[Striker]

I've been wanting to start an independent thread for this for a long time, but never got around to it. I wanted to share some of the progress I've made with my TV/Fury3/Hellbender port.




As you can see, rendering is pretty much spot-on, and is good enough for a start. It'll need a lot of optimization, and a few additional features to make it on-par with software rendering (such as brightmaps to replace the "fullbright" colors).

However, I still have a long way to go with sound, input, UI, text drawing (namely timed and wrapped messages), and supporting TV and Fury3 again. I'll get around to it eventually.

How much longer will it take for me to get a release out? Hard to say... I'm still trying to build up my skillset, and am still dealing with the day-to-day struggles of life and health issues, but I'll try the best I can.

[Aristotle Gumball]

I'm a fan of these games so I'll be curious to see where you go with this. I actually read a previous thread about this before I signed up on the forum. Probably everyone involved remembers what happened so I won't bring it up again, but I hope you're doing better, man.

[deus-ex]

I'm happy to see that you are still working on this project. TV is one of my all-time favorite games. The idea to perhaps play TV, Fury3 and Hellbender in a modern port somewhen in the future fills my heart with joy.

Wishing you all the best for the future, both for your health and the progress of your project.

[MusicallyInspired]

Pretty freaking awesome. I've never played these games so I'll be excited to try them when this is ready.

[Mike Norvak]

I loved Hellbender despite I just played a shareware demo that came with a Windows 95 CD-ROM. It's nice to hear that you are working on this.

[Altered Reality]

That's excellent, I can't wait to try it!

I know Terminal Velocity for playing the demo from the Duke Nukem 3D CD, but I never got the full game because I thought Duke Nukem Forever would come out soon, so I would not have time to play Terminal Velocity... oh man.

[MrFlibble]

Mike Norvak, on 23 January 2019 - 07:21 PM, said:

I loved Hellbender despite I just played a shareware demo that came with a Windows 95 CD-ROM.

Same here Awesome music in the demo level.

[MrFlibble]

Love this tune:

[MusicallyInspired]

Cool remix! That tune always stuck with me too from the demo. I never even played the game much.

[MrFlibble]

MusicallyInspired, on 06 March 2019 - 09:59 AM, said:

Cool remix! That tune always stuck with me too from the demo. I never even played the game much.

Same here. I only played the shareware and found the Ymir episode awesome (owing in part to this cool tune), got to the second planet but stopped playing soon after.

[Striker]

I regret to say that there hasn't been any progress since last update, however, I have an excuse: I've been focusing on EDuke32-related things, that hopefully will prove very beneficial in due time.

[Striker]

MrFlibble, on 06 March 2019 - 09:39 AM, said:

Love this tune:

This track is in the high-def audio POD file for TerminalFury. TF supports loading .ogg files in place of the original MODs if the name matches. (JEST.OGG will replace JEST.MOD, for example.)

Don't worry, it'll be optional. I plan on hooking everything up so you can choose original music or CD/OGG music.

[NY00123]

Thanks for updating us on the status, I can understand. As one may claim, sometimes you have to give up one fury for a different fury.

[Torturephile]

Glad to see this is still going on. For a year or so I thought that it was abandoned.

[Striker]

Resurrecting this thread (that I totally forgot about).

A few weeks ago I posted this video, showing off some of my progress.


Since then, I've fixed many bugs, optimized a ton of code, got brightmaps working to bring the OpenGL renderer in parity with software.

And tonight, I've got the beginnings of the new GUI up and running, which is soon to replace the windows-based UI altogether:

[Striker]

Good to see that you're still kicking. I'll be posting some progress as regularly as I can.

Speaking of which, I've experimented with neural network upscaling for the in-game cockpit and hand:

[Striker]

Textures are rotated wrong, object positions are out of wack, and the scale is fucked six weeks to Sunday, but Fury3 maps are loading in TerminalFury now, albeit with a Hellbender coat of paint.

This used to just crash the game outright, or be overwhelmingly corrupt.

[Striker]

And now they're rendering (mostly) correctly, with correct object positions:

[Striker]

More progress:

Sky renders correctly, fog boundary is the correct distance in scale with the terrain.


The Deathbringer is now the default ship model when playing Fury3 maps. (Also leveraged Hellbender code for engine particles, need to fix the color though.)

[Striker]

Another progress video.

[Striker]

Been leveraging Hellbender's features, like rain/lightning weather effects to enhance some of the Fury3 maps.

[Striker]

Almost got Fury3's cockpit UI implemented in Hellbender's engine:
(Some obvious issues, it's a WIP after all.)


EDIT: Now widescreen extended

[Striker]

[Striker]

I need some help from someone with some artistic/photoshop skills, or at the very least, someone who knows how to train an AI model with some source images for upscaling.

Here's a zip with the explosion sprites from Terminal Velocity, and the stock footage used to make it. I need help getting a higher res (256x256) version of the explosion, making sure to preserve the shape, aspect ratio, and number of frames of the TV/Fury3 sprite (16).
https://shadowmaveri...MOV_convert.zip

Here's an example/comparison of the images within:


Credit will be given if used.

