Another Merger Update

luciusDXL · **Joined:** Thu Apr 14, 2011 4:05 pm **Posts:** 589

jet800 wrote:

Wow, linux gaming is one step closer!

(offtopic)Personally the only thing that stops me from using linux is that wine couldn't support all games

Btw, lucius, why are you switching OS's instead of having virtual systems? It's great for testing.

When I go to work on Linux stuff, it takes a while. So its easy enough to switch over and back. It's not the rebooting time that slows things down (my system boots quick, even for Windows) but the actual time spent on the Linux side. But as I said, most of that work is done now.

jet800 · **Posted:** Wed Jul 13, 2011 9:57 am

Well, my system cold boots around 1 min in windows environment, but still i don't like to switch OS's that way. But it's all about personal preference

Klasodeth · **Joined:** Thu Apr 14, 2011 7:58 pm **Posts:** 308

jet800 wrote:

Well, my system cold boots around 1 min in windows environment, but still i don't like to switch OS's that way. But it's all about personal preference

Considering the need for 3D graphics hardware, it's probably not a good idea to develop the XL Engine on a virtual PC.

jet800 · **Posted:** Wed Jul 13, 2011 9:59 pm

Bah, most of virtual machines offers 3D acceleration support. So just for developing - it's enough.

Klasodeth · **Joined:** Thu Apr 14, 2011 7:58 pm **Posts:** 308

jet800 wrote:

Bah, most of virtual machines offers 3D acceleration support. So just for developing - it's enough.

Hmm... It seems virtual machine technology has progressed considerably since I last looked at it. Virtual machines used to be pretty much useless for anything that needed any amount of graphical horsepower.

Kirtai · **Joined:** Thu May 05, 2011 6:54 am **Posts:** 13

Sounds really good

BTW, what scripting language are you using?

Gez · **Joined:** Fri Apr 15, 2011 2:54 pm **Posts:** 192

This one: http://www.angelcode.com/

luciusDXL · **Joined:** Thu Apr 14, 2011 4:05 pm **Posts:** 589

More news:

The "movie playback" system is in place, with the first supported format being the cutscene system used by Dark Forces. In addition the UI scripts, which control the UI/HUD and general gameflow are working well. DaggerXL UI scripts and movie playback support is next.

I've also been taking care to handle widescreen better with 2D elements.

DarkXL Title screen:

And various screenshots from the intro cutscene, notice that the aspect ratio is preserved, which is why there are black borders on either side in widescreen. Note that game UI will recieve similar treatment.

Once more of the UI is finished for DarkXL, I'll do the same for DaggerXL, BloodXL and OutlawsXL. After that I start getting the 3D gameplay re-integrated and working for all 4 games on all platforms. I'm expecting to start getting the gameplay re-integrated and start outside testing next week.

Edit - the title screen from the Linux build:

Akghar · **Posted:** Sun Jul 17, 2011 7:38 am

Gorgeous !

DigitalMonk · **Joined:** Fri Apr 15, 2011 6:18 pm **Posts:** 15

luciusDXL wrote:

I've also been taking care to handle widescreen better with 2D elements.
...
And various screenshots from the intro cutscene, notice that the aspect ratio is preserved, which is why there are black borders on either side in widescreen. Note that game UI will recieve similar treatment.

I don't know if this will actually be relevant for any of the existing games, but I know a lot of older 4:3 games did cutscene movies in letterboxed widescreen for a more cinematic effect (and to reduce bandwidth and CPU requirements

). Will it be possible to somehow flag cutscenes so that they fit width, instead of fit height? That way, a 4:3 letterbox video won't be floating in the middle of the screen.

Another Merger Update

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