For those who remember 1995!

Anybody remember that old 3-D DOS game Descent? The first game ever to allow you to move in any and all directions in a full 3-D environment. The Pyro-GX, I think, looked absolutely awesome. So I went online to descent2.com and found a 3-D model of it, and rendered it into a new ship (full credits will be in a readme file with the final version). Right now, I want you all to download it HERE (I had to do it this way to trick Angelfire into hosting the file).

What do you think?
Suggestions?
Anything else to add?

(Note: The ship costs $1million, and requires many licenses, and comes with no weapons or outfits)

Just did some testing on the ship. Nice plug, very workable. I personally would move the beam x,y to the centerline, and perhaps have the turret fire from the top ( 180 dgreee field of fire), but these are both easy fixes and subject to personal interpretation. Overall a very workable plug Fnoigy. Just make sure you give proper credit in the readme, and I think it'll work fine.

Yipee!

I've always wanted to fly the good ol' Pyro-GX around in Nova. Descent has been one of my favorite games for quite a few years now, and shortly after getting Nova, I started thinking about how much the two had (or could be made to have) in common.

Haven't tried the plug yet, but it looks good!

Speak of the Devil. Just today, I finally managed to beat descent on insane. That was one hell of a trip. Kinda boring though, lots of shoot, hide, save, shoot, swear, load etc....

Yes, That would be very cool and Id be glad to lend a hand. Just for fun, we could hack together a few of the bots from classic. They use what, like 10 triangles each?

That's funny. I've had the game probably since 1995 when it came out, and including the few years where I probably never touched the game, it's still been 10 years and I haven't beaten the game (in the earlier years of having it when I was little, I never actually could get past the Super Hulk on level 7, a feat which I have only figured out was easy to do within the past couple years). Within the past year, I've been finding ways to actually make an effort to actually beat the game, such as putting Descent on my network drive at school and playing it on the older computers (as Descent hates anything above windows 98 and developes issues with it), and recently I recieved my dad's old 133Mhz Pentium 1 laptop running win98 and have gotten back in the game (using my saved game from my school network drive). Yesterday I got to level 26, and hope to beat the game (level 27) by the end of the week. I think I'm playing on rookie mode (though I'm not sure, I know it's not trainee mode), and it is VERY hard, and the fact that the old laptop doesn't know how to use its sound card doesn't make it much easier to know my surroundings well. Once I'm done with D1, I'm planning to go through the entirety of Descent 2 (which I already have done years ago, because Descent 2 is too easy), and then Descent 3, and then think about how Interplay and anybody who bought them has pretty much dropped off the face of the Earth. Oh yea.

I have never beaten the massive hulk without getting blown up three times. I've never seen it explode either. I just left LOTS of mines in there and it died tripping over those two seconds after I respawned. I still got out ;-).

It doesn't take very kindly to NT 4, either. It played fine (minus the fact that it was software-rendered on a Pentium-100. It was even on a SERVER and the fans were annoying, and the graphics were 8-bit)... until I tried to use a sound card. I'm still looking to fix the problem with a Mac copy for my 6500.

I'd challenge one of you to a duel if Descent would recognize the fact that I don't use my serial ports to connect to the 'Net.

Make a couple of Descent weapons to go with it. I'm not sure how you'd level up lasers, but I'd LOVE vaping a Manticore with the Gauss cannon. Then we get into the issue of range. Infinite like Descent, or finite like everything else? Fire and don't move for a while, and you shoot yourself as the weapon flies around the system ;-).

Actually, I've seen the results of very long or infinite range in a weapon I made once in a plug bringing the Polaris Scarab and a new weapon into EVC. Basically, your projectiles don't disappear fast enough, and it only takes a minute or two before the engine cannot create any more objects and your weapon fires nothing. Actually, I was already in the process of making a fusion cannon model (just out of boredom), and I'll probably make a plasma cannon, or maybe a gauss cannon.

weapons dont wrap

Anyway, yeah, that level 7 boss is super hard. I know its cheating, but never actually let yourself die. Just reload from as soon as you can before then. Its too much of a drag to start naked. Though I would like to see how hard it is to play through without cheating at all... (not codes, of course)

I have two entries on my scoreboard. 2.5mill and 8.~mill, trainee and insane respectively. That was a damned lot of work.

If anyone needs tips to beat the level 7 guy, just do it from the entrance to the room, the little hall with the red door. Make sure you hide far enough back that the smart missiles hit just outside of the hall rather than just inside, because those are almost impossible to dodge. Theres also either a cloak or an invuln outside of the red room, like above between the purple robot generators, but that doesnt really help to much unless you do the hands on approach.

Actually, the level 7 boss (Super Hulk) isn't that hard, I've just never been very good at much of any combat tactics until the past couple years. The last time I tried, which was the first try in years (and was months ago), I think I either beat him in one attack run, or in two (lives). Do you have the patch for v1.5? It's a real patch, but it makes the bosses only have half as much armor (I think).

BUT ANYWAY, I JUST BEAT IT NOT 10 MINUTES AGO!! IT TOOK ME 10 YEARS (in a way), BUT I FINALLY BEAT DESCENT!!
Fnoigy_____2,350,290 points (HA! no cheating for me!)_______Rookie______levels 1-27______time 10:50:05 (however long that is)

Now to go all through Descent 2, then Descent 3!

P.S. I think D2 is much easier, and D3 is also easier, but the goals are more encryptic and tedious.

YAY!! And now I'll be in the mood even more to get to creating some weapons to go along with the Pyro-GX. Stay tuned!

OMG Fnoigy! I love you! My hero! Hooray for the Pyro-GX!

IIRC, Descent 2 used the Pyro-GX and it was destroyed by the Sun in the beginning of Descent 3. D3 used the Pyro-GL. You should totally make a Black Pyro-GX and a Phoenix plugin. Then again, I can just slap a coat of paint on the Pyro to make it black....

I would, but there's a problem. The only Pyro-GL, Magnum AHT and Poenix models I could find were all one solid object, and in 3DS format, and since I don't have 3DS Max, I can't break it into actual components. So right now, it's stuck as a solid color. I do, however, have a good version of a black pyro model, so I could do that at some point.

Fnoigy, do you have a way to view 3ds 7 max models? I need someone with a viewer that supports textures or the full 3ds 7 program so that I can make my DeLorean plugin.

I don't know. I use Bryce 5, and it is rather quirky to do textures with. I'd rather not get into any real texturing.

Quote

BUT ANYWAY, I JUST BEAT IT NOT 10 MINUTES AGO!! IT TOOK ME 10 YEARS (in a way), BUT I FINALLY BEAT DESCENT!!
Fnoigy_____2,350,290 points (HA! no cheating for me!)_______Rookie______levels 1-27______time 10:50:05 (however long that is)

Great. Now do it on insane, visiting all of the secret levels.

(there are secret exits from level 10, the level where the reactor is in the cube of locked secrets (something like 20~23) and level 25, or whatever the huge circular level is.)

And the guidebot makes d2 a bit to easy, less fun/challenging exploring.

This post has been edited by NebuchadnezzaR : 06 May 2005 - 08:28 AM

Sadly, Descent doesn't run wll on OS 9 or X, and I got rid of my Performa that ran 7.5.3. So I'm stuck using D2X to play D1. It works fine, but there is no cockpit mode and the textures get all screwed up.

Eww... I dont think i could live with no cockpit mode. The shield hud is really useful, and the cockpit is just pretty.

But yeah, D1 really doenst like 9 or X. I got an old powerbook running 8 that works great for it. And i can even run it without pixel doubling.

The guide bot is just plain drunk, it seems. I like sticking flares to him in D3. Yes, Descent 2 is a little too easy at times, and a little too annoying at others. Descent 3 is at least a little more interesting.

But anyway, I have a new beta revision of my Pyro-GX plug-in up!

I like the Fusion Cannon! Nice render! It's a little weak, though, and slow. The real Fusion Cannon (whoa, did I just say it's real? just a game... just a game...) is slow but incredibly powerful. And it has a mighty kickback. But I'm not sure that kickback would be very easy to do. My bro had a good idea about a weapon that launches directly behind your ship and detonates, like an EMP torpedo, only without the damage and ionization. Just to be used as an ammo-based boost system. Maybe a small weapon that launches forward and detonates shortly after leaving to rock the ship.

P.S. Make more D1 weapons! Missiles, cannons, throw in some D3 stuff. At least do Plasma. That Fusion Cannon was VERY clever.

Actually, I did add a plasma cannon. Just not to the version currently on my site (I'll change that, soon). The first real release has been submitted to the add-ons page, and should be there sometime soon.

I saw some Feds shooting the Fusion Cannon. Is that supposed to happen?