MrFlibble

I remember this being freeware for some time, but then the author wanted to make a mobile port and removed the free download, with the official site going down indefinitely (?) shortly afterwards. I played the demo version a bit, some time ago, and I generally liked it. It's a good mix of first-person shooting and action-adventure. On a different note, here's a thing that makes me wonder: does anyone know a game that would be to Duke Nukem 3D what Quake is to Doom? I mean, something very similar but in true 3D and taking heavy advantage of the new 3D tech? Is it even possible? I remember reading a preview of SiN that basically said something along the lines of "this is much more than just Duke Nukem 3D on the Quake II engine", but I guess this is already an indicator that SiN has introduced far more new elements of the story-driven kind, which to me are hallmarks of the next generation of FPSs compared to Duke and the other big Build titles. Perhaps a more obscure game exists that kind of goes in that direction? By which I mean a way more interactive and detailed world than vanilla Doom or Quake, but at the same time more non-linear and not heavy into cutscenes and other non-interactive storytelling techniques.

You know what's worse, put something on your site as a free download but explicitly prohibit others from mirroring it, then one day many years later the site is down for good and it turns out that the Wayback Machine has not preserved the download, while whatever happened to the author is anyone's guess. Good if someone was prudent enough to keep a copy of that stuff somewhere. This usually won't happen to works that have at least some popularity of course, but a bunch of decent freeware games was lost or nearly lost exactly this way. However, I need to stress that I respect the authors' rights to do whatever they want with their creations. It's certainly not nice from the user's standpoint if something good gets taken down, removed, destroyed or whatever by the author, but it's ultimately their work and their choice. They had the good will to offer their work to the public in the first place, and they are totally entitled to remove it if they please. Although I cannot imagine the situation when a piece of work was really good and people liked it, but then it turned out that something connected with it had hurt the author so much that they decided to destroy or remove it? That must be something really bizarre and then I guess worth not being public after all.

I guess it won't hurt to upload it here as well: MBF_GENMIDI.7z This is not a complete package, these are replacement EXEs for gerwin's MBF Maintenance release 2.04. The 7z archive includes all modified source files (compared to the latest source from gerwin), but please note that those from the Allegro package (in the Alleg30B folder) are for @ludicrous_peridot's version of Allegro found here. Also here are some notes from @ludicrous_peridot about how secondary instruments support works in this build: Additionally, this build replaces Wolfenstein 3-D dogs with CC-BY versions created by @Nash: I've not included the modified INFO.C file in the GENMIDI build package, but you can get it here.

The funny thing is that I found UPX almost by accident, I couldn't locate DJP from my experiments with REKKR-MBF last year (and I had learned about DJP from DOSDoom documentation of all places), so after some brief Googling and finding something that wasn't it (but probably related) I stumbled upon UPX as the continuation of DJP and realised that the latest version is still online at SourceForge.

Another update! To take full advantage of @ludicrous_peridot's Allegro modifications, I used MIDI2MUS to convert the soundtrack to MUS format, which is currently the only one supported to play secondary instruments, and packed them into HCOMPAT.WAD. The OPL3 music now sounds even better, and quite close to the MPU-401 version when coupled with DMXOPL v1.11. The updated download links are in the previous post above.

Somewhat embarrassingly, it turned out that I actually had not set @ludicrous_peridot's modified Allegro library to support MIDI secondary instruments when I first compiled it. This is fixed now, and I have updated the download links in the post above.

I decided to make a custom version of MBF to run Harmony Compatible in DOS with a few small improvements. This is based on gerwin's Maintenance release 2.04 with improved sound code by @ludicrous_peridot, and uses miniwad as the dummy IWAD to make the game stand-alone without the need to modify HarmonyC.wad from the original release (thanks to @brightentayle for making me aware of the miniwad's existence!): hcdos102.zip - binary package, only needs HarmonyC.wad to run hcd102_s.zip - source code Apart from merging the improved sound code and modified Allegro library routines courtesy of @ludicrous_peridot, which should make OPL music sound better (DMXOPL v1.11 included and loaded by default), I only made a few cosmetic changes. First off, I felt it to be a moral obligation to restore the original Harmony 1.1 HUD font, which I gather had to be changed for compatibility's sake in HarmonyC.wad: The menus now use a font colour scheme similar that in the original Harmony 1.1, with varied background patterns: The same also goes for MBF's dynamic help screen: Additionally, the minimized HUD now uses correct colours too: I also restored the original par times from Harmony 1.1, except for the new maps that don't seem to have custom par times. But I just copied the par time from MAP11 for them. As a bonus, you can use the included HCOMPAT.WAD to restore the HUD font in other ports, like Crispy Doom (haven't tested it with anything else yet).

Thanks!

Apologies for the random question, but what is the name of the flat that is used as the background for the Crispness menu?

I never had this idea of the republic plot, but that they are AGM's elite soldiers/guards that secure the company's operations is what seemed quite natural, even based on their old design (a.k.a. the recoloured player).

This is actually basically the same as how I conceptualized the minigunners in my Freed∞m headcanon :)

Actually yes, something along those lines. Someone with a better imagination than me could probably come up with something cyborg-y enough and possibly looking "eldritch" at the same time, instead of a straightforward dinosaur.

I've been interested in this port because it has built-in DEH support and is very close to vanilla, but the inclusion of the original DMX library makes it non-free. However, I just thought that perhaps it would be possible to build a version that uses APODMX instead? (I was previously not aware if the source code of DoomNew was available anywhere). Hopefully it's okay I bumped this, I was reluctant to make a new topic for this one question.

I think that the original idea was to "swap" the Cyberdemon and the Spider Mastermind, conceptually. I.e., the Cyberdemon replacement is an assault tripod piloted by some brainy creature, so the final boss should supposedly be something close to a cybernetic organism then. Perhaps some giant humanoid creature standing on all fours, with cybernetic implements and a cannon mounted on its back, with some nasty alien thing piloting it? Or maybe a leviathan stitched together from many creatures and cybernetic parts? There are actually many different directions it could go. It could be another of those insect-like things like a trilobite, with cybernetic parts, to continue the design theme of the many ordinary monsters. I just feel that the brain-tank design is a bit too close to the Spider Mastermind.

I'm pretty certain that editing libre sounds should be acceptable, but of course the maintainers could prove me wrong. I suppose your best bet would be to make your edits and do a pull request, and see where it goes from there.