Duke Nukem Forever

Post by **Gambit37** » Sat Oct 16, 2004 11:55 am

You have to check out this engine demo!:

http://www.meqon.com/downloadarea/meqon-demos-1.4.zip

It's the physics engine that's being used in Duke Nukem Forever -- can't wait!

Try out all the demos, loads of possibilities, and great fun too!

Also some threads about it on 3DR forums:

http://forums.3drealms.com/ubbthreads/s ... ber=686953

Jardice · Post by **Jardice** » Sat Oct 16, 2004 9:08 pm

that nice to hear....but i'm not giving up my hopes for it.

chances are it'll probably end up dong a system spec. leap like doom3, forcing people to buy unneeded upgrades.

Post by **Gambit37** » Sat Oct 16, 2004 9:46 pm

Well, yes that goes without saying as by the time it appears we'll probably need P16s with 80 GB RAM and a 48Ghz graphics cards -- while I'm excited by the fluidity of this physics engine, I gave up hope on DNF a long time ago. I'm just looking forward to getting HL2, though on my two year old machine I'm already having doubts that I'll be able to run it....

Post by **cowsmanaut** » Sun Oct 17, 2004 12:39 am

I heard it wasn't going to be made. Someone told me that recently it had been dumped. So I dunno if it will even see the light of day.

At any rate this is much the same as Doom and Halflife. Ragdoll dynamics and Rigid body Dynamics. Nothing new here.. this stuff has been around for a long while and even been in a few games before Doom3 even hit the shelves. It's just never been a focal point since you couldn't do it on such a large scale.. it was enough to have one or two things have this.. but not everything in the scene..

anyway.. moo

Post by **Gambit37** » Sun Oct 17, 2004 2:12 am

Dumped? I may be cynical about it's release date, but dumped it is not. Why would an independent third party confirm the use of it's flagship physics engine to be used in the most anticipated game of all time if it had been dumped? Yes, it's taking a long time, but I do believe it will surface, even if we have to wait another two years for it.

AS for Doom 3, well the physics in that are *nothing* like these demos. You're lucky if you have one or two things to knock over. These demos show off a physics engine far superior to anything in Doom3. Did you go through them all? Check out the water and cloth demos! I don't know about HL2 though -- will have to wait on that one. I've deliberately avoided all rich media previews so that the game is a surprise for me.

Post by **cowsmanaut** » Sun Oct 17, 2004 5:47 am

do a peruse of Gamasutra and you will see that all of this is old school. Some of the demos produced for these kind of things were in articles as old as 99 or 98. Real time cloth, realtime water, real time rigid body dyanamics (anything solid that reacts to gravity) and of course Ragdoll physics. To be honest I've got some links to somre realtime water effects that blow that stuff out of the water.. (no pun intended)

moo

Jardice · Post by **Jardice** » Sun Oct 17, 2004 6:22 am

I find that funny though...all these realisitc effects and you're still forced to wil the game by the book.

Argh we more door crushing! more pit kills! More I tells ya more!

Well that was random. Anyway I have some time think i'll play around with htis and see how good the engine is.

Post by **Gambit37** » Sun Oct 17, 2004 3:13 pm

I'm clearly out of date! However, how many of the demos you speak of have made it it into real, workable solutions in a mainstream game, I mean to the degree that you see in the meqon demo? I hear Max Payne 2 has some nice stuff, and as mentioned there are one or 2 bits in Doom 3 that are OK but hardly impressive. Can you provide those links, would like to see the better stuff you speak of.

Post by **cowsmanaut** » Sun Oct 17, 2004 5:20 pm

I know that a lot of it was produced a long while ago for the prospect of improving the realtime imagery in games. Though I'm uncertain how many games actually use any of the code. I've tried the code on my machine and noted it does work in realtime. however, one of them needed a minimum geforce3 to run at the time and it was a fairly new card.. but you needed pixel shaders for the crests of the waves..

I'll hunt it down..

moo

Post by **cowsmanaut** » Mon Oct 18, 2004 2:18 am

here's a newer one..

http://graphics.cs.lth.se/theses/projects/projgrid/

the other ones the links are dead.. they are a few years old.. one of them had crests to the water though which was neat.. so as it peaked you got white froth...

no demo for this one.. but this is something they are working on for simulating realtime atmospheric effects of light ...

http://www.cs.utah.edu/vissim/papers/sunsky/

I've also got stuff on realtime clouds that form and undulate and react to light.. but it's all mainly code and theory with just a few screen shots.

