[supergoofy]

The reason why ProAsm stopped developing Duke3dw and SWP is probably because of lack of time and interest. No to mention that his builds were never very popular. Actually few know the existence of SWP and very few the existence of Duke3dw.

Also, ProAsm never claimed that he has the knowledge and capabilities of a professional programmer, but he can code and he proved it.

Anyway, Duke3dw is more polished from the the old JFDuke3D port, and SWP is more polished from the old JFShadowWarrior port.

Plus, ProAsm has also created few utilities, which you can find in his site, that are very useful.


Now, why everyone is using EDuke32 and forgot about all the other ports ? It's simple, because it is awesome!

To make EDuke32 beyond awesome, three things should be done:
1. Eliminate any remaining bugs.
2. Finish all the incomplete features (like multiplayer support) and make them fully working.
3. Optimize the Polymer renderer, make it a fast renderer so that we can use it all the time. I'm in love with Polymer renderer


About Megaton Edition: it is the easiest way to legally get Duke3D + the three commercial expansions for a low price.

[Juras]

Quote

Now, why everyone is using EDuke32 and forgot about all the other ports ? It's simple, because it is awesome!

That's something new to me, i dont know anyone (ummm ok maybe Radar is the only who is using eduke time to time) and over the past five years i have played with 135673 people online. Want demos for proof?

Quote

To make EDuke32 beyond awesome, three things should be done:
1. Eliminate any remaining bugs.
2. Finish all the incomplete features (like multiplayer support) and make them fully working.
3. Optimize the Polymer renderer, make it a fast renderer so that we can use it all the time. I'm in love with Polymer renderer

That's true, except point number 3, first 2 points will make eduke enough awesome for me.

[Micky C]

The number 1 reason for eduke being around in this day and age is user made content. Maps, mods, TCs. All modern mods require eduke's extended coding capability, and maps have slowly started using TROR and/or polymer. I know some people just want a source port that simply allows them to play a few hours a year for nostalgia, others such as yourself are only interested in the online experience. For you guys xduke or whatever is fine. However there are thousands of people out there that are hooked on both playing and making new content using awesome new features (or not), and that is why so many people are playing eduke32.

[Juras]

@Trooper Mick
True, but saying that everyone is using eduke and forgot about other ports is False.
In online players category hduke/xduke always was #1 then probably xbox port would be #2 and then is #3 eduke.
Other things like polymer,TROR,mods,TCs, suport for Linux,Mac or other advanced stuff eduke is placed on #1 spot without any competition.
Edit: Hmmm if you think about how many people bought Duke from xbox arcade then i wasn't be so sure that general number of eduke users is higher than xbox ported version. Talking about best port is like arguing who is best duker of all time, it depends on criteria for online community it would be for example map or prime time.

[LkMax]

Well since after the launch of the Megaton compilation everybody decided to list things they would like to see implemented on eduke32, here's one I thought since I first used gzDoom:
"distorted" sky textures so they won't look like a giant cardboard paper on a 3D renderer. See image below inside the spoiler tag.

Spoiler

[Jimmy]

supergoofy, on 27 March 2013 - 11:07 PM, said:

Anyway, Duke3dw is more polished from the the old JFDuke3D port, and SWP is more polished from the old JFShadowWarrior port.

In some respects. SWP is extremely buggy. JFSW is rather stable.

[supergoofy]

I don't have problems with the current SWP, it works 100% ok, so far.

But that doesn't mean that it will work 100% ok for others. It may contain bugs, that's naturral.

And JFSW has bugs too.

[Jimmy]

Unless he's updated SWP since I last used it, 8bit didn't work properly and save files would get corrupted. JFSW didn't do this as far as I could figure.

[Kevin]

I picked up this Megaton lashup to get the GRP files for Duke in DC, Caribbean and Winter, not a bad deal for $8.99. Not wild about Nuclear Winter, may grow on me. I copied the GRP files out and set them up with eDuke, HRP and Dukeplus {DC}. Couldn't find these anywhere else. I'm keeping Megaton installed, they are promising multiplayer soon,{and the check is in the mail.} I find it looks a bit like eDuke without the HRP, and the options are really limited, looks like a console config menu.
By the forums there are a LOT of people having troubles, crashes, failure to start, control problems. Mine seemed ok, but I haven't spent a lot of time with it. eDuke, HRP and Dukeplus spoil you for other ports.

[TerminX]

Kevin, on 28 March 2013 - 06:52 PM, said:

eDuke, HRP and Dukeplus spoil you for other ports.

