Engine X 4.61 Beta

[Baker]

Dear Baker -

I am sorry if I may be late with this post but can you please postpone your release until you look into the following issues, points #1 and #2 are classified severe:

1. Screen skips around lava environments, almost unplayable on lava intensive levels.

2. Screen does not flash when hurt, therefore making it hard to tell when you are hit. I looked up any commands to remedy this, however I was unsuccessful in making it work. (I believe something with gl_polyblend but the engine ignores the setting - please help?!)

3. The inside of 'effects' menu is half broken - but bearable.

#1 + #2 sap any enjoyment from the game because of screen lag and you cannot tell when you are hit, making it very frustrating.

About #1 - I ran the the D3D exec for the game but same story, same screen lag, even if resolution is bumped to minimum.

You seem very enthusiastic about this project and the engine itself is very nice; furthermore, I really like the graphical changes esp. to some of the levels - very neat and fresh.

I will be waiting until the next release for these major points to be fixed before I can actually properly play it.

On a technical side note - will you still work on PQ or you switched over to this one? I personally like this one better - it plays better for me, also how does this engine differ from PQ and what extra features does it have integrated? (Just curious.)

Sorry, I put everything into one post but I wanted to cover all bases asap so with the next download I can fully enjoy my Quake game with this new engine.

Thank you,
~fQ.

#1 I don't experience any problem with lava and I've used this engine on a few different machines. I continue to try to think about what could be causing your issue and how I can address that.

#2 I am aware of this one.

#3 Also aware of that.

I will have to continue making new releases incrementally even before the engine is "perfect" because perfect is a destination and an engine doesn't start there.

As for ProQuake versus Engine X, I do plan on continuing development of ProQuake but the level of maturity of ProQuake makes it so there are limited conservative features I can add to the engine. With this engine I have more freedom to implement non-traditional ideas, so this engine is over all going to get more attention.

[freQncy]

Awesome -

I am really sorry about the lava thing for me. Because I like all the changes and the feel of this engine so much, I may still put up with this and just not play lava levels that much.

As I said, if the lava is in view the screen skips around. I have an ATI chipset vidcard, perhaps some code there along the line causes this - perhaps you can compare the two codes from PQ and EngineX, to see where they differ in this respect at the lava. [I get no graphic lag at all using PQ.]

Just an idea, I am no programmer but just logically thinking what could this could be and what may be causing it, is a start anyways.

When I loaded this up, I felt a whole new experience + the 'race-car' dashboard is just awesome (mentioned in your 1st post). If I could I would add a silver, gradient background to it - of course, just dreaming, since I cannot program but as an ex., it seems so much you can do with it - given the ideas. (I loved the sweet, new graphics.)

An auto level downloader would be nice too.. (Perhaps you already thought of that.)

With all the fixes coming up, I am looking forward to it becoming 'perfect.' But it is still, a great, great piece of work.

Regardless, I am looking forward to the next release; will be downloading it and if you come up with any explanation(s) for the lava issue, I would be very grateful if you please let me know.

Thanks again,
~fQ.

[=peg=]

I *think* it could fullbrights.. gl_fullbright 1 tends to hog down proquake in terms of fps on some maps.. so it might as well do for engineX..

[Disco]

Baker,


In your screenshots above and also in my Engine X, i have a timer that is running in the top right corner of my screen. I havent found a way to turn that off yet so it doesnt display at all. What is the command to turn that off?



Thank you!

[freQncy]

^ Yes - I would also like this off.

[Baker]

show_stats 0

This is going to get removed at some point. There should be standard single player clock like there is a standard multiplayer clock (at least in ProQuake/Qrack/Engine X).

[R00k]

Freq, #2 on your bug list, try gl_HWblend 0 (or whatever the command is). On some cards hardware blending fubars the color blending.

Baker the rj jitter bug: check your writeangle if you are rounding the values or the server is using floats instead of shorts you will get this problem. I specifically had to keep that fuction exactly like what a PQ server uses to avoid this sticky angle looking down and turning.

[freQncy]

Well, that takes care of the clock - thanks.

Also I got visible screen damage now - I can see when being hit.

So the lava thing still remains..

Also the menus do not seem to retain some of the settings (w/ cfg protect off) so it is pretty hard to determine what was activated last time it was configured..

A temporary solution would be I think to write-protect your cfg right after exiting the game.

Also the game has no capitalization - like my "Q" in my name shows up lowercase and so does other players' names - but this is a relatively small issue.

These are all the things I spotted so far..

I am eagerly awaiting the next release so I can play; I have not in a few days, but I do not want to rush Baker so I will wait patiently so he can finish his work.

Thanks and l8r.

[foq]

Yeah, I really like this engine, it just needs work.

[jakub1]

nice engine, fast and stable even with moster maps like warp. i tried some quoth maps and i found that ladders don't work. is it possible to add this feature?

[Baker]

I'll try some Quoth maps and see what happens. You should use the -quoth command line parameter when playing Quoth maps, otherwise it won't use the quoth progs.dat which is probably the issue you are having.

[Mr.Burns]

Does this happen in, say, the modern versions of ProQuake?
....

Sorry for the slight delay in replying (ISP down for 48 hours), I've just tried Proquake 4.44 on the same server and there's no sign of the same problem. I can look straight down and RJ to my hearts content

If you can tell me what the vid capture commands are for Engine X I would happily try to produce a demo and upload it to QuakeVoid on YouTube if this would help you out?

Hope this helps

Monty
P.S. Thanks Peg, as always, and yes you were correct my config was already set to "0"

[jakub1]

ladders solved
-
i'm sorry for false alarm. i haven't noticed that my quoth directory is somehow messed up. i reinstall quoth mod and ladders work. strange is that the only problem were ladders - i mean quoth monsters were in place, quoth plasma gun too... i used -hipnotic -game quoth command and the quoth progs.dat was apparently loaded.
-
jakub

[Baker]

ladders solved
-
i'm sorry for false alarm. i haven't noticed that my quoth directory is somehow messed up. i reinstall quoth mod and ladders work. strange is that the only problem were ladders - i mean quoth monsters were in place, quoth plasma gun too... i used -hipnotic -game quoth command and the quoth progs.dat was apparently loaded.
-
jakub

It's all good. Thanks for trying my engine.

The next version will be a far higher quality release, I'm rather embarrassed by the dumb elementary mistakes I made in this one.

[Baker]

If you can tell me what the vid capture commands are for Engine X I would happily try to produce a demo and upload it to QuakeVoid on YouTube if this would help you out?

They are identical to ProQuake's and JoeQuake's and Qrack's.

That being said, no need for a demo. I think I know what the issue is.