Wolfensas
An experiment in SAS' gaming potential (and a fun diversion)

screenshot

Download latest version (15 December 2008)



Wolfensas started out as a test to see what sort of realtime interaction could be done in SAS. After early tests proved some animation was possible through SAS display windows, a crude 3d engine was built as a proof of concept. From there network code was added to make it a multiplayer game, and the game engine rewritten until it became what's seen today. Sure, it's in monochrome, but that doesn't make it less fun!

Requires

  • SAS 8.x running (in Display Manager, batch submitting doesn't quite work correctly) on Windows XP - should work with newer versions of SAS/Windows
  • Extracting the zip (subdirectories included) to any directory of your choosing
  • Copying wolfensas.fon over to your Windows fonts directory
  • If playing with sound, turning off "default beep" in the "Sounds" control panel
  • (Preferably) a couple of other people doing the same, for some oldschool multiplayer goodness
    • Note: There's a few setup variables in the .sas files themselves, see the manual contained in the zip for more information.

    Recent Changes

    (06 Feb 2009) I don't have access to any version of SAS at the moment, so development's on hold. Hopefully I'll end up making the jump to 9.2, and really start making things interesting!
    (15 Dec 2008) New release version. Finally, a shotgun!
    (14 Dec 2008) Completed a basic user manual
    (11 Dec 2008) General code cleanup, getting things ready for release
    (09 Dec 2008) Able to spend some time on this again - finally added a semi-decent loading screen
    (29 Sep 2008) Finished off the scoreboard, including bugfixes
    (23 Sep 2008) The mouse pointer is now unlocked when alt-tabbing away from SAS while the game is running
    (22 Sep 2008) Got the basics of the scoreboard working, and in the process found that the line drawing routine is buggy
    (15 Sep 2008) Added a delay for respawning on death, and a quickie death "animation"
    (12 Sep 2008) Added a different type of decal for shotgun damage, increased decal limit (not much of a performance hit!)
    (03 Sep 2008) Rough decal support added for textures - good enough for bullet holes at any rate
    (08 Aug 2008) Changed weapons to fire projectiles visible in flight, instead of hitting instantly
    (Click here to show older news)
    (03 Aug 2008) New release version. Various bugfixes, balance tweaks, and a fully textured/lit demo map.
    (29 Jul 2008) Smoothed movement of other players, fixed hit detection
    (23 Jul 2008) Changed renderer to use texture-mapped floors
    (21 Jul 2008) Added lighting support and allowed different textures on each face of a map block
    (18 Jul 2008) Added an option to use entire available vertical resolution, for double image quality
    (16 Jul 2008) Redid game logic to use real frame delta time instead of trying to work at x FPS
    (07 Jul 2008) Added support for sprites drawn at the pixel level, changed over most graphics
    (04 Jul 2008) Added rudimentary A* pathfinding for bots, they pick random destinations for now

    Changes Remaining for Next Version (Work in progress screenshot here)

  • None!

    • Possible Extras, Ongoing Changes

  • Add player/player collisions (0%)
  • Make a basic map editor to make new map features accessible (10%)
  • Give bots some offensive capabilities (5%)

    • Future

  • Add client-side option of using UDP for non-essential packets for better 'net play
  • Give particles size information
  • Better sound engine, somehow. As a minimum need variable volume. Looks like this'll need a custom DX wrapper DLL
  • Pickups - health etc
  • Doors and other interactive bits
  • 3D engine rewrite to handle BSP trees (a la DOOM) - probably would be SAS 9 only