Game Disk Images as a Datasource

[pixelmischief]

I've been kicking around the idea for a while of using the disk images of classic games as datasources for remakes of those games. Games must have databases on the disks that layout things like towns and dungeons, npc dialogue, quest parameters, platform levels, etc. If those regions could be identified in the disk images, read as data, and then used to drive a modern game engine, it could be interesting. SCUMMVM does a very similar thing, reading the original data (usually from files, instead of disk images) and rendering the graphics and sound on modern platforms.

 

Thought? Crazy? Not worth it? Amazing idea?

[mattlacey]

Depends how badly you want remakes I guess

The advantage with all the Lucasfilm/Lucasarts games was that they were all built on the SCUMM engine which made it relatively easy to build an engine that replaces it. Given series of ST games are likely to use standardised formats for level data etc. which would open up possibilities of this kind of thing, but otherwise it would take a lot of effort per game in comparison to SCUMM games.

Could work well for something like the Dizzy games!

[witchspace]

Not too crazy. I'm working on a port of Sundog: Frozen Legacy to modern platforms.

This uses the same principle as the SCUMM engine and ScummVM, or the Inform games and Frotz.

 

This can work because Sundog was written, with the exception of a few small bits of 68k assembly, in UCSD/Softech Pascal. This compiled to a platform-independent p-code. So it was "just" a matter of writing an interpreter for the appropriate p-code dialect and I have most of the game running.

 

With most other games, which tend to be written for the native platform this is going to be much harder. But I'm certain there are other cases where a game vendor used a single engine for a series of games and much of the game logic is scripted in the data files.

[witchspace]

Proabably currently only builds and works on Linux/Ubuntu, but I've cleaned up and uploaded my code for the Sundog port: https://github.com/laanwj/sundog

[Tillek]

Proabably currently only builds and works on Linux/Ubuntu, but I've cleaned up and uploaded my code for the Sundog port: https://github.com/laanwj/sundog

Have you heard of/looked into the Sundog Resurrection Project?

 

http://www.sundogresurrectionproject.com/

[Tillek]

And so then I go give your link a thorough read and find that you have indeed heard of it and linked to it.

 

But I like your approach as well. Even playing the new one, I still have nostalgia for the old one (which about 10 years ago I actually played start to finish.... finally....)

 

It is one of my absolute favorite all time games.

[witchspace]

Have you heard of/looked into the Sundog Resurrection Project?

 

http://www.sundogresurrectionproject.com/

Yes I think it's great that they're working on that. After all, the game was supposed to be a trilogy. 33 years late is better than not.

 

But indeed, my project's goal is different, it is about nostalgia and history and making the original game more accessible. I very likely won't be adding any new missions

[DanBoris]

I've been kicking around the idea for a while of using the disk images of classic games as datasources for remakes of those games. Games must have databases on the disks that layout things like towns and dungeons, npc dialogue, quest parameters, platform levels, etc. If those regions could be identified in the disk images, read as data, and then used to drive a modern game engine, it could be interesting. SCUMMVM does a very similar thing, reading the original data (usually from files, instead of disk images) and rendering the graphics and sound on modern platforms.

 

Thought? Crazy? Not worth it? Amazing idea?

 

This is very common for PC games, there are a lot of re-creation projects that use new code along with game data from the original games.