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[00:04] <grogbot> <Die4Ever> also check this https://www.scummvm.org/screenshots/
[00:05] <grogbot> <Domarius> Hey, perfect! I will try both approaches, I seem to be stumbling across some good ones both ways...
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[00:10] <grogbot> <Domarius> I'm a retro game game fan but I always knew there must be tonnes of them I don't know about - wow, look at Urban Runner, another perfectly cheezy looking 90's video based game 😆 https://www.scummvm.org/screenshots/coktel/urban/
[00:16] <grogbot> <Die4Ever> that really looks like something lol
[00:20] <grogbot> <eientei> Graphics packs?
[00:28] <grogbot> <DreamMaster> Actually keep in mind that not all V6 Infocom games work under ScummVM yet. It's one of my future projects to have the existing interpreter just for other versions ZCode games so that it can benefit from the proportionate fonts, input scrollback, etc. that Glk provides, and then just for version 6 do a faithful port of one of the interpreters just so they play exactly like the originals.
[00:33] <grogbot> <DreamMaster> Considering how long I ended up working on the AGS port, I'm currently taking a brief break to work on finishing another game Chewy Escape From F5. Once that's done, I'll likely do further work on AGS, then maybe switch to working on some of the Legend Entertainment games. Then ZCode may come after that.
[00:33] <grogbot> <DreamMaster> So much that could be worked on, so little time 😛
[00:34] <grogbot> <eientei> when can we get an option to play some of the Glk games as they'd appear on certain machines, e.g. fixed-width, 60 columns...
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[00:37] <grogbot> <DreamMaster> No idea, sorry. Glk is currently low on my list of priorities. Maybe someone else might be interested in playing around with creating a proper settings tab for Glk with all the different options.
[00:45] <grogbot> <eientei> all good
[01:12] <grogbot> <Frotz> On the PC platform, the V6 games came with three files, one for CGA, EGA, and MCGA
[01:13] <grogbot> <Frotz> this file contains all the individual pictures as well as palette and dimension info
[01:14] <grogbot> <Frotz> For modern interpreters, they use an IFF -based scheme called "Blorb" to wrap up resources (graphics, audio, etc) into a single file.
[01:14] <grogbot> <Frotz> The work to do this for the V6 games was done around 1999 and the people involved are incommunicado.
[01:15] <grogbot> <Frotz> So I re-implemented the tools to go from the old-style files to new. That old work didn't touch on the CGA or EGA graphics, so I'm trying to get that done too.
[01:16] <grogbot> <Frotz> I got MCGA stuff working fine. EGA extracts okay and after some fiddling, I have it mostly working.
[01:16] <grogbot> <Frotz> CGA is still a mess.
[01:18] <grogbot> <Frotz> Anyone who wants the EGA files, let me know
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[03:01] <grogbot> <trembyle> @Frotz I'm confused. You say these were added for V6 games? But they already have EGA graphics.
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[03:09] <grogbot> <DreamMaster> Tried playing Transylvania right now, and pressing 'R' to restart works for me. The only minor issue I had was that the restart message doesn't initially show up until I press any key, and if it's other than 'R', the buffered line is displayed, and then a second copy of the line is also shown
[03:10] <grogbot> <trembyle> Hmm, ok. I'll try again in a little bit to see if I can pin down the issue. Thanks for checking
[03:11] <grogbot> <DreamMaster> Of course, that's the v1 of Transylvania. I brief tried the experimental v2 version, but the game crashed on me when I tried letting the werewolf kill me 🙂
[03:11] <grogbot> <trembyle> I was using v1
[03:12] <grogbot> <trembyle> Actually comparing it against the Japanese versions, which I have copies of now.
[03:13] <grogbot> <trembyle> There was also Crimson Crown in Japan, but not Transylvania v2 afaik
[03:14] <grogbot> <DreamMaster> Frankly I was originally surprised that Transylvania had a re-release with the new engine version to begin with
[03:15] <grogbot> <trembyle> right, it's not that similar to the original Comprehend, right?
[03:16] <grogbot> <trembyle> Oh and by the way, I think we talked about the similarities to ADL (@waltervn might have been part of that too), given the use of Graphics Magician.
[03:16] <grogbot> <trembyle> The Japanese ports of Transylvania and also the Hi-Res adventures from Sierra use the same modified engine, developed by StarCraft.
[03:22] <grogbot> <eientei> wonder what the 2009 iOS port has for data
[03:22] <grogbot> <trembyle> I assume it's no longer in the App Store?
