Bringing NewWolf back to life

Hi all,

I have been doing a bit of work on the source code to NewWolf and was wondering if anyone is interested in this. I'm doing it because I want to play Wolfenstein 3D and Spear of Destiny again, and NewWolf seemed to be promising to me since it had some improvements to make it more modern, but still supported saving games, unlike Wolfenstein 3-D Redux. It has some things missing, but I think if these were fixed, it might be popular, but I'm curious as to what other potential users might think of this.

Problems I'm aware of:

• In Spear of Destiny, doesn't change to map 21 when you pick up the spear: already fixed

• Drawing problems when FOV is set for widescreen monitors: already fixed

• If you use 3D models for weapons, it's hard to aim: already fixed by adding a crosshair that can be customized a bit

• No game endings - when you kill the boss or reach the exit, nothing happens: currently working on this, have a scripting engine enabling most of the ending to be shown apart from the scores

• No high scores: will deal with this as part of the above

Note that fixes I've already made aren't available on the NewWolf site.


Improvements I've made:

• Added a widescreen video mode for my monitor; others can easily be added on request

• Improved automap

• Started working on hqx upscaling for textures, although the result will probably not be something everyone will want!

Also:

• NewWolf is based on OpenGL: not sure if this is a problem - I assume nobody actually wants to play Wolf3D on early 1990's-era computers?

• NewWolf is Windows-only: again, not sure if this is a problem for anyone?

• Requires Visual C++ 2005: if this was preventing anyone from using it, I think it could be modified to work with free "Express" versions of Visual C++

NewWolf's author, DarkOne, seemed to want to have a scripting engine to enable more mods to be made without having to write any C code. It sounds like a good idea, and having worked with the early Medal of Honor games on the PC, which had a very powerful scripting engine, I can imagine just how it should work. I wouldn't be aiming to do this sort of thing too soon, though - I just want to be able to play the game first! I'm interested to know what the most basic sort of modifications normally made to the code are, though, as perhaps allowing a few minor things to be modified via scripting would be easy.

Finally, I have tried sending DarkOne a few messages to see if he'd accept the changes I've already done and the ones I'm planning, but I haven't heard back after about a month and a half, so I guess there is no way to contact him anymore, and I'll have to create a new SourceForge project for my changes.

Please let me know if you think you'd be interested in this stuff!

Not sure that people are going to choose this over 4SDL to be honest, it seems to have pretty much everything Wolf modders need for Windows compatible mods these days.

YES!, I am extremely interested!,
I've been praying for an update for a long time,
I'd be more than happy lending a hand beta testing and coding (my skills are limited but I do what I can)

get in touch if you still have interests in making this happen!

cheers

I'm late to the thread as well but I'd be interested in seeing NewWolf development. It's always nice to see a slightly different take on game source ports and it's not like it'll cause a schism in the small community. So, I say more power to you.

If you need anyone to test through things I'm happy to lend a hand. I can't code or anything but I'm happy to give a player's feedback if your interested.

PS: Hope you are still working on it!

No news is good news? *Crosses fingers*

Dean wrote:Not sure that people are going to choose this over 4SDL to be honest, it seems to have pretty much everything Wolf modders need for Windows compatible mods these days.

+1

NewWolf is based on OpenGL: not sure if this is a problem - I assume nobody actually wants to play Wolf3D on early 1990's-era computers?

Some modern computer videocards (like mine) - doesn't support OpenGL - so I can't play it on my new comp. I could on my old comp - but can't now.

So, is that OGL dead then? I really hate this planned obsolescence crap that's prevalent in computing these days...

Still, there are things I like about NewWolf that aren't part of the average SDL mod. One key strafing, next weapon controls and an automap are all good things IMHO. And they were certainly good enough to keep in Id's iPhone port (which is based on NewWolf - I think!).

The biggest thing I would change would be the graphics filtering. That should, at least, be a toggle option in the menu...

Hi Brandon!

Yes, automap and such were already implemented on Wolf4SDL. There are tons of relatively easy coding tutorials for it.

Hi all,

Sorry for taking a while to respond!

doomjedi, what video card do you have? I am curious about video cards that don't support OpenGL.

As for the work I was doing, I will set up a new SourceForge project so I can release what I've done so far, since there is a little interest, which is far better than no interest What should I call it? I was considering LoneWolf since nobody was very interested, but that name is actually taken by a Wolfenstein 3-D project on SourceForge already (it didn't appear to get anywhere) How about "NewWolf Lives"? It makes me think of "Dopefish Lives"

Regards,
David

Phew! I though you'd disappeared on us there!

I'm interested in seeing what you can bring to the table with an alternative engine - maybe it'll even be the ZDoom of Wolf engines...

