XWAUpgrade: The Executor

[Kurgan]

They finally did it!

http://www.xwaupgrade.com/phpBB3008/vie ... cf90c0569e

(more pics in the thread link)

Personally I think it could use a darker shade of blue, but that's me.

[Soontir C'boath]

I need to find my XWA disc.

[RogueIce]

So is there any word on what kind of a hyper-expensive supercomputer it's going to take to run the whole thing at max settings for maximum pretties?

[Tolya]

Just your average joe's 3d gaming rig will be able to run this thing at max without any hitches. Considering they didn't fuck up the code, which is highly unlikely.

Seriously, space games are not very pushy when it comes to computing power. Essentially, you just have empty space with some 3d models with it. Considering that probably a model of a single rifle in Battlefield 3 has more polygons and high res textures than an X-Wing, you shouldn't have any problems at all.

[Starglider]

Seriously, space games are not very pushy when it comes to computing power.

Modern space games can chew up an arbitrary amount of GPU power on technically correct lighting, shadowing, reflection, volumetric explosions, particle spam and post-processing. Particularly things like BSG with lots of big clumsy greeble-covered ships fighting at stupidly close range. XWA is from 1999 though, AFAIK it has no shadowing or bump mapping of any sort, so no it isn't going to strain any even vaguely modern GPU.

[Tolya]

Modern space games can chew up an arbitrary amount of GPU power on technically correct lighting, shadowing, reflection, volumetric explosions, particle spam and post-processing. Particularly things like BSG with lots of big clumsy greeble-covered ships fighting at stupidly close range. XWA is from 1999 though, AFAIK it has no shadowing or bump mapping of any sort, so no it isn't going to strain any even vaguely modern GPU.

Agreed, but games like modern shooters have all that PLUS they have to render terrain and all the objects that come with it. So any rig that let's you run a game like MW3 should be able to run it well.

I've wiki'd XWA engine and it turns out it is the same engine that the original X-Wing used, only overhauled. Is it difficult to implement custom shadow/bump mapping to such a thing? I remember that one of the devs of Startopia released a patch some years after the company (Mucky Foot) went bust where he implemented shadows and it was really a resources hog.

[Executor32]

It'd be nice if the engine could be upgraded to something higher than DX6, maybe then it wouldn't be so damn hard to get modern video cards to work properly with it (especially if you want widescreen). This is why I haven't so much as installed XWA since 2008.

[Knife]

Nice. I remember having most of the stuff off that site downloaded onto XWA. They have always done great work.