Metroid Prime PC Port Via Engine Rewrite (Update: 2½ Hours of Gameplay)

SweetVermouth · Sep 13, 2018

Isn't this basically comparable to someone programming their own audio player that can play mp3 files? I mean it's a lot more sophisticaded than just an audio file but in theory it's the same approach and in that video it just shows what the thing can do the same way someone would play a random mp3 file to show how their own programmed audio player works.

takriel said:
Awesome. I take it there are no loading doors in this version?

I think technically there are always loading times except on a modern PC they would be so quick the doors would open almost instantly.

Kromeo · Sep 13, 2018

Cartridge Games said:
Essentially just a lot of effort for piracy when you could just dump your copy and play on dolphin

I still can't get it to play on dolphin without the stuttering when you open doors

Mugen · Sep 13, 2018

Cool stuff.

FreezerGeezer · Sep 13, 2018

This forum has so many bizarre members.

Impressive work by the developers and sounds like a cool project.

Grigorig · Sep 13, 2018

Dr. Caroll said:
While I'm sure they'll implement controller support, half the reason to do this is in the first place is to implement proper mouse+keyboard controls.

Oh that was my biggest question. The way he's looking around seemed kinda sluggish which is why I thought it was controller. Sweet...

Grigorig · Sep 13, 2018

Dr. Caroll said:
The developer behind this project is also responsible for Turok/Turok 2/Powerslave/Forsaken Remastered.

I thought the Powerslave beta was released openly and then C&D'd into oblivion (very glad I grabbed a copy..) Did they release it in the end?

Look at TimeSplitters. Sure, you've been able to emulate TimeSplitters 1-3 for many years, but that's no substitute for proper PC ports which THQ Nordic are presumably currently work on.

Wait WHAT is this a thing? I would kill for PC versions of these games.. Not sure if you've ever played Goldeneye with 60fps and mouse injector but holy hell it's an absolute joy to play. Would love a similar experience with TimeSplitters.

Blackpuppy · Sep 13, 2018

Guys, this isnt piracy. They're taking PPC machine code, figuring out what the hell it's doing, and re interpreting it in a high level language (C? C++?)

They don't have the original developer code. Just the digital 1s and 0s de-complied into machine code.

So a really terrible example: they're taking "sys $ff0086; mov $ff0087; add $ff11875" and tranforming it to "hello world"

hanmik · Sep 13, 2018

and people complain about Spider-Man being a cop... lol

Durante · Sep 13, 2018

This is as impressive as this thread is embarrassing.

So, very impressive indeed!

AlecKoKuTan · Sep 13, 2018

XSX said:
I like how one of the devs from Prime tweeted about how cool this is, but the "experts" on here jumped on the "IT'S PIRACY"

Lighten up.

All of this.

Cyanity · Sep 13, 2018

Shoe said:
Yeah, exactly. None of the game assets are included, so you'd use your own rip.

That's ingenious. It's essentially a pc emulator for one game. Which means it can't be C&D'd.

edit - lmfao at the narcs in here

FancyPants · Sep 13, 2018

Shoe said:
Been following this project for quite a while - super impressed with the Prime engine reverse engineering effort! Fools will say that it's no different than Dolphin, but this will run natively on far inferior hardware, and is a greater resource for the burgeoning Prime hacking community.

Dolphin already runs on potatoes. Shit, it runs full speed Metroid Prime on tablets.

Molten_ · Sep 13, 2018

so like, would this open the door for modding the game? kind of like doom source ports? if so, that's actually kind of insane and I'd like to see this for other games, like Ocarina of Time.

edit: to clarify, I'm aware that mods already exist for OoT ... but if I'm reading into this right, this kind of thing would make modding far easier. which is cool.

SweetVermouth · Sep 13, 2018

FancyPants said:
Dolphin already runs on potatoes. Shit, it runs full speed Metroid Prime on tablets.

I have tested Dolphin multiple times and it always had stutters and framedrops and slowdowns. If it doesn't run as well as on the original console it's not worth it.

