Sonic and Sega Retro Message Board: Andrew75 - Viewing Profile - Sonic and Sega Retro Message Board

Update: Mike Wallis Micro Interview! (5/7/2015)

Related threads:
Release thread for STI Engines, 037 and 040 (PC and Saturn): http://forums.sonicr...opic=34038&st=0
Original Retro Leak thread: http://forums.sonicr...showtopic=33545
Original Assembler Leak thread: http://assemblergame...required.54194/
Assembler Release Thread: http://assemblergame...v-builds.55713/
Modding Thread: http://forums.sonicr...showtopic=34041


The Original Teaser Post




==== POINT OF VIEW BUILD OF SONIC X-TREME: ====
(Totally different engine from the STI Engine that we are all familiar with)
(Credits to Jollyroger for getting this build to run on real hardware and not just the dev hardware)

Release Trailer:

Credits to Andrew75.




Mini Documentary.

Credits to Borman.




Okay Guys ! So yeah, We have here the never before seen engine build of Sonic Xtreme by Point of View. (videos or pictures have never been released publicly until now.)
Little is known about this build of Sonic Xtreme outside of a FAQ put togeather By Chris Senn which mentions POV a few times.
The Faq can be found here: http://www.senntient...xtreme/FAQ.html

From what I gather, sometime in the middle of Sonic X-treme's development, Sega outsourced the completion of Sonic X-treme to Point of View studios, without the knowledge of technical lead Ofer Alon or artist Chris Senn, who were working on the PC and Saturn engine and levels.
Point of View used assets from the original effort and developed a level converter to convert Sega Technical Institute's engine levels into the binary format used by POV's own engine, which had already been used before for several other games on a variety of
platforms, such as Saturn, Playstation, Nintendo 64, PC.

Fast forward to 2015
Jollyroger acquired the POV file assets from Tichua.
In its Initial state the POV build did not run on Standard Saturn hardware, It could however run on development Saturn hardware.
so Jolly had to massage the engine code so that it could run on the Saturn hardware.


Here are some Quotes taken from Chris Senn's FAQ (linked above) in regards to POV and Sonic X-treme.

Quote

Mike Wallis micro interview:
So yeah , I've been speaking with Mike Wallis (Sonic xtreme's Producer) by email.
and!
I asked if he remembered the POV build from this video and if he could give us some behind the scenes information related to the build.
https://youtu.be/2snIoULkLlg

Mikes response:

Quote

Next I asked him if he could tell us anything about this particular v40 build for Saturn that was found by Jollyroger in the POV assets he had acquired. (as featured in the video.)
https://youtu.be/Fvuxpv9-J1o

Mikes response:

Quote

Point Of View Sega Saturn July 14, 1996 Build Public Release 001:

Mega
Hugefiles
Mediafire

Notes:
I used ImgBurn for burning the iso.
If attempting the swap trick or installing a Mod chip , please be careful not to bust your Saturn, all parties involved with this release are not to be held accountable.
If I've made any mistakes here, please point them out and I'll correct them, thanks guys!

Related threads:

Release thread for STI Engines, 037 and 040 (PC and Saturn): http://forums.sonicr...opic=34038&st=0
POV Saturn Build thread: http://forums.sonicr...opic=34255&st=0
Original Retro Leak thread: http://forums.sonicr...showtopic=33545
Original Assembler Leak thread: http://assemblergame...required.54194/
Assembler Release Thread: http://assemblergame...v-builds.55713/


Well guys I'm going to leave some information here in regards to understanding how the .def files work.
Right now things are very disorganized as I'm Mid project with AXSX. hopefully I can clean the presentation up later.

To start off, I'll post some copy past of other posts that I've made.
Hopefully someone interested in Modding X-treme will find these to be useful, and maybe perhaps even take over documenting this from me so I can concentrate on other things.

Levels can be ported from other builds of the engine quite easily, it just takes a little understanding on what does what between the multiple .def files.
Keep in mind that Ver 037 does not support many aspects of the later .def files leaked by HXC ( lets refer to that as the Package X leak) Basically you cant translate the X shaped blocks (used for trees and other level props like icicles to V037.

