Lucasarts on GOG

[Vendetta]

ATTN: Fat People

Lucasarts games, including X-Wing and TIE Fighter, are now available from GOG. Meaning they might work on something resembling a modern operating system.

Also available are several of the classic pointy clicky adventure games and KOTOR (which was already on Steam but at least you don't have to piss about with CDs or pay for DRM now).

[Elheru Aran]

Lovely! I never got the chance to play X-Wing and TIE Fighter, or the VS... do they have the VS or is it just the individual games? Also do they have Rogue Squadron?

[Darksider]

Looks like just X-wing and TIE Fighter for now. Maybe Vs. and Alliance will come later?

[Eternal_Freedom]

If they get Rogue Squadron and/or Episode 1 Racer I'll be happy. Now don't judge me, podracing is fun

[Elheru Aran]

Lawd yes. Racer was pretty awesome. Sure, it was a bit generic and repetitive, but damn if podracing isn't actually kinda fun when you get down to it.

You know what would be kinda awesome? Dark Forces 2 and Mysteries of the Sith redone with updated graphics. Oh yeah.

[Eternal_Freedom]

Lawd yes. Racer was pretty awesome. Sure, it was a bit generic and repetitive, but damn if podracing isn't actually kinda fun when you get down to it.

It was quite refreshing to have a Star Wars game where you aren't trying to kill people or blow shit up. Don't get me wrong, blasting TIE Fighters or stormies is great and all, but sometimes it's nice to just...race or play, without fighting. Hence why I have a snooker game on my shelf right next to Wolfenstein.

[Havok]

While I'm a Fat People, I am not a FattyNerdTM. What is GOG?

[DaveJB]

While I'm a Fat People, I am not a FattyNerdTM. What is GOG?

http://www.gog.com

Depending on your outlook, either it's a nifty place to pick up both indie games and older "classic" games that are packaged to run on a modern OS without too much fuss (and with a guarantee of no DRM besides the code cards you used to get with floppy games), or it's the only gaming store on the internet worth using and an antidote to the Great Satan that is Steam (and I guess the Vaguely Annoying Demon that is Origin).

[TheFeniX]

You know what would be kinda awesome? Dark Forces 2 and Mysteries of the Sith redone with updated graphics. Oh yeah.

There were 2 projects in this vein. One was going to port JK1 and MotS over to the Outcast/Academy engine (Q3 engine) and got shut down by Lucasarts because they were always like that. The other was updating the models on the original game using the original engine, which I'm pretty sure was already a heavily modified Q2 engine which it was pushing the limits of in the first place, but it's been years.

While I'm a Fat People, I am not a FattyNerdTM. What is GOG?

GoG.com offers digital editions of video games, sans DRM. Like Steam, you have to hit a lot of the old games you buy from there with a hammer to get them to work right.

[Elheru Aran]

Updating the models with the original engine? Wouldn't that just make... marginally less shitty models? Even for... what was it, 1998? they were not particularly awesome. Like the stormtrooper blasters were basically extruded triangular prisms rather than cylinders... Now JK1 and MotS on Q3 would have been pretty nice and probably good enough.

While we're on graphics. Are or have they updated them in any way, or are they still the cheesy Win95 blocky pixels? I totally understand retro, but it might be nice to have a cleaner, more modern option. At this point it might basically constitute creating a whole new game from scratch though.

[TheFeniX]

Updating the models with the original engine? Wouldn't that just make... marginally less shitty models? Even for... what was it, 1998? they were not particularly awesome. Like the stormtrooper blasters were basically extruded triangular prisms rather than cylinders... Now JK1 and MotS on Q3 would have been pretty nice and probably good enough.

While we're on graphics. Are or have they updated them in any way, or are they still the cheesy Win95 blocky pixels? I totally understand retro, but it might be nice to have a cleaner, more modern option. At this point it might basically constitute creating a whole new game from scratch though.

Well, yea. There's nothing "retro" about it. It's just old. You're running into 15 year-old engine limitations. Same thing Natural Selection developers ran into. I don't even know if the mod still works. That said, once you try porting over assets from a game to another engine, the publisher can step in and shut you down. This is why the next JK project disbanded. Lucasarts sent them a cease and desist.

Years later, Raven would start talks with LA to start on another JK game. But due to a combination of internal projects they didn't want to compete with (read: the snooze-fest of Force Unleashed) and how the Arena shooter mechanices (among other things) of the JK games were outdated and they were looking for a new audience, the series has been dead for over a decade. You take what you can get. With the release of the J-O/JA source code and LA finally getting put down, I was hoping to see something from the batshit modding community, but nothing has come of it that I've seen. But hey, there's nothing wrong with your IP when your best Jedi games this decade have LEGO in the title.....

[RogueIce]

They have the original and the remake versions that LucasArts put out. The 94 and 98 editions, according to them. So depends I guess.

I don't think GOG really "improves" the games, do they? They pretty much just try to get them functional on modern systems, but that's about it. I don't know that they ever try to patch bugs and stuff (aside from CTDs).

[DaveJB]

They do occasionally include fan-made patches, but only the ones where the original developers released a bug-ridden mess and then either didn't bother patching it or went bust before they could do so. Other than that, they just release the latest stock version of the game and let you decide what mods you want to install.

