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Half-Life 2 in a Browser

hl2.slqnt.dev

171–180 of 283 posts

Re: Half-Life 2 in a Browser

#171
post #157
post #112

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Only the very first few models of Intel Macs had strictly 32-bit processors (the 2006 iMac and Mac minis with Core Solo/Core Duo processors), and none of them were realistically capable of playing Half-Life 2. Apple is guilty of many sins, but this isn't one of them. Valve should never have shipped a 32-bit application in the first place. The binary was already obsolete before it even left Bellevue.

> Valve should never have shipped a 32-bit application in the first place. It's literally a 2004 game! That's ridiculous. A handful of opterons existed in the market, but Intel wouldn't get there for years still and it was well over a decade until x86_64 crossed 50% market share in consumer stuff. Good grief, as it were.

In 2004, sure, but Valve didn't (publicly) ship Mac OS X software before 2010.

Re: Half-Life 2 in a Browser

#172
post #9

And Quake 3: https://thelongestyard.link/q3a-demo/ And Unreal Tournament: https://dos.zone/mp/?lobby=ut There's also https://noclip.website/ which, while not playable, has hundreds of levels from dozens of older games that you can explore freely. Including Half-Life 2, with more accurate rendering than this web port (which seems to be missing many shaders including character eyes).

There's also Ultima Online in the browser (sanctioned by the official servers). I'm one of the maintainers. https://retail.classicuo.org/

> sanctioned

Oh you mean it is or isn't approved.

Re: Half-Life 2 in a Browser

#173
post #165
post #112

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Only the very first few models of Intel Macs had strictly 32-bit processors (the 2006 iMac and Mac minis with Core Solo/Core Duo processors), and none of them were realistically capable of playing Half-Life 2. Apple is guilty of many sins, but this isn't one of them. Valve should never have shipped a 32-bit application in the first place. The binary was already obsolete before it even left Bellevue.

> Only the very first few models of Intel Macs had strictly 32-bit processors (the 2006 iMac and Mac minis with Core Solo/Core Duo processors), and none of them were realistically capable of playing Half-Life 2. What? First, those chips were plenty powerful to run HL2 (the game predates them). And second, all x86_64 chips can run older x86 32-bit code unmodified. The reason macOS stopped supporting 32-bit code has no…

The CPUs were powerful enough, sure. The GPUs (Intel GMA950) absolutely weren't. Even on Windows with better drivers, Half-Life 2 is a slideshow on that class of hardware.

Re: Half-Life 2 in a Browser

#174

Cool! I recently ported Doom on browser so that you can easily play multi-player (up to 4) completely free (you can host it yourself on Cloudflare) https://playdoom.ossy.dev/

Cool, so now I can leave my lawnmower where it belongs.

https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=39521535

Re: Half-Life 2 in a Browser

#175
post #9

And Quake 3: https://thelongestyard.link/q3a-demo/ And Unreal Tournament: https://dos.zone/mp/?lobby=ut There's also https://noclip.website/ which, while not playable, has hundreds of levels from dozens of older games that you can explore freely. Including Half-Life 2, with more accurate rendering than this web port (which seems to be missing many shaders including character eyes).

And Diablo: https://devilutionx.app

Re: Half-Life 2 in a Browser

#176

Earlier quoted context omitted.

How is that possible? 32 bits should be compatible with a 64 bit machine. You can always use less bits for your memory addresses. Are there any other architecture changes that are preventing 32 bits binaries from running? Does that also mean that old software no longer runs unless there is a 64 bit version? In windows you can run x32 and x64 executables in a 64 bits machine

In the case of hl2 the source code for the engine has leaked, so you can recompile it for your target platform of choice, no "conversion" needed. I got it running natively on aarch64 linux a while back, with no issues.

So why can’t Valve do it?

Re: Half-Life 2 in a Browser

#177
post #21

I remember saving up for a year to buy the ATI Radeon 9600 XT (I think it was $200 MSRP) so I could play the game on high settings. Now we can play it inside a virtual machine on a crappy laptop. What a journey

I remember when the game files got hacked before release, and you could run around in half completed maps and small area snippets. I spent hours running around in awe of the new physics engine

Re: Half-Life 2 in a Browser

#178

Earlier quoted context omitted.

How is that possible? 32 bits should be compatible with a 64 bit machine. You can always use less bits for your memory addresses. Are there any other architecture changes that are preventing 32 bits binaries from running? Does that also mean that old software no longer runs unless there is a 64 bit version? In windows you can run x32 and x64 executables in a 64 bits machine

Apple goes way out of their way every few years to ensure old games stop working

The don’t let backwards compatibility stop them from doing anything, but I don’t think they go out of their way to target games. That doesn’t make any sense to me.
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