dave Brown Message #96877, posted by daveb at 00:57, 9/1/2007, in reply to message #96876
Member
Posts: 41
Unfortunately no. The module I actually meant was GameUtils. I suspect there is a 32bit version available in the 32bit version of Quake but I don't own it :(
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Dave Brown Message #96917, posted by daveb at 22:02, 9/1/2007, in reply to message #96877
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Posts: 41
Hi Jeffrey,

I justt wanted to check if you received the source. I got a bounce the first time I attempted to send it but it appeared to go through on the second attempt.

Cheers,

Dave
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Simon Wilson Message #96918, posted by ksattic at 22:08, 9/1/2007, in reply to message #96827
ksattic
Finally, an avatar!

Posts: 1291
But AFAIK Simon still hasn't worked out how to get IyonixMesa running on the new GeForce cards, so don't expect me to provide any help in porting anything 3D :P
The newer GeForce FX cards just don't seem to tick over correctly with IyonixMesa. Nothing is drawn on screen because the drawing commands are not processed. I am not sure why, but there is a way around it (by using DMA).

The bigger problem is that IyonixMesa is all floating point, so we'd need an integer version anyway. That'll take a long time, and though it will be cool, is there much point (sad as that sounds)? Comments/suggestions on this please!

If we had a floating point accelerator, then things would be great!
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Jeffrey Lee Message #96919, posted by Phlamethrower at 22:18, 9/1/2007, in reply to message #96917
PhlamethrowerHot Hot Hot Hot Hot Hot Hot Hot Hot Hot Hot Hot Hot stuff

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I justt wanted to check if you received the source. I got a bounce the first time I attempted to send it but it appeared to go through on the second attempt.
No, it hasn't come through yet. Try phlamethrower@gmail.com instead.
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Dave Brown Message #96920, posted by daveb at 22:26, 9/1/2007, in reply to message #96919
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On it's way. Sent via GMail so should already be there :)
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Jeffrey Lee Message #96921, posted by Phlamethrower at 22:26, 9/1/2007, in reply to message #96920
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Got it - cheers :)
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Jeffrey Lee Message #96922, posted by Phlamethrower at 23:00, 9/1/2007, in reply to message #96921
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http://www.iconbar.com/downloads/quake2src.zip

I'll start having a look at the code and see what our options are with regards to GameUtils. I'm not sure what the license is for the 32bit version of the module, so we can't be guaranteed to get a copy from RCI.
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Dave Brown Message #96923, posted by daveb at 23:18, 9/1/2007, in reply to message #96922
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Posts: 41
I'm not sure what the license is for the 32bit version of the module, so we can't be guaranteed to get a copy from RCI.
I'm pretty sure that it was written by Peter Teichmann so it may be worth attempting to get in touch with him. He was very helpful when I decided to use it for the original port, supplying me with full documentation.

The port as it stands also contains a slightly modified version of his floating point library although it's probably a better bet to use GCC 4.x once it's available as I believe it now uses softfp. It would certainly be a lot easier to work with as replacing the floating point code was time consuming and rather boring :).

With any luck I might get enough free time in the near future to start looking at the code again. I had wanted to do some serious profiling work to determine where most of the time was being spent in the renderer although I suspect that the major bottleneck is the Iyonix's memory system (I'd be interesting to see how it performs on an A9).

I'd love to try to get to port properly off the ground and welcome help from anyone that feels like chipping in. Getting it running using IyonixMesa would be fantastic even if the performance was terrible as I suspect it would then classify as the first OpenGL RISC OS game :)
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Jeffrey Lee Message #96924, posted by Phlamethrower at 23:27, 9/1/2007, in reply to message #96923
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Hey, it even works when I compile and run it! Shame about the lack of keyboard/mouse input, though.

I'd love to try to get to port properly off the ground and welcome help from anyone that feels like chipping in. Getting it running using IyonixMesa would be fantastic even if the performance was terrible as I suspect it would then classify as the first OpenGL RISC OS game :)
If it looks like it's possible to get the code running at a playable speed, then I'd be happy to help out. And if GCC 4.x uses softfp as you say, then it will hopefully give IyonixMesa a speed boost too.
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Jeffrey Lee Message #96925, posted by Phlamethrower at 00:49, 10/1/2007, in reply to message #96924
PhlamethrowerHot Hot Hot Hot Hot Hot Hot Hot Hot Hot Hot Hot Hot stuff

Posts: 15100
Here's a quick change to riscos.c.keyin so the keyboard will work without GameUtils.

I've done my part, now it's your turn to get optimising the code ;)

If you're interested, WOUM has some profiling code (jprof2) that allows you to enable and disable profiling of (almost) any function that has the function name placed before it (ala -mpoke-function-name). It modifies the function header at runtime, and so doesn't need any special profile build flags/configurations etc. in order to operate. The code can easily be linked up to the console (as I did in DarkMatter) so you can switch to profiling different functions at runtime, view reports, etc.

