DOS Games Discussion

Powerslave EX is a remake of Lobotomy Software's PlayStation version of Powerslave. The PlayStation version is quite different from the PC version, and to some extent from the Saturn version.

Powerslave EX uses a custom engine built from scratch by the author, level designer, Samuel ‘Kaiser’ Villarreal. Recently, a public beta versions of the project was released:
https://powerslaveex.wordpress.com/2015 ... -released/

Here's a gameplay video: YouTube link.

People who have played the authentic PlayStation version of the game say that the recreation is pretty true to the original.

An interview with the project author:
http://techraptor.net/content/interview ... powerslave

As for the legal status of the project, the FAQ says the folllowing:

• Is this legal? Who owns the rights to Powerslave?
  • While I know who owns the rights, I am not going to disclose the name of that individual. That said, I have no intention of making any profit from Powerslave EX. The whole purpose of this project is to keep the spirit of the game alive and to introduce it to a whole new generation of gamers and act as a teaching tool to those who want to be a game programmer. This project will, and always will be, free. I will continue developing this project unless I am given a cease and desist letter.

The engine is planned to have an open source release in the future.

Ceased & Desisted, apparently. The download links have been removed from the site.

Too bad! Next step would be to use custom engine with custom content and make a "spiritual successor", I suppose.

Well, it would be logical to recreate the Saturn port of Duke Nukem 3D, which is based on the same SlaveDriver engine developed by Lobotomy as the console versions of Powerslave.

As for a freeware data replacement, that sure would be awesome but apparently modders/developers generally view 2D monster sprites as a lot of work, as mentioned in a conversation here for example:

Cage wrote:

MrFlibble wrote:Supplice's visuals are awesome, and the custom textures and sprites look amazing. So do the monsters, but some of them seem to be edits of the original ones from the vanilla game. Do the developers aim to create a megawad that is made of 100% original content?

I'd love to, no idea if I'll manage though. When it comes to "low-tech" first person shooter graphics, monsters require the most work. I'm slowly working on monsters for Hacx 2.0 and I'm slowly building a workflow, so the chances of custom monsters in Supplice are getting higher!

Jblade wrote:As Cage said, fully original monsters are the hardest asset to create for a 2D game. It's not a suprise that the majority of new enemies are either edited from originals or spliced together from different sprites (or taken from other games)

Duke of Hazzard wrote:Monsters have dozens of frames so they're really very hard to create from scratch.

Which is why HD sprite projects never go forward. And really, I think lowres 2D sprites still look fine to this day. Quake's models aged much more terribly compared to preceding games' sprites.

All good points, except I love Quake's super-low poly monsters more than 2d sprites, but I may be unusual in that opinion as in so many others.

I'm surprised that there aren't quick tools to make sprites from 3d monsters, though. Or maybe that is the slow part.

Quadko wrote:I'm surprised that there aren't quick tools to make sprites from 3d monsters, though. Or maybe that is the slow part.

Yeah, I also suggested that, and apparently there's a shader for Blender that can create "retro" pixel art from 3D models.

However you're also right that 3D modelling in itself isn't an easy task.

Interestingly, it seems that nowadays there are quite a few very talented pixel artists who are willing to share their works at Open Game Art and similar projects. For example, here's a collection of FPS monsters:
http://opengameart.org/content/2d-first ... ter-sprite

The other question for a Powerslave free alternative would be the selection of monsters. There are of course many mythological creatures to choose from, but the most notably Egyptian ones like the mummy are already in use by the original game.

It would be interesting to have a similar game in a different mythological setting, kind of like how Will Rock could be called Serious Sam in Ancient Greece (with a touch of Rome). It probably may take quite an effort, but on the other hand I think appropriate textures and sprites for monsters like Minotaurs or the like are more or less readily available.

Man, what a bunch of morons with that 'cease and desist' nonsense, killing a fan-made remake on an almost twenty year old game.

Jesus Christ!hehe

Quadko wrote:All good points, except I love Quake's super-low poly monsters more than 2d sprites, but I may be unusual in that opinion as in so many others.

I'm surprised that there aren't quick tools to make sprites from 3d monsters, though. Or maybe that is the slow part.

Well, just daydreaming to one of my favourite bands, I am inspired by God#!!!!!!!!!!!!

There is a way to do 3D modeling in a simple way however it is kind of cheating and not actual plotting 3D points and rotating it like in one of those sci-fi movies that you see.

If you are interested. I will give you the information for freeware here. You just have to wait for me to come out with it if I ever get around to doing my projects. haha I am beginning to be like you now with too many projects on my hands... well, if you could count at least 2 projects so far plus a bunch of year old DEMOs hehe

Anyways, I always hate it when people put me in suspense. So I will give you the information however not the implementation since I have not gotten around to it yet.

What you need is to take a an actual photograph of a human subject.

Then use PhotoShop CS2 to reduce the pixels to cartoon like.

Then animate the many sides of the human subject.

When you put all these elements into a game you have (WHA-LA) 3D model.

hehe

Jesus Christ!hehe

Here is a DEMO. It is not a complete version. However for something to work with you get the general idea of how the 3D is to be accomplished. By taking actual 3D subjects and converting it to usable images you are actually using live actual 3Ds.

http://www.mediafire.com/download/e4ikp ... Dmodel.rar

I have to clarify that this is a "fake" 3D since actual 'modeling' in the truest sense of the word means calculations that positions the 3D in some way.

Thank you Jesus for God always#!!!!!!!!!!!!

Bless Jesus Christ first, then my real mom Huong Thi Vu for always being there.

Honour to both my real mom, and my real dad Nguyen Binh Thuy for always teaching me to work and study every day honest for a living.

Aldeb wrote:Man, what a bunch of morons with that 'cease and desist' nonsense, killing a fan-made remake on an almost twenty year old game.

The remake uses proprietary content: sprites, textures, sound effects, music and levels. There's enough legal reason for a C&D.

The fact that people have shown interest in playing the remake even though the game is almost 20 years old as you say is a proof of concept that it can still be commercially successful. It would make a lot of sense for the copyright holders to acquire the rights to this port from its author and sell it via Steam or other similar service.

tienkhoanguyen wrote:There is a way to do 3D modeling in a simple way
<...>
What you need is to take a an actual photograph of a human subject.

Then use PhotoShop CS2 to reduce the pixels to cartoon like.

Then animate the many sides of the human subject.

It has been done, and it's a lot of work. Actual 3D modelling requires a lot less effort.

You can find some videos showing how actors were filmed for Rise of the Triad here:
https://youtu.be/DCqWSo6jtnk
https://youtu.be/zUbuFR6tVrc

The background behind those:
http://joe.siegler.net/2014/05/rott-video-capture-1/
http://joe.siegler.net/2014/11/rott-video-capture-2/

Jesus Christ!hehe

Nice to see some of the stuffs that goes into making their versions.

It is not too often we see private scenes before release.

This is like officially buying a movie and getting how-it-was-made scenes.

Usually pirated versions just have the movies and not the background stuffs.

There are so much stuffs that I usually only check out the latest posts.

However I look at it this way - if it is worth saying - someone will say it again.