What's new in Alien Arena: Combat Edition 7.53

Dec 30, 2011
  • Extended use of VBO for signifigant performance increases on high settings.
  • A number of bot AI changes to improve navigation, combat and more human like behavior.
  • Added a number of video resolutions.
  • "Dm Lights" server option.
  • Menu changes to make things behave more consistently and intuitively.
  • When entering join server menu, servers only refreshed on first entry, unless refresh button is pressed.
  • Entity def files to allow maps to have multiple game types and configurations.
  • Chaingun behavior smoothed out.
  • Grass/vegetation rendering visually improved, and optimized.
  • CTF scoring improvements.
  • Smarter precaching.
  • Speed hack detection improvements.
  • Fixed account bugs.
  • Optimizations for IQM and MD2 rendering.
  • Stats math refactoring.
  • New maps - TCA-Invasion, CTF-Zion2k9
  • New violator sounds, skin, and effects.
  • Added "ultra" skill level to single player mode.
  • Added sun object control to scripts.

New in Alien Arena: Combat Edition 7.52 (Oct 10, 2011)

  • Many new models and textures
  • Four exciting new levels
  • Vegetation shadowmapping
  • Account system for stats
  • Improved stats algorithms
  • Various improved effects
  • Decoupled renderer from client frame code
  • Variety of bug fixes and code cleansing
  • Changes to the bot code and anti-camp

New in Alien Arena: Combat Edition 7.51 (Mar 12, 2011)

  • Major 7.51 features:
  • 1. Extensive rewrite of bsp surface rendering for a massive performance increase
  • 2. Complete rewrite of vertex buffer object code
  • 3. Complete rewrite of post process effects(pain, heat wave distortions, etc)
  • 4. Improvements to light volumes
  • 5. Improvements to shadow mapping for dynamic shadows
  • 6. Massive renderer cleanup and re-org
  • 7. First editions of a developer reference
  • 8. Improvements to vehicle hud rendering
  • 9. Added configure option for Unix/Linux ANSI color console output
  • 10. Integrate ODE library into Unix/Linux build to avoid potential problems
  • 11. Variety of graphical updates
  • 12. Three new/revamped levels
  • 13. Fixed bug with vid_restart on map change, for much faster map loading
  • 14. Added downloading of iqm meshes
  • Important SVN commits:
  • Revision: 2282
  • Author: irritant
  • Date: 1:14:10 AM, Friday, December 10, 2010
  • Message:
  • Changed fps counter text a bit.
  • Revision: 2286
  • Author: blackice
  • Date: 4:25:27 AM, Tuesday, December 14, 2010
  • Message:
  • Ragdolls: added a NaN check which seems to solve the ODE assertion error problem
  • Revision: 2289
  • Author: strat
  • Date: 2:07:03 AM, Saturday, December 18, 2010
  • Message:
  • Correct missing return in alternate non-HAVE_MREMAP q_shunix.c::Hunk_End(); might affect non-Linux builds.
  • Add error trap to file path initialization for unexpected lack of HOME environment variable in Linux/Unix version.
  • Revision: 2293
  • Author: irritant
  • Date: 12:33:10 AM, Tuesday, December 21, 2010
  • Message:
  • Changed armor shard skins a bit.
  • Revision: 2298
  • Author: irritant
  • Date: 12:36:16 PM, Friday, December 24, 2010
  • Message:
  • Added new features for light volumes(roll, pitch, rotating flag).
  • Revision: 2301
  • Author: irritant
  • Date: 12:36:46 AM, Monday, January 03, 2011
  • Message:
  • Add beta version of dm-dismal2k11. This needs to be tweaked and relit some, and have the rotating fans replaced by shadow casting meshes.
  • Revision: 2302
  • Author: irritant
  • Date: 1:04:26 PM, Tuesday, January 11, 2011
  • Message:
  • Added some of the new weapon sounds.
  • Revision: 2303
  • Author: irritant
  • Date: 7:08:01 PM, Tuesday, January 11, 2011
  • Message:
  • Complete rewrite of VBO subsystem. This is not finished, so it's disable by default. Goal will be to first move surface VBO's into one large VBO with offsets.
  • Revision: 2304
  • Author: irritant
  • Date: 5:19:10 PM, Wednesday, January 12, 2011
  • Message:
  • 1. Finished bsp vbo work, using one vbo, with offset data. Note - this is not proving to be faster, and in fact quite slower on some older cards, so it's disabled by default(gl_usevbo). Some modern cards might see a performance increase, will need testing
  • 2. Stripped out a number of useless and dated junk(i.e ancient SGIS extensions). Removed fallback code for cards not capable of multitexturing(no card after a geforce2 wouldn't have hit). Removing all of this pointless checking resulted in a small increase in fps.
  • Revision: 2305
  • Author: strat
  • Date: 2:07:57 PM, Thursday, January 13, 2011
  • Message:
  • Update Linux for OpenGL function name changes.
  • Add files for dm-dismal2k11 to game_data.am.
  • Add mouse buttons 8 and 9 to Linux. (X