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Unreal Tournament 99 running on WASM (2017)
- personalityson 4y agohttps://quakejs.com/ https://quakejs.com/ https://play-cs.com/en/servers https://play-cs.com/en/servers
- all2 4y agoI spent many hours in Unreal GOTYE honing my reflexes for Counter Strike Source. Put the bots on godlike, increase the gameplay speed to 200% and then die more often than not. It is brutal and makes other FPSs feel like they're molasses.
- senko 4y agoNote that it's just the intro, for bandwidth/copyright reasons: > This is just the intro flyby to show it works. The whole game is not included because it's a big download and not mine to give out.
- chupasaurus 4y ago> Note that it's just the intro So 100 to 200 MB of PRECACHING /s
- dvh 4y agoTechnically a DLC
- pjmlp 4y agoDLC at least are kept around for the next time.
- chupasaurus 4y agoThe joke was that the very first screen in the game is blue text "PRECACHING..." on the black screen which stayed for minutes on 99' hardware, so it could also be an intro of sorts.
- smcl 4y agoA year or so back I got back into UT99, and was pleasantly surprised that on ~2021 era hardware PRECACHING flashes for a couple miliseconds or so :D
- chupasaurus 4y agoYeah, it's always there for at least one frame.
- deleted 4y ago[deleted]
- remram 4y agoThis should be stated in bigger letters. I started a match and waited A WHILE for it to load.
- cyclotron3k 4y agoWorth mentioning this was first published in 2017 EDIT ...and now the title has been updated, so I look like an idiot!
- pvg 4y agoSmall HN thread from then https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=14216439 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=14216439
- MuffinFlavored 4y agoWASM wasn't cool then? :)
- doubled112 4y agoThere's something about the pace of older FPSes that the new ones don't match. Plus, turns out realism isn't something I ever wanted in an FPS. I still fire UT99 up and play a few bot matches once in a while. Now I can do it in my browser?
- galleywest200 4y agoCheck out Prodeus on Steam or Xbox Gamepass if you are trying to scratch that itch with a modern take.
- MushyRoom 4y agoSelf hosted communities. I can still play on ~5 CS 1.6 servers where the same people hang out since 20 years.
- serf 4y ago>Self hosted communities. if that were the only catch then people like myself and parent wouldn't return to these games simply to fight a bot match.
- doubled112 4y agoSome of it is because I am terrible, to be honest. I have a hunch that most the people still hosting servers for games 20+ years later are very good at it. The noobs and casuals like myself moved on ages ago. Being blown to bits before the whole spawn animation plays repeatedly is amusing for a while, but the charm wears off fast. I don’t have the time to dedicate to get good. This was my Quake experience a couple years ago, at least.
- thot_experiment 4y agoIt's crazy to me how unpopular arena FPS is these days. To me it's pure joy, bunnyhopping around a map in Q3 dueling rail vs rocket in the air. I've had fun moments in modern FPSs but nothing comes close to Q3 or UT2k4/UT99 except games like Reflex Arena which are basically Q3CPMA with a modern engine (amazingly well done engine too). It's not nostalgia goggles, I still get the same response every time I play.
- gavinray 4y agoOne of the earliest memories I have of being alive is playing UT99 on my grandfather's computer (I was born in '97). He was an electrical engineer and very DIY/handy, so had gadgets and new tech about the house constantly.
- loeg 4y agoNote: loud.
- magicalhippo 4y agoIt always was.
- corytheboyd 4y agoThere has also been a fully playable version of Quake that runs in the browser for many years. Super cool, was great for slacking off at work back in the day haha Edit: Quake Live it was called. Unclear if it's still offered in the browser as it seems to have made it's way to Steam.
- ZiiS 4y agoQuake Live was a plugin, the game itself was running nativity not using the browser. Though the have also been several WASM ports of quake.
- modeless 4y agoQuake Live was a plugin IIRC (remember plugins?). This is using WebGL and WASM, no plugins.
- pxlpshr 4y agoOne of my first startup experiences was working on the multiplayer platform that supported Quake Live. We eventually licensed it to Riot Games for what became League of Legends but both games were significantly delayed and we ran out of funding.