[Striker]

Thanks. Got a link so I can watch for replies?

[Striker]

Back around 1999, I used to visit a website known as ElectricGames.com, who were part of the UGO network. Used to go there for game cheats, demos, etc. It's where I first downloaded the trial of Fury3 back in the day, after seeing it preinstalled on the PCs at a local shop, realizing how similar it was to Hellbender. (Having already played the shit out of the copy of Hellbender given to me by my uncle and wanting more.)

My long-term memory has served me well, since about 2 months ago, I remembered that there was a copy of the Hellbender level editor on that site. Probably the only one that ever existed. I had made an earlier attempt to find it years ago (around 2014), but The Wayback Machine only had a page, and no functional downloads at the time, so I kind of just forgot about it until I decided to take another look. Lo and behold, The Wayback Machine finally has functional download links! See: https://web.archive....om/gamelev.html

That said, it was a bastard to get working in its normal state. It'd just crash immediately with garbage text and no indication what went on. (And the included readme.txt is useless) So, I used my knowledge of the source code to figure out what was happening, and got things set up properly. Helledit originally lacked sound as well, since there was no sound driver included whatsoever, so I've also gone and included a copy of the Terminal Velocity sound drivers, which seem to work perfectly with it.

What you essentially get, is a DOS version of Hellbender, with a built-in level editor and debug keys. I don't have a documentation of all of the controls right now, but I'll try to edit this post later with my discoveries when I get around to it. If there's anyone willing to learn and document the editor as they go, they're more than welcome to do so, and I'll try my best to contribute what I can.

Some of the keys I've been able to find, however are as follows:

• CTRL-D (on main menu) - Open Demented Shape Editor (Model Editor)
  
• CTRL-L (on main menu) - Open Level Editor
  
• CTRL (in-game) - Stop in place (zeroes throttle).
  
• F4 (in-game) - Screenshot
  
• Z (in-game) - Toggle Debug Mode / Status Bar.
  
• Hold ?/Forward Slash (in-game) - Flight Course tool/weapon. (Used for flying around and setting up flight paths for enemies, escorts, etc)
  
• Enter (in-game, debug mode on) - Skip Level
  
• T (in-game, debug mode on) - Skip to next pattern in MOD music.
  
• CTRL-H (in-game, debug mode on) - Show flight course pathing lines.
  
• CTRL-L (in-game, debug mode on) - Return to spawn point.
  
• CTRL-C (in-game, debug mode on) - Take severe damage. (lethal without shields)
  
• CTRL-V (in-game, debug mode on) - Same as above. (damage)
  
• CTRL-N (in-game, debug mode on) - Teleport to next objective.
  
• Plus/Minus +/- (in-game, debug mode on) - Change zoom (FOV).

In Texture Editor:

• Arrows - Move.
  
• Left Shift - Move Faster.
  
• E - Adjust Eye Pitch/Heading (using arrow keys).
  
• R - Rotate Eye Heading 90 Degrees.
  
• T - Browse Textures.
  
• I - Hide/Show Top Bar.
  
• D - Cycle Grid Line Types.
  
• G - Teleport to Nav Point (brings up a selection).
  
• J - Jump to Sector (X/Y coord on heightmap).
  
• N - Normalize Layer (Replaces ALL ground texture on a layer).
  
• L - Generate new terrain. (Replaces level terrain!)
  
• A - Increase Ambient Light.
  
• SHIFT-A - Decrease Ambient Light.
  
• [ and ] - Cycle Texture
  
• Space - Apply Texture

Download: https://shadowmaveri..._configured.zip

To get it running, all you need is DOSBox, configured with 64mb RAM (memsize = 64 in dosbox.conf), and a copy of your Hellbender's GAME.POD and STARTUP.POD files put in the "SYSTEM" folder. Once ready, run "Helledit.exe" in DOSBox. If you're missing sound, try running setup.exe.

To make a new level, you're going to need to make a copy of an existing level, and edit that for now. From what I can tell in the sources, there's no way to make a new level from scratch.

[Striker]

[Gaelou]

Striker, on 21 August 2024 - 12:30 PM, said:

Very good job Striker !
It is far better than TV Boost Edition !

Regarding the fog, do you plan to increase the deep of field ?

Thank again, I'm very impatient to play this enhanced version

[Mark]

WOW, thats looking good.

[Striker]

Gaelou, on 22 August 2024 - 01:45 AM, said:

Very good job Striker !
It is far better than TV Boost Edition !

Regarding the fog, do you plan to increase the deep of field ?

Thank again, I'm very impatient to play this enhanced version

Thanks, I appreciate it!

As for the fog, the draw distance is already tripled over the original game's. I can't extend it any further without severely breaking the gameplay, so I gotta keep it where it's at. A lot of the game logic and mission structure is built around the draw distance.