[03:30] <grogbot> <eientei> no idea as i don't have itunes https://apps.apple.com/us/app/transylvania-adventure/id337021492
[03:30] <grogbot> <Frotz> @trembyle The V6 games can be played in CGA, EGA, or MCGA modes
[03:30] <grogbot> <Frotz> @trembyle until I started fiddling with this, the only Blorbs for the V6 games have been prepared from the MCGA graphics files.
[03:31] <grogbot> <trembyle> So the use case for this is playing the games with original graphics in modern interpreters?
[03:32] <grogbot> <Frotz> not exactly. Infocom's graphics files contain bitmaps and related data. These bitmaps were extracted and put into PNG files.
[03:33] <grogbot> <Frotz> So, when you play a V6 game with the Blorb's you see the same graphics as were originally shipped.
[03:33] <grogbot> <Frotz> the container and compression changes
[03:34] <grogbot> <Frotz> There are other subtle differences that if not taken care of, will make a mess of things... which is what I'm trying to fix.
[03:34] <grogbot> <Frotz> Some of the changes, I found, have to be made in the interpreter's user interface code.
[03:35] <grogbot> <trembyle> I'd be interested in trying that in ScummVM.
[03:35] <grogbot> <trembyle> Of course, if @DreamMaster gets around to it, the V6 games will work with original files and won't need this workaround.
[03:35] <grogbot> <Frotz> I'm also working on the problem from that end too. I reenabled old-style graphics for the X11 interface
[03:36] <grogbot> <trembyle> Oh cool
[03:36] <grogbot> <Frotz> unfortunately, getting the EGA graphics working there have been less successful than through the Blorb library
[03:37] <grogbot> <trembyle> Are you converting them to 24-bit PNG first?
[03:37] <grogbot> <Frotz> No. They're mostly 4 bits per channel
[03:38] <grogbot> <Frotz> The tools I made for this are here: https://gitlab.com/DavidGriffith/blorbtools
[03:38] <grogbot> <Frotz> pix2png extracts the data and saves PNG files, rectangles, and some supporting data.
[03:39] <grogbot> <Frotz> infoblorb creates a blurb file... lists all resources in order.
[03:39] <grogbot> <Frotz> pblorb processes the blurb file and creates the final blorb
[03:40] <grogbot> <Frotz> The CGA data is supposed to be 1-bit black-and-white
[03:40] <grogbot> <Frotz> I'm having trouble extracting that without losing data
[03:41] <grogbot> <trembyle> I played them on CGA when they were released. I think they were 1-bit in a higher resolution mode.
[03:42] <grogbot> <trembyle> Of course you can just test it in DOSBox
[03:42] <grogbot> <eientei> Asked someone who was looking into the graphic data in the past: > I don't remember discovering much, though I'd have to find & sift through stuff again. The biggest discovery I made was that the DOS interpreter for Zork 0 doesn't use the dithering info in the color palettes.
[03:44] <grogbot> <trembyle> I think it was common to build the dithering functions into the platforms' engines, one benefit being that it's easier to port just the resources.
[03:45] <grogbot> <trembyle> with minor engine updates per game
[04:05] <grogbot> <Frotz> At least for the PC port, dithering was not done. Nor was it done for Amiga. Apple II, sure.
[04:05] <grogbot> <Frotz> Just Zork Zero made it to Apple II and I haven't examined how it does graphics.
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[04:18] <grogbot> <trembyle> Definitely check out the Mac version too. Those are usually pretty unique.
[04:22] <grogbot> <Frotz> @trembyle As far as I've seen, those graphics are the same as PC
[04:27] <grogbot> <Frotz> MCGA graphics are 24-bit, but you only get a palette of 16 colors
[04:45] <grogbot> <Frotz> in other words, you can have 16 24-bit colors
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[06:56] <eriktorbjorn> Frotz: In addition to the colour graphics, the Mac versions have a set of black and white graphics as well. They're probably pretty unique.
[06:58] <grogbot> <trembyle> I recently noticed that the original Mac AGI games actually have color pics in their resources despite being published before color Macs existed.
[06:59] <grogbot> <trembyle> The engine handles the mapping to monochrome.
[06:59] <grogbot> <trembyle> I wonder if this is how it works in the Infocom games.
[07:01] <eriktorbjorn> trembyle: I assumed they used the original graphics, and the engine dithered them to black and white. Similar to Loom and Indiana Jones and the Last Crusade, but unfortunately the AGI games seem to have used a different dithering method. Judging by screenshots I've seen, different versions of the AGI engine may even have used different dithering methods?