- sergiotapia 4y agoRuns perfectly on my pixel 6! Great job!
- deleted 4y ago[deleted]
- NickC25 4y agoawesome! UT is probably my favorite PC shooter - have so many memories of running a LAN version of UT2003 back in high school and playing with a few friends during open hours. Don't know why, but the UT series has, for me, been more enjoyable than modern FPS games like CoD. I'd take UT99 or UT2003/4 or the more recent UT over any crap that EA puts out every year.
- Shared404 4y agoXonotic may be of interest to you, it's a go-to for some of my friends and I.
- hot_gril 4y agoI like AssaultCube even more. Unreal/Quake were always too fast and cartoonish for me. New-style shooters are too slow and realistic. AC is in between, both in terms of speed and realism, though more on the old side.
- deleted 4y ago[deleted]
- macspoofing 4y agoCool cool cool ... though these kinds of browser proof-of-concepts have been around for a decade (more than a decade if you include Flash+alchemy running Quake). Is the browser coming back as a gaming platform yet?
- pdntspa 4y agoUgh I hope not. Battlefield 4 took a thousand steps back when they tried to make all the UI a web app If this shit becomes mainstream say goodbye to ever owning your data ever again
- hot_gril 4y agoI don't want to "own" a 50GB platform-specific root-accessing game.
- pdntspa 4y agoThen don't buy it? I don't want to rent something that doesn't recognize platform conventions or take full advantage of my hardware and storage, when it can and should have Neither do I want to have to pay some rent-seeking wanterpreneurial fuck a monthly fee to access content that runs better locally
- hot_gril 4y agoThen don't rent it.
- SahAssar 4y agoThat started with BF3, and worked pretty OK there.
- pdntspa 4y agoIt worked horribly! It worked so poorly that BF4 had to switch back to an in-game server browser
- hot_gril 4y agoWonder why it doesn't work in MobileSafari.
- langarus 4y agoI get Uncaught 72428808 - Exception catching is disabled, this exception cannot be caught. Compile with -s DISABLE_EXCEPTION_CATCHING=0 or DISABLE_EXCEPTION_CATCHING=2 to catch when starting a game, anyone have an idea why? On both chrome and edge.
- segmondy 4y ago
- jrockway 4y agoI ran into this too. The documentation says: > This is just the intro flyby to show it works. The whole game is not included because it's a big download and not mine to give out. > Since there are files missing, the main menu crashes if you try to start a game. This is known.
- vivaldidev 4y agoSo when are we going to see modern Unity and Unreal games running on the web? Games seems like one of the last areas that is a holdout on desktop. We've seen terminals/IDE, productivity software, and even design software like Figma run in the browser, but not 3D games which is a multi-hundred billion dollar industry in it's own right. Correct me if I'm wrong, but it seems like a massive opportunity for both game engine providers and portals, especially with the arrival of WebGPU on the horizon.
- dylan604 4y agoI still like that physical discs can be played, maybe just in campaign mode, without network/subscription. Browser based games will go to GaaS subscription or even "Insert $.25 to Continue" very quickly.
- squarefoot 4y agoAnd when whoever controls the server pulls the plug, it's game over. Definitely interesting technically-wise, but considering the implications, no thanks.
- giraffe_lady 4y agoI still like churning butter by hand but I don't really expect the local hardware store to carry a wide selection of butter churns you know?
- dylan604 4y agoSo go out to the woodshop and make your own! Churning your own butter in a store bought churn is mailing it in.
- quickthrower2 4y agoWhy hamstring the game by running it in a VM?
- _joel 4y ago
- panzi 4y agoVery cool, even though the only thing that works is the opening. Anything past that crashes the game (player setup, starting a new game or training session).
- SLWW 4y agoplay-cs.com allows you to play the OG Counter Strike with people through your browser
- brundolf 4y agoOnce a few years ago I was working on some internal web-based dev tools at a company. Some of the users requested a "quake console" in the browser UI (a slide-down console) I took it a step further and made an iframe-embedded version of Quake deathmatch pop up when you typed the konami code. It was a hit :)
- PTOB 4y agoYou are the reason people dream of becoming computer programmers.
