Id Software • Hacker News Board

Re: Id Software

#11

Post by gukov » Wed, Jun 13, 2018, 2:30 AM UTC

vertexFarm wrote: post #2

Id's move back in the day to open their software enough to allow a modding community was an early stroke of genius. I still play quake mods from time to time. It's amazing how much longevity they got out of those games, let alone the engines. Modding quake was one of my first great bursts of curiosity and creativity. I really remember those days fondly.

Adding your own skins, modifying the config files... it was so easy to feel a creator.

Re: Id Software

#12

Post by thinkingkong » Wed, Jun 13, 2018, 2:38 AM UTC

Where’s the commander keen?

Re: Id Software

#13

Post by movedx » Wed, Jun 13, 2018, 2:52 AM UTC

CaliforniaKarl wrote: post #10

For some of the history of that time, I suggest checking out "Masters of Doom : how two guys created an empire and transformed pop culture", by David Kushner. The book is 15 years old (!!!) at this point, but I think it's still a compelling read.

I also recommend the NoClip documentary on Id Software and on the back of that, virtually any interview with John Romeo -- the guy is awesome and so willing to share his thoughts, ideas, history, anything...

Re: Id Software

#14

Post by acheron » Wed, Jun 13, 2018, 2:54 AM UTC

thinkingkong wrote: post #12

Where’s the commander keen?

I was going to say Apogee probably still owns it, but Wolf3D is up there. It’s possible id got the Wolf3D source but not Keen, I suppose.

It would be fun to see Keen source code if it’s out there!

Re: Id Software

#15

Post by chrisparton1991 » Wed, Jun 13, 2018, 2:54 AM UTC

There are so many interesting tidbits tucked away in the code, things the devs had to consider that have never crossed my mind whilst playing.

For instance, the idclev cheat handling in st_stuff.c has to check if the game is shareware and restrict level changes beyond a certain range.

Re: Id Software

#16

Post by bitexploder » Wed, Jun 13, 2018, 3:05 AM UTC

movedx wrote: post #13

CaliforniaKarl wrote: post #10

For some of the history of that time, I suggest checking out "Masters of Doom : how two guys created an empire and transformed pop culture", by David Kushner. The book is 15 years old (!!!) at this point, but I think it's still a compelling read.

I also recommend the NoClip documentary on Id Software and on the back of that, virtually any interview with John Romeo -- the guy is awesome and so willing to share his thoughts, ideas, history, anything...

John Romero for anyone looking him up.

Re: Id Software

#17

Post by westoncb » Wed, Jun 13, 2018, 3:06 AM UTC

CaliforniaKarl wrote: post #10

For some of the history of that time, I suggest checking out "Masters of Doom : how two guys created an empire and transformed pop culture", by David Kushner. The book is 15 years old (!!!) at this point, but I think it's still a compelling read.

I can second that—it's an excellent book. It put a clear image in my mind of the sort of environment I'd like to develop software in: primarily just a group of friends who have a shared idea of something cool they want to build together. I've been disillusioned that that will happen at a Silicon Valley type startup (not that it's impossible—but far more likely that the founders will segregate themselves from employees in such a way that everyone involved can't feel the same passion, commitment, interest, etc.—or even just the knowledge that they're going through the same struggle at the same time. Also the big stakes and investor pressure etc. are almost certainly gonna drain the fun.), but I'm still hopeful I can find or create similar circumstances elsewhere.

Re: Id Software

#18

Post by billsix » Wed, Jun 13, 2018, 3:07 AM UTC

thinkingkong wrote: post #12

Where’s the commander keen?

I believe that they lost the source long ago

Re: Id Software

#19

Post by scruffyherder » Wed, Jun 13, 2018, 3:08 AM UTC

CaliforniaKarl wrote: post #10

For some of the history of that time, I suggest checking out "Masters of Doom : how two guys created an empire and transformed pop culture", by David Kushner. The book is 15 years old (!!!) at this point, but I think it's still a compelling read.

For sure it's a great book!

Re: Id Software

#20

Post by scruffyherder » Wed, Jun 13, 2018, 3:24 AM UTC

DooM is not only fun, but it's great fun to play around with from the inside, or even to port. I've helped bring Doom to the x68000, which was quite the mission as the only compiler we had that could build 'large' executables was GCC 1.39 which had been translated into Japanese.

But it's been fun doing ports to OS/2, DJGPP v1, Watcom C, and of course various other Unix via the X11 code. The GPL'd code was 'cleaned up' and kind of bugged up on the way, sadly what was released really wasnt' all that pure.

For anyone wanting something more 'pure' for MS-DOS I'd highly suggest: Mara'akate's DooM-New

https://bitbucket.org/maraakate/doomnew-for-dos

And then there is Quake, which I compiled with the excellent MS-DOS based TCP/IP stack WATTCP so that I could bring native TCP/IP networking to Quake.

https://virtuallyfun.com/wordpress/2011/01/05/quake1-with-wa...

And on the heels of that, I did a QuakeWorld client for MS-DOS

https://virtuallyfun.com/wordpress/2011/01/06/quakeworld-cli...

which kind of took a life on it's own here:

http://dk.toastednet.org/QDOS/index.html

And of course with the source to Quake 2 available, it only seemed proper to port it to MS-DOS.

https://virtuallyfun.com/wordpress/2015/06/02/porting-quake-...

https://virtuallyfun.com/2015/06/03/porting-quake-ii-to-ms-d...

https://virtuallyfun.com/2015/06/07/porting-quake-ii-to-ms-d...

https://virtuallyfun.com/2015/06/26/porting-quake-ii-to-ms-d...

https://virtuallyfun.com/2015/09/17/porting-quake-ii-to-ms-d...

So yes, there is GREAT fun to be had in the iD source.