That's because EDuke32 is almost 10 years worth of donated time by multiple developers who LOVE Duke Nukem 3D. At this point in time, Megaton is a source port from 2005 with a few months worth of hacks by a couple of guys who are being paid by 3D Realms to do it as part of another cash grab attempt to further monetize Duke3D (just like the Xbox Live Arcade version, the Android version, the iOS version, etc).

By the way, support for the Megaton versions of the add-ons is coming soon to EDuke32! When it's finished, EDuke32 will automatically locate your Megaton installation directory and present the expansions as individual entries in the game selector in the startup window (not the drop-down directory selector that lets you load mods, but the actual game selector that lets you pick what grp file you want to use). It should be pretty sweet.

[Paul B]

Kevin, on 28 March 2013 - 06:52 PM, said:

I'm keeping Megaton installed, they are promising multiplayer soon,{and the check is in the mail.} I find it looks a bit like eDuke without the HRP, and the options are really limited, looks like a console config menu.

If multi-player is supported in this megaton version i'm very interested in getting my hands on it at least the multi-player aspect has been given some priority. I wonder if this port will work with existing TROR maps? or do we need to start mapping using the classic build map editor? This is pretty exciting and the exposure on steam should revive the duke community something it really could use.

[Lunick]

Paul B, on 28 March 2013 - 10:36 PM, said:

If multi-player is supported in this megaton version i'm very interested in getting my hands on it. I wonder if this port will work with existing TROR maps? or do we need to start mapping using the classic editor?

This port doesn't work with TROR maps...

[Paul B]

Lunick, on 28 March 2013 - 10:42 PM, said:

This port doesn't work with TROR maps...

Well that really sucks... I really like TROR and its hard to go back to classic mapping after using TROR. =( In all honesty Megatron port should have been ported from Eduke rather than the original game. Why keep re-inventing the wheel? People need to work together to achieve a common goal of a fully functional Duke 3D game. Once Eduke gets multi-player there will be no such thing as competition it will just be Eduke as the new standard for Duke Nukem 3D. Let's go team EDuke !!! It's time to kick some @$$! It's not too late to be the first with a solid multi-player release before the competition does.

[supergoofy]

TROR is only available in EDuke32.

[Kevin]

I agree with Paul B, I feel eDuke would have saved them a lot of headaches. The forums for Megaton are running over with complaints. I always found eDuke very stable, unless I was trying to run some weird mod or tc. I used Jonofs' port way back, had no real problems with it. Must be the magic touch of 3D Realms effecting Megaton. A lot of the people posting about bugs are probably not used to editing config files, and the config menus are really dumbed down, as I said above. I just harvested its' moldy corpse for the three GRP files for the expansion packs, worth the $8.99. If multiplayer doesn't come to fruition and/or they don't get the bugs sorted out, it will be going to bit Heaven. Kind of funny, the only reason I am on Steam is my Wife bought me Duke Nukem Forgetit a while back, I just smiled and said thanks. Could have been worse, she could have given me an actual turd, instead of a figurative one.

[Lunick]

Kevin, on 29 March 2013 - 12:14 PM, said:

I agree with Paul B, I feel eDuke would have saved them a lot of headaches. The forums for Megaton are running over with complaints. >snip<

Are we looking at the same forum? Because all I can see is people happy with the game, bug reports and people asking if certain features will be implemented. I was going to let this post slide but I don't like it when rumours like this float around.

[NightFright]

I am just afraid about Shadow Warrior possibly facing the same treatment. Right now, it looks like they could have saved tons of effort by choosing EDuke32 from the beginning. After all, it appears they ripped some parts from it anyway (just not properly at all), and until now without giving the people credit for their work. The groupfiles themselves are the only really valuable contents of this offering so far, and a LOT would need to happen to change that.

It's likely that some issues will get fixed, but many others probably won't. Still, it is not the resurrection the game would have deserved. And in fact, it was not required - since this community has already done that, keeping it alive until the present day - and more than admirably, I might add. Countless years of improvements, finetuning and expertise have found their way into both EDuke32 and the HRP. Both may still not be finished, but it's clearly more than the Megaton port can ever be (also considering all the great mods we have for it, e.g. DukePlus). All we can hope for now is that they will listen to the people who know about programming and learn something from that - especially considering the Shadow Warrior re-release. Those classic games really deserve better than being used as cashcows.

After all, I would say Megaton was good for one thing: Reinforcing the focus on those who are not taking care of the game for profit, but for free, out of dedication to the game. And that's why it is so great.

[Lunick]

NightFright, on 29 March 2013 - 03:30 PM, said:

I am just afraid about Shadow Warrior possibly facing the same treatment.

But the iOS port for Shadow Warrior was awesome, surely they can't mess it up since they will most likely be using the code from that.

[Jinroh]

Lunick, on 29 March 2013 - 03:46 PM, said:

But the iOS port for Shadow Warrior was awesome, surely they can't mess it up since they will most likely be using the code from that.

I agree the iOS Shadow Warrior is badass it'll be hard to screw it up, if they more or less just port it over to Steam.

[Jimmy]

To be honest, I don't see the big fluff about being able to get the expansions legally. Is any of the money actually going to their respective developers? I sincerely doubt it.

[Kevin]

Lunick, on 29 March 2013 - 02:27 PM, said:

Are we looking at the same forum? Because all I can see is people happy with the game, bug reports and people asking if certain features will be implemented. I was going to let this post slide but I don't like it when rumours like this float around.

There's a lot of people having troubles getting it to launch, a lot of problems with ATI cards with crashes after the title screens, messed up textures, lost and/or corrupted saves, distorted sound. It's not exactly bleeding edge software, I feel it is giving too many problems. They've already released two beta versions to address these problems, and it's been out for all of three or four days. When it works, it works great. For all I ran it, which wasn't much, it worked fine for me. I only bought it for the expansion pack GRP files, if they don't bring out the multiplayer, I will remove it as eDuke is far superior. Also, for me, the configuration menu is cut down to something like a console would have. I know it's only ten bucks, $8.99 in the introductory sale, and I was very happy with the price for the GRP files alone. If I had bought this to use extensively and was having the problems a lot of people are, I would be disappointed. I don't pay to beta test. Take a scroll through the sixteen pages and read some of the subject lines. I wasn't starting a rumor, I was commenting on what I read. I have nothing against Steam or this version of Duke3d, I was just stating what I had drew from reading through the forums.

[Fox]

Maybe you should have downloaded the add-ons from some warez website. Probably Sunstorm or WizardWorks are not even aware of Megaton, just like with Silverman.

[Kevin]

Fox, on 29 March 2013 - 08:45 PM, said:

Maybe you should have downloaded the add-ons from some warez website. Probably Sunstorm or WizardWorks are not even aware of Megaton, just like with Silverman.

Help yourself to all the virus' you want sport, I'll pass. Even if the files were genuine, " Warez" is a fancy word for theft, no thanks. I would imagine they would have to get a release for these from someone, I can't see Valve leaving themselves open for litigation like that.

[Fox]

Think again: http://forums.duke4....post__p__153244

So it doesn't seems purchasing Megaton is better than "theft".

[Jimmy]

Only noobs get malware.

[Fox]

Hahahaha owned!

[NightFright]

There is an easy way to fix this, though. If they can't give the proper people credit and just rip code from wherever they need it, they should get their OWN credits removed from the game as well. Still better having no one listed at all than the wrong people.

But honestly, what would you expect from a project that just lasted a few months? Didn't expect them to rewrite the code from scratch. Using outdated code is one thing, but not even asking the guy who wrote it is another. Not speaking of mixing in some other code and asking even less. Official apologies would be in order, but I don't think that's ever gonna happen.

The whole thing is pretty embarrassing, and the fact that it happens with this game and to this community is very sad. For profit, some people just lose all respect. A shame 3DR guys authorized this, it's a disgrace.

[Helixhorned]

LkMax, on 28 March 2013 - 05:19 AM, said:

Well since after the launch of the Megaton compilation everybody decided to list things they would like to see implemented on eduke32, here's one I thought since I first used gzDoom:
"distorted" sky textures so they won't look like a giant cardboard paper on a 3D renderer. See image below inside the spoiler tag.

Spoiler

Probably not what you want, but I've been thinking of making the other two classic parallax modes available via two additional sector[].ceilingstat/floorstat bits. One looks somewhat similar to that gzDoom screenshot. Different sky projections in the GL modes will likely be only ever implemented in Polymer (if at all), since Polymost is considered kind of feature-frozen.

[LkMax]

Well, any new sky projection should be welcome, I suppose. I remember using the HRP skyboxes alongside the classic sprites to get rid of this "paperboard" effect but it doesn't help with mods that uses custom sky textures.

PS: I should have posted it in the appropriate forum, but whatever. =P

[Jimmy]

Someone needs to come up with an 8bit skybox mod. I'd be willing to help with the art if someone else to could do the rest of the work that I know nothing about.