Deleted member 11018 · Sep 13, 2018

Molten_ said:
so like, would this open the door for modding the game? kind of like doom source ports? if so, that's actually kind of insane and I'd like to see this for other games, like Ocarina of Time.

If it is open source, yup, it will be wide open for any gameplay improvement one can make :)
I find it amazing... it take a tremendous amount of work (and i find it touching the original devs give their input to help producing this simulator).

Deleted member 1849 · Sep 13, 2018

Molten_ said:
so like, would this open the door for modding the game? kind of like doom source ports? if so, that's actually kind of insane and I'd like to see this for other games, like Ocarina of Time.

edit: to clarify, I'm aware that mods already exist for OoT ... but if I'm reading into this right, this kind of thing would make modding far easier. which is cool.

I believe modding is one of reasons they are doing this, actually.

Molten_ · Sep 13, 2018

MikeNeko said:
If it is open source, yup, it will be wide open for any gameplay improvement one can make :)
I find it amazing... it take a tremendous amount of work (and i find it touching the original devs give their input to help producing this simulator).

Nappael said:
I believe modding is one of reasons they are doing this, actually.

Dope. I hope someday we will get a fully-fledged Metroid Prime level editor. Imagine the possibilities.

Barrel Cannon · Sep 13, 2018

Looks good but I can't imagine playing it with proper mouse support till I try. Which prolly won't happen. C&D definitely incoming

flare

Deleted member 442 · Sep 13, 2018

That is really cool and really shows a level of love for the game that you don't see all that often.

Deleted member 1759 · Sep 13, 2018

ITT: why do you people dare to play my dear Nintendo franchise on your filthy PCs?

Pirates! Copyright infringements! Moral grey zone!

spam musubi · Sep 13, 2018

This is awesome. Source ports are some of the best things in gaming.

The posters in this thread derailing are the worst.

Deleted member 1849 · Sep 13, 2018

MikeNeko said:
If it is open source, yup, it will be wide open for any gameplay improvement one can make :)
I find it amazing... it take a tremendous amount of work (and i find it touching the original devs give their input to help producing this simulator).

https://github.com/AxioDL/urde

MIT

Doskoi Panda · Sep 13, 2018

The ignorance displayed throughout this thread is downright saddening

Deleted member 11018 · Sep 13, 2018

Nappael said:
https://github.com/AxioDL/urde

MIT

That's great :) Thank you veeeery much !

Blackpuppy · Sep 13, 2018

Cyanity said:
It's essentially a pc emulator for one game. Which means it can'd be C&D'd.

Barrel Cannon said:
C&D definitely incoming

flare

How can this project possibly be C&D'd? Where is the C&D for Dolphin? Mupen64? BSNES?

They are reverse engineering the engine. That's all they're doing. There is not a single line of Nintendo code or a byte of Nintendo assets on their Github page. Heck, they don't even use the name Metroid. Just 'Retro Games Engine'

Deleted member 3010 · Sep 13, 2018

Just so you know: You can actually config Dolphin to play Metroid Prime Trilogy with M/KB setup. I completed MP entirely like that last year and it felt great.

That said, this project is impressive so far.

Yarbskoo · Sep 13, 2018

Damn that looks cool. I'd love to play Metroid Prime with proper mouse support. I hope Nintendo doesn't decide to get shitty about it.

Damn this thread's a mess.

Cyanity · Sep 13, 2018

Blackpuppy said:
How can this project possibly be C&D'd? Where is the C&D for Dolphin? Mupen64? BSNES?

They are reverse engineering the engine. That's all they're doing. There is not a single line of Nintendo code or a byte of Nintendo assets on their Github page.

can't* the word in my post was can't.

Blackpuppy · Sep 13, 2018

Cyanity said:
can't* the word in my post was can't.

My bad!

Chaosblade · Sep 13, 2018

Blackpuppy said:
How can this project possibly be C&D'd? Where is the C&D for Dolphin? Mupen64? BSNES?