[07:02] <grogbot> <trembyle> That's definitely possible. The early ones dithered with a lot more dots. The later ones had more shades of gray.
[07:02] <eriktorbjorn> trembyle: I think some of the Infocom games included a program to create EGA and CGA data files from the MCGA ones, but I'm pretty sure they were still shipped as different files. The Macintosh graphics must have been redrawn, since they are higher resolution.
[07:02] <grogbot> <eientei> https://cdn.discordapp.com/attachments/870528165255188530/928021619643932702/0018.png
[07:03] <eriktorbjorn> See for instance https://www.mobygames.com/game/macintosh/zork-zero-the-revenge-of-megaboz/screenshots/gameShotId,900719/
[07:05] <eriktorbjorn> I haven't played the Apple II versions of the games, but judging by screenshots those graphics were probably redrawn as well. The user interface looked a bit different in some too, e.g. in Zork Zero there were graphics at the top to indicate if you were indoors, outdoors or underground, instead of att the sides: https://www.mobygames.com/game/apple2/zork-zero-the-revenge-of-megaboz/screenshots/gameShotId,900725/
[07:06] <eriktorbjorn> Shogun also dropped the decorative side bars in the Apple II version, apparently: https://www.mobygames.com/game/apple2/james-clavells-shogun/screenshots/gameShotId,994613/
[07:07] <grogbot> <trembyle> Always forget about that one. I never played Shogun because it was left out of the later collections due to rights issues.
[07:08] <eriktorbjorn> The Apple II UI for Arthur and Journey looks pretty close to the other versions though, except for the lower-resolution graphics.
[07:11] <eriktorbjorn> One thing I noticed while playing Journey in Frotz was that it's a bit sensitive to which type of computer it thinks it's running on. The DOS version had a slight glitch if the interpreter claimed to be an Amiga. I guess what happened was that when the games were ported to new systems they had to tweak some details, so they added special cases for that computer. But I guess no one went back and tested the new game file on the older inte
[07:11] <eriktorbjorn> rpreters. (And why should they?)
[07:16] <grogbot> <trembyle> This is CGA
[07:16] <grogbot> <trembyle> https://cdn.discordapp.com/attachments/581224061091446795/931086096740257802/unknown.png
[07:16] <eriktorbjorn> So there is a fair bit of special cases for different platforms, to see if they should use a line-drawing font for the user interface, if the interpreter uses a fixed-width font or not, if some user interface texts have to be abbreviated (on Apple II), etc.
[07:16] <grogbot> <trembyle> CGA does look different than Mac black & white
[07:17] <grogbot> <trembyle> eriktorbjorn: not to mention the composite color artifacts on the Apple ][
[07:17] <eriktorbjorn> trembyle: Yup. As I said, it looks like it was drawn specifically for the Mac. It's how I originally played those games, so I have a soft spot for it. Even if some of the graphics don't look that good...
[07:18] <eriktorbjorn> They were planning to release the games for Atari ST as well, but I guess those would have looked pretty much like the Amiga versions?
[07:19] <grogbot> <trembyle> probably
[07:19] <eriktorbjorn> I still have a copy of the order form: http://www.update.uu.se/~d91tan/InfoGraphics/page8.jpg
[07:21] <grogbot> <trembyle> Kind of lame that the IBM versions don't support Hercules
[07:21] <eriktorbjorn> I probably have an early version of that brochure, because all other copeis I've seen dropped the Atari ST versions and made some changes to the text in the rest of the brochure. See for instance https://mocagh.org/infocom/infocom-ad.pdf
[07:23] <grogbot> <trembyle> Was there actually a IIgs version?
[07:23] <eriktorbjorn> I don't know. I'm very unfamiliar with the Apple II.
[07:25] <eriktorbjorn> Infocom were on its last legs at the time, so it wouldn't surprise me if a lot of things that were planned fell by the wayside. (E.g. Quarterstaff was supposed to be released for other platforms as well.) In one interview, Dave Lebling described Shogun as his biggest disappointment and described it as "written as Infocom was dying around me".
[07:26] <grogbot> <trembyle> IIgs is almost a different platform. It's a 16-bit machine that usually has a graphical OS with a Finder. It has much better graphics and an Ensoniq wavetable sound chip.
