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Hello everyone.
As many of you may know, Relic (makers of Homeworld) recently had released Homeworld source code to the public, so now it's possible to make a Mac version of this great game :)
The good (I believe) news is that I just started porting it, the bad news is that it definately will take some time to finish, as I'm able to work on it only in my spare time. So please, don't be too excited yet ;)
But the main reason I write so early about this is to find out if anyone else seriously thinks about making Homeworld for Mac. It would be a little pointless to have more than one port of this game, so if anyone makes Mac version, please let me know.
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More power to you and good luck. It would be nice to see a mac version of this classic game.
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I'd say go for it. Anything for the Mac community is a good thing. More power to you!
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thanks god... i thought nobody would notice that the source code was released. Unfortunately I'm not able to help you as I know nothing about programming.
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I bet the folks at coderus are trying it out to check for bugs in MacDX. That would be brilliant if it worked!
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I'd lend a hand if I could write a line of code!
I understand that the game is written in a very Windows-specific language and it will be difficult to port?
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I can't program, but go to www.idevgames.com and post on their forums, quite a few programers there might help.
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ALRIGHT!!! thanks alot i heard it was a great game, cant wait for it.
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Quote:Hello everyone.
As many of you may know, Relic (makers of Homeworld) recently had released Homeworld source code to the public, so now it's possible to make a Mac version of this great game :)
The good (I believe) news is that I just started porting it, the bad news is that it definately will take some time to finish, as I'm able to work on it only in my spare time. So please, don't be too excited yet ;)
But the main reason I write so early about this is to find out if anyone else seriously thinks about making Homeworld for Mac. It would be a little pointless to have more than one port of this game, so if anyone makes Mac version, please let me know.
This game is really timeless, and I think you shouldn't worry about getting this thing ported quickly. Just take your time, as the Mac community appreciates the effort greatly! A classic game like this available for the Mac would be excellent.
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I can't wait! My PC friends have been flaming me for years about it. Of course, these were the same friends who bought X-Boxes soley for HALO. I just chuckled and bided my time...so when they say, hah, we've got homeworld...I say, HA, we've got a better version of HALO with custom mods and better weapons and maps...
So, to make a long story short, well, still long...show whitey who's boss, get Homeworld ported.
(By whitey, I mean Bill Gates)
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omg.. someone is finally porting Homeworld to mac! I'll be eagerly waiting just as everyone else is. I used to go to my friends house, kick him off his comp and play homeworld :)
btw, what about the expansion, Cataclysm? did the release the source for that too?
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Quote:omg.. someone is finally porting Homeworld to mac! I'll be eagerly waiting just as everyone else is. I used to go to my friends house, kick him off his comp and play homeworld :)
btw, what about the expansion, Cataclysm? did the release the source for that too?
I don't profess to know anything about the game engine, but from gameplay experience, I don't recall a major revision in the game engine in Cataclysm. It might just be supplemented units, missions, etc. that would require little to no porting expertise but rather resource moving (unlikely,) or it could require a major overhaul for this lone porter (unfortunately is probably the case.)
Let's just be happy he's doing the original!
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well i hope he doesn't get burdened by the port alone and wish him luck in finding someone to help him in the port, whether it be just the orginal or the expansion included. i just wanna play space admiral :)
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Quote:Hello everyone.
As many of you may know, Relic (makers of Homeworld) recently had released Homeworld source code to the public, so now it's possible to make a Mac version of this great game :)
The good (I believe) news is that I just started porting it, the bad news is that it definately will take some time to finish, as I'm able to work on it only in my spare time. So please, don't be too excited yet ;)
But the main reason I write so early about this is to find out if anyone else seriously thinks about making Homeworld for Mac. It would be a little pointless to have more than one port of this game, so if anyone makes Mac version, please let me know.
Good luck with it! I will certainly buy it! However, I must suggest that you contact the guys at MacDX and maybe work with them to make the port easier. No point a whole lot of people working on the same peice of code.
Also, **maybe** some of the guys at Westlake might be able to help you, maybe even Ryan Gordon or tigital if you're patient enough to wait for Duke3D OS X or Freespace 2 to finish being ported. But the chances of that is fairly slim.
What's your past programming experience been like?
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Didn't know they released the source code, thats pretty good news for us!
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Thanks to everyone :)
For now, I don't think I need any help, as I'm progressing rather smoothly (although, I just started). Anyway, I really, really appreciate your will to help :)
I'll try to post info about progress on this forum from time to time, so watch this space :)
As for my experience, I'm programming for about 10 years, so I'm not a rookie ;-) I recently ported Another War to Mac, and right now I'm working for People Can Fly on Painkiller for Windows and X-Box (that's, by the way, the main reason Homeworld port can take some time - my daily job has much higher priority :)
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How the heck did you manage to download it? I've
been "in the queue" forever...
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I gave some thought to working on a port of this myself. I downloaded the code, and got the CD at CompUSA in the shrikwraped jewel case budget stacks.
The biggest obsticle I see is how to get the game asset files onto a mac hard drive, since they seem to be tied up inside the installer app on the game disk.
Other than that, I have a steep learning curve to deal with because I mostly work on office type apps, and am not familiar with stuff like sockets, sound API, or OpenGL API. Also I'm not optimistic about the app ever working over a network.
There's also some debate on what you can or can't do with the license that you had to agree to when you downloaded the source.
Anyway, I'd still like to give it a shot. Send me an email, maybe we could cooperate.
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hey gang,
...in another example of my easily distractible programming style, I also downloaded the source and have started looking thru it...on the one hand, it should be easier than freespace2 was, because it's already got the opengl stuff in there...on the other hand, there seems to be a bit of assembly code that will be a reaaaaallly big challenge to get around: I'm looking at /src/Game/etg.c and task.c, which appear to be some "task manager" that doesn't use functions, but actually seems to jump to certain places in memory!! Maybe I just don't understand it yet...and, of course, we can probably count on alot of byteswapping to sniff out...
...also, the bink video codec is commercial, so we'll not have cutscenes (unless some are done in engine)...haven't looked at the sound and network stuff, which has us mired in freespace...
...so, I'm not going to make it a priority for awhile (working on tcl/tk mostly atm), but I'm definitely interested in seeing this thing work...
...don't know if anyone has seen this, but this guy already has some menu screenshots on linux:
http://www.thereisnospork.com/projects/homeworld/
...also, to the poster that is still in queue: I was only able to d/l correctly when using IE (blech: good indication of the x86-centric attitude of relic)...and even then, make sure it only starts once in the download manager...
l8r
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