Anyway as far as names go how about one of these:

ZWolf (as a daft allusion to the above. It also means 12 - maybe you can work that into something )

NeoWolf (probably used for something other than a cheesy werewolf film)

Wolf: Rebirth (No idea why! Other than old code being reborn)

Wolf: NG (see above!)

The Lycanthe Engine (another allusion to werewolves...)

I can probably think of hundreds of other cheesy titles... if you dare!

Anyway, glad that you're happy to do something with this.

Chokster37 wrote:

Per-Scan wrote:And they were certainly good enough to keep in Id's iPhone port (which is based on NewWolf - I think!).

I think it's based off the code in Wolf3d Redux:
http://wolf3dredux.sourceforge.net/screenshots.html
http://www.idsoftware.com/wolfenstein3dclassic/wolfdevelopment.htm

Per-Scan wrote:Still, there are things I like about NewWolf that aren't part of the average SDL mod. One key strafing, next weapon controls and an automap are all good things IMHO.

Wolf4SDL is by default set to run true to the original (makes sense, right?). You can still add that stuff:
http://diehardwolfers.areyep.com/viewtopic.php?t=5326#68752
http://diehardwolfers.areyep.com/viewtopic.php?t=5993#77859

Not sure what you mean by "next weapon controls" though.

Ah, I knew there was something about a next gen port as the basis. FTR: I like Redux as well and it still contains the same functionality as NewWolf...

I know that Wolf4SDL is capable of these things to but there are no easy options other than making your own build and that's not the most user friendly thing in the world -especially if you want to get new blood into the Wolf community. I reckon these things should at least be command line flags if not actual in-game menu options.

I don't expect that to happen so that's where I see a gap in the engine market for something like NewWolf... It ticks different boxes straight out the box (if you see what I mean!).

As for Next Weapon controls; what I meant was you can scroll through next and previous weapons like any modern game rather than having to use the number keys on the keyboard.

So is this still on? I would love to see newwolf complete

Sorry, yes, I disappeared I'll try and get back to this soon!

I've been down this road before. I once added a radiosity lighting mode to the NewWolf engine:



I also ported Totengraeber Phase II final to NewWolf:



These days I prefer to work with the classic, non-OpenGL and less-buggy Wolf4SDL engine.

Doshea, I already completed an experimental version of Wolf4SDL with OpenGL support. Do you want to continue it? I am too busy with other projects to finish it off.

Apologies for the lateness of my reply!

linuxwolf wrote:I've been down this road before. I once added a radiosity lighting mode to the NewWolf engine:

Nice! Looks like it could do with some ambient lighting too so there isn't so much pitch black, or is that just how you prefer it?

Is the source available? Did you also port it to Linux?

I also ported Totengraeber Phase II final to NewWolf:

This video isn't available any more

These days I prefer to work with the classic, non-OpenGL and less-buggy Wolf4SDL engine.

I don't remember bugs, just a lot of stuff that was not yet implemented

Doshea, I already completed an experimental version of Wolf4SDL with OpenGL support. Do you want to continue it? I am too busy with other projects to finish it off.

I got the impression there were probably lots of people working with Wolf4SDL out there, is there no-one else who'd want to pick this up? I'd rather stick to what I know.. or knew

doshea wrote:Apologies for the lateness of my reply!

No need to apologise.

doshea wrote:

linuxwolf wrote:I've been down this road before. I once added a radiosity lighting mode to the NewWolf engine:

Nice! Looks like it could do with some ambient lighting too so there isn't so much pitch black, or is that just how you prefer it?

I've always had trouble making it brighter. Had the same problem in a later project for Wolf4SDL called "Wolfenstein 3D Lite". You can learn more about it at DHW: Wolfenstein 3D Lite

doshea wrote:
Is the source available? Did you also port it to Linux?

It only works for Linux and completely untested on Windows. I have uploaded my source to my public DropBox, just for you. Others are obviously welcome to download it as well. Be warned the code sucks a lot. Don't bother looking at it if you're not comfortable with Linux. The project is rife with poorly written Makefiles.

So here it is. My version of NewWolf with radiosity support: lwolf

If you are on a 32-bit Linux system, extract the 7z archive, go to lwolf_games/wolf3d and then run ./lwolf from there. The first room is completely dark, but walk straight and press space to open the door. The rest should speak for itself.

BTW: r_lightingmodel is set to 1 by default but you can change it to 0 via the console if you want to turn off radiosity rendering.

doshea wrote:

linuxwolf wrote:I also ported Totengraeber Phase II final to NewWolf:

This video isn't available any more

Sorry about that. I removed it a while ago.

doshea wrote:

linuxwolf wrote:These days I prefer to work with the classic, non-OpenGL and less-buggy Wolf4SDL engine.