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[07:47] <grogbot> <eientei> IIGS got Lost Treasures
[07:51] <grogbot> <eientei> other than that, the only IIGS version of an Infocom game was Beyond Zork
[07:51] <grogbot> <eientei> There exists disk images of Journey, Arthur and Shogun but it's most likely they're hacks
[08:13] <dgriffi> eriktorbjorn: yeah, that Apple II Zork Zero clearly has its own graphics
[08:17] <grogbot> <eientei> and yup, hacks by one "Green Hornet"
[08:18] <grogbot> <eientei> Oh, fun factoid about the graphical Infocom text adventures for Apple II: The INFODOS system had code contributed by "L.Roath & J.Romero, Ideas from the Deep"
[08:18] <grogbot> <Frotz> I'll have to dig those up later and see if I can extract graphics from them.
[08:20] <grogbot> <eientei> Huh, so Beyond Zork and Lost Treasures are both by Big Red Computer Club
[08:21] <grogbot> <Frotz> eh.. my copy of LTOI 1 and 2 are both the CD editions
[08:22] <grogbot> <Frotz> I had a few infocom stuff for Apple II back in the day
[08:22] <grogbot> <Frotz> but not LTOI
[08:22] <grogbot> <Frotz> or Beyond Zork
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[08:34] <eriktorbjorn> eientei: I seem to recall John Romero was in the "Get Lamp" documentary, at least partly becaues of his involvment with Infocom.
[08:34] <grogbot> <eientei> eriktorbjorn: Yup!
[08:36] <grogbot> <eientei> Jason has said of the encounter "When he walked out front of his building and I got there, he said "I'm really happy to finally meet you""
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[09:00] <eriktorbjorn> In case anyone missed it, the Get Lamp interviews are archived here: https://archive.org/details/getlamp-interviews
[09:02] <eriktorbjorn> At least some of them?
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[12:02] <ScummBot> Build [#97](https://buildbot.scummvm.org/#builders/83/builds/97) of `zzz_clean-stable` failed.
[12:57] <grogbot> <Die4Ever> Discworld in ScummVM is gonna be on GamesDoneQuick in about 30 minutes https://www.twitch.tv/gamesdonequick
[13:15] <Unseen2> Starting now
[13:22] <grogbot> <antoniou79> he mentioned a potential crash (that didn't happen). I wonder if this could be a fast way to update reports or create tickets for the ScummVM engine for the game
[13:23] <Unseen2> I wonder if the item duplication is also in the original game or if it is ScummVM-specific
[13:23] <grogbot> <Die4Ever> His discord is Mindez#0001 if anyone wants to talk about bugs with him lol
[13:25] <grogbot> <Die4Ever> Also there's the Speedy Adventures discord that probably has tons of people who know many bugs
[13:33] <grogbot> <Die4Ever> I asked about known bugs in there, someone said "Loom has the distaff disappear if you go fast in scummvm"
[13:39] <grogbot> <antoniou79> might be an old bug. iirc there was some glitch like that in some scenes.
[13:39] <grogbot> <antoniou79> but if not, then we'd still need a proper bug ticket and description to reproduce (or maybe a link to a youtube playthrough showing it off)
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[13:45] <grogbot> <Die4Ever> He said he didn't see anything about it in any of the release notes, but then again there's a lot of little things that don't get mentioned
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[14:16] <grogbot> <jakejakejake1234> Hey there @everyone. Just wanted to give you guys a heads up on the the blade runner restored content cut project. I am happy to announce that I have compiled dozens of commits that pretty much restore the majority of the cut content. Yep that's right, it took me many months but the main bulk of the work is finally done. Now just be clear none of this content has been implemented just yet, it is all still in the commit stage which
[14:16] <grogbot> has been posted to github. Hopefully the moderators will be able to review them soon and if all goes well we could have this project finished and delivered to you sooner than anticipated, not making any promises though.... after all nothing in life is guaranteed. Here is a link to the commits to anyone who is interested in having a sneak peek of what is to come. https://github.com/jakejakejake123/scummvm/commits/restored-content
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[14:24] <grogbot> <jakejakejake1234> So what should you expect from the final product. Thousands of lines of restored dialogue. Dozens of cutscenes that have been restored. More branching paths, more clues, refined KIA database the list goes on. Hopefully you will all get to play it one day and experience the game in it's entirety. Also a big thank you to @sev @antoniou79 @peterkohaut @madmoose and all the other moderators for making all of this possible. Without
[14:24] <grogbot> these guys we wouldn't be playing blade runner on scummvm at all, let alone a restored content version. So yeah a big round of applause to them. 👏 https://youtu.be/barWV7RWkq0
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[14:30] <grogbot> <jakejakejake1234> So yeah, I'm going to focus on doing a bit of clean up for the restored content cut. Doing some bug testing, restoring some little things like animations and sound effects and maybe even adding a few surprises of my own. 😉 So to all you blade runner fans out there stay well and be vigilant, there might be some more blade runner content coming soon.
