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DaggerXL is officially dead

Posted: Fri May 01, 2020 3:59 pm
by Ferital
A week ago, Lucius has updated the XLEngine GitHub page to announce that the project is cancelled. While there hasn't been any news in four years, it was quite obvious that the project was already abandoned, but at least it's nice to see an official update on this.

Whitout mentioning DFU explicitly, Lucius also states that there are already "high quality ports/projects" for Daggerfall and Blood so there is no reason for him to continue to work on his own. However, he seems to be on something for Dark Forces, so for people interested in this game, this may be worth looking at once he releases the source code, since he's planning to do so.

Re: DaggerXL is officially dead

Posted: Fri May 01, 2020 4:06 pm
by BadLuckBurt
I hope he has more luck with his plans for Dark Forces, I know several people who would love to have a good port to play it on.

Re: DaggerXL is officially dead

Posted: Fri May 01, 2020 4:10 pm
by mikeprichard
I actually thought he might have died (no joke). I find it quite strange that he didn't bother to take two minutes to post a message to his own forum just to confirm he was still alive and give some vague direction as to his plans, back when it was obvious far longer than four years ago that the project wouldn't deliver, but of course that was his call to make. Personally, I was only interested in DaggerXL way, way back, and now of course we have DFU!

I do hope he finds the motivation to follow up on DarkXL and is able to vastly improve his communication with people following the project, at least for those interested.

Re: DaggerXL is officially dead

Posted: Fri May 01, 2020 4:12 pm
by Interkarma
It's good to hear Lucius is still alive and well. Looking forward to seeing what else he does with Dark Forces. His earlier remake was so far along it was a shame to see it stall. I completely understand him being caught up and distracted by Daggerfall though. I have the same disease, so nothing but empathy from me. :)

Re: DaggerXL is officially dead

Posted: Mon May 04, 2020 12:47 pm
by MrFlibble
mikeprichard wrote: Fri May 01, 2020 4:10 pm I find it quite strange that he didn't bother to take two minutes to post a message to his own forum just to confirm he was still alive and give some vague direction as to his plans
I believe it might have to do with the forum getting infested with spambots. It happens very quickly and is incredibly hard to manage for one or two persons even if you don't have your hands full of other things, which is what I believe was the case. But of course this is just my assumption.

I was kind of hoping that something would come out of the part where he reverse-engineered the original DF binaries, but I'm not sure if this may be open sourced. Would be nice if those results could augment the achievements of the DFU team doing reverse engineering here. From the statements made by luciusDXL back in 2016, it could be assumed that he was approaching the state of a "source port accurate" recreation of Daggerfall:
While previous parts of the engine were not written based on disassembly, the new release will be source port accurate and any code that does not match the original is being replaced. In fact, the game specific code is being written from scratch from the reverse engineered code. Only once the original code is working is it being refactored and common functionality pulled out to ensure that the results remain "source port accurate."
[source] [emphasis added]
At any rate, wishing him good luck with the new project (which is probably an engine recreation of Dark Forces -- very hopefully on the same principles as described above!).

Re: DaggerXL is officially dead

Posted: Tue May 05, 2020 8:01 am
by luciusDXL
Hello everyone, I saw this message by accident so I figured I would drop in and say hi.

Truth be told I went through some rough times several years ago and was unable to continue developing the XL Engine. I should have communicated that but for a long time I thought I would just go back to it, so why kill it? But time moves on. I just didn't feel that DaggerXL (or even the XL Engine as originally envisioned) was still needed with projects like this and various Blood-related projects taking up the slack. Regardless I apologize to any fans that were holding out hope for DaggerXL, though fortunately, you have this project to fill that need.

Fast forward to today - things are going well and for a variety of reasons, I have a lot more time available again. So I have "returned" in a sense and have been working on a new project, though I have yet to publically announce it. However, I have decided to make the main GitHub repository for the project public so it will be discovered soon enough (yes its Dark Forces/Outlaws related as already guessed).

Once I have reached a proper release, I will make an announcement and have something to show. Though it will not be Daggerfall related as I mentioned above.

Re: DaggerXL is officially dead

Posted: Tue May 05, 2020 8:14 am
by Jay_H
Ahh, Lucius pays us a visit! :) Welcome to the forums. Let us know what you come up with, Daggerfall-related or not! Glad to hear from you.

Re: DaggerXL is officially dead

Posted: Tue May 05, 2020 9:05 am
by jman0war
Good to hear from you Lucius, glad that life is going well.

Re: DaggerXL is officially dead

Posted: Tue May 05, 2020 9:38 am
by Interkarma
Welcome Lucius! It's good to see you and here and know that you're well. Best wishes and good luck with whatever you're working on now. :)

Re: DaggerXL is officially dead

Posted: Mon May 18, 2020 1:49 pm
by MrFlibble
luciusDXL wrote: Tue May 05, 2020 8:01 am Fast forward to today - things are going well and for a variety of reasons, I have a lot more time available again. So I have "returned" in a sense and have been working on a new project, though I have yet to publically announce it. However, I have decided to make the main GitHub repository for the project public so it will be discovered soon enough (yes its Dark Forces/Outlaws related as already guessed).
Hello luciusDXL, glad to hear you're well and continue your work. I'm a fan of Dark Forces and I hope all the cool stuff envisioned back in 2016 (like playing the DOS version with hi-res Mac interface and HUD) will come to be.

Just out of curiosity, if you don't mind: how far had you progressed with reverse-engineering Daggerfall for DaggerXL? Was it in any way ready to be made at least into a rough "source port-accurate" engine reconstruction before you had to pause development?