Quote

I've somewhat documented values ect., however the documenting is scattered throw-out multiple .def files.
I did make a chart for AXSX to translate blocks and slopes between the multiple early. def files that don't work in any of the engines we have or the later engine that we do not have, But they wouldn't be of much use to you guys at the moment.
I don't have time to consolidate all the notes scattered about right now.

And there is a chart that translates slope types between version 037 and 040.
As for Package X type .def files Most of the information is locked away in my head. I did document how some of the Package X block scales are handled.

Anyhow , if you want to get the Package X levels to load properly, ( most blocks anyways) you will need to custom rebuild the package X .def files in the version 037 format.
using a translation chart. ( something that will need to be made up)

Here is a quick copy past of the chart I used for Package X re-construction of levels for AXSX
Its raw. Hope it helps start your very own chart! ( one that I lack time to put together for the community at the moment, will have time in the future, but yeah if you beat me too it than by all means please share with everyone.)
//----------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
//AXSX Block Scales Cheat Chart Many Package X Blocks (Version 041 and up)
//----------------------------------------------------------------------------------------

////start Block extrude from Bottom,Left,or Front ////

-1048592 87.5% of block visible

-2097184 75% of block is visible

-3145776

-4194368 50% of block is visible

-6291552 25% of block is visible

-7340144 12.5% of block is visible



////start block extrude from Top,Right, or Back ////

14679840

7339920 12.5% of block is visible

6291360 25% of Block is Visible

5242784

4194240 50% of block is Visible

3669960

2097120 75% of block is Visible

1834980

1048560 87.5% of Block is Visible

393216

524280

262140

131070

65535

32767.5

16383.75

8191.875

4095.9375

2047.96875

1023.984375

511.9921875

255.99609375

127.998046875

63.9990234375

31.99951171875

15.999755859375

7.9998779296875

3.99993896484375

1.999969482421875

0.9999847412109375
------------------------------------------------------------------
------------------------------------------------------------------

Here are how blocks are defined within the version 037 levels.
Total block size is 512 units, and each value is extruding 1 side of the block outwards from the center up to and maybe past 256 units.


Same thing for the slopes but by vertex points from the selected side that is defined.



//Slope Chart Ver 037
//REV 001
//01/07/2015
//By Andrew Bedell (AKA Andrew75)
//[email protected]
//[email protected]-----------------------

//Slope looks like |\

//Ver 037=

Value 015,TOP //Slope direction

Value 016,256 //Slope value Range: -256 -> 256

Value 017,-256 //Right Top Vertex //Slope value Range: -256 -> 256

Value 018,-256 //Right Top Vertex //Slope value Range: -256 -> 256

Value 019,256 //Slope value Range: -256 -> 256

//----------------------------------------------------------------------------------------

//Slope looks like /|

//Ver 037=

Value 015,TOP //Slope direction

Value 016,-256 //Left Top Vertex //Slope value Range: -256 -> 256

Value 017,256 //Slope value Range: -256 -> 256

Value 018,256 //Slope value Range: -256 -> 256

Value 019,-256 //Left Top Vertex //Slope value Range: -256 -> 256

//----------------------------------------------------------------------------------------

//Slope looks like |/

//Ver 037=

Value 015,BOTTOM //Slope direction |/

Value 016,-256 //Right Bottom Vertex //Slope value Range: -256 -> 256

Value 017,256 //Slope value Range: -256 -> 256

Value 018,256 //Slope value Range: -256 -> 256

Value 019,-256 //Right Bottom Vertex //Slope value Range: -256 -> 256

//----------------------------------------------------------------------------------------

//Slope looks like \|

//Ver 037=

Value 015,BOTTOM //Slope direction

Value 016,256 //Slope value Range: -256 -> 256

Value 017,-256 //Left Bottom Vertex //Slope value Range: -256 -> 256

Value 018,-256 //Left Bottom Vertex //Slope value Range: -256 -> 256

Value 019,256 //Slope value Range: -256 -> 256

//----------------------------------------------------------------------------------------