[14:30] <grogbot> <jakejakejake1234> https://cdn.discordapp.com/attachments/581224061091446795/931195295138725988/541548-blade-runner-windows-front-cover.jpg
[14:30] <grogbot> <jakejakejake1234> https://youtu.be/RScZrvTebeA
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[15:54] <grogbot> <madmoose> Here's a speedrun from AGDQ2022 of Discworld running in ScummVM with some interesting glitch abuse: https://www.twitch.tv/videos/1262057821?t=5h23m17s
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[16:55] <grogbot> <antoniou79> I intend to review @jakejakejake1234 's commit, one by one if possible, but it's going to take a while. We're communicating also via private chat here, and the plan was for me to start during the holidays but several stuff came up (personal issues, also being a bit burned out on Blade Runner, the 2.5.1 release, bit of Android work) and it got postponed.
[16:55] <grogbot> <antoniou79> It's going to get done, just not quickly I don't think.
[17:01] <grogbot> <antoniou79> @madmoose we were discussing on this a few messages above. The streamer also mentions a crash and maybe a bug with sound effects (but I may have misheard that). It would be great if there speedrunner communities could contribute in feedback on ScummVM engines, since they do have to know the game inside out to go through it quickly. Glitch exploits are probably ok to keep if they were on the original game (at least most of the time), but
[17:01] <grogbot> reports /updates on crashes and bugs would be great to have!
[17:05] <grogbot> <madmoose> @antoniou79 Sorry, I scrolled back a bit but didn't see it 🙂
[17:12] <grogbot> <antoniou79> We did have a speedrunner here about a year ago who reported for Blade Runner the lack of skipping dialogue continuously by keeping the enter key pressed (which worked in the original). I implemented the feature as close as I could approximate it -- not from rev eng code -- but I don't think we heard back if this was ok or needed more tweaking.
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[17:48] <grogbot> <gu3> @jakejakejake1234 awesome work!, any idea why the content was cut from the release?
[17:58] <grogbot> <jakejakejake1234> @gu3 We can't know for sure but I'd say it was probably due to time constraints. Video games are just like any other business. You are given a task and a set date on which you need to deliver. Basically if the higher ups or the people funding your game give you a release date you have to deliver or else the whole project may collapse. Another reason for content being cut could be due to quality. Sometimes particular content doesn't
[17:58] <grogbot> meet the standards that the developers were aiming for so it was left on the cutting room floor. But I can assure the majority of the cut content is really good and was most likely cut because of time restraints.
[17:59] <grogbot> <DreamMaster> Time and budget constraints.. the curse of many a game company. Ultima 7 Serpent Isle's story was partially gutted because of it, not to mention Ultima 8 Pagan. And we only ever got half the story of Toonstruck. And other games like Anachronox.. 😦
[18:00] <grogbot> <Henke37> a game isn't finished. it's kicked out.
[18:01] <grogbot> <DreamMaster> LOL. Yes
[18:02] <grogbot> <jakejakejake1234> https://cdn.discordapp.com/attachments/581224061091446795/931248626058010694/g1u9il5gylc11-800x400.jpg
[18:04] <grogbot> <jakejakejake1234> https://cdn.discordapp.com/attachments/581224061091446795/931249152132800562/g1u9il5gylc11-800x400.jpg
[18:05] <grogbot> <jakejakejake1234> At least until a patch comes out..... Then again if the servers go down and you can't download the patch and all you have is the physical disc copy........ Yeah...... Miyamoto is definitely right on this one.
[19:03] <grogbot> <timofonic> And Cyberpunk will always be a bad game, lots of unimplemented promises and an extremely plainly scripted world compared to the presented concept. Even a lot older games are more dynamic and alive
[19:05] <grogbot> <thoth> No man's Sky tho.
[19:07] <grogbot> <timofonic> Yes, another deceiving game. And as the market grows more, more deceiving products arise. It's 80s again 🤣
[19:11] <grogbot> <antoniou79> This is getting off-topic here
[19:12] <grogbot> <timofonic> Sorry
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[19:57] <grogbot> <somaen> Duke Nukem Forever comes to mind
[19:59] <grogbot> <somaen> Although to be fair that game project started from scratch and suffered from having too much money available, thus not really having a deadline.
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[00:00] --- Fri Jan 14 2022