DF-21 Forums

[Barry Brien]

Well I finally got to play this on my brother's laptop. Everything came out looking weird. The lighting was screwy (the highest light level appeared black) and the weapon bms were non-transparent.
Also I don't understand why you haven't yet given the option for players to actually use the classic DF controls. I know I keep whining about this, but I cannot get used to the keys+mouse configuration, I've never liked it and I never will.
It seems strange to build a port of a classic game but not to allow people to play it in the way it was originally intended.

[lucius]

[Gez]

[joel96]

I like the new visuals in the 9.01 build. Here's some stuff I've noticed in the Secret base level.
1. Secrets aren't counted in the F1 menu. I picked up the revive, the extra life, and the infrared goggles, but the secrets are still measured as 0%.
2. There is no icon next to a completed mission to show what difficulty I completed it on. This feature is present in the Steam version.
3. Yep, collisions were a problem for me too. The worst one is the door at the top of the elevator at the end of SecBase. I used F and G to get unstuck.
4. I don't know if there is supposed to be music in the cutscenes after Secret base, but there was only speech in every one of the cutscenes up to level 2.

Here's something that isn't a problem, so no one else should mention it. It's a gameplay thing unrelated to collisions. The secret door that opens up into the secret area with all the emblems is not opened by nudge. It's opened by nudging a wall deeper in the cave to reveal a switch. Nudge the switch, and the door opens. Not a collision thing.

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[lucius]

[klasodeth]

[joel96]

I'm saying it's not a problem.

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[klasodeth]

[Mark Saffrey]

Hello all, this is the first time i've posted here but i've been following the project for a while now. Firstly hats off to lucius for all the hard work on getting the project this far, I look forward to the future developments.

Now regrettably on to the bad news. I can't get version 9.01 to work on my system. I am running windows vista home premium sp2 the graphics card uses the intel GMA 3100 Chipset. All I get at start up is the music and a black screen. I have tried using the -safe command and then all I get is a black window again with the music playing. I have checked all my direct x drivers are up to date and that openAL is properly installed. Version 8.05 works on my system no problem.

I believe the problem is graphics related and have checked the DXL_log and it all seems to work fine up to this point:

<Driver3D_DX9::LoadShaders 992> LoadShader "ps_texmask8" failed.
<Driver3D_DX9::LoadShaders 995> LoadShader "ps_texmask12" failed.
<Driver3D_DX9::LoadShaders 998> LoadShader "ps_texmask16" failed.
<Driver3D_DX9::LoadShaders 1001> LoadShader "ps_texmask24" failed.
<Driver3D_DX9::LoadShaders 1004> LoadShader "ps_texmask32" failed.
<Driver3D_DX9::LoadShaders 1007> LoadShader "ps_texmask48" failed.
<Driver3D_DX9::LoadShaders 1010> LoadShader "ps_texmask64" failed.
<Driver3D_DX9::LoadShaders 1013> LoadShader "ps_texmask96" failed.
<Driver3D_DX9::LoadShaders 1016> LoadShader "ps_texmask128" failed.

Apologies that this is a slightly lengthy post. If anyone has any ideas they would be gratefully received.

Thank you

[Barry Brien]

[Barry Brien]

Lucius when I turned off the bloom everything was fine again. Not sure of his specs, its a Dell Inspiron 1501 running XP.

[lucius]

[lucius]

[klasodeth]

[Barry Brien]

[klasodeth]

Ah, for me it's the opposite. Much of my childhood was spent playing computer games, with comparatively little time spent on consoles. The older I got the more the PC won out over the videogame systems. The last time I bought a videogame console was in the 20th century.

I remember being wowed by Wolfenstein 3D and being floored when Doom came out. I turned into such a hopeless fan of first-person-shooters that there's no way I could let evolving control schemes keep me down for long. Only Bioshock has triumphed over me in that respect, placing a hard-coded key right in the middle of my usual control scheme. The annoyance and awkwardness of having to use the opposite side of the keyboard was enough that I decided not to bother playing it.

[Barry Brien]

When we first got DF all those years ago I used to play it with one of those huge flight simulator joysticks. It wasn't long before the thing was destroyed and I started using the keys, and I haven't looked back since. Maybe I should just get a joypad altogether. It would certainly be easier for me to play stuff like DarkXL.
Consoles have come a long way since the last millenium. I was playing Call Of Duty on the Wii yesterday with the zapper addon. It was very enjoyable.

[The MAZZTer]

Hahah joysticks, how very 90s.

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[tnoyce]

Yeah,

I grew up in the era before most of the consoles really took hold. Heck, I still remember the day we got our first 13" color tv. Big change from the old black and white, with vacuum tube technology.

Still remember Pong and the Atari 2600, though such things were seen as frivolous expenses in my house growing up. We never had a console of any type.

Pretty amazing when you think of what computer games used to be, vs where they are now. Very different expectations and implementations. Same goes for physical hardware of course.

I agree that mouse-look in games like this is a huge asset. I've tried playing the old DOS version a bit, and have a heck of a time hitting much of anything above eye-level, especially with Auto-aim disabled - my preferred setting.

Sometimes a joystick is a good option, though it doesn't really 'feel' quite right for this type of game. For those of us that have dealt with Carpal Tunnel, an option other than keyboard is a good thing to have on occasion.

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Tim Noyce

[GreggD]

I didn't have to turn on any of the arguments, but I did get stuck in a doorway on the Secret Base level.

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"If they were created by man, then we can solve them by man." -Tim Sabien

[Barry Brien]

Success! updated my graphics drivers and now it's working beautifully. I'll look forward to playing this properly.

[lucius]

[Barry Brien]

Totally. It's looking great Lucius.

[joel96]

Can someone do a difficulty check on the latest build? Maybe it is because the Steam version is so difficult to use because of the horrible graphics and lack of mouse Y-axis, but it seemed to me like the enemies were easier on the DXL version. Enemy accuracy is tough to check, so just do a head count of enemies in the SecBase level. Keep in mind there are secret areas with additional enemies, and more enemies sometimes spawn in an area after you have left it. Steph Smith in the KLoepelmann FAQ did a count between difficulty levels. It can be used as a rough guide. Scroll about halfway down: http://www.gamefaqs.com/computer/doswin/file/3397/2031

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[lucius]

I'm pretty sure the enemy count is correct, though the enemy activation and accuracy needs to be further tweaked.

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DarkXL....http://darkxl.wordpress.com

[The MAZZTer]

The Steam version is identical to the original retail version except:

- The control scheme has been changed in setup to more closely match modern FPSs as much as possible.
- A no-cd crack has been applied to remove the need for a CD.
- Bundled with DOSBox, as it will not run properly in Windows' own DOS emulation. You are free to use your own solution such as virtualization of the MS-DOS OS or whatever.

No other differences AFAIK. LA lost the source code anyway long ago so it's not like they could change anything really if they wanted to.

I'm not sure why enemy count would be something brought into question. Other than enemy spawners, every enemy is explicitly defined in a level's .O file. Figuring out how many enemies and where to put them is the EASY pary.

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[lucius]

[Mark Saffrey]

[joel96]

[lucius]