The only downside is that the timer module it uses isn't 32bit compatible yet (But it's basically an interface to OS_ReadMonotonicTime anyway). It should be trivial to change it to use a different timer (Hopefully one with more resolution!)
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Andrew Message #96934, posted by andrew at 12:00, 10/1/2007, in reply to message #96923
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I'm not sure what the license is for the 32bit version of the module, so we can't be guaranteed to get a copy from RCI.
I'm pretty sure that it was written by Peter Teichmann so it may be worth attempting to get in touch with him. He was very helpful when I decided to use it for the original port, supplying me with full documentation.

The port as it stands also contains a slightly modified version of his floating point library although it's probably a better bet to use GCC 4.x once it's available as I believe it now uses softfp. It would certainly be a lot easier to work with as replacing the floating point code was time consuming and rather boring :).

With any luck I might get enough free time in the near future to start looking at the code again. I had wanted to do some serious profiling work to determine where most of the time was being spent in the renderer although I suspect that the major bottleneck is the Iyonix's memory system (I'd be interesting to see how it performs on an A9).

I'd love to try to get to port properly off the ground and welcome help from anyone that feels like chipping in. Getting it running using IyonixMesa would be fantastic even if the performance was terrible as I suspect it would then classify as the first OpenGL RISC OS game :)
I managed to get Doom playing on an A3010 when it was released with reduced resolution and screen size. It'd be interesting to see something like Q2 on a RiscPC if similar options exist.
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Jeffrey Lee Message #96937, posted by Phlamethrower at 12:20, 10/1/2007, in reply to message #96934
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I managed to get Doom playing on an A3010 when it was released with reduced resolution and screen size. It'd be interesting to see something like Q2 on a RiscPC if similar options exist.
I'm not sure how much faster the retail version of Quake was than ArcQuake, but I'd be surprised if a RiscPC could run Quake 2 at a reasonable speed without spending an incredible amount of time optimising it.
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Dave Brown Message #96941, posted by daveb at 13:23, 10/1/2007, in reply to message #96937
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Posts: 41
I'm not sure how much faster the retail version of Quake was than ArcQuake, but I'd be surprised if a RiscPC could run Quake 2 at a reasonable speed without spending an incredible amount of time optimising it.
The big bottleneck for Quake 2 on a SA RPC was definately the memory speed. Running on a Kinetic and doing all rendering in the SD ram before copying to VRAM could possibly result in ok performance.

[Edited by daveb at 13:43, 10/1/2007]
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Sion Message #96952, posted by blasts of the xtre at 18:26, 10/1/2007, in reply to message #96941
blasts of the xtre
Suppose you were an idiot. Suppose you were a member of Congress. But I repeat myself.

Posts: 326
If this port will be released will it be a commercial release or freeware?
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Dave Brown Message #96955, posted by daveb at 18:39, 10/1/2007, in reply to message #96952
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Personally I've no interest in attempting to make any money out of it. The port is for my own and hopefully others entertainment. As Quake2 was released under the GPL this port will be under the same license.
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Jeffrey Lee Message #96958, posted by Phlamethrower at 19:05, 10/1/2007, in reply to message #96955
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Posts: 15100
Also remember that the full Quake 2 level set is still under a commercial license, so although we're able to give away free copies of the engine you'll still need to own an original copy of the game to get the level data from.

When Quake 1 was first ported, someone made a program to extract the data from the instal files for the PC version, so you could play if you didn't own a PC. It should be possible to do a similar thing for Quake 2 (In fact it wouldn't surprise me if there's a Linux tool we can port for this)
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Dave Brown Message #97011, posted by daveb at 21:26, 11/1/2007, in reply to message #96958
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Just thought you might be interested to hear that, although it crashes shortly after with a stack corruption, I have just seen the Quake 2 console rendered by IyonixMesa :)
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Jeffrey Lee Message #97012, posted by Phlamethrower at 23:08, 11/1/2007, in reply to message #97011
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Cool :)
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Dave Brown Message #97014, posted by daveb at 00:45, 12/1/2007, in reply to message #97012
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Posts: 41
And now the game is running :) Albeit rather slowly so far, but it is in 32bpp 1024x768 and MUCH prettier.

Now I'm off to bed.

[Edited by daveb at 00:46, 12/1/2007]
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Jeffrey Lee Message #97016, posted by Phlamethrower at 01:14, 12/1/2007, in reply to message #97014
PhlamethrowerHot Hot Hot Hot Hot Hot Hot Hot Hot Hot Hot Hot Hot stuff

Posts: 15100
Excellent!

The newer GeForce FX cards just don't seem to tick over correctly with IyonixMesa. Nothing is drawn on screen because the drawing commands are not processed. I am not sure why, but there is a way around it (by using DMA).
Any ETA on a fix? I have a sudden urge to play Quake ;)
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Richard Goodwin Message #97017, posted by rich at 10:24, 12/1/2007, in reply to message #97014
Rich
Dictator for life
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And now the game is running :) Albeit rather slowly so far, but it is in 32bpp 1024x768 and MUCH prettier.
|uploadremind|
________
RichGCheers,
Rich.
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Andrew Message #97035, posted by andrew at 12:54, 12/1/2007, in reply to message #97017
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And now the game is running :) Albeit rather slowly so far, but it is in 32bpp 1024x768 and MUCH prettier.
|uploadremind|
Indeed!
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The Icon Bar: Games: Conversions (mostly games)