Z-QUAKE: Doom TC of the Original Quake (RESOURCES UPDATE!)

[DBThanatos]

Ok, first of all, sorry about the following:

A couple RL things went today in a way I definitly didnt want, so, my time is a bit smaller. Taking this in count, I will focus in the project the team and me have been working (aeod of course). Basically, I have to withdraw the offer I made in my last post here. I will (hopefully) at some point redo the quake monster's code for aeod, and then, of course you'll be (as anyone is) allowed to use it for your own project; but in general, Im not sure when that'll be, and I cant do it for you right now.

Sorry about that.

[Blade3327]

That's cool. I took care of the enhancements, anyway. They're pretty much done. All that's left is to do a <heavily> updated demo, after I get some more mapping done.

Right now, I'm juggling some possible game structure ideas. Instead of going level-to-level, why not take advantage of the "ZDoom (Doom in Hexen)" format's autosave and map-to-map teleportation features, to create larger realms? It'll feel a lot more like you're really exploring the Quake worlds, if I do this...

[ShadesMaster]

Go for it! Use GZdoom. Push the engine to its limits, even beyond Quake's limits!

[Blade3327]

Meh... I am SO not using GZDoom. Why? The colors of the Quake textures get distorted. I dunno, but it just doesn't look right. Too dark and too high a contrast. I'll stick w/ ZDoom. If you want to use GZDoom, it will work, but it looks best on ZDoom. Sry, man .

[XutaWoo]

Then you'll have some tough luck with remaking Quake's levels; no true 3D floors in ZDoom, and when you've got sloping 3D floors in Quake you're going to have a pain in the ass to do with ZDoom's bridge actors.

[Blade3327]

Well, well, well. Why always so negative?

First off, yes I will do slopes. As far as 3D slopes, meh... This isn't meant to be a 100% remake of the Quake engine. It's bringing Quake to ZDoom. I'll utilize as many ZDoom (not GZDoom) features as I can to recreate Quake <to a point> using the ZDoom engine. That was <and has always been> the project goal.

Plus if I do this for GZDoom (and utilize its features), ZDoomers won't be able to play it. This should be playable on as many ports as possible (with the exception of SkullTag, heh heh). Like I said, GZDoom also does not display the Quake textures very nicely. It really does look better on ZDoom. When the first demo comes out, sure. You can try it and see for yourself.

Oh, one more thing. I'm making my own levels for Z-QUAKE. It's not gonna be a room-by-room level conversion, at all. Besides, it follows a new <but similar> story.

[Enjay]

Like I said, GZDoom also does not display the Quake textures very nicely. It really does look better on ZDoom.

I disagree. Having seen Quake textures in both, they don't look too awful in the Doom palette but the bottom line is you are forcing them into a palette other than their native one and they do lose some quality. [Emperor]It is unavoidable.[/Emperor] Personally I don't really see the point of trying to recreate the appearance of a game and then sacrificing one of the most important things about it - ie, its colour - when there is an option not to. But, hey, it's your choice. However, your decision on this issue is already giving me a "could have been better" and "didn't go far enough" gut feel about the project, which is a shame. Given that Quake Doom (for EDGE) has already been done (and done very well) there doesn't seem to be a huge advantage to this particular mod. Again, however, it's your choice and if you're having fun doing it, knock yourself out.

BTW, if you are so against GZDoom's fancy, new fangled OpenGLness, many of the filters and effects can be switched off in the options allowing you to have something that looks very close to the software renderer but which retains the advantages of OpenGL too.

[SoulCrow]

You are also aware that you can import textures as .pngs into your project, and GZDoom will display them correctly (that is, skipping these palette related issues)?

[Doom64hunter]

Well, I have to say that, without gzdoom features, you may have problems with recreating the quake levels, and even if you would it wouldn't get easy.
Oh, and btw. don't relay too much on portals. They will get you frustrated pretty fast.

(with the exception of SkullTag, heh heh)

Why? Why should it not work on skulltag, even with gzdoom features? It is based on zdoom after all.

Oh, and you forgot the Spawn.