This is the main reason much of this is not seen in games. You see, someone comes up with something cool but rather specific. They write papers on it and those who are willing enough to go hunt it down will see the cool results.. but these people are either students looking for their masters.. or they are just professionals with a realtime hobby. Many don't work for games companies and it's a shame because they could make games even more visually stunning.

I'm sure if a few more years they will hit this mark.. Using the brute force method instead of the obvious finess these guys exhibit without needing the absolute top of the line all the time.

I always think about taking some of what I find and making good use of it.. then real life interferes and it gets lost in a pile of dreams and good intentions..

moo

Post by **cowsmanaut** » Mon Oct 18, 2004 7:08 am

oh and just incase I wasn't clear.. the physics demos for rigid bodies and cloth etc.. even realtime particle based hair can be found mainly at Gamasutra.com. Though as I said. the articles are older than you would expect since we are only just now seeing them in games.

the code is often even provided in the articles to show and sometimes binaries.. so you can test them..

I've found some great realtime fire examples too.. can't remember where that link is.. but if you're REALLY interested I can try to find it again..

moo

Post by **cowsmanaut** » Mon Oct 18, 2004 10:23 am

http://freespace.virgin.net/hugo.elias/ ... _ffire.htm

fluid fire.. moo

Jardice · Post by **Jardice** » Tue Oct 19, 2004 4:08 am

Ah so that's how they do the fire effects in most games...never though it was a coded yellow orb and some blue space.

Of course the type of games that I hope to see in my lifetime is those that have full interaction(i.e. real life simulation) and no obsurbed limits (i.e. not able to jump or climb over a small rock or push a chair out of the way). Oh well I can only hope.

There wouldn't be anyother realtime effect demos would there cowsmanaut?

Post by **cowsmanaut** » Tue Oct 19, 2004 5:08 am

plenty for those who want to search..

annother like Gambits link.. this engine is going to be added as support to a 3D program I use sometimes called Milkshape3D.
http://www.novodex.com/

annother demo of water by someone else.. you can play in this one if you like

http://www.geocities.com/davidl1_2000/index.htm

just hunt around for direct X and openGL demos.. lots of them all over..

Post by **Gambit37** » Thu Nov 25, 2004 3:34 pm

Heh, after playing Half Life 2, I'm not that impressed with the original demo I posted. The stuff in HL2 is simply fantastic -- you can pick up and throw pretty much anything ant anything else, and depending on the preset behviours, you'll normally get some kind of dynamic realtime interaction between the objects -- it's blooming fantastic!

beowuuf · Post by **beowuuf** » Thu Nov 25, 2004 5:50 pm

It's the little things, like planting a box a tire, standing on the box, and 'feeling' that slight give below your feet

Tom Hatfield · Post by **Tom Hatfield** » Fri Dec 31, 2004 9:00 am

What's amazing about Half-life 2 isn't that it has such impressive physics --- like cows said, a lot of game are doing this, and the concepts have been implemented since time eternal --- but that it does it so _fast_. Source easily has the fastest real-time physics simulator in the biz. I've played through the game twice on my 1.8 GHz (133 FSB) and it _never_ slows down. Valve also did a fantastic job of defining rigid/cloth/ragdoll bodies so they react as realistically as possible. I've noticed the weights and elasticity of everything are near perfect.

Jardice · Post by **Jardice** » Sun Jan 02, 2005 7:31 pm

Yes...now they just need to work on separation of the rag dolls near explosions :p(cmon we all know that gwetting blown up by 5 different oil cans is not going to leave your body intact every time).

But the physics are fun..Especiallywith the gravity gun and some saw wheels(heheh).

Tom Hatfield · Post by **Tom Hatfield** » Sun Jan 02, 2005 8:21 pm

Yes, this has also been one of my grievances since ragdolls came into play. Painkiller and UT200X are the only games with rag dolls that can be dismembered --- and UT's can only be blown apart *before* they die.

Ravenholm was AWESOME. I don't want to spoil it for anyone, but as soon as I discovered you can pick up the saw blades with the gravity gun, it was a heyday.

