Over the course of a week, Fraggle and I have been going back and forth to create a Chex Quest mode in Chocolate DooM.
He finally got it all worked out (I think), and is asking for people to test it and give feedback...His topic:
http://www.doomworld.com/vb/showthread.php?s=&postid=733815#post733815
Windows build of the engine:
http://www.soulsphere.org/chocolate-chex.zip
Go to it ! and if you have an account on doomworld, go post there!
Way to go Atarian! ;D
this is awesome!
But doom wire...is not. We were trying to link up for a CQ coop game on it, but since the setup hasn't been coded to recognize chex.wad, we couldn't use the easy launchers...then doomwire had a 'showstopping' bug with its players list that prevented us from even getting started.
but the port is cool...I'm thinking about reworking chex2.wad so that maybe it wont crash, and will be smaller...
Is this a new engine altogether? What I think would be even better is if the original Chocolate Doom were updated to include a different play mode for Chex Quest if chex.wad is being used as the IWAD. This way, there wouldn't have to be a separate Chocolate Chex, and the original Chocolate Doom could be easily used to play either Chex Quest or Doom whatever.
Thats EXACTLY what this is! Its chocolate doom and a .deh patch that will enable this release of Chocolate Doom to play chex.wad to the letter...And that link to the .zip above now links to an updated release...xbolt found some errors, and went through and posted them.
I'm thinking of making a hardcoded version of this, tho...I'm getting tired of DEHACKED and all that. Patches are good, but I'd rather have two things: an exe and a wad. With chocolate-doom, this isn't very possible (due to the SDL libraries), but maybe if we found another port (something Boom compatible), with the data fraggle gave me, we could do this precisely as well. If I could get a compiler to build something like prBoom or something, I could edit the info and english code...
Weird... I don't remember there ever being a demo of the 5th level. ???
Huh. The Chocolate Doom website (http://www.chocolate-doom.org/wiki/index.php/Chocolate_Doom) still points to the older release. Is this a pre-release thing or something?
I got an error in the caverns at the last part of the map coming out of one of the secret area places marked by a lamp on the wall.
R_DrawPlanes: visplane overflow (620951875)
I think this was also an error in the original CQ, cause I remember coming out of one of the secret area things and the game crashed.
Ah, yes. Ye olde visplane error. That be one of the functions of Chocolate Doom, to preserve all of Doom's bugs and limitations.
Hmm...is it a visplane error that causes CQ2 to crash on the red door bug? Or is it bad nodes?
...If its nodes, i'm rebuilding CQ2 starting tomorrow. If its visplane...mebe make the room smaller?
OH! to use CQ2, make a batch file and use the command:
chocolate-doom -iwad chex.wad -merge chex2.wad -deh chex.deh
(NOTE: with the latest version, you can leave off the -deh command...its auto loaded)
And yes, manny, this is a special release. IDK if this will actually be included in a major release, but it would be cool if fraggle kept it.
Quote from: The Atariangamer of 1993 on August 01, 2008, 11:43:57 PM
Hmm...is it a visplane error that causes CQ2 to crash on the red door bug? Or is it bad nodes?
...If its nodes, i'm rebuilding CQ2 starting tomorrow. If its visplane...mebe make the room smaller?
It's not a visplane error, or a node error. I don't know what it is. I've already asked about that in the thread on Doomworld, here (http://www.doomworld.com/vb/showthread.php?s=&postid=733962#post733962).
Entryway fixed it by removing the front middle texture from linedefs 373, 359, and 371. I don't know why those particular ones cause trouble, but I just tried removing them, and sure enough, it didn't crash.
O_o? Thats...odd...Why on earth does that happen, and how did he know what to do?
That's what I intend to find out.
"Join xbolt on his epic quest to find out why front-middle 373, 359, and 371 crash the greatest game of all time...he will face many ???'s and 'Whats CQ?'s on his journey, but he will not stop...till he finds...
The Secret of the Red Door
Weekends at 5 on the The DooM Channel (Playit, editit, LIVEIT)
But thats reallly strange...But what linedefs are those? And if we remove the front middle, wont there be nothing there? OR are we seeing a doublesided linedef with a texture on the outside of the map? Or since its a middle texture...maybe its crashing because we're seeing outside the map?
LOL. That's great. ;D
The textures are on sectors that have a height of 0, so removing them doesn't make any visible changes.
Hmm...I needs some screens...and what sectors are these things on?
Here, I've highlighted the troublesome lines:
http://xbolt.knowledgehouse.info/chex2trouble.jpg (http://xbolt.knowledgehouse.info/chex2trouble.jpg)
Hmm...did you notice the texture SKY1? I wonder...
I doubt using a sky box texture like that could do anything. E1M4: Arboretum does this in the large, circular room next to the room with the blue key without any problems.
oh...I guess not.
Thats really odd. Hm...
Woot! Wow, this is cool! I just did a speed run of CQ with Chocolate Doom/Chex! Awesome!
The thing is, the textures and sprites and stuff look a bit grainy. It hurt my eyes to look at them.
Maybe I've just been using GZDoom so much I've forgotten how the originals look. ;D
Yes! They really looked like that! lol
And they always have. And they still do, you just have different filters on the video to smooth it out...but is still pixely when you get up close.
Well yeah, it's just that in the original it's not smoothed out. But I guess I've forgotten. ;D
this is awesome. dload as soon as i can.
for clarification, is the link the .deh or a different chocodoom altogether? i didnt quite understand :(
Its an internal windows build of Chocolate DooM that auto loads Chex Compatiblity features and a chex.deh file that will fix most things. The reason he didn't really wanna hardcode an engine was the fact that it was never opensourced, and that it might be illegal. We could if we want.
