[HN Gopher] The GTA III port for the Dreamcast has been released
___________________________________________________________________
The GTA III port for the Dreamcast has been released
Author : Funes-
Score : 230 points
Date : 2024-12-31 16:52 UTC (6 hours ago)
(HTM) web link (gitlab.com)
(TXT) w3m dump (gitlab.com)
| tetris11 wrote:
| Does one need the original textures for this to work?
|
| Edit: Yes
| diggan wrote:
| There is a whole section of the README written just for you :)
|
| https://gitlab.com/skmp/dca3-game#prerequisites
| tetris11 wrote:
| Oh I know, I was just hoping that someone might generate
| their own texture pack
| geor9e wrote:
| and models and sounds and fonts and text and paths and
| configs and ...
| datameta wrote:
| What a time to be alive.
| kls0e wrote:
| do we have a gameplay capture on real hardware?
| rasz wrote:
| Judging by ~15 fps video Yes.
| moosedev wrote:
| https://x.com/falco_girgis/status/1873520002306871358
| musha68k wrote:
| https://youtu.be/ofn3F16ZKk4?si=wNdArUZ5WyznFgXL
| homebrewer wrote:
| Make sure to stash the copy of the source code somewhere before
| Rockstar copyright mafia comes and takes it down, like they did
| with the original re3:
|
| https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=28402640
|
| https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=26199879
| kevin_thibedeau wrote:
| How dare they claim ownership over their property.
| nirav72 wrote:
| No other person. nor GP said that Rockstar doesn't have a
| right to their IP.
| jjulius wrote:
| If you were talking about a much more recently released game
| for a current gen console, sure.
|
| Instead, we're talking about a 23 year-old game with numerous
| predecessors (including one on the way), on a 26 year-old
| console that hasn't been manufactured in 23 years. The number
| of people who will go to the effort of playing this pales
| _tremendously_ in comparison to the rest of Rockstar 's
| active market. There's next to no loss for them here.
|
| And also: https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=42562089
| bobthepanda wrote:
| GTA III was recently remastered so this isn't strictly true
| that it has no impact on Rockstar at all.
| jjulius wrote:
| >... this isn't strictly true that it has no impact on
| Rockstar at all.
|
| You're right, but you're right because you're arguing
| against a statement/point I never made. :)
|
| There's "next to no loss" (I _did_ choose my words
| carefully...) because people will continue to buy the
| remastered versions for the consoles they were released
| for. The only segment of people Rockstar may or may not
| lose out to are the people who are going to go to the
| effort to port this to an old, defunct console (one that
| Rockstar doesn 't even see profitability in, since they
| don't have a version for it), but even then this project
| requires a legally purchased copy of the game in order to
| get started.
|
| So now we're into a fun legal/moral area of, "I've
| purchased this game legally, and I've purchased this
| console legally, and now I would like to use both
| together".
| lizardking wrote:
| For Dreamcast?
| wkat4242 wrote:
| Remastered for dreamcast? Right..
|
| They didn't even bother to release san Andreas for the
| Oculus quest after promoting it. And the remaster was
| really bad quality.
| ziml77 wrote:
| They brought the impact on themselves by having the
| remaster be a rebuild of the crappy mobile port. One of
| the most well known games ever and they treated it like
| trash.
|
| Digital Foundry did a video back when it released
| detailing the problems:
| https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Y1JJt7xHTlE
| bingaweek wrote:
| I can't stand these one like twitter-style bitchposts. It
| already starts off obnoxious and sarcastic, and for what,
| defending Rockstar from the evils of Dreamcast homebrew?
| whateveracct wrote:
| I love retrocomputing. It completely flips the idea of "outdated
| consoles" on its head. Instead of being less valuable because
| there are better options, they are instead a forever-immutable
| computer for developers to target.
|
| The produced consoles will last many more years (I have an N64
| still kicking running new ROM hacks on an Everdrive). And even if
| every bit of hardware becomes defunct, the emulators will live on
| preserving that architecture in an immutable state forever.
|
| I used to think "what's the point of creating new software for
| old consoles" but once I reframed them this way, I find them as
| or more exciting that writing software for modern hardware.
| kls0e wrote:
| excellent, did you try SM64 - Through the Ages? Great custom
| level design.
| whateveracct wrote:
| It's on my list :) I kinda wanna replay SM64 first for a
| comparison.
|
| I replayed Majora recently but insisted on replaying OoT
| first for similar reasons.
|
| EDIT: idk now thinking about it again, I think I'll just play
| it. I want something pure and fun to play. Sadly it doesn't
| play on original N64 but alas. I can always use my Steam Deck
| :D
| paulryanrogers wrote:
| Hardware does fail over time, apparently due to stuff like
| leaky capacitors. Enthusiasts and repair shops can keep a few
| alive for a while, and shops like PCBWay may produce
| replacement parts.
|
| That said, I think your point about emulators is very on point
| because they facilitate experiencing these long after hardware
| becomes impractical. And folks can try a huge variety of games
| without a lot of travel or shipping. I'm also curious to try
| some FPGA solutions, especially if they can support save
| states.
| whateveracct wrote:
| re: FPGA, the Analog Pocket with an Everdrive also works
| great. I use it to play GB/GBC/GBA games on my TV via its
| dock. Sadly, those don't support sleep and stuff but that's
| worth it.
| wolrah wrote:
| Why bother with an Everdrive on an Analogue Pocket? Mine
| has only seen a cartridge once, just because my partner
| happened to have an old GB game she wanted to see if her
| save had survived on, otherwise it runs entirely off SD.
| whateveracct wrote:
| I guess it's mostly because I already had it? That's a
| good point though.
| ethagnawl wrote:
| There are also companies like Analogue who are producing high
| quality clones which will keep gamers (mostly) happy for at
| least another generation.
| jchw wrote:
| Analogue makes FPGA-based emulators. These are pretty cool
| because they can eliminate a number of downsides with
| software game console emulation while still retaining some
| of the upsides, and versus pure hardware clones, they can
| be updated and patched, either to fix bugs or add new
| targets. Another bonus of FPGAs is that they're accessible
| to hobbyists. I don't know what the current preferred
| solution is but a while ago people were buying DE10 Nano
| boards for running MiSTer, which could support a large
| variety of cores.
| alexjplant wrote:
| MiSTER is going strong and the recent release of the
| excellent-but-confusingly-named MiSTER Pi [1] board has
| brought the cost of entry down considerably. After I do
| some more SD card shuffling and verify game compatibility
| I plan on selling my N64 and Saturn and using OEM
| controllers with my MiSTER Pi. Unfortunately the Altera
| Cyclone FPGA in it doesn't have the horsepower to run
| anything beyond fifth-gen systems so a new platform would
| be required for the Dreamcast, Gamecube, and PS2. The
| common refrain from FPGA enthusiasts regarding these
| systems is that because the hardware has many more layers
| of abstraction they're less dependent on cycle-accurate
| timing than older consoles so the juice might not be
| worth the squeeze as far as building HDL cores for them
| is concerned.
|
| [1] https://retroremake.co/pages/store
| jchw wrote:
| In my experience relatively few of the components on old
| computers and game consoles are particularly failure prone
| and most of them can have a future contingency plan:
|
| - Electrolytic capacitors can be replaced relatively easily.
| Some people are replacing them with solid state capacitors to
| try to improve reliability and avoid corrosion from leaked
| electrolyte.
|
| - Batteries likewise can be replaced easily, and you can
| usually fit a socket in there if there isn't already one.
|
| - Damaged traces on PCBs (usually caused by leaky capacitors
| or batteries) can often be patched. It is definitely not the
| easiest work, but if patching a few traces is all that's
| needed to get something back into working order, then it's
| probably worth it.
|
| - Some of the old AC-DC transformer blocks are dying or
| horribly inefficient anyways. Most of them are outside of the
| machine and can be replaced with readily available modern
| equivalents, so this one is extremely easy. For old
| computers, ATX supplies are easy to adapt to pre-ATX
| standards and even some different machines entirely since
| they provide some of the most commonly-needed voltage rails
| (some new supplies lack -12V but it will be listed on the PSU
| specs either way). There's even very small form factor ATX
| supplies using GaN based transformers that can fit pretty
| much anywhere.
|
| - CD-ROM lasers are definitely starting to wear down, but
| there's quite a lot of optical drive emulators available
| nowadays for a variety of machines, with more showing up
| every year. As long as small-order PCB manufacturers remain
| around, it will probably remain viable to make more of these
| ODEs.
|
| - Likewise, floppy disks and their drives can fail for a
| variety of reasons, but floppy drive emulators are at the
| point of reasonable maturity and can support a lot of
| machines, too. I'm sure there's some weird standards where
| emulation may be spotty (thinking of NEC) but for typical
| Macs, PCs and Commodore computers I imagine most of the
| ground is covered already.
|
| It is true that a lot of hardware is failing and some of it
| is not so easily replaced, but honestly, I think if we wanted
| to, we could keep a good amount of the retro hardware working
| for possibly hundreds of years longer. The real question is
| if enough people will deem it worth their time and money to
| do so. But then again, I suppose it's not much different in
| that regard from vintage automobiles.
|
| There will always be a place for emulation, probably a much
| larger one at that. Not only does emulation give a very nice
| long-term solution to keeping software libraries accessible,
| they offer plenty of advantages over actually using old
| hardware, and it's obviously a lot more accessible.
|
| P.S.: to whoever does eventually come into possession of the
| machines I worked on next, I apologize for my soldering. In
| fairness, some of these old boards are stubborn even with a
| ton of flux.
| Suppafly wrote:
| >- Some of the old AC-DC transformer blocks are dying or
| horribly inefficient anyways. Most of them are outside of
| the machine and can be replaced with readily available
| modern equivalents, so this one is extremely easy.
|
| Except the commodore ones that fry the computer when they
| stop working.
| jchw wrote:
| I believe the Commodore 64 power supply I am using I
| ordered from c64psu.com. I did not evaluate the quality
| in any way, but years down the line it hasn't failed me.
| So, at least _working_ replacements are available, and
| while they 're not necessarily cheap, it's probably worth
| it considering you're definitely right about the fact
| that the Commodore ones tend to fail in pretty ugly ways.
| girvo wrote:
| The optical drive emulators are great but sad: being able
| to play games with original disks is half the fun, IMO
| aidenn0 wrote:
| The DC will be around for a long time, but games won't be
| played from optical discs much longer. It used a format that
| was double the density of the yellow-book standard, and when my
| drive failed, it was much cheaper to replace it with a flash-
| based option than to buy a replacement drive.
| pezezin wrote:
| Yes, optical drives tend to fail. A couple of days ago I
| tried to play with my old Gamecube that had been in storage
| for at least 10 years, and surprise, it doesn't read the
| disks anymore.
|
| On the other hand, a few months ago I bought a Saturn and
| despite being much older, it works flawlessly. That thing was
| built like a tank...
| boomboomsubban wrote:
| I'm not disagreeing that optical drives fail, but isn't it
| also the part most bothered by dust? And if you bought the
| Saturn from some kind of shop, they probably cleaned it to
| prevent returns.
| pipes wrote:
| I've got one of those, bought and installed it a few years
| ago. Unfortunately it doesn't work with all games. Maybe that
| has been fixed, but was very annoying to find that hydro
| thunder didn't work!
| farmerbb wrote:
| If you're using an HDMI converter then that's most likely
| your reason for Hydro Thunder not working. Hydro Thunder
| notoriously doesn't work well with VGA output (HDMI
| converters for the Dreamcast usually convert the VGA
| signal)
| gxd wrote:
| Completely agree and I'll go a bit further. I see old consoles
| and computers as the only VMs that will last. In 500 years,
| assuming we all survive, I believe it's more likely that code
| targeting the NES will be runnable than code targeting today's
| browsers, .NET or the JVM. The reason is that while these
| competing VMs are well documented, they are extremely complex
| and code targeting them tend to rely on idiosyncrasies of
| current operating systems, browsers and even hardware.
|
| Also, the retro hardware itself is the ultimate documentation.
| You can look at every chip using (nowadays) accessible
| equipment and create an absolutely perfect replica in software
| or FPGA. VM documentation, however, can contain inaccuracies.
|
| My speculative fiction statement of the day is that only
| software targeting relatively simple architectures will stand
| the test of time.
| jebarker wrote:
| Not to mention that so much more modern software will fail
| due to requiring network connectivity to non-existent
| services
| Klonoar wrote:
| Isn't this general idea what the 100 Rabbits people theorize?
| i.e with uxn and all that
| robinsonb5 wrote:
| Another aspect of this is the relative simplicity of the
| toolchain.
|
| On my 10-year-old PC (Core i5 something or other) I can build
| a cross assembler and C compiler for the Amiga in around 21
| seconds (vbcc, Vasm, Vlink).
|
| I can build the same on the Amiga itself in minutes
| (admittedly quite a lot of minutes!) rather than hours.
|
| Meanwhile, I read recently of a build of llvm on a RISC-V SoC
| taking well over 12 hours.
| majormajor wrote:
| I think it has less to do with the architecture or medium and
| more to do with the type of media itself.
|
| We are more likely to actively preserve art in usable forms
| than something like JIRA. We play Chess more than we use
| whatever contemporary accounting tool. We read old novels
| more than we read transcripts of business meetings.
|
| So we'll be more motivated to keep these architectures and
| games continually preserved.
| cyanydeez wrote:
| Also reminds us that line goes up is often more a perceptual
| FOMO than real technical milestones.
| griomnib wrote:
| The people who mod retro machines into more "modern" formats
| are pretty wild on the hardware side as well.
|
| This nut job decided to make a portable PS4:
| https://youtu.be/bJSLscnFd_M
| alexjplant wrote:
| From my limited understanding the Dreamcast also has one of the
| simplest architectures of that generation (since Sega learned
| from the monstrosity that was the Saturn) which I would think
| would make it a good target for homebrew. The GPU was also an
| early PowerVR design so maybe contemporary mobile GPU expertise
| can be leveraged instead of trying to target the Gamecube or
| PS2's proprietary architectures.
|
| Of course the OG XBox is probably simpler to port a PC game to
| since it basically _was_ a PC so it doesn't really count in
| this discussion.
| mattxxx wrote:
| "We got GTA III on dreamcast before we got GTA VI"
| GenerWork wrote:
| As an admitted Dreamcast fanboy, I love seeing work like this.
| SequoiaHope wrote:
| Screenshots: https://dca3.net/screenshots/
| devops99 wrote:
| There's something kinda beautiful about this.
| 93po wrote:
| Is this possible because GTA III was originally coded in such a
| way to be compatible with the Dreamcast, and this is simply tying
| together lose ends, or did someone go through an absolute butt
| load of work rewriting huge chunks (or maybe even all chunks) of
| the engine to make it Dreamcast compatible?
| tmjwid wrote:
| It's an engine port from the decompilation project RE3. A lot
| to changes to get it to run
| Sparkyte wrote:
| I really wish Dreamcast had a longer life most people
| underestimated how great of a console it was. However I believe
| this was completely Sega's fault for not pushing the system
| harder. The hardware was vastly superior to the PS2 which
| launched the same year. I think Sega didn't consider how much
| more expensive the Dreamcast was against the competition. Of
| course XBOX sealed it's fate.
| aesh2Xa1 wrote:
| The Dreamcast launch price in Sep 1999 was $199 (US market).
|
| The PlayStation 2 launch price in Mar 2000 was $299 (US
| market).
|
| https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Dreamcast
|
| https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/PlayStation_2
|
| So the Dreamcast was much _less_ expensive than the PlayStation
| 2.
___________________________________________________________________
(page generated 2024-12-31 23:00 UTC)