//Slope looks like \|

//Ver 037=

Value 015,LEFT //Slope direction

Value 016,-256 //Left Bottom Vertex //Slope value Range: -256 -> 256

Value 017,256 //Slope value Range: -256 -> 256

Value 018,256 //Slope value Range: -256 -> 256

Value 019,-256 //Left Bottom Vertex //Slope value Range: -256 -> 256

//----------------------------------------------------------------------------------------

Slope looks like /|

//Ver 037=

Value 015,LEFT //Slope direction

Value 016,256 //Slope value Range: -256 -> 256

Value 017,-256 //Left Top Vertex //Slope value Range: -256 -> 256

Value 018,-256 //Left Top Vertex //Slope value Range: -256 -> 256

Value 019,256 //Slope value Range: -256 -> 256

//----------------------------------------------------------------------------------------

//Slope looks like |\

//Ver 037=

Value 015,RIGHT //Slope direction

Value 016,-256 //Right Top Vertex //Slope value Range: -256 -> 256

Value 017,256 //Slope value Range: -256 -> 256

Value 018,256 //Slope value Range: -256 -> 256

Value 019,-256 //Right Top vertex //Slope value Range: -256 -> 256

//----------------------------------------------------------------------------------------

//Slope looks like |/

//Ver 037=

Value 015,RIGHT //Slope direction

Value 016,256 //Slope value Range: -256 -> 256

Value 017,-256 //Right Bottom Vertex //Slope value Range: -256 -> 256

Value 018,-256 //Right Bottom Vertex //Slope value Range: -256 -> 256

Value 019,256 //Slope value Range: -256 -> 256

//----------------------------------------------------------------------------------------

Quote

Sadly Many block types are not supported in build 037 for levels like crystal frost.
With some tweaking you should be able to get some of the .def files from the Package X leak to work. but all block types are not supported by build 037 like x shapped blocks and blocks that scale relative to sides.
However some of that can be worked around if you know how to translate block scales between .def files.

Here is some info about creating actors.

Some other collision issues can be Kind of sort of fixed like the Waterfall and badnik collision push issue by replacing the Cubes with actors. When setting up a new actor in the def file just copy the ring actor code and paste it just below and give it a new name like Badnik and than load the badnik's texture on the new actor.
(Actors currently have no collision, so they don't get in Sonic's way when running around the levels. I was going to replace them before the release, but ehh the rings were the only real game breaker.
you'd also have to replace the pixels that represent the cubes in the .pcx map file with the newly created Actors threw the .pcx map file.
Example:
//========================================================================================
// This is the BADNIK Actor!
//========================================================================================
NEW_ACTOR_TYPE "Badnik_001" //Add your custom actor name.
{
Value 001,"SLICER" //Texture Name
Value 002,40960 //Scale Range:0 -> 65535
Value 007,1 //MainActordCount Range: 0 -> 15
}

************************************************
***************BONUS TUTORIAL TIME! *************
************************************************
In photoshop Load the Level_01.pcx
Now go to Image---> Mode ---> Color Table than save out the pallet as an .act file.
Next bring up the Swatches if already not set as a tab. by going to Window ---> Swatches.
Next load the .act file and replace current color swatches.
Find the rings pixel inside the .pcx file. (The rings color is # is 606098, this is so you know which one it is)
In the swatches pallet its the 10th row over from the left and 8th color row down.
The next color after the ring will be your next actor if you chose to set one up inside the .def file. ( and so on )


Circled is the rings actor Index color as seen placed in the map.

Now there is just 1 issue with replacing the badniks with actors in this map, The Badnik is produced by 4 pixels within the .pcx map 2 wide and 2 high.
you may have to tinker with the scale a bit to get something close, or divide up the actor texture into 4 segments and load the new textures in the .def file than apply to 4 actors.
Anyhow this is just to help some of you get started in any modding projects you may have planned. Wish I had time to wright up full on and detailed tutorials of my adventures with the .def files. there are a lot of things that can be done!