And this is classic chex.exe. It can run all 3 chex quests, but someone have revealed the bug that caused the CQ2 crash. IDK how he found it, but the instrux are above.
I played the hole first Chex Quest, It was great! ;D
Was this .deh supost to help the error when it crashes before E1M5, because that happened to me. :|
Yay! 200 Posts!
Now I'm a Chex Master! ;D
What error was that? The one that crashes when you come out of the hole? Someone described that above. I think its a DooM limitation (meaning with that door open, the amount of stuff in your view is too much for the engine to render, so it crashes). But, the whole point of this engine was to get it to act the exact same...and some noticed this in chex.exe thing.
the .deh was basically taking the object state tables extracted by fraggle and turning them into dehacked to get precise replications of flemoids. the only things hard coded were the autoloading of chex.deh, the skipping of the episode select, and the exit after 5 levels.
and the 200 posts, congrats! (I just never notice when I hit a milestone) :-|
I think he's talking about the thing that commonly occurs with the scifience version on Doom Legacy, where it crashes after E1M4.
I'll probably wait until a full release is posted on Chocolate Doom homepage (http://www.chocolate-doom.org/wiki/index.php/Chocolate_Doom) before I download this.
Why? It's just Chex Quest, made to resemble the original. There's nothing wrong with it.
I didn't get that...odd.
Immah check, just to make sure.
CHECK:
Nope, the crash after e1m4 is gone. This was clean.
The crash after comming out of the space behind the 2nd light to the left of the flembrane is true.
R_FindPlane: no more visplanes
Im not exactly sure what this is, but I shall find out. Its probably due to a great deal of things having to be drawn on screen.
You didn't get what?
Quote from: ChexCommander on August 07, 2008, 11:08:38 AM
Why? It's just Chex Quest, made to resemble the original. There's nothing wrong with it.
Why what? Are you asking why does it crash, or are you asking why am I waiting to download it?
The latter.
Read my above post, I explain it.
That error is a visplane overflow, when 128 different ceiling and floor surfaces (visplanes). Comming out of that area shows all of the caverns, the entrance, and what you're standing in. its pretty bad, just be careful when comming out of there.
And if you're the technical sort, heres why and how:
http://rome.ro/lee_killough/editing/visplane.shtml
I'm waiting because... uh... because I'm waiting for an official release. It's a little hard to explain.
Well, its already built, has bug fixes (since it was internal), was compiled by the author (no errors), is all fine. There is no reason not to. Also, I"m not exactly sure he will keep chex support in there. the package isn't that big...
Quote from: The Atariangamer of 1993 on August 06, 2008, 09:30:38 PM
Its an internal windows build of Chocolate DooM that auto loads Chex Compatiblity features and a chex.deh file that will fix most things. The reason he didn't really wanna hardcode an engine was the fact that it was never opensourced, and that it might be illegal. We could if we want.
dood, chex.exe was freeware. theres nothing illegal if its hardcoded.
Quote from: GameMaster on August 07, 2008, 08:16:33 PM
Quote from: The Atariangamer of 1993 on August 06, 2008, 09:30:38 PM
Its an internal windows build of Chocolate DooM that auto loads Chex Compatiblity features and a chex.deh file that will fix most things. The reason he didn't really wanna hardcode an engine was the fact that it was never opensourced, and that it might be illegal. We could if we want.
dood, chex.exe was freeware. theres nothing illegal if its hardcoded.
That just means it is legal to DISTRIBUTE, not reverse engineer and rewrite. For that to be legal, the source code would have to be released, or have the permission of whoever owns the rights to the program.
Gosh...who would that be? If I could get permission, I might be able to get fraggle to help me hard code the bits...or, as i said earlier, we could do this ourselves. I just need someone who can compile the thing!
I got Microsoft VB 2008 Express, but I dont know how to install the SDL libraries (i'm guessing its sound) or compile the code. If I could get that, then I would be able to mess with it some and get stuff goin. What would be necessary:
-The ammo drop code removed
-the flemoid behavior corrected
-the level/episode situation fixed
-the cheats replaced
-the strings replaced
Don't forget that the baron of hell would need to be "glued".
hold on.......doom.exe source code was released....
and chex.exe is derived from doom.exe, so doesnt that make it free code?
I would think so. The only thing I'd worry about is the Chex name all over everything. Also, the company that made Strife went outta buisness w/o opensourcing it...and lookie here! Many systems are emulating it.
The only problem would be the fact that we have only one person who can code, and he wants a GZDooM port, not a Chocolate Doom port...
Quote from: GameMaster on August 07, 2008, 11:06:00 PM
hold on.......doom.exe source code was released....
and chex.exe is derived from doom.exe, so doesnt that make it free code?
No, because it is different code. For example: The code for Medal of Honor: Allied Assault is a modified form of Quake 3 code. However, just because Quake 3 becomes open source does NOT mean that Medal of Honor: Allied Assault was released.
This is called "Engine Licensing". Essentially, rather than code from scratch, a development company will purchase the right to use an existing engine, and modify it to suit their purposes. Chex Quest uses a modified DooM engine, so even though DooM is open source Chex Quest does not become open source by association because it is different.
Software legalities are very crazy weird.
Perhaps I will start another Chex Quest staff crusade, this time, to get the source code released. :D However, I should probably take these crusades one at a time....
you should...Both of em. Do the crusades for the source, and do them one at a time. But As far as I can see...the source is the last great thing. The only thing that I could think of is trying to contact Lee Snyder (didn't he do original story?) and asking him more things about the CQ universe, and maybe the company that made the videos and seeing if they have something.