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Descent 3 Source Code

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Re: Descent 3 Source Code

#71

Post by pixelpoet »

meekins wrote: post #57
jaegrqualm wrote: post #14

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Not that you asked, but there's exactly one (popular) game that utilizes the same control scheme in modern times, Outer Wilds. Although it's not a shooter, it's quite a nice adventure game. https://store.steampowered.com/app/753640/Outer_Wilds/ There is, however, an outright continuation of the subgenre, in Overload. https://store.steampowered.com/app/448850/Overload/

Overload is awesome! However I wonder if some remnants of 90s game design like tight time limits and repeating enemy ambushes that make the game such a familiar and intense experience for the old school in reality disadvantage the game and the genre from reaching wider audiences. There was also another classic Descent contender, Forsaken, that got remastared in 2018 to run on Linux and macOS in addition to modern Win…

The Forsaken soundtrack was so good!

Re: Descent 3 Source Code

#72

Post by nier »

OrwellianChild wrote: post #45
jaegrqualm wrote: post #14

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Not that you asked, but there's exactly one (popular) game that utilizes the same control scheme in modern times, Outer Wilds. Although it's not a shooter, it's quite a nice adventure game. https://store.steampowered.com/app/753640/Outer_Wilds/ There is, however, an outright continuation of the subgenre, in Overload. https://store.steampowered.com/app/448850/Overload/

Super cheap on GOG right now... https://www.gog.com/en/game/overload

There’s this review that stands out:

«I am the CEO of Orbital Design Studios, and am the designer behind the canceled "Descent IV" project in 2002. This game is a thing I thought I'd never see, aside from prototypes in my company's archives.

A very warm welcome back to Matt & Mike and all of the old crew of Parallax and Outrage Entertainment who have returned to create this long dreamed of and hoped for creation. Thank you for putting my regrets that D4 couldn't get made, to rest. Overload will stand for all time in its place.»

Re: Descent 3 Source Code

#73

Post by msk-lywenn »

kevin42 wrote: post #18
XorNot wrote: post #12

Ooh, time to take another crack at a level scripting language - AFAIK the original was ripped out right before release due to being too limited and replaced with just compiled C libraries.

Yes. The original language was custom and turning into a nightmare. We talked about it over lunch one day and came up with the idea of building a c++ code generator so the level designers could do most of the work with the GUI we made, but the code could be edited by hand as well. Fun fact, the editor was called DALLAS, which from what I remember stood for "Don't ask Luke for Levels And Scripts". Luke was the only de…

The source includes AngelScript. Is it actually used by the game?

Re: Descent 3 Source Code

#74

Post by jimbob45 »

shermantanktop wrote: post #3

I loved loved loved this game. Never understood why this concept didn’t become a whole genre. No actual up, 360 degree freedom, enemies that were smart and could snipe you. Wasted many hours back then and very eager to try this out.

Aquanox fell mostly into the same genre.

Re: Descent 3 Source Code

#75

Post by jbm »

shermantanktop wrote: post #3

I loved loved loved this game. Never understood why this concept didn’t become a whole genre. No actual up, 360 degree freedom, enemies that were smart and could snipe you. Wasted many hours back then and very eager to try this out.

This entire thread led me down a long, long rabbit hole; I remembered the name "Descent", but I couldn't recognize anything about it in the online videos I saw on Youtube.

After hours of searching google, I realize that I was actually thinking about Terminal Velocity. Great soundtrack, fun game (although I never finished it).

Re: Descent 3 Source Code

#76

Post by somat »

dvaun wrote: post #34

Happen to have FreeSpace code? Or is that under lock and key still?

Freespace is open source. or at least fs2 is.

I am not familiar with the.. um.. I guess you could call it the landscape of the freespace community but this was a top search result.

https://www.hard-light.net/

and here is a github project that looks correct.

https://github.com/scp-fs2open/fs2open.github.com

And now, for free, an opinion. I enjoyed descent, but did not like freespace, I am sure there is fun subtlety to the game, but I bounced off it hard, combat in open space ended up being just these really boring circle battles. Much funner combat when you have tight claustrophobic corridors to deal with.

Re: Descent 3 Source Code

#77

Post by easyThrowaway »

Osiris wrote: post #42
two_handfuls wrote: post #33

Earlier quoted context omitted.

You are correct. It’s an awesome game though.

I tried it and literally couldn’t figure it out. I got like 15 minutes into and had no idea what to do. What makes it so good?

That's quite intentional on the game part. The best advice I can give you is reach the observatory / museum on your home planet, and from there try randomly exploring the entire solar system (Hint: what's literally the first thing you see when your character open their eyes?).

Re: Descent 3 Source Code

#79

Post by cubefox »

bostik wrote: post #68
Analemma_ wrote: post #20

Earlier quoted context omitted.

There's a weird effect where sometimes one game in a genre will become so iconic that nobody wants to try and make another one, possibly out of fear of seeming like they're ripping it off? It happened to Descent, and I feel like it happened to e.g. Myst as well - everyone was expecting the huge success of Myst to launch a whole genre, and then it just... didn't.

Myst may not have launched a genre, but it did establish its own kind of game style. 3D world. Adventure game mechanics, with problems and puzzles - but where progress opens up more puzzles, and where instead of developing the character skills, you develop the story. Slow paced. There have been plenty of games to tap into that style, but not enough or frequently enough to warrant calling them part of a genre. Black D…

I think Myst's innovation was mainly using a first-person perspective with (pre-rendered) scenes of a continuous 3D world. Otherwise it was a point-and-click adventure that arguably didn't reach the heights of some earlier Lucas Arts games. Unfortunately these games went out of fashion because most people want some amount of real-time action in their games. But they still get made occasionally by smaller developers on Steam or Android/iOS.

Re: Descent 3 Source Code

#80

Post by gsich »

shermantanktop wrote: post #3

I loved loved loved this game. Never understood why this concept didn’t become a whole genre. No actual up, 360 degree freedom, enemies that were smart and could snipe you. Wasted many hours back then and very eager to try this out.

I think it's called 6dof games.
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