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If you think this port is related to tour point; The source code for Command and Conquer generals (and other C&C games) was released a while back. This port use

If you think this port is related to tour point; The source code for Command and Conquer generals (and other C&C games) was released a while back. This port uses that source code. So this port is not based on reverse engineering. The port even states someone else (manually) already did the hard work of porting it to macOS and Linux (so not an LLM): > Built on EA's GPL v3 source release via fbraz3/GeneralsX (which did the heavy lifting of the macOS/Linux port — this fork adds the iOS/iPadOS port and a set of engine fixes

port11 3mo ago
Then the title is incorrect. Generals has been on the macOS App Store for years.
- embedding-shape 3mo ago
  > Then the title is incorrect. Generals has been on the macOS App Store for years. Neither the HN submission or GitHub repository says it's first or novel though? Just that it's (another) port of it?
  - flohofwoe 3mo ago
    The HN title makes it sound like Fable did the port from the original code base to macOS and iOS, but this is very wrong (the project's readme does a much better job). It's merely enhanching an existing macOS version to also run on iOS, which tbh is very trivial and not at all impressive for any LLM. The actually important work (of making the original code release portable and then create Linux and macOS ports) had already been done in https://github.com/fbraz3/GeneralsX https://github.com/fbraz3/GeneralsX. There is really not much to see here.
    - embedding-shape 3mo ago
      > > It's merely enhanching an existing macOS version to also run on iOS, which tbh is very trivial and not at all impressive for any LLM. It's so crazy to remember sitting in front of W3Schools after school trying to learn PHP to create a website, and hear people today saying it isn't very impressive a fucking machine can automatically translate/port code from one platform to another, even a machine doing that with PHP3 > PHP4 code back then would have been cool but nope, "not at all impressive" just because things improved so much, so quickly, everyone got quickly used to the status quo. I agree with you in general though, the title does make it sound like more was done than what was done in actuality, as it was just a iOS port. Still, I'd wager it seems interesting enough, given it's on the front page right now.
      - flohofwoe 3mo ago
        > Still, I'd wager it seems interesting enough, given it's on the front page right now. It's a good example of AI psychosis I guess, people reading things into a headline which they want to be true, no matter what reality says ;) When you look at the commit history, the actual changes come down to a few dozen lines of code, all of them absolutely trivial, and most of those code changes seem to be cherry-picked bugfixes from the original project.
        embedding-shape 3mo ago
        > It's a good example of AI psychosis at work ;) More like "wisdom of the crowds" (for better or worse) unless you're trying to argue that everyone who upvotes/downvotes on HN suffers from AI psychosis ;)
        sarchertech 3mo ago
        > everyone who upvotes/downvotes You can’t downvote articles, so a relatively small amount of enthusiastic people slamming upvote will do it.
        cdud3 3mo ago
        The AI bros industry needs to keep the impression that employees can be replaced with something more cheap since otherwise where will all the money come from that is burned right now?
    - taormina 3mo ago
      HN titles are not the best. Have you ported a desktop title to mobile? It is NOT trivial. This is the next step in a continuing chain of work that builds upon the next and next person's work, but this is not a trivial step. If it was so trivial, why hadn't it already been done? The jump to Apple Silicon is net-new work, and they aren't trying to pretend they did more than they did. > This fork — the iOS/iPadOS port (arm64-ios cross-build, DXVK-on-iOS, touch controls, app lifecycle, packaging) and engine fixes, offered upstream They are even asking you to support the original creators on Steam, so they are getting a cut. No one is stealing assets. I would love to see more of this sort of work being done out in the wild, not discouraging it. Were previous steps harder? Absolutely. Doesn't that invalidate this step? No.
      - flohofwoe 3mo ago
        > Have you ported a desktop title to mobile? It is NOT trivial. I created and maintain a cross-platform wrapper library (several over the decades actually) which among other platforms supports macOS and iOS, so I have an idea what's involved. This is a game that renders its own UI, it only needs to use AppKit/UIKit for creating the application window, and from then on hand off all rendering to Metal. When you already have working 'Metal-heavy' macOS code, porting to iOS is indeed trivial these days, the Apple-specific code is at least 90% identical between macOS and iOS. The main difference is mouse input vs touch input, but that's also not a big deal for an RTS since it only needs 'click', 'zoom', 'pan' and 'dragbox-select'. > If it was so trivial, why hadn't it already been done? Because maybe the author of the original Linux+macOS port simply didn't care about iOS or didn't want to put up with the messy iOS development workflow in Xcode?