HOW COULD YOU EVER FORGET THE SPAWN ???

[Blade3327]

When it comes to the Spawn, not even the EDGE TC used him. I also got second opinions off of the ZDoom IRC channel. They don't really care about 'im, as long as the others are in there. So, yeah... Then again, I wonder if AEoD had one... I dunno. Doubt it, since they used the EDGE TC's rips too.
Today I'll just look over everything and make sure I've got what I need. Make any necessary changes to the code, etc. I think I can use AEoD as a reference to get my Fiend to pounce. Then it'll all be done. Afterwards, I'll get to the maps.

@Enjay: Dude, I'm not sacrificing color. That's the thing. By playing it in GZDoom, I am. That's why I want to keep using ZDoom. I like the color ; I don't want to get rid of it by any means.
And it's not the OpenGL filters and effects that turn me off of GZDoom. It's exactly the problems I've stated.
Lastly, <and I know this doesn't sound very encouraging, but it is true> you don't need sloped 3D floors to make good levels. Yes, this is Quake. But it's Quake for ZDoom. In addition, Doom Builder 2 does not have the option to create a map in GZDoom format.
All of the other features will be there -- water, skyboxes, regular slopes, etc. Let's not forget that with the ZDoom water (which is composed of two sectors), I can mimic the appearance of 3D slopes. Like that bridge with the opening you can swim through in Quake's E1M2. With two sectors created for the water, that could be reproduced.

@Doom64Hunter: I'm not saying it shouldn't work on SkullTag. It just doesn't. Honestly, it won't start in that port. Some sorta error about player.weaponslot being an unknown actor property (which is weird, because I've never had such an issue w/ the other ports).
Either way, it's not a big deal because SkullTag basically adds multiplayer. For now, that's really not an issue for my TC.
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EDIT:

I'm simply surprised that the 3D slope thing is being brought up here, when there are plenty of good ZDoom-only Quake 2 TCs. Take Nexus Aftermath, for example. You could even run QuakenDoom 2 in ZDoom and it's fine. I'm not trying to divert attention from this TC at all, I'm just saying that ZDoom was the focus of this project and there's nothing wrong with that.

[InsanityBringer]

...It's basically completly impossible to sacrifice colors in a 32 bit color graphics enviroment, like GZDoom. I don't see how the quake textures lose their color in GZDoom.

On the other hand, Zdoom is only 8 bit. It loads a palette into memory and maps all textures to that. Unless you switch to the Quake palette your quake textures *WILL* lose colors because the default Doom palette has different colors than quake and the game has to map them to the closest Doom color. And considering the differences between the palettes, many shades will be lost to that process.

[CaptainToenail]

I managed to use the Quake textures with GZDoom

You simply cannot make a Quake TC without utilising 3D floors, nuff said.
Also, if you use XWE to convert the Quake textures to Doom palette, they look all 'shit-encrusted'

[phi108]

You simply need to include all Quake textures as full-color .PNGs, that way it will work with ZDoom, and they will display with all colors in GZDoom.

And aren't you using the Quake palette anyway? So there shouldn't be any color sacrifice for ZDoom OR GZDoom, should there?

EDIT: To what Cpt. Toenail said: I'm OK with the 3D floor sacrifice, and by using the Quake pallete, I THINK the textures should look fine in ZDoom.

[Blade3327]

Whoa, whoa, whoa. The textures look perfect in ZDoom. No palette-rape at all. I dunno how to explain it. They look absolutely fine in ZDoom. It's just in GZDoom, for some unknown reason. Anyway, how can I switch to the Quake palette (to ensure visual niceness in GZDoom)? I've never done something like that before, so I could use some help.
And I didn't use XWE to convert any textures to the Doom palette. I simply copied the patches, flats, ANIMDEFS, PNAMES (and any other importat texture-related files I may have forgotten to mention) into Z-QUAKE from q1tex.wad. Looks fine in Doom Builder 2, looks fine in ZDoom. For some reason, looks a little weird in GZDoom:

[InsanityBringer]

I'm going to assume something is configured wrong, then.