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OpenTESArena 0.6.0 Released!

Posted: Thu Dec 28, 2017 5:44 am
by afritz1
I just released version 0.6.0 of my open-source engine for Arena today. You can now look around in the first floor of main quest dungeons and building interiors (mage's guild, equipment store, etc.). Although it's only loading voxel geometry at the moment, I'm planning on adding basic support for loading original entities and objects by version 0.7.0 (the test city just has some hardcoded ones for the purposes of demonstrating the renderer).

I'm glad that the player can now explore some actual places from the original game. That's a milestone in the engine re-implementation process, I'd say.

Here's the release video: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=SREWBHaL_eA

I posted about it on Twitter, too :)

Re: OpenTESArena 0.6.0 Released!

Posted: Thu Dec 28, 2017 9:35 am
by Interkarma
Excellent progress! Have retweeted your post as well, hopefully it helps you get a few more eyeballs on this deserving project.

Re: OpenTESArena 0.6.0 Released!

Posted: Sat Feb 24, 2018 1:07 pm
by MrFlibble
afritz1 wrote:voxel geometry
Is this how the original Arena engine handles stuff? I never realised those were voxels.

Re: OpenTESArena 0.6.0 Released!

Posted: Sat Feb 24, 2018 5:24 pm
by afritz1
MrFlibble wrote:Is this how the original Arena engine handles stuff? I never realised those were voxels.
I don't know exactly how Arena's renderer works, but what I meant was that my engine could load and draw Arena's level data, which usually consists of three floors of "boxes" (ground, main floor, and second floor). To make it clear: there is no geometry in Arena's file data (i.e., no vertices or texture coordinates). I'm assuming Arena uses a 2.5D ray caster like Wolfenstein 3D, but I could be wrong.

Re: OpenTESArena 0.6.0 Released!

Posted: Sun Feb 25, 2018 10:23 am
by Al-Khwarizmi
Amazing progress, keep it up! It looks gorgeous and makes me want to play even though I never tried arena at its time (only Daggerfall).

By the way, I didn't know some of the most iconic tracks in Daggerfall's soundtrack were in Arena already. I have always loved the track sounding in the first part of the video. The arrangement is different from what I was used to hear in Daggerfall, is it because the MIDI file is different or just due to the various soundtrack settings?

Re: OpenTESArena 0.6.0 Released!

Posted: Sun Feb 25, 2018 5:19 pm
by afritz1
Al-Khwarizmi wrote:By the way, I didn't know some of the most iconic tracks in Daggerfall's soundtrack were in Arena already.
Yeah, some of them like SunnyDay and Overcast are the same, converted from XMI/XFM format to HMP/HMI.
Al-Khwarizmi wrote:I have always loved the track sounding in the first part of the video. The arrangement is different from what I was used to hear in Daggerfall, is it because the MIDI file is different or just due to the various soundtrack settings?
Most likely because of the sound patches/font being used. Generally I like to use the Windows-sounding one (Saphyr 2000?), but I also like OPL3 which has a much different feel. There are others much more knowledgeable about MIDI than I am, though (like psi29a on the OpenMW forums; he's one of the WildMIDI guys).

Edit: on a side note, the floppy version of Arena only played one dungeon track while the CD version chose from a selection.

Re: OpenTESArena 0.6.0 Released!

Posted: Tue Mar 20, 2018 2:57 pm
by Gudadantza
I've noticed that the GOG version is not detected (CD version) . Do you have plans to implement it in a future? Apart the voice in some parts of the game, is the cd version very different from the floppy?

Greetings

Re: OpenTESArena 0.6.0 Released!

Posted: Tue Mar 20, 2018 4:32 pm
by afritz1
Gudadantza wrote: Tue Mar 20, 2018 2:57 pm I've noticed that the GOG version is not detected (CD version) . Do you have plans to implement it in a future? Apart the voice in some parts of the game, is the cd version very different from the floppy?
Yeah, I do have plans for the CD version. In the grand scheme of things, it shouldn't be hard to make the engine compatible with the CD version. The primary barrier is with creating a list of all the data offsets into the executable for the program to use, and the floppy disk version of that list is still in development, so I wanted to delay making a second list until the first one is essentially complete (just to prevent bugs due to me being forgetful to update both lists). I've been getting that question about the CD version pretty often, so maybe I should implement support sooner than later.

I think the CD version is different enough that it might require having separate save files for each version, but I'll have to look into it. Maybe they can be homogenized.

Re: OpenTESArena 0.6.0 Released!

Posted: Tue Mar 20, 2018 6:08 pm
by Gudadantza
Oh, I was just curious. I made the question because GOG is the version I own in the HD. But is not a great deal having the bethesda version installed too. Both are free and small as well.

Greetings and keep the good work.

Re: OpenTESArena 0.6.0 Released!

Posted: Wed Mar 21, 2018 9:31 am
by R.D.
I think the CD version is different enough that it might require having separate save files for each version, but I'll have to look into it. Maybe they can be homogenized.
I haven't had any noticeable problems using saves I made in the CD version in the floppy version. I haven't tried the other way. Also I haven't played extensively with a save carried over from CD version to floppy, but I have often loaded them up for short testing sessions and haven't noticed any issues.