Surreal Engine is an ongoing project to reimplement UE1, mainly focused on Unreal Tournament v436 and Unreal Gold v226 at the moment.
This one has been discussed in the other linux_gaming community before, more than two years ago. Since then there were numerous improvements:
- It can now run UT99 maps and Unreal Gold botmatch maps (whereas it was limited to only UT before), and boot up onto the intro flyby of Deus Ex.
- Colission handling is much better (but not perfect yet).
- Can utilize SDL2 on Linux for windowing and native Wayland support (previously it’d use pure X11, and actually still does if you don’t have SDL2 installed).
- The menus mostly work now.
- Initial works for the AI (they will move around sometimes, and retaliate if attacked).
- Game detection system based on the SHA1 sum of the game executable. This allows us to detect many versions of UT and U1/UGold, as well as Deus Ex, Klingon Honor Guard, NERF Arena Blast, and more!
- A launcher has been added to select the game you want to play on startup. And lots of other improvements!
There is still a lot of work to do to implement everything though, and contributions are always welcome!
Oh my god, that’s amazing. I wasted so much time in UT99 messing around with bots back in the day. The game still holds up well.
The name though 🤌
In 2291, in an attempt to control violence among deep-space miners, the New Earth Government legalized no-holds-barred fighting. Liandri Mining Corporation, working with the NEG, established a series of leagues and bloody public exhibitions. The fight’s popularity grew with their brutality.
Soon, Liandri discovered that the public matches were their most profitable enterprise. The professional league was formed: a cabal of the most violent and skilled warriors in known space, selected to fight in a Grand Tournament.
Now it is 2341. Fifty years have passed since the founding of Deathmatch. Profits from the tournament number in the hundreds of billions. You have been selected to fight in the professional league by the Liandri Rules Board. Your strength and brutality are legendary.
The time has come to prove you are the best, to crush your enemies, to win the Tournament.
I read this while the city intro was playing in my head lmao
Totally checking this out for UT99.
I was there for the fan wars. I was in the Tribes camp, but Quake and UT ate up plenty of time. The map mods for Duke Nukem were a big deal for a while making ridiculous stuff with inescapable pits that were only fun to play a few times.
Whelp, time to reinstall Deus Ex.
Based!
One thing to keep in mind if you’re gonna try Deus Ex out with Surreal Engine is that it currently does not have the input system working, due to it being completely different than UT’s lol. Lots of functions aren’t implemented yet also, so we’re pretty much stuck with the intro flyby now :V
Oh man, while i love xonotic, i really miss the ut99 weapons and maps :)
That’s awesome! My childhood dream comes true
So can it play RUNE?
Sadly it cannot yet. The engine immediately crashes upon starting it up. Current focus is more on getting Unreal Tournament v436 and Unreal Gold v226 (and Deus Ex whenever it gets some attention) running.
“My engine is augmented”
This is great!