Useful information from an older post.

So yeah I've been looking threw a lot of the .def files in both Jolly's Leak and HXC's leak, I Found some comfortable parameters within both leaks. The HXC leak parameters however did not work out of box, since that engine used different coding attributes. I had to multiply or divide the parameters by even numbers. So with a marriage Between both types of parameters the results are very close to what was shown in the E3 video footage.
Things that were tweaked include :bounce effect, air drag, run friction, jump up and down gravities, and a few more.) ( Sure its not 100% authentic but , at least its more comfortable to play than lets say jumping half way up a level with single bounce, or floating down to the ground slowly for 30 seconds. or having the camera right up in Sonic's face. ( for you guys who want something untouched, I think that it may be best to release 2 level packs separately so you can have something to play and something in original state.)
Now, onto the rings and objects news. Many of the levels are using Actual cubes with odd cube collisions for rings and other props like badniks. These can be passed threw from the back to the front, but they have a force that pushes sonic making levels virtually not at all very fun to play threw)
What Jolly has asked and that I've already started was to take Actors (like the rings actor) as found in older .defs and get them moved over to the newer .defs that lack the Actor section.
Thank God that the engine can still load up the actors ( although some broken)
First we need to tell the .def to load textures, than the pallet, than after the Cube section definition area, we need to add the new ring definition code.
Inside the Actor's parameters we can tell It do the following:
Bubble, FollowEdge, Follower, PingPong, Static, or leave it blank and the actor will have no collision.
Some of these seem broken at the moment, Follower and static seem to be reversed actions, and bubble does not work,
The real follower has an interesting action ,( I can not reveal that at the moment, You all will have to wait for future videos)
I've also made a small chart that tells us which color to use for the .pcx layout image maps when drawing Cubes and Actors. The engine uses the index of the color to lay out the objects and not the color itself.
(color is only important for the artist's to use it as a visual when designing layouts. What I mean is for example we could change the color of the index chart in Photoshop and the engine wouldn't give a shit another words)
C starts the cube actors and A starts the Actors pallet index color.
Please note since this image has been screen captured , its color attributes are not the same as a real indexed color and can not be used when editing a real .pcx map file. ( yes I learned the hard way)

Quote

Oops... I missed a step in the instructions !
To do level Swap trick:
1: Please back up Level_01.def and Level_01.Pcx, then delete or move the originals.
(In case you'd like to roll back to the more playable edited level versions)
\RSRC\PCX for the .DEF files
\RSRC\DEF for the .pcx map files
2: Change TEST.def and TEST.Pcx names respectively to Level_01.def and Level_01.pcx.
3:Find below code in your newly name swapped .def file and change test to Level_01
NEW_QUBIX "QBX0001"
{
Value 001,"test" //Layout Texture
Value 002,"SkyTxtr" //Background Texture
Value 005,Color(248,176,000) //Specular Color Range:0 -> 255
Value 006,Color(008,088,168) //Fog Color Range:0 -> 255
}
4: Boot game as normal and enjoy!

Related threads:
POV Saturn Build thread: http://forums.sonicr...opic=34255&st=0
Original Retro Leak thread: http://forums.sonicr...showtopic=33545
Original Assembler Leak thread: http://assemblergame...required.54194/
Assembler Release Thread: http://assemblergame...v-builds.55713/
Modding Thread: http://forums.sonicr...showtopic=34041


== V037 SONICBOOM Sonic X-Treme Level Editor ==

kudos to JollyRoger on another fine release!
This is another "AS IS Release" so there are lot of bugs and issues as how it was found.



