SS1 SHLink - System Shock Windows wrapper (no music)

[67501209b9dcdvoodoo47]

hmm,seems like it crashes as soon as I hit this lever:

Image: http://img823.imageshack.us/img823/148/97447991.png

save+details here.


btw,the dartgun acts weird,the cursor jumps across half the screen after each shot..

[67501209b9f7fMalba Tahan]

Thanks for your report, voodoo47. I've tracked down that bug with your help, and it seems to be fixed. I've uploaded a new version which already has that fix (version 0.5).
This version is different, it assumes that System Shock Portable is installed (and not the original System Shock as previous versions did).

Source code has been uploaded too!!

P. S.: I can't reproduce the "mouse-jumping with the dartgun" bug anymore. It's strange, because I didn't do anything to fix it!! If the bug persists, please post you reply here.
Thanks!

[67501209ba0c3voodoo47]

both issues (crash and dartgun) are fixed in the new release.awesome work

[67501209ba1aeDav]

Good to see you are still working on this, Malba Tahan!
I can't wait for the mouselook addition.

[67501209ba312Stingm]

Agreed! I'm waiting for the mouselook addition too.

[67501209baa21Enchantermon]

To fix that (using System Shock Portable), I had to create a folder named CDROM inside the RES folder, and copy CDSHOCK.EXE (which is inside shlink.7z) there.

That works for a non-SSP install as well; thanks!
Other than a framerate drop during the hacking of Shodan in the intro video, it looks great! Excellent work!
Fun fact: during the intro video, at least on my system, every time I moved the window, the video's audio stuttered, which was great fun while Shodan was talking; it made her sound like her old, corrupted self.

This version is different, it assumes that System Shock Portable is installed (and not the original System Shock as previous versions did).

Can it still be used with a non-SSP installation?

[67501209bb016Malba Tahan]

Can it still be used with a non-SSP installation?

Yes! I just made the guide and the default paths inside shlink.ini ready for a SSP installation, but it works fine for original System Shock CD version.

Other than a framerate drop during the hacking of Shodan in the intro video, it looks great! Excellent work!
Fun fact: during the intro video, at least on my system, every time I moved the window, the video's audio stuttered, which was great fun while Shodan was talking; it made her sound like her old, corrupted self.

Sound needs a bit of work, and I think the framerate drop is related to audio. In fact, everything needs some work, because it's just a huge hack. If anyone takes a look at the sources, he/she will see it's just awful. I didn't want to create a separate thread for IRQ emulation, so I had to inject calls to the IRQ handler routine everywhere in the game (there are nine injection spots until now). As a side effect, sound stutters under some occasions, like the OpenGL mode I'm implementing (at least on slower machines).

As for the mouselook addition, It's almost done. There's one bug left, that will probably be corrected by the weekend.

P.S.: I'm thinking about adding higher resolutions and widescreen modes, but I'm not really sure they're going to be useful. Higher resolutions are really amazingly resource demanding, even for today's computers, as the rendering is done entirely in software.

[67501209bb1a2Nameless Voice]

The higher resolutions should work okay if you can hack in OpenGL rendering though, shouldn't they?

Any news on the music?

[67501209bbbb4Enchantermon]

Can it still be used with a non-SSP installation?

Yes! I just made the guide and the default paths inside shlink.ini ready for a SSP installation, but it works fine for original System Shock CD version.

Awesome.

Sound needs a bit of work, and I think the framerate drop is related to audio.

Ah, okay. Testing further, I noticed that the stuttering only happened when playing in a window; in fullscreen, the video played with no problems. This is on Windows 7, btw.

As for the mouselook addition, It's almost done. There's one bug left, that will probably be corrected by the weekend.

Sounds great!

I did find a small bug: if you try to start a new game without entering a character name, the program freezes and then crashes.

[67501209bc0eeMalba Tahan]

The higher resolutions should work okay if you can hack in OpenGL rendering though, shouldn't they?

Yes, but I'll have to figure out all the rendering algorithm for that, it will take a long time. Higher resolutions in software mode should be way easier to get working, though they'll be slow as hell.

Any news on the music?

I haven't looked at it for a long time. But I haven't given up yet.

I did find a small bug: if you try to start a new game without entering a character name, the program freezes and then crashes.

That looks like an old bug that I have already fixed. Please test it with the latest version, because they don't happen for me anymore. I can be wrong about it, though.

[67501209bc1ffEnchantermon]

Ah, sorry, I forgot I was using an old version. I will test with the newest version when I have the opportunity.

[67501209bc307Stingm]

Any chance the cyber space mouse movement will be tweaked as well? I know you have enough on your plate but wanted to ask.

[67501209bc3ffvoodoo47]

my recommendation would be-stability,bugfixes,mouselook and original features (like music) first,higher resolutions and extra features (like opengl) later.don't overwork yourself..

[67501209bc4e2Nameless Voice]

My recommendation would be music before mouselook, definitely.  I wouldn't want to play the game without music.

[67501209bca6aMalba Tahan]

Any chance the cyber space mouse movement will be tweaked as well? I know you have enough on your plate but wanted to ask.