They are reverse engineering the engine. That's all they're doing. There is not a single line of Nintendo code or a byte of Nintendo assets.

It could still be C&D'd in theory if Nintendo feels threatened by the project. Nintendo has money to throw at litigation, the people working on the project probably don't have money to defend themselves in court even if they are in the right.

This is a really cool project though and I really hope it gets finished.

Blackpuppy · Sep 13, 2018

Chaosblade said:
It could still be C&D'd in theory if Nintendo feels threatened by the project. Nintendo has money to throw at litigation, the people working on the project probably don't have money to defend themselves in court even if they are in the right.

This is a really cool project though and I really hope it gets finished.

But what's the legal basis? Reverse engineering is legal. Emulation is legal. Where's the C&D for CEMU? or Yuzu? These projects are much more threatening for Nintendo than a 'source' port, but Nintendo can't do anything because these developers are following the law.

AM2R got shutdown for re-using sprites and Nintendo characters.
The Romsites got shut down for freely distributing their intellectual property.

FancyPants · Sep 13, 2018

SweetVermouth said:
I have tested Dolphin multiple times and it always had stutters and framedrops and slowdowns. If it doesn't run as well as on the original console it's not worth it.

Is this on a 486? My ancient 7 year old work laptop runs Metroid Prime perfectly with supersampling and added visual oomph cranked up.

Deleted member 1849 · Sep 13, 2018

Blackpuppy said:
But what's the legal basis? Reverse engineering is legal. Emulation is legal. Where's the C&D for CEMU? or Yuzu? These projects are much more threatening for Nintendo than a 'source' port, but Nintendo can't do anything because these developers are following the law.

AM2R got shutdown for re-using sprites and Nintendo characters.

There is no legal basis at all. This is legal.

However, Nintendo could still try it, and some devs would just accept it rather than trying to fight it in court. It's unlikely because otherwise they'd already be trying it on Dolphin, etc.

ArnoldJRimmer · Sep 13, 2018

I find nintendo fans defense of nintendo when it comes to projects like this so damn strange.

Especially given this company's history and old games.

Radamammuth · Sep 13, 2018

I played prime on dolphin hires textures and 3d with no stutters with the Jp dudes build.. the name escapes me right now. It was glorious!

Anyway I think this actually looks better

SweetVermouth · Sep 13, 2018

FancyPants said:
Is this on a 486? My ancient 7 year old work laptop runs Metroid Prime perfectly with supersampling and added visual oomph cranked up.

No on a PC with 16GB RAM a GTX960 and an Intel Xeon Quad whatever with 3.4Ghz. It simply doesn't run perfectly, stop lying. I had dozens of people telling me how "perfectly" this runs and then I see what they think is perfect and it has framedrops and microstutters all over the place. Apparently for some people having "5 dropped frames in 30 seconds" is still perfect. It isn't. Enabling pre compiling shaders improves a lot but it still isn't perfect and considerably worse than the original release.
I do not even care about enhancing the resolution and whatnot, I'd much rather play the game in 480p without a single issue instead.

Deleted member 7450 · Sep 13, 2018

That is fucking fantastic and I wish I could download it right fucking now.

Damn impressed, I always thought about stuff like this.

Al3x1s · Sep 13, 2018

Cool but if its primary purpose is Metroid Prime fan games as it was mentioned somewhere, isn't it kind of unnecessary to go to the trouble of recreating everything exactly as it was in the original game so that an original copy can be read and played through it? Why not make one's own FPS/A engine with the functions needed for MP-like gameplay in a from-the-ground-up for PC experience (basically the weapons, abilities, level entities, world streaming, A.I. etc for people to slot their own assets and campaigns on with editing to match)? Just a question, the project is super cool, it just seems like the harder way to go about doing something like that. Unless the primary purpose is to play the original game(s, if they plan to add support for 2 and 3) in a native PC environment, then never mind.

