A lot of people ask a lot of questions about the coming Quake II port. Here are the answers.
When is the final release? How much space will it need?
The
final build will be released when I'm happy with the feature set. It
will take from 10 mb (one level with textures and less enemy models) up
to 400 mb (full version of Quake 2 with additional multiplayer maps. In
fact there is no upper limit :)
The final version will include the
demo levels so everybody can play. If you have the original full
version of Quake 2 you can copy the pak files to the memory stick and
play.
Why the beta crashes, freezes or the fps goes down?
It
is just a beta. But if you found bugs, send mails to
quake2[at]teamemergencyexit[dot]com with the subject "[Bug] ..." and a
short description.
How do I become beta tester?
I
don't have a lack of beta testers. In fact everyday three to five
persons ask me to become a beta tester. But I'm paranoid about a leak.
So only gave betas to people I trust. I will not change this even if
the first public beta is out. There are still more beta tests. I build
a new quake 2 test version nearly each day.
How do I control the player? Do I need the remote control?
I
think Quake II PSP is the most configurable psp game ever. The shipped
control layout can be found here. But the ingame control can be
modified completly. The behavior of the analog nub as well as each
button can be set freely.
The remote control is not needed. But you can add three additional actions to that.
Why I never see the normal Quake 2 maps?
At
the moment not every Quake 2 map feature is supported yet. When there
is water in the map the port crashes. I'm working on that at the
moment. You will be able to play every map from the original game in
the final build. It will be possible to use the unchanged .pak files.
You only have to add a new default.cfg to your baseq2/ folder.
How is the rendering done? Software or OpenGL?
Neither
nor. The rendering is completly hardware powered (like the OpenGL
version in the pc), but I have rewritten the whole graphic engine from
scratch and it only uses pspgu and pspgum. The OpenGL port for the psp
is a mess and I don't think it will become really good some day. The
guys who do this port are good coders but OpenGL and PSP graphics unit
are too different. Even if both apis are state machines and the calls
look similiar, there is a lot of stuff whick cannot be mapped. In my
eyes it is a dream of just change some input stuff and compile a gl
game to psp without problems.
That's why I took the pspgu instread
of pspgl. So my port it completly hardware powered. Just my new unfaked
clipping algorithm is not. The new clipping is not included in the beta
version.
Multiplayer? PSP vs PSP? PSP vs PC? Adhoc?
Multiplayer will be supported someday. I cannot say when. Don't ask for it.
The
first multiplayer release will only support PSP vs PSP over
infrastructure mode. So you need a Quake 2 Server running on a psp. No
homebrewer knews how to use adhoc wlan at the moment, but it will be
added as soon as possible.
What is with the sound port?
I'll care about the sound as soon as I can play normal maps. I also will add background music support.
What is with support for 2.0? Why Quake II don't run on 2.0?
All
homebrew started on 2.0 with Fanjita's EBOOT Loader runs in a limited
environment. You don't have the same resources like on a 1.00 or 1.50.
You have less memory and the memory management of the EBOOT Loader is
as good as the normal memory manager. Id Software's code is not written
for save memory and I worked hard on reduce the memory abuse for 1.00
and 1.50. I don't have a 2.00 and I just sometimes send a Q2 version to
someone with 2.0. So I don't really care about.
Another problem is
the missing prx file suppport. I have altered the build proccess to
build Quake II in a single executable with hard linked libraries or as
a smaller executable and two dynamic linked libraries. One for
game-engine and one for graphics-engine. The game-engine could be
changed to insert a mod.
If I get another psp and prx files are supported on 2.0 I will try to get running Quake II there.
How do I write mods for Quake II PSP?
I
think it is really easy to port a mod to the PSP. All you have to do is
compile the mod as a prx file for the psp. I don't changed the internal
game api. I'll release further information about the requirements for
prx files could be loaded as a mod.
Why you don't add an On Screen Keyboard?
I'm
really happy with the console input method. But some of the testers
didn't like it. So I will add an osk if I found one that is good. The
most osks I have seen are not really good.
What are your current Quake II tasks?
At
the moment I'm working on lightmaps and the missing engine stuff to
render each map. But I have exams soon, so the development will be a
little bit slower. I don't know what I'll do after that. Sound engine,
multiplayer and port a mod are on the same level of dev plans.
Will the source code be released?
Yes,
I'll release the source with the final build. If I do it now, the Quake
2 PSP port will become inconstistant. Because all lot of thrid people
development would be done and some changes will not be compatible with
others. A typical problem of some Linux tools.
No, the source code
is not a good tutorial. A lot of new programmers ask for the source as
a tutorial for their own games. The source code was bad written before
I touched it. The programming style is bad and my changes which are
hacked don't increase the readability. I don't added comments and don't
fixed bad stuff.
As you can see, the scene
has made our genius almost crazy by all kinds of vices. We hope
everyone can pay 120% respect to him and all his efforts, no trash
talks any more. To McZonk: Please take your time, we are always with
you. :)