I don't remember bugs, just a lot of stuff that was not yet implemented

doshea wrote:

linuxwolf wrote:Doshea, I already completed an experimental version of Wolf4SDL with OpenGL support. Do you want to continue it? I am too busy with other projects to finish it off.

I got the impression there were probably lots of people working with Wolf4SDL out there, is there no-one else who'd want to pick this up? I'd rather stick to what I know.. or knew

Well the source for it is available on DropBox just in case. If you're happy with your engine by all means keep going! I'm not going to get in your way.

linuxwolf wrote:So here it is. My version of NewWolf with radiosity support: lwolf

It looks like radiosity is not all you added to it! It's a bit hard to tell due to the source reformatting (yes, the original NewWolf coding style wasn't very nice!), but I see DeathCam. What else did you do? I found your SourceForge project but it looks like everything has been removed from it, I was hoping to see a version control repository change log or something!

The radiosity stuff is quite a mystery to me, in terms of what it is that you need to compute, what the expected outcome is, etc.!

linuxwolf wrote:

doshea wrote:

linuxwolf wrote:These days I prefer to work with the classic, non-OpenGL and less-buggy Wolf4SDL engine.

I don't remember bugs, just a lot of stuff that was not yet implemented

Actually, I'm remembering the bugs now I'm back into the project

I've made the changes I did back in 2011 available now at https://github.com/dcoshea/NewWolfLives Scroll down to the "Installation" heading. Basically start with NewWolf, then get the replacement .exe file. The page also has details of the changes I made, and the source code is right there for those who are interested.

I noticed that http://wolfenstein.wikia.com/wiki/NewWolf says "On higher resolutions, the projectiles fired by Fake Hitlers travel much more slowly than they are intended to." I did a comparison and I didn't see any difference in the speed between 320x200 and 1280x1024, and the speed seemed to be about the same as that in the original DOS version. Please let me know if you think there is a problem here.

If you would like any video modes added to the list, that's easy to do, so let me know.

The slower Fake Hitler projectiles happen with higher frame rates, not resolution. This problem is in id's original source code too.

Someone should edit that Wiki.

Andy wrote:The slower Fake Hitler projectiles happen with higher frame rates, not resolution. This problem is in id's original source code too.

Oh thanks for the info! I had a look at the code and I'm not sure why this is. Are there rounding down (to zero?) issues when not much time has elapsed between frames? I Googled and did find some mentions of the problem but no solutions, would you have any references by any chance? I assume this issue applies to all projectiles, and it's just more obvious with the fire projectiles because they're already slower?

Someone should edit that Wiki.

Yes, I definitely should, to mention my fork of it and which things I've fixed! I'd better add it to my to do list before I forget

Thanks!

I know of this problem because we ran across it in beta testing of ECWolf. Blzut3 initially coded it as he thought id intended, but I thought the fireballs moved too quickly - that is, they did not replicate the original DOS behavior. That's where he explained the frame rate / fireball speed / coding issue to me. I think he wound up slowing them down to make them more "DOS-like." If you need more details on this, you may want to send Blzut3 a PM.

AFAIK, the other projectiles do not suffer from this.

When the flames are too slow, it makes the entire enemy useless.

Andy wrote:If you need more details on this, you may want to send Blzut3 a PM.

Thanks, will do! I can reproduce the issue by slowing the code down, but it wasn't obvious from looking at the code what the problem is. Blzut3 might have forgotten after all of these years, though, I guess

Andy wrote:I know of this problem because we ran across it in beta testing of ECWolf. Blzut3 initially coded it as he thought id intended, but I thought the fireballs moved too quickly - that is, they did not replicate the original DOS behavior. That's where he explained the frame rate / fireball speed / coding issue to me. I think he wound up slowing them down to make them more "DOS-like." If you need more details on this, you may want to send Blzut3 a PM.

AFAIK, the other projectiles do not suffer from this.

I've already replied to his PM, but for the benefit of everyone who might stumble across this later: I explained the bug in the ECWolf FAQ. As the question title suggests, I've chose to keep the intended behavior by default. The issue was merely a typo. Compare how T_Projectile is called between
the rockets and the fireball and the problem should become obvious.

Thanks very much for making it so easy to fix, Blzut3!

For the information of the one person who downloaded 0.74 I released a new version - 0.75 - with the above fix, plus a few others. I didn't do a nice change log, but you can see the details at https://github.com/dcoshea/NewWolfLives/commits/master under "May 07, 2003" - lots of details there, hopefully a fair bit can be understood by anyone.