port11 3mo ago

Then the title is incorrect. Generals has been on the macOS App Store for years.

embedding-shape 3mo ago
> Then the title is incorrect. Generals has been on the macOS App Store for years. Neither the HN submission or GitHub repository says it's first or novel though? Just that it's (another) port of it?
- flohofwoe 3mo ago
  The HN title makes it sound like Fable did the port from the original code base to macOS and iOS, but this is very wrong (the project's readme does a much better job). It's merely enhanching an existing macOS version to also run on iOS, which tbh is very trivial and not at all impressive for any LLM. The actually important work (of making the original code release portable and then create Linux and macOS ports) had already been done in https://github.com/fbraz3/GeneralsX https://github.com/fbraz3/GeneralsX. There is really not much to see here.
  - embedding-shape 3mo ago
    > > It's merely enhanching an existing macOS version to also run on iOS, which tbh is very trivial and not at all impressive for any LLM. It's so crazy to remember sitting in front of W3Schools after school trying to learn PHP to create a website, and hear people today saying it isn't very impressive a fucking machine can automatically translate/port code from one platform to another, even a machine doing that with PHP3 > PHP4 code back then would have been cool but nope, "not at all impressive" just because things improved so much, so quickly, everyone got quickly used to the status quo. I agree with you in general though, the title does make it sound like more was done than what was done in actuality, as it was just a iOS port. Still, I'd wager it seems interesting enough, given it's on the front page right now.
    - flohofwoe 3mo ago
      > Still, I'd wager it seems interesting enough, given it's on the front page right now. It's a good example of AI psychosis I guess, people reading things into a headline which they want to be true, no matter what reality says ;) When you look at the commit history, the actual changes come down to a few dozen lines of code, all of them absolutely trivial, and most of those code changes seem to be cherry-picked bugfixes from the original project.
      - embedding-shape 3mo ago
        > It's a good example of AI psychosis at work ;) More like "wisdom of the crowds" (for better or worse) unless you're trying to argue that everyone who upvotes/downvotes on HN suffers from AI psychosis ;)
        sarchertech 3mo ago
        > everyone who upvotes/downvotes You can’t downvote articles, so a relatively small amount of enthusiastic people slamming upvote will do it.
      - cdud3 3mo ago
        The AI bros industry needs to keep the impression that employees can be replaced with something more cheap since otherwise where will all the money come from that is burned right now?
  - taormina 3mo ago
    HN titles are not the best. Have you ported a desktop title to mobile? It is NOT trivial. This is the next step in a continuing chain of work that builds upon the next and next person's work, but this is not a trivial step. If it was so trivial, why hadn't it already been done? The jump to Apple Silicon is net-new work, and they aren't trying to pretend they did more than they did. > This fork — the iOS/iPadOS port (arm64-ios cross-build, DXVK-on-iOS, touch controls, app lifecycle, packaging) and engine fixes, offered upstream They are even asking you to support the original creators on Steam, so they are getting a cut. No one is stealing assets. I would love to see more of this sort of work being done out in the wild, not discouraging it. Were previous steps harder? Absolutely. Doesn't that invalidate this step? No.
    - flohofwoe 3mo ago
      > Have you ported a desktop title to mobile? It is NOT trivial. I created and maintain a cross-platform wrapper library (several over the decades actually) which among other platforms supports macOS and iOS, so I have an idea what's involved. This is a game that renders its own UI, it only needs to use AppKit/UIKit for creating the application window, and from then on hand off all rendering to Metal. When you already have working 'Metal-heavy' macOS code, porting to iOS is indeed trivial these days, the Apple-specific code is at least 90% identical between macOS and iOS. The main difference is mouse input vs touch input, but that's also not a big deal for an RTS since it only needs 'click', 'zoom', 'pan' and 'dragbox-select'. > If it was so trivial, why hadn't it already been done? Because maybe the author of the original Linux+macOS port simply didn't care about iOS or didn't want to put up with the messy iOS development workflow in Xcode?