Let it be known that I completed HL2 again and am still severely disappointed at how stupid the friendly NPC's are. I wish there were a friendly-fire mod that didn't replace the game's core DLL's. I hate the whole concept of Steam and have been using an offline crack since I got the game, so these modded DLL's might not work for me.

Post by **Gambit37** » Sun Jan 02, 2005 8:25 pm

I managed to take out nine zombies in a row with one blade -- fantastic fun!

BloodFromStone · Post by **BloodFromStone** » Mon Jan 03, 2005 3:29 pm

Half-life 2 is a pretty incredible game. While I loved the physics engine, and it was a hell of a lot of fun to play with (I spent a few minutes just dropping bricks on bottles at the beginning of the game), the gameplay itself was as fun as the original. A great physics engine is impressive, but it doesn't mean anything if the game itself isn't fun.

As far as Duke Nukem Forever... I imagine it will come out eventually, but it had better be ready to blow people's minds if they want to get any kind of positive reactions from the public after all of the delays.

Jardice · Post by **Jardice** » Wed Jan 05, 2005 3:07 am

Yeah...what is this the 8th year it's been delayed?

What they need to do is stop changing the engine so much...THey don't always need have the game up to date with every new piece of hardware that comes out (which what every 6 months now?)

Post by **Gambit37** » Fri Jan 13, 2006 12:27 am

I was just thinking about DNF again after I mentioned him in the Christmas Story. Do we think that this game will *ever* surface? I was quite positive in earlier postings, but now I'm not so sure. How can 3DRealms possibly stay in business without shipping any new titles in over 8 years? I know they have partnerships with other studios/distributors, but still, it can't possibly keep them afloat can it?

There was a time when I was looking forward to DNF. Now I don't give a shit.

Trantor · Post by **Trantor** » Fri Jan 13, 2006 12:41 am

I don't think we will ever see this game finished, but I also don't want it to be officially cancelled. It just offers the perfect opportunity for silly jokes!

Post by **Gambit37** » Sat Dec 22, 2007 7:38 pm

Hey, in case you weren't aware, a teaser trailer for DNF was released last week, only 6 years after the last one!

It doesn't look that great if you ask me, very underwhelming and while I appreciate it's a teaser, they are going to have to do far better than this in the final game if they want to compete with current and other forthcoming titles. Sure, it's got the fancy lighting, normal mapping et al, but everyone's doing that now, and better.

http://www.3drealms.com/news/2007/12/dn ... eased.html

I wonder how many more years we'll be waiting?

ian_scho · Post by **ian_scho** » Sun Dec 23, 2007 11:51 am

This title almost defined the term "vapour-ware"

MitchB1990 · Post by **MitchB1990** » Mon Dec 24, 2007 6:28 am

I half-heartedly think it might happen this time seeing as other games that have been high quality are produced quite quickly theses days.

Post by **Gambit37** » Mon Dec 24, 2007 1:52 pm

Yes, one of the main problems 3DR faced was wanting the game to be better than leading edge, which is why they kept changing to the next better engine and then tweaking it to be more awesome than it's default capabilities. The probloem is, they could never lock down the actual game and assets quickly enough to capitalize on the tech, so by the time they were ready to show something, it looked dated because everything else had moved on.

Now that engine tech has stabilised a bit (a bit!), hopefully they won't feel the need to go beyond the leading edge and will actually deliver a good GAME rather than trying to be the best tech out there. Asit is, they use modified Unreal3 tech.

Whoa. Deja vu. I am certain I've written something like this before.

Post by **Gambit37** » Tue Dec 09, 2008 12:05 am

Heh heh, this is an interesting page: Look at the bottom at all the things that have taken less time than DNF!

http://duke.a-13.net/

EDIT: Just found some very brief footage of the game. It's about half way through this clip:

http://crackle.com/c/Jace_Hall/Jace_Hal ... K_/2298717

Can't tell much from that. Looks kinda 'meh'.

Post by **Gambit37** » Wed Jan 14, 2009 8:39 pm

Some new wallpapers on the 3DRealms site!!!

http://www.3drealms.com/duke4/

"When it's done" could be "Not long now..."

I still feel a bit "meh" about it though. And my PC is too old to play it.