Shading (fog) in Wolf4SDL

Hi guys, I've been hacking a bit with Wolf4SDL a bit (v1.7, is there a newer code base?).
What bothers me is that in 256 color mode, you have to map colors to existing palette which
makes shading look very ugly in some cases, which is a pity as I've seen it being used
in lots of cool mods.
So i decided to try to use 16 or 32-bit screenBuffer instead. There're still many problems,
especially palette fades and so on. If time permits and if I find a solution I will upload
the modified source somewhere. The rgb solution would allow to shade textures with animated
palette (with some extra work of course) and i believe it would allow for new cool effects.
Of course the drawback is extra memory and some performance penalty
but Wolf4SDL is not intended for DOS anyway.

original (8bpp, palette):

32bpp, rgb:


I chose a bad area (and JPEG did its job - not my fault, the images i uploaded were jpegs with quality 100)
but you sure noticed for example colorful textures going gray etc.
So what do you think? Please let me know if something like that has been attempted before.
I don't have much free time for this so no need to reinvent the wheel (btw. has someone tried mipmapping yet?)

Very nice work, mar. I don't recall this ever being done before.

Does it affect game performance at all?

Thanks Andy. Yes there will be some performance hit. I will quantify it as soon as I finish it.
I already solved the palette problems, but have some minor things to fix yet.

With this way of shading, could you also make a level insanely dark? It's an effect I've always wanted to use but it doesn't look great with the old way of creating shading.

Yes it should be possible. There's still some minor issues like ugly frame after get psyched and shading
bypasses fade to red when killed (no easy way to fix).
I also added nonlinear shade define to version.h, as well as 32-bpp mode define.
The source along with precompiled windows binaries can be found here:
http://www.mediafire.com/download.php?x4cpevlomlo7x7i

Runs smooth in 640x400 on core2 duo/2 GHz.
However, 1280x800 is not smooth even with original Wolf4SDL but still even with smooth shades well playable.
I haven't tested floors/atmos effect as I don't know how

Here's final screenshot with nonlinear, 32bpp shades:

You can make a good spooky mod with that kind of shading, looks great!

Super late. Just discovered a thread in my own forum.
Looks quite awesome. The shades of grey have been so standard in many mods, I got used to it. Hopefully newer mods won't have those bars of grey.

Looks great, I think I will be trying this out.

soo I did this thing

Smooth Shading

It works but I've found some kind of Bug...

When the 32bit is off



But with the 32bit on...This happens





I'm Stumped for real...Someone give me a hand Please

Hi Ted!

Chokster37 wrote:

Richter Belmont wrote:Someone give me a hand Please

Here you go

Lawl.....But Anyways Its already been fixed in the Other Fourm tho But still Wondering about the Blue Ladder....

mar wrote:Hi guys, I've been hacking a bit with Wolf4SDL a bit (v1.7, is there a newer code base?).
What bothers me is that in 256 color mode, you have to map colors to existing palette which
makes shading look very ugly in some cases, which is a pity as I've seen it being used
in lots of cool mods.
So i decided to try to use 16 or 32-bit screenBuffer instead. There're still many problems,
especially palette fades and so on. If time permits and if I find a solution I will upload
the modified source somewhere. The rgb solution would allow to shade textures with animated
palette (with some extra work of course) and i believe it would allow for new cool effects.
Of course the drawback is extra memory and some performance penalty
but Wolf4SDL is not intended for DOS anyway.

original (8bpp, palette):

32bpp, rgb:


I chose a bad area (and JPEG did its job - not my fault, the images i uploaded were jpegs with quality 100)
but you sure noticed for example colorful textures going gray etc.
So what do you think? Please let me know if something like that has been attempted before.
I don't have much free time for this so no need to reinvent the wheel (btw. has someone tried mipmapping yet?)

I'm wondering if Mar still has the original pictures of "original (8bpp, palette):" & "32bpp, rgb:" on here.  I think that we'd be interested.