Cyberspace mouselook-like movement needs more disassembling and a deeper understanding of the movement algorithm. I just don't have that knowledge yet.

my recommendation would be-stability,bugfixes,mouselook and original features (like music) first,higher resolutions and extra features (like opengl) later.don't overwork yourself..

My recommendation would be music before mouselook, definitely.  I wouldn't want to play the game without music.

I would like to have music working before mouselook, too, but I'm just doing what seems to be easier now. As for higher resolutions, I'll just add them before adding music if someone thinks it would be nice (and if it's possible, of course), because I think that the lack of music makes the gameplay a little frustrating.

By the way, version 0.6 has been uploaded, and it the key binding and mouselook mods are integrated into it.
You can download the source code if you wish. The key bind code is the very same used in the DOS mod. The mouselook code was a modified a little bit to better fit into the SDL code.

[67501209bcb8aEnchantermon]

I've become curious as to why this thread has not yet been moved into the File Archive as it now contains a working (albeit still being developed) mod, so I'm going to move it there since it shouldn't hinder the discussion and development in any way. If there's a specific reason that it's still here, it can always be moved back.

[67501209bccc5voodoo47]

yeah,it' a mod,and I guess it needs a name.how about winshock? short,nice and easy.

btw,I'm linking this,it' and old and unfinished project that tried porting ss1 to opengl,most people here are aware of it,but better safe than sorry-maybe it will be useful in some way..

[67501209bce16Kolya]

I like SHLINK better than winshock.

[67501209bcf35Enchantermon]

I like SHLINK as well. Then again, I'm not exactly sure what it stands for, assuming it's an acronym (Shock Loader something?).

[67501209bd041voodoo47]

I did not realize that SHLINK is actually supposed to be the name of the mod :p

oh well.anyway,I have just completed the first deck,with only one random crash (I did not manage to repeat it,so no error log this time),and no other problems/anomalies.I consider this a great success

[67501209bd28dEnchantermon]

I did not realize that SHLINK is actually supposed to be the name of the mod :p

I don't know if it was really supposed to be or if it just sort of fell into the name because of the 7z file, but I like it.

[67501209bd7ddMalba Tahan]

yeah,it' a mod,and I guess it needs a name.how about winshock? short,nice and easy.

Before starting the write the program, I realized that there could be some legal problems if I released the original game's binaries "inside" a modded EXE. For that reason, I decided that I would not link the mod code with CDSHOCK.EXE. Then I decided to write a loader, that would open CDSHOCK.EXE, patch it and run it. But in order to patch it, I had to get the mod code from somewhere. Then I decided that I had to write a linker that would behave similarly to OpenWatcom's wlink.exe. That's the reason for "link in "shlink" (Shock Linker? Shodan's linker? who knows?). Shlink is just a tool. It's able to load almost any DOS EXE created with the Watcom compilers. There are some harcoded values inside it, though, that make it work only with Watcom 9.5C's executables, though. When I started coding it, I couldn't realize that it would really work. It was just a "theoretical" idea: "why not patch CDSHOCK.EXE in order to redirect the DOS related function calls and memory addresses into their Win32 counterparts"? I was really suprised when I first saw that Origin logo, with it's pallete corrupted facing me, after only two days of coding. I realized then that I could be right: it was indeed possible to do what I was trying to do. Of course I went into some troubles that always appeared to be "impossible to solve" at first. But I didn't give up, I always could proceed. That's where I am now. I'm not sure if the mod needs a name. Maybe someone finds Shlink useful and starts to use it to load another game (I'm almost certain that won't happen). If that happens, the mod shouldn't be called SHLINK anymore. In fact, strictly speaking, the mod is nothing but a bunch of .TXTs and .OBJs lying in the "mods" directory.

oh well.anyway,I have just completed the first deck,with only one random crash (I did not manage to repeat it,so no error log this time),and no other problems/anomalies.I consider this a great success

I've run into a random crash yesterday too. However, that crash was not directly related to my mod. It was actually a bug in the original game. They original developers apparently didn't know about many memory access violation in their code, because the DOS protected mode interface didn't report them. I'll have to create some kind of crash dump in order to get a nice log, track the bugs down and eliminate them. They seem to be rare though. By the way, I believe all of those bugs are in the software renderer.

[67501209bd8fdEnchantermon]

Ah, so that's the story. Cool. Even though the program isn't strictly limited to SS1, a name would still be nice, but it's your mod, so it's your call.

[67501209bda70spif2001]

Just stumbled upon this thread, when I was trying to get my old System Shock CD to run (failed miserably).

Installed SSP and your SSL and it works like a charm. Well - I got it up and running without problems anyway. 

I can't seem to change to a resolution higher than 640x480 though. Tried altering the ini file to 800x600, but that only changed the size of the Window, not the size of the game - as seen below. When in Fullscreen mode it is the same - the game is centered and in 640x480.

Image: http://share.xboxlife.dk/file/mta0mzm1y2ziyjvmngzhzjvmzmy2yme5zjkwyjzjymu.jpg

Is resolutions higher than 640x480 not supported (yet)?