[Zaune]

While we're on graphics. Are or have they updated them in any way, or are they still the cheesy Win95 blocky pixels? I totally understand retro, but it might be nice to have a cleaner, more modern option. At this point it might basically constitute creating a whole new game from scratch though.

GOG.com are just a retailer and only have limited access to the source code for copyright reasons; they can port games to modern hardware but they can't mess around with the content. In some cases they don't even do that and just sell the game bundled with a preconfigured copy of DOSBox.

[sgt67]

Can anyone who downloads either X-Wing or TIE Fighter clarify a few questions for me? The blurb mentions both the 1994 and 1998 versions, but this is a fairly vague statement. X-Wing in its original format was released in 1993, with the CD Collector's Edition in 1994 that added voiceovers. The same followed for TIE Fighter in 1995 with its collector's edition, except it was not only voiceovers but significantly enhanced resolution. The 1998 versions referred to are the X-Wing Collector's Series, which replaced the entire game engine (for the most part) with the one used in X-Wing vs. TIE Fighter, hence better graphics (good) but a stock movie soundtrack (bad). So, what I would like to know is whether or not the old versions bundled here include the Collector's Editions or are the original versions.

[Vendetta]

While I'm a Fat People, I am not a FattyNerdTM. What is GOG?

It's a distribution platform that specialises in older and indie games. They rework older games so they work on modern operating systems as well.

It's operated by the guys who do the Witcher games, CD Projekt.

[Vendetta]

Can anyone who downloads either X-Wing or TIE Fighter clarify a few questions for me? The blurb mentions both the 1994 and 1998 versions, but this is a fairly vague statement. X-Wing in its original format was released in 1993, with the CD Collector's Edition in 1994 that added voiceovers. The same followed for TIE Fighter in 1995 with its collector's edition, except it was not only voiceovers but significantly enhanced resolution. The 1998 versions referred to are the X-Wing Collector's Series, which replaced the entire game engine (for the most part) with the one used in X-Wing vs. TIE Fighter, hence better graphics (good) but a stock movie soundtrack (bad). So, what I would like to know is whether or not the old versions bundled here include the Collector's Editions or are the original versions.

You get both.

And yeah, the games are totally still running in 1994-o-vision which you may or may not be able to cope with. In the '98 collectors edition you can probably force antialiasing with your graphics driver so you don't cut your eyes on all the jagged edges, but that might have wacky effects.

[sgt67]

Thanks! I can live with 1994-o-vision so I'll be downloading away.

[AniThyng]

Does the 1994 tie fighter include the final campaigns?

[Fingolfin_Noldor]

Only problem is that Windows 8 apparently *hates* joysticks.

Does the 1994 tie fighter include the final campaigns?

The 1998 did. The 1994 TIE Fighter required lots of floppy disks to install the damn thing... along with that stupid memory requirement.

[Executor32]

The DOS versions included with both games are the Collector's CD versions, so yes.

[AniThyng]

Only problem is that Windows 8 apparently *hates* joysticks.

Does the 1994 tie fighter include the final campaigns?

The 1998 did. The 1994 TIE Fighter required lots of floppy disks to install the damn thing... along with that stupid memory requirement.

Thanks. Yeah I remember. Back then my PC had a...what, 600mb hdd? felt like it would never run out.

Then I got Daggerfall...but I digress.

I doubt I will ever get a joystick again - how does it play using keyboard? My recollection from the dim recesses of 1994 suggest that it was not optimal at all.

[Jub]

I doubt I will ever get a joystick again - how does it play using keyboard? My recollection from the dim recesses of 1994 suggest that it was not optimal at all.

I'd play it with a control pad, it's not optimal, but you can make it work. You can also get a mouse to joystick emulator, but I haven't tried any of those.

[Joun_Lord]

Only problem is that Windows 8 apparently *hates* joysticks.

Does the 1994 tie fighter include the final campaigns?

The 1998 did. The 1994 TIE Fighter required lots of floppy disks to install the damn thing... along with that stupid memory requirement.

Thanks. Yeah I remember. Back then my PC had a...what, 600mb hdd? felt like it would never run out.

Then I got Daggerfall...but I digress.

I doubt I will ever get a joystick again - how does it play using keyboard? My recollection from the dim recesses of 1994 suggest that it was not optimal at all.

I still got an ancient Win 95 computer with a massive 1GB hard drive sitting in my closet. And I can still remember thinking that was pretty darn big.

Fast forward to today where I recently bought a teensy tiny el cheapo memory card with over 16 times the capacity to stick in my woefully outdated smart phone that is probably several times more powerful then that computer. My current computer has for its primary hard drive a drive that is a 1 Terabyte.

Things like that make me feel old and I ain't even 30 yet.

[Thanas]

I doubt I will ever get a joystick again - how does it play using keyboard? My recollection from the dim recesses of 1994 suggest that it was not optimal at all.

I'd play it with a control pad, it's not optimal, but you can make it work. You can also get a mouse to joystick emulator, but I haven't tried any of those.

You need both the keyboard and the joystick to play Tie Fighter, it was a game where you had to do a lot of things manually (especially considering the difficulty). Things like transferring energy to shields and vice versa, or modulating your shields so that the strong side is up front or in back are critical to surviving the missions. The dificulty is really hard in that game.