NOTES:
If you are missing a DLL, you may need to download the C++ x86 Redistributable. https://www.microsof...s.aspx?id=40784
The readme file has a little more information on how to work the editor.
We had initially planned to do a PDF guide with illustrations, but seriously lack the time to do something like that these days.
Hoping we can get someone to write up an instruction guide and also someone to do some bug reports. ( there are a lot of issues that need to be documented)

SonicBoom "Sonic X-treme" Level editor for v037 levels. Release 001:
Mega
Hugefiles



== V40 Engine for PC And SEGA SATURN ==

K guys !
2 new simultaneous releases for Engine v040! The First Release is for the PC. And YES SEGA SATURN TOO!!!! (Again lets thank JollyRoger for his hard work)
Both releases Support Fisheye ! YES I said it Fisheye and SEGA SATURN together! Did I say Fisheye with good FPS! ? !
The PC release generally looks better with more frames of animation for Sonic, enemies and the rings. The PC ver Also sports higher res with better color than the Saturn version which looks a bit washed out, but that is to be expected. Improvements for both 040 versions are planned including frame rate improvements and more frames of animation for sprites like rings for the Saturn build among too many other improvement to list.

Here is the video for 040 running on Sega Saturn!


The video shows the engine essentially unmodified from the way it was found.
As you can see, this is a very early build of the Saturn version. The v40 engine is very different from v37: many features had been removed or simplified to streamline portions of the code and data structures to increase the performance, so that it could run on Saturn at an acceptable speed.
The engine was clearly in the middle of heavy refactoring and basic functionality such as player control and collisions were disabled. The code for those features had not been ported to use the new data structures and functions, and was completely commented out, so it had to be partially rewritten/ported.
The engine was also prone to constantly crashing due to several bugs, so the code has been altered further, but only to make it more stable, no other changes were made to its appearance or functionality.
The level displayed is a test level that was used to debug the engine, and it is the only level that was found with this particular version of the engine. The engine only loads and displays one animation frame every eight, this explains the mostly non-existent animation.

Please keep in mind that there are visual differences between Saturn and PC build of v040 so try them both if you can.
PC Engine Ver. 040 Release 001:
Mega
Mediafire

SEGA SATURN Engine Ver. 040 Release 001:
Mega
Mediafire

I used ImgBurn for burning the iso.
If attempting the swap trick or installing a Mod chip , please be careful not to bust your Saturn, all parties involved with this release are not to be held accountable.



==== V37 Engine for PC: ====


After you get the game, Please people, read the included Readme file for additional info and how to set up the alternate level with un-modified physics)

First Release Trailer :
for JollyRoger's port of STI's V037 engine.



Mini Documentary about this port of v037.
Credits to Borman.
https://youtu.be/YdEqYplS6v8


Before we continue I'd like to give my appreciation and display credits to all who were involved.
Thanks to JollyRoger putting in massive amounts of Blood Sweat And tears to port the original assets over to modern windows making this release and future releases possible for us to experience.
Thanks to Tichua for contributing the source materials.
Thx for Bormon for taking the time to do a mini documentary video in regards to the release.
Also Thanks to Sonic Retro and assemblergames.com for hosting the leak.
And myself for other miscellaneous tasks.

I Don't know about you guys but for me personally, the past 19 years has been a very long wait to be able to play This game, Sure its not finished and only a very early build, and yes that aspect really shows!
However, I believe that if X-treme were finished, It may have been a whole other game than what this early beta portrays. (who knows)
*************************************************************************************************************

Now for the description:
Sonic X-treme's Version 037 engine has been painstakingly ported to Modern Windows and Open GL by JollyRoger, from Windows 95 that also required the NV1 Graphic's card hardware..
This is the real Sonic X-treme, as JollyRoger had acquired it. ( Not some a Fan game) This is a restoration project meant for preserving historical accuracy as closely to how it was found as possible. However If released in the original state the game basically would have been beyond unplayable as code had to be massaged back into a working state.
Basicly this is an almost as is port of the engine (Almost as how the original developers had left it, A snapshot in time "if you will".

And Guess what ?!
This port of X-treme is out there right now! Ready for YOU to download and enjoy!
Go to www.assemblergames.com FOR YOUR VERY OWN COPY!

However, We'd like to point out that this is a single level release.
This first public release consists of a Jungle level, which I like to refer to as "The E3 Jade Gully level" since it was shown in one of the E3 96 Promo videos.
Other levels are playable and all , but they are not featured in this teaser release. Rest assured they will be released in the final release that also addresses some bugs.

Fun Facts:
*The next port to be done will be of version 040 which has the fisheye lens effect. V040 can also run on Sega Saturn hardware. ( with a good FPS mind you) There is also a mysterious build by the now defunct Point of View studios. POV's build version is for Sega Saturn as well and uses 100% original code separate from the STI's code.

*JollyRoger had to massage much of the code back into place to restore functionality since some code had been commented out due to being in mid engine re-wright by STI or POV.

*The game ran on the NV1 GPU by Nvidia, supported true Quad polygons (Like Sega Saturn) instead of quads made up of 2 triangles.
http://en.wikipedia....rocessing_units

*Currently this port of v037 lacks true quad polygon rendering, *check out the sides of slopes where the textures look distorted*
Future releases may or may not incorporate true quad like rendering to fix the issue.

*The level data file itself had to be edited to improve physics to the point of playability, As well as remove ring collisions so the level could be explored properly. ( rings would push sonic off ledges if he walked near them)

*The Bouncing ball effect when sonic Lands can be disabled. Which allows for better playability, but in this case it was kept to better match the E3 Videos.

*You guys can tweak physics quite easily by opening the .def files in your text editor of your choice.

*I had attempted to fix up the Sonic Magnetic effect so as to help Sonic better when rotating the level in ball mode. This was tried so that it wouldn't sling shot sonic over the edge of sharp angles when rotating the levels.
I did have it fixed so that the slingshot no longer happened, but it caused other issues with Gravity, and gravity relative to jumping (causing low jump heights), Jumping near walls and celling would cause sonic to stick to objects incorrectly.
Many of these could be remedied by counter balancing with other tweaks, however after 3 days worth of trying, I just could not find a sweet spot that replicated the feel of the E3 video gameplay clips without the rotation sling shot flying issue.
(so we had to give up fixing the Magnetic level rotations in favor of better play Mechanics. ( perhaps one of you may be able to find that sweet spot)

* More Builds and levels to come !

PC Engine Ver. 037 Release 002:
•Fixed palette management
•Initial implementation of scrolling backgrounds (no quadratic distortion)
•Fixed foreground objects transparency issues (For when Sonic moves behind objects like rocks)
•Gamepad Support Added
•Windowed mode EXE added
Mega
Anonfiles
Hugefiles
Mediafire

PC Engine Ver. 037 Release 001:
Mega
Anofiles
Hugefiles
Mediafire


NV1/Win95 (The Original) 037 Release 001:
Notes:
*Old Win95 computer with NV1 Diamond Edge 3D graphics card required.
*The archive needs to be unzipped directly on C:\, so that it decompresses into a folder called "SONCBOOM".

Edit: Updated links to include unmodified level files that will work with the original engine.
Mega
Mediafire

AVI's Uploaded by Chris Senn, these have been re-encoded.
We've all seen these before , but not like this! I think this is as good as its ever going to get. (unless we re-contrast the videos.)
The E3 1996 promo video can be seen clearly for the first time . The 4 worlds video with Jade gully has a clean opening among other things if you guys can catch them.
I think that the videos need to be re-contrasted though as they are a bit dark.

Quote

Here are Youtube up-loads in case you want to check them out quickly.


SonicDemo96 (New Paths and New Worlds)


Xtreme promo spot ( shown at E3 1996 ) Music score intact and for the first time very clear visuals! (This is my personal favorite)
If you look very close at 1:17 you can see that Sonic's sprite may have environment lighting as he runs arround the crystal.

After all these years playing Sonic 1, I never noticed that the air bubbles he exhales form into the drown count down digits.
Sonic is directly telling us that he will drown in that amount of time!

Sonic's first words ?