@Karlos

The explosions rock! The green grease coming out of the red aliens still is ridiculous when it was red in the first game. It was a compromise so that they could use green 'grease/blood' for both IMHO!

Point taken about the Protracker music. It's no Doom theme though

Last edited by BigD on 15-Aug-2022 at 04:05 PM.

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@BigD

I don't begrudge the developers for such shortcuts. Despite being released by Team-17, it didn't exactly have a big crew; just a couple of people did almost all of it.

They also worked within a 4MB memory limit for the high end version. My mod needs between 8-16 MB (exact amount unknown).

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I found this, for comparison

https://youtu.be/6nY8nNNNBfE

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@Karlos

You have made great graphical improvements. The question is can the AI be improved and can it be made to be a better game?

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@BigD

I don't think the criticisms of the game itself are that valid. The AI is basically the same as the first Alien Breed 3D.

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Also, we're a bit off topic. The thread is meant to be about the fact a more system friendly version of the engine is being developed. My mod is actually inconsequential here.

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@Karlos

Your mod shows what is possible. The game was widely criticised for worse game design, worse collision detection and bad AI compared to the first iteration! If this could be improved then this new compilable source-code development might be worth something beyond just speeding it up or improving the colour gradients and lighting however great that is!

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@BigD

Ironic that the AI and collision detection were criticised because I'm pretty sure they aren't changed since AB3D. I think the game just felt unfinished overall. I deliberately made the collision radius smaller for pickups in my mod because I wanted to show off the 3D models.

For me one of the things that bothered me most was the lack of rotational views for the monsters. The lightmapped sprites were neat but having 8 rotational views, like Doom would've been much better. Since they were all rendered from models, there's no reason why this couldn't have been done, however the memory requirements would've been correspondingly higher.

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Speaking of monsters in the game: the triclaw. I never did understand the point of it. It was so lame, annoying and yet could inflict stupidly rapid melee damage, was almost impossible to shoot without a hitscan weapon and looked like a pair of flying Y-fronts when attacking. I always assumed this was an in-joke. Taking damage from flying soiled kex.

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@Karlos

Which one is the Triclaw? Is it the red/green flying one-eyed thing? Is it me or did they play it safe with the aliens in the 2nd game? There doesn't seem to be any henchmen aliens and the robots while tough are not as scary and with their search lights hardly sneak up on you! The bosses are cool but the variety of fleshy splattering foes seemed to dry up! The jump scares and the sound of double barreled shotgun on aliens flesh/alien shriek effects were half the fun in AB3D1!

Last edited by BigD on 16-Aug-2022 at 12:54 AM.
Last edited by BigD on 16-Aug-2022 at 12:53 AM.

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@BigD

It's the one that's literally just a floating hand with three claws. In the game assets it's called triclaw. The thing you are referring to is called ashnarg in the assets. It's basically a beholder/cacaodemon thing with a pair of buff arms bolted on.

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There were other lightsourced aliens in the sources that never made the cut, some of which I reintroduced in my mod. One is the halfworm from the first game. It actually looks better IMO than half the monsters that did make it. Another was a bigger, boxier robot. There was also a flying robotic globe. Replaying some of the levels now, I must've had a sadistic streak because I use them a lot and gave them a high speed plasma projectile that while not doing much damage, really kicks you about making it almost impossible to aim.

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@BigD

Quote:

BigD wrote: @Karlos You have made great graphical improvements. The question is can the AI be improved and can it be made to be a better game?

Maybe you'd like this level more. I didn't finish the play through because it has a large, annoying maze. https://youtu.be/0rvaRBLOg3w

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Updated engine/RTG graphics would be most welcome.

Can someone more audio inclined please replace the extremely repetitive music.

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@agami

The music engine needs replacing. It's basically a single channel protracker mod with no tempo control and a maximum of 64K of samples (from memory). There were other limitations I've forgotten too. Which is why I experimented using short loops which in turn is why this is so repetitive. Ironically I only used them on a few levels. The rest is more or less vanilla. The whole thing wasn't finished. I posted a few screenshots I can't remember how many years ago now and someone asked for a copy.

An unfinished mod running on an unfinished game. Perfect.

Last edited by Karlos on 17-Aug-2022 at 07:57 AM.
Last edited by Karlos on 17-Aug-2022 at 07:36 AM.

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I know this is not the Idea you are looking for .....
But cant any make an Quake port who is then playable in nice smothness and with all modern things we like on today FPS games (mouse control as example) ....
(and flawless on modern PC's ...) (imho i have read decades ago any have maked an partial port of the Levels to the Quake engine ... but this is all i remember ..)
I realy like the AB 3D 1 port for gzDoom - it play like the original ... but better - in all ways ... https://forum.zdoom.org/viewtopic.php?f=19&t=67666
If i "realy-realy" musst have the old feeling from early ninetys with the original ...
I can run it on WinUAE (or even on org HW) ....

but this is only my view ....

Regards

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@R-TEAM

I believe it has been attempted before.

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@R-TEAM

Totally agree! The GZDoom version of AB3D1 is awesome and does the basic remaster thing better than we have any right to expect given the limited exposure of the world at large to mid to late 90s Amiga AGA 3D games!

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@Karlos

You're right! I did prefer that level and it even had some alien half human grunts! Great floor animations and the lighting and spinning 3D ammo and guns is great!

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"Art challenges technology. Technology inspires the art."
John Lasseter, Co-Founder of Pixar Animation Studios

ALIEN PADDING

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