#149923 - simonjhall - Sun Jan 27, 2008 1:31 pm
Hi,
has anyone seen that the source to the classic game 'Homeworld' is available? I honestly can't remember the specs required for the game (it came out '99?) but I reckon it'd be pretty cool if someone were to do a port of this ;-)
I do remember that there was pretty much nothing on screen for most of the game (the space ships were tiny) so...err, at least the poly count wouldn't be a problem!
Source:
http://www.homeworldsdl.org/
Any thoughts?
_________________
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#149925 - silent_code - Sun Jan 27, 2008 2:29 pm
they've been out for quite some time!
i remember seeing them on the rdn (relic developer network - or something), along with all the file specs and tools and stuff. i actually downloaded them, but never had a look at them... :^D
that's been some years now, i think. well, pardon me in the case i have mixed up something, but i'm quite sure...
also i never played hw, i guess that was the reason i never got into decompressing the archive. :^p
would be a nice game for the ds (i *have* seen some demos and videos and all, though).
err, sorry for the lame and lengthy post.
#149944 - elwing - Sun Jan 27, 2008 8:53 pm
well, the memory ressource needed don't seem to bad... but an exram device would probably be mandatory to run it, but system spec mantion a PII 233 as minimum requirement... seems kinda hard to run on the DS... would probably be a nice port for a psp trough...
#149950 - silent_code - Sun Jan 27, 2008 9:48 pm
233 mhz using software rendering? or is it recommended when using a 3dfx?
ps: perhaps the official page (or at least relics) could help with information. check www.relicnews.com
from the hw faq:
| Quote: |
3.2 - What are the system requirements? Straight from the official site:
Pentium 200 32-MB RAM 4x CD-ROM Sound Card Windows 95/98/NT 4.0
Keep in mind that those are the minimum system requirements. If you don?t want the game to chug like a Yugo, I?d suggest something with a little more speed. Like your neighbourhood speed dealer, for instance. |
| Quote: |
3.3.2 - Will Homeworld require hardware acceleration? Nope, but let?s be realistic (if only for a very brief moment): the graphics will be uglier than a baboon?s ass without 3d acceleration. Actually, they won?t be that bad but a baboon?s ass is pretty damn ugly. Suffice it to say, you will want a 3d accelerator while playing Homeworld.
3.3.3 - Which graphics APIs will Homeworld use? Homeworld can be played using either Direct3D or OpenGL as the renderer. And that?s it. There is no Glide support. |
| Quote: |
System Requirements
Minimum:
* Windows 95/98/NT 4.0 (w/ service pack 4.0)
* Pentium II 233 processor
* 32-MB RAM
* 80 MB HD Space (plus 50 MB permanent Swap File)
* 4 MB PCI Video Card (16-bit color, Direct X compatible)
...
Recommended:
* Pentium II 350+
* 64 MB RAM
* 600 MB HD Space (For Full Installation)
* 12 MB+ Accelerated Video Card
...
|
actually, that game sounds interresting! i really like dow (<= starcraft for me) and coh (still don't own a copy of that game - damn, it's about time!), so i might aswell like hw! i'm not much into space sim, though, that's what kept me away from it for soooo long. but it's the goddamn first fully 3d rts! silly me!
#149968 - elwing - Mon Jan 28, 2008 8:05 am
effectively we need less processor power if we use the ds 3d hardware, but still... using a processor more than 3time slower seems pretty hard...
#149969 - theli - Mon Jan 28, 2008 8:28 am
| elwing wrote: |
| effectively we need less processor power if we use the ds 3d hardware, but still... using a processor more than 3time slower seems pretty hard... |
you shouldn't compare CISC vs RISC frequencies in such way
#149972 - elwing - Mon Jan 28, 2008 9:44 am
I know, but I mean that quake2 require as example a 90Mhz pentium1... It runs quite fine on the DS, but it is already near the hardware limits of the DS it seems. compared to the PII 233 requirement of homeworld it seems pretty unprobable that we'll get a homeworld running on the DS... that would be pretty cool trough...
#150074 - silent_code - Tue Jan 29, 2008 4:59 pm
but know that homeworld does (taken from the faq) a lot of audio dsp, too. it should be run on at least a 300 mhz machine, though. take that out and you have a bit more cpu cycles available.
also, it used quite highly tessalated meshes (for that period), with up to 5 lod levels.
given, that the file formats are well documented, aswell there's all the sources available, one could make a mesh stripper (ha, ha!) that would strip out high level lods. that way some cpu power was needed for vertex processing. remember, vertex processing was a cpu task back then, before T&L - that is done by dedicated hw on the nds!
i think it's pretty much possible to do it!
i have to get a demo of that game! the official site doesn't have one... :^C