- aliqot 4y agoYou ever see something that is relatively minor, but because it hooks something in your subconscious it inspires a great emotion? It's not a sadness, but some form of eustress. This does that for me. Thanks to the devs who put in the time to do this, both the game and the wasm port.
- branon 4y agoicculus' ports are legendary, had many hours of fun with the u42004 linux port. nice to see this!
- singularity2001 4y agojs exception on ipad firefox Localization: No localization: Core.Progress.Loading (int)
- kernaussage 4y agoThe github page states that this project doesn't work with mobile safari. Therefore all browsers based on the safari engine on ios including firefox will not work.
- snarfy 4y agoI'm still sad Epic abandoned UT4 for Fortnite. UT is such a better game.
- smcl 4y agoI had no idea about this until my friend - who's still active at the top level in UT99 in a couple of game modes - gave me the lowdown a year or so ago. For anyone who doesn't know what we're talking about - a sequel to Unreal Tournament was announced in the mid-2010s. But it was to be developed relatively openly and in collaboration with the existing UT community. There are builds available that are very playable (including source code[0]) and as far as I know it was shaping up to be a great arena shooter. Then Fortnite exploded in popularity - and UT4 (or just "UT"?) was quietly de-prioritized, and has set in limbo ever since. It's a shame. I still have some hope that it'll get dusted off, polished and given the attention it deserves at some point. A few people in the community feel quite hostile towards Epic, though, so they may have to work extra hard to regain that following. Edit: ALSO I figured I'd add something interesting. The UT99 unrealscript source was semi-officially released and Epic did permit the community to release patches ... on the condition that they didn't break compatibility with the released version. That is, if I went back to my parents' house, dug out my old CD copy from 23 years ago, installed it and tried to play on one of the community servers, it would still work. Which is a shame since there are a handful of updates and quality-of-life improvements (for example, net code is supposed to be a bit janky) they would like to do but simply can't. Another missed opportunity :-/
- mschuster91 4y agoCould that source code, in theory, be ported to UE5? So basically, it looks and feels like UT99 but maybe with upscaled assets and better rendering quality?
- smcl 4y agoI think that would require a pretty substantial overhaul - the models + textures for players and items are accessible and in a relatively readable format, I'm not an expert but I guess they could be ported. Maybe some conversion is possible for the UI, levels, music, sounds too. However a lot of the game logic is implemented in UnrealScript, and it'd need to be entirely rewritten in (I think) C++ for UT5. I suspect that would be a fairly in-depth task, and at the end of it all you'd have a slightly shinier version that nobody plays because they're happy enough with UT99 despite its faults. Might be fun as a technical exercise if you're bored, though :D The UT99 UnrealScript sources are here if you ever want to play around - text editor support for UnrealScript files isn't great but if you can move past that, it's really quite moddable and extensible, I really wish I made the effort to dig into it earlier when the game was more current: https://github.com/Slipyx/UT99 https://github.com/Slipyx/UT99
- rwb_1912 4y agoUT GOTY edition is still my favourite FPS. Fortnite is still good, but feels more childlike than I prefer
- mustardo 4y agoUT99 GOTY always amazed me with how well it runs and plays on abysmal hardware, can lan party it on pretty much any PC
- bit-hack 4y agoWhat I'm curious about is how this has been done. I don't think that the source for UT99 has been released, so does icculus have access to the source and has then ported it to emscripten, or has it been decompiled from x86 and then recompiled for WASM, or is it running on an x86 emulation layer programmed in WASM? I presume it was from source, given that everything else is prohibitively hard just for a demo like this.
- smcl 4y agoSome members of the UT99 community have access to the sources
- onnnon 4y agoUT99 is still being maintained by the community if you want to give it a try! https://www.oldunreal.com/ https://www.oldunreal.com/ You can find the latest patches on GitHub. https://github.com/OldUnreal/UnrealTournamentPatches https://github.com/OldUnreal/UnrealTournamentPatches