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AmiDoom v0.6
1998-01-15
ported by Marcus Geelnard
What's new since v0.5?
======================
* Fixed low-detail mode. Now works better than fine.
* Fixed gamma-level correction problem in ECS mode.
* Hand-optimized some parts, so at least gfx-card users will probably
notice a difference in speed.
* Now checks for HOME environment variable, and uses it if present.
* You can select the prioroty of the AmiDoom task with the -pri flag.
* Minor (from what I've heard) 060-speedup.
* Some other small fixes.
Requirements
============
The minimum required system for running AmiDoom is:
* 68020 (no FPU needed)
* 6MB of FAST ram (or you can use VMM)
* ECS, AGA or a CGraphX graphics-card
* AmigaOS 2.0+
* ixemul.library v45 or later
* A proper wad-file (you can get one from the AmiDoom homepage, see bottom
of text)
However, I recommend at least:
* 68030-50MHz
* 8MB of 32-bit FAST memory
* A graphics card
Running AmiDoom
===============
It couldn't be much simpler... Just place the AmiDoom executable in a
directory together with a Doom wad-file (where all the game data is stored,
like maps, pictures, textures, sounds etc). Then run it. Voila!
I have made a small script called StartDoom, that launches AmiDoom (either
from Workbench or from Shell). You can edit this script, and add your
favourite parameters to AmiDoom (e.g. how many audio-channels to use).
Graphics
========
AmiDoom opens its own screen. This screen will have 256 colors, if your
system supports it, or it will use 64 colors, if you only have an OCS/ECS
graphics chipset.
Sound
=====
AmiDoom has full sound-support with real stereo panning. It is implemented
with a very fast double-buffered 16-bit mixing-routine and 8-bit stereo
sound output. Everything goes through audio.device, so no hardware banging
is done, and no extra drivers are required (like AHI). Although AmiDoom can
play up to 16 channels of sound, you rarely need more than 3 channels, which
is the default.
However, it uses up quite some memory (for loading all sounds from the wad-
file), and if you use many channels, it is bound to eat some CPU-time. On a
fast Amiga with much memory (like a 68040 with 8MB FAST memory), this is not
really a problem, but on a slow machine (like mine), it can be wise to play
around with the sound-parameters (see flag descriptions below) to get the
best result.
Keyboard
========
I used an Amierican layout of the keyboard (like in the original PC Doom-
version). There are two differences between the PC layout and the Amiga
layout however: F11 is mapped to Del on the Amiga (which changes the gamma
level), and Pause is mapped to Help on the Amiga.
Stack
=====
It seems that you need a stack of about 40000 bytes to run AmiDoom. To set
the stack-size, use the command 'stack 40000' from the shell that you are
running AmiDoom from. This is automatically done in the startup-script
"StartDoom", which can be run from the Workbench.
Slow hard-disk loading
======================
You might notice that it takes (nearly) forever to load wad-data from your
hard-disk. The remedy is (if you have enough memory for it) to add some
buffers to the disk that you have installed AmiDoom on, with 'addbuffers'.
Adding about 200-800 buffers (100-400 KB) has a tremendous impact on loading
aswell as playing (loading is done during game-play too).
Networking
==========
I have not been able to test the network support, but I have gotten reports
from users saying that they have had success running network-games with
AmiDoom. Ridwan Hughes said this in a letter to me:
"Just to let you know, the networking side of it does work, I tested it on
a serial TCP link between my A1200 and A2000, have to set a high baud rate
and low MTU (as low as 128) to make the updating of both displays smooth
enough to be almost playable (plus I need something better than an 030 in
both machines ;)"
Switches
========
You can use the following Amiga-specific switches when starting AmiDoom:
Graphics:
-aga Forces AGA optimized c2p routine to be used. This is default
on AGA systems without a graphics-card.
-ecs Forces ECS modes to be used. This is default on ECS systems
without a graphics-card.
-noehb When ECS is used, use a grayscale display instead of the
default 64-color display.
Sound:
-nosound Turns of sound output.
-channels n Use n audio-channels, where n is between 2 and 16 (default 3).
Misc:
-pri n Sets the prioroty of the AmiDoom task (default -1).
Background
==========
AmiDoom is based on the free source-code for Doom v1.10 (for Linux), which
was released on 24-Dec-1997. I got interested in porting it when someone on
a bulletin-board mentioned that the source had been released, and asked if
there were any efforts being made to port it to the Amiga.
It took about one day to make it work on my Amiga 3000, and one more to fix
faster and better graphic support (of which about 6 hours went to tracking
down a stupid bug - I had commented out one source-line too many). For me
this was a challenge, as I had never really written complex code like this
in a system-friendly manner: multitasking, AmigaOS screen and window, timers,
keyboard and mouse input etc. However, it turned out to be very nice. Almost
everything worked after the first compilation (!).
What is implemented?
====================
* Fast native CyberGraphics, AGA and ECS support.
* Full sound-effect support, with real stereo-panning.
* Keyboard and mouse control.
* Support for several Doom wad-files (Doom I shareware, Doom II registered,
Ultimate Doom, Eternal, Plutonia and TNT versions have been reported to
work fine).
* Networking.
Todo
====
* Speed-up the c2p-routines.
* Add requester for selecting screen-mode.
* Joystick/CD32 game-pad support.
* MIDI music emulation.
* A setup-program for easy setting of parameters.
* Fix more bugs.
* ...suggestions?
Contacting me (bugs etc)
========================
First of all: AmiDoom is freeware! (you do not have to pay a penny for it)
For bug-reports (or success-reports) and comments, I can be reached at:
e-mail: e4geeln@etek.chalmers.se
Updates, support and the Doom I shareware WAD can be found at:
WWW: http://www.etek.chalmers.se/~e4geeln/amidoom/