BasilZero · Sep 13, 2018

By using their own assets and they could have made a different game but Nintendo is gonna c&d this to hell regardless what a dev says lol

Should have completed it and released when done, can never understand why people always reveal things like this early

PaulloDEC · Sep 13, 2018

BasilZero said:
By using their own assets and they could have made a different game but Nintendo is gonna c&d this to hell regardless what a dev says lol

Should have completed it and released when done, can never understand why people always reveal things like this early

No, but you...

I...

You don't unders...

Stormkyleis · Sep 13, 2018

This is very impressive. I wonder if this will spawn interesting hacks.

Blackpuppy · Sep 13, 2018

BasilZero said:
By using their own assets and they could have made a different game but Nintendo is gonna c&d this to hell regardless what a dev says lol

Should have completed it and released when done, can never understand why people always reveal things like this early

They're not using any assets. They're just creating a game engine.

In the future, you'll download a small executable, and the user will have to provide a Metroid Prime iso. This executable will then take all the assets from your legal copy of MP and run a Windows, MacOS, Linux native version of the game.

DonMigs85 · Sep 13, 2018

Awesome, maybe they can do it for F-Zero GX too

Deleted member 6730 · Sep 13, 2018

Blackpuppy said:
They're not using any assets. They're just creating a game engine.

In the future, you'll download a small executable, and the user will have to provide a Metroid Prime iso. This executable will then take all the assets from your legal copy of MP and run a native version of the game.

I wish someone said this earlier. Nobody has made it clear you still have to use their own copy of the game.

Barrel Cannon · Sep 13, 2018

Blackpuppy said:
How can this project possibly be C&D'd? Where is the C&D for Dolphin? Mupen64? BSNES?

They are reverse engineering the engine. That's all they're doing. There is not a single line of Nintendo code or a byte of Nintendo assets on their Github page. Heck, they don't even use the name Metroid. Just 'Retro Games Engine'

Emulation can't be C&D'd. However from my understanding a game that is reverse engineered and then had it's assets recreated like this can definitively be served C&D'd. It might not hold up in a court but a small guy like this team probably wouldn't want to deal with battling Nintendo. The case is really similar to the case of Metroid AM2R.

If it starts being released to the public then it's more likely to be served one(not sure if it already is)

edit: Ok nevermind I misunderstood this project. I thought they created their own assets. It sounds like it's just an engine that runs the assets through it. Not sure anymore if it'll be C&D'd

Blackpuppy · Sep 13, 2018

Barrel Cannon said:
it's assets recreated

No assets are being recreated. The game engine will rip the original textures, models, sounds etc off of your legal copy of the game when you run it. Without the original game you can't run this port.

They are only making engine code.

Deleted member 2913 · Sep 13, 2018

Pretty cool, gonna keep track of this.

Also yikes, talk about "I dont know what I'm talking about but i'm gonna keep fighting" the thread.

Spyder_Monkey said:
I wish someone said this earlier. Nobody has made it clear you still have to use their own copy of the game.

People have said it multiple times in this thread.

Virtua Sanus · Sep 13, 2018

This thread is a fever dream. We are seriously bringing up morality?

Awesome work. I am pretty surprised how well Metroid Prime holds up now too. Great art trumps all I suppose!

Quad Lasers · Sep 13, 2018

Spyder_Monkey said:
I wish someone said this earlier. Nobody has made it clear you still have to use their own copy of the game.

There are numerous people literally saying this on the front page.

Deleted member 6730 · Sep 13, 2018

FriskyrumX said:
People have said it multiple times in this thread.

Is it in the OP? Nothing about this has been made clear since the OP calls it a port.

Metroid Prime PC Port Via Engine Rewrite (Update: 2½ Hours of Gameplay)

Editor/Writer at Popaco.dk

Dark Souls Man

User requested account closure

User requested account closure

User requested account closure

User requested account closure

One Winged Slayer

User requested account closure

User requested account closure

Resettlement Advisor

User requested account closure

User requested account closure

Visited by Knack

User requested account closure

User requested account closure

User requested account closure