Strife: Veteran Edition for Nintendo Switch now available (Widescreen update)

[Edward850]

Hmm, unsure though I'd be very surprised. Uploading and downloading is only done while the application isn't running. And it's such a weirdly specific symptom, I'm pretty sure the current file needs to exist to load the save, and that file also contains the current map as well as the inventory like a typical save. 

 

Almost wonder if it wasn't a write issue or even corruption, but maybe a broken player state like if they saved while dead or in a borked transition, though all that disables saving to begin with. From what I do know, if this can happen in Strife, it must also happen in Doom somehow. You wouldn't think it but they are actually identical systems, just the Strife saves store every level instead of just the current one. This is what makes me think it must have been player state when saved somehow.

Edited October 27, 2020 by Edward850

[Zillah]

7 hours ago, hfc2x said:

The hostility of this response reminds me of that comment Kaiser got when posting the differences between the Doom 64 rerelease and EX, and someone basically jumped at him saying "REEEEEE the pirated version allows for freelook and jumping and therefore is superior, I won't pay you a cent because you're having the nerve to charge for your work now, and I demand free stuff". But I digress.

That has absolutely nothing to do with what I'm talking about. I'm simply talking about my experience. I get if your angry at whoever that was, but this is not the place to come and vent at random people with unusually angst-y comments. If you found my response that hostile, I'm afraid to say you were the only one who felt threatened. But I digress, we're here to talk about the game, not behavior.

Once I buy it again, I'll see if I find anything out of place- or as I hope, stand corrected and enjoy it. Who knows? ¯\_(ツ)_/¯

[Redneckerz]

9 hours ago, Edward850 said:

Or to put it more straightforward, this is Chocolate Strife but with a different renderer stapled on and some bugs fixed (by default). I'm just as dubious of such a claim as anyone would be over a new soft-lock being discovered only in Chocolate Doom or the Unity port, the notion is very improbable.

Tangibly related, the obscure* SvStrife-Plus (by Entryway, no less) port added a OpenGL 1.1  renderer to SvStrife, based off GLBoom. It also includes some new features outside of the GL renderer due to backporting of PrBoom+ 2.26.29 code to PrBoom 2.23, of which SvStrife is based upon.
 

Spoiler

*Obscure as in that this port was not listed on the Sourceforge pages whatsoever.

 

Link includes binary and source code. Might be interesting to have a peek around the code, if you weren't aware of this port already.

[hfc2x]

6 hours ago, Zillah said:

That has absolutely nothing to do with what I'm talking about. I'm simply talking about my experience.

Never said? Just mentioned it because of you outright lying that there have been hundreds of reports of this game being broken to the point of unplayability and then going out of your way to demand the devs they better do a good job for you, because you're otherwise not going to buy their game (lol) reminded me of that particular post, because you're that entitled.

 

6 hours ago, Zillah said:

If you found my response that hostile, I'm afraid to say you were the only one who felt threatened.

Ever been diagnosed with narcissistic personality disorder by chance? Asking because of the clown shoes you're wearing.

[Edward850]

@hfc2x calm down there, the matter has already been resolved.

 

6 hours ago, Redneckerz said:

Tangibly related, the obscure* SvStrife-Plus (by Entryway, no less) port added a OpenGL 1.1  renderer to SvStrife, based off GLBoom.

Of course. I'm not sure why you're bringing it up here, though. It has nothing to offer us, and is also code we can't even use. 

[Redneckerz]

33 minutes ago, Edward850 said:

Of course. I'm not sure why you're bringing it up here, though. It has nothing to offer us, and is also code we can't even use. 

Hmm, i was kind of thinking that perhaps some bits of code could be useful for Strife VE's. Otherwise, it would just be a related tidbit of curiosity :)

[Edward850]

That launch sale that was supposed to be on launch has now arrived. 25% off. Plus there's also Turok for 50% off.

 

 

Edited October 29, 2020 by Edward850

[Edward850]

Minor update, we've fixed gamepad support and added turn/look sensitivity options in the PC version and updated the Linux build on Steam. The Linux build is currently upstream on GOG and a new patch with 1080P support is in testing for Switch.

Edited November 24, 2020 by Edward850

[TheMagicMushroomMan]

18 minutes ago, Edward850 said:

Minor update, we've fixed gamepad support in the PC version and updated the Linux build on Steam. The Linux build is currently upstream on GOG and a new patch with 1080P support is in testing for Switch.

Glad to hear this, I had trouble with analog sensitivity in the PC version. Thank you!

[CyberDreams]

This is great news for Switch players!! Good job for keeping this game alive team!

 

It does suck though that due to the fact that XB1 and PS4 don't have openGL that they cannot get a port. I'd love one for Xbox but it's understandable i guess.

 

Off Topic: I tried getting a regular Switch brand new (not used) and man, they are hard to find for the normal price. Usually they are sold out and price scalped everywhere else. I can't use the Switch Light because of my neck issues that i am currently going through so i would need to use one that's hooked up to a TV.

[hfc2x]

Try to get a Mariko model (the ones with the red box), because they have a newer CPU that allows for pretty much double the battery life.

[Thermal Lance]

Wait? Strife on SWITCH!?!??!

Damn it sucks to be broke right now. LMAO.

 

Going to need to grab that one ASAP. Been looking for a good FPS to play on the go. Keep up the good work people. You just made me a lot more happier.

[Edward850]

I noticed I neglected to mention this, so a couple of updates:

Strife on Switch has been updated to now run 1080P while docked, plus some additional options in the menus including stick sensitivity.

The Linux build has been updated for GOG. These don't go on GOG Galaxy at the moment (there is presently no Galaxy client on Linux) but you can download it now from the site (1.1.1), bringing it in sync with the Steam version. Note that we've dropped support for the 32bit Linux build on both Steam and GOG to maintain our sanity.

[A Nobody]

Why was Chocolate Doom used as the base instead of Zandronum I wonder? Zandronum already has great multiplayer, and with bots! Would have been fantastic. Well what's done with Veteran Edition is way better than having it set up with an outdated Dosbox. Good work.

Edited December 24, 2020 by The Strife Commando

[AtticTelephone]

11 minutes ago, The Strife Commando said:

Why was Chocolate Doom used as the base instead of Zandronum I wonder? Zandronum already has great multiplayer, and with bots! Would have been fantastic. Well what's done with Veteran Edition is way better than having it set up with an outdated Dosbox. Good work.

Zandronum is too complicated for the Switch to handle, and it would take a long time anyways. Besides, ZDaemon would've been better for that stuff. Oh, and ZDoom-ports are awful for compatibility, so that's another problem.

[A Nobody]

2 minutes ago, AtticTelephone said:

Zandronum is too complicated for the Switch to handle, and it would take a long time anyways. Besides, ZDaemon would've been better for that stuff. Oh, and ZDoom-ports are awful for compatibility, so that's another problem.

Well I meant in general, not the Switch port.

[AtticTelephone]

2 minutes ago, The Strife Commando said:

Well I meant in general, not the Switch port.

Still wouldn't be a good idea for compatibility purposes, besides, not a lot of people deathmatch on Strife.

[P41R47]

2 minutes ago, The Strife Commando said:

Well I meant in general, not the Switch port.

Simply because, and maybe main reason, zdoom base ports are not accurrated as Chocolate base ports.

They wanted to offer the genuine and more vanilla oriented experience.

This is the vanilla experience, enhanced for modern computers.

[chungy]

19 minutes ago, The Strife Commando said:

Why was Chocolate Doom used as the base instead of Zandronum I wonder? Zandronum already has great multiplayer, and with bots! Would have been fantastic. Well what's done with Veteran Edition is way better than having it set up with an outdated Dosbox. Good work.

Chocolate Strife was the result of multiple years of reverse-engineering the original Strife engine and has totally unmatched compatibility with Strife compared to anything else. (Just run Strife in GZDoom versus Chocolate and VE, the difference is striking)

 

That, and the same developers that did Chocolate Strife were hired to do Strife: Veteran Edition.

[A Nobody]

Well that's interesting.

 

I have a question about the Switch version. Is the option to play it like how it was years ago available in it? You know, no objective markers and such?

[Edward850]

1 hour ago, The Strife Commando said:

I have a question about the Switch version. Is the option to play it like how it was years ago available in it? You know, no objective markers and such?

There is a classic mode in the gameplay options, yes, which fully restores all 1.31 dialogue behaviours, gameplay quirks and softlocks, for better or worse. This will disable all the new behaviours as well except the renderer, which in the PC version is a separate option and is not available on the Switch as it can't be changed at runtime (I got some away into it but had troubles switching out the nodes).

1 hour ago, The Strife Commando said:

Why was Chocolate Doom used as the base instead of Zandronum I wonder? Zandronum already has great multiplayer, and with bots! Would have been fantastic.

Zando being an inappropriate base aside, we actually can't license Zandronum for the Switch. We have permissions granted to use Chocolate Strife in a non GPL context, given the people involved either work for us or are easy to contact. This isn't the same for Zandro given its GPL control is partly owned by Zenimax, and partly owned by frankly too many community members to track.

However all that aside, frankly I wouldn't use it for multiplayer anyway, not for the Switch. The Switch is primarily a WiFI device and I don't think Zandro's netcode is a good fit for it given previous experiences. I'd much rather design a single-frame-single-packet key update solution which would be a great resolution to any potential packet loss.

Edited December 25, 2020 by Edward850

[A Nobody]

10 minutes ago, Edward850 said:

There is a classic mode in the gameplay options, yes, which fully restores all 1.31 dialogue behaviours, gameplay quirks and softlocks, for better or worse. This will disable all the new behaviours as well except the renderer, which in the PC version is a separate option and is not available on the Switch as it can't be changed at runtime (I got some away into it but had troubles switching out the nodes).

Zando being an inappropriate base aside, we actually can't license Zandronum for the Switch. We have permissions granted to use Chocolate Strife in a non GPL context, given the people involved either work for us or are easy to contact. This isn't the same for Zandro given its GPL control is partly owned by Zenimax, and partly owned by frankly too many community members to track.

However all that aside, frankly I wouldn't use it for multiplayer anyway, not for the Switch. The Switch is primarily a WiFI device and I don't think Zandro's netcode is a good fit for it given previous experiences. I'd much rather design a single-frame-single-packet key update solution which would be a great resolution to any potential packet loss.

As I said, offline bots.

 

Wait, softlocks? That's actually an issue. I know the option makes the game fully like the original, but shouldn't major or game breaking glitches not be included?

[Edward850]

22 minutes ago, The Strife Commando said:

Wait, softlocks? That's actually an issue. I know the option makes the game fully like the original, but shouldn't major or game breaking glitches not be included?

The softlocks aren't things explicitly coded but are rather irregularities in the dialogue behaviour, missed circumstances and all that. If you load the original unedited maps, you naturally get the original dialogue behaviour as well. You can't have one without the other. What Classic mode does is load the original 1.31 maps that are in the unaltered Strife1.wad, so that's exactly what you get.

Edited December 25, 2020 by Edward850

[DavidN]

Thanks for your and everyone’s work in putting this together - I played through over a couple of weeks and it was nice to experience a bit of Doom-engine history that I’d overlooked before. (Reflecting on the game itself, I’d describe it as an interesting but not particularly good Hexen-Doom hybrid, but that’s not your fault :) )

 

One thing I noticed was that the game would very consistently crash if it was running while the Switch went to sleep and was left for a while - it would reopen with the music still going but with the display and controls frozen. Quitting to the Switch menu and closing the software from there would cause it to wait for a while and then declare “The game had to close due to an error”.

 

It’s been good to explore it, though. I liked the touch that you can line up your shots more precisely with the tilt controls, and yet it never felt they got in the way when I wasn’t deliberately trying to tilt the handheld around.

[Edward850]

3 hours ago, DavidN said:

One thing I noticed was that the game would very consistently crash if it was running while the Switch went to sleep and was left for a while - it would reopen with the music still going but with the display and controls frozen. Quitting to the Switch menu and closing the software from there would cause it to wait for a while and then declare “The game had to close due to an error”.

Unless you have a way for me to consistently reproduce this on a devkit (the one place I've yet to experience anything even remotely like this), I largely suspect this is actually a Switch OS bug, as I've seen this reported with just about any Switch game. 

Edited December 29, 2020 by Edward850

[DNSKILL5]

DavidN, I’m a switch owner too, have you tried soft-resetting the switch? It may fix the issue. 

• Press and hold the Power button for 15 seconds
• Wait a minute, then press power button again. 
• Nintendo logo will display and it’ll do the reset. 

If that doesn’t fix the issue, you may need to do a factory reset or as some call it a “hard-reset”, but be sure to remove your SD card before doing so and don’t forget to remember your account details so you can log back in. 
 

I have not run into this problem on either my switch console or switch lite for this game, but soft-resetting has fixed similar issues for me in the past with other games. For others, it took doing the hard reset. 
 

Another suggestion, maybe try this first, is uninstall the game and reinstall. Maybe something happened during your download. 

Edited December 29, 2020 by Gerolf

[DavidN]

Thanks for your ideas! It’s not a massive problem but I’ll give them both a try.

[P41R47]

Hey, Ed, i've been looking around and there are just a few mods for Strife. Most of the only compatible with Zdoom derivatives.

 

I know that those are probably not compatible with veteran edition.

But is the veteran edition able to load mods, vanilla mods for Strife (probably no one out there)?

[Edward850]

1 hour ago, P41R47 said:

I know that those are probably not compatible with veteran edition.

But is the veteran edition able to load mods, vanilla mods for Strife (probably no one out there)?

Yes. It's built on top of Chocolate Strife, so the compatibility there is identical. Though note that your map requires GL nodes if you are using the high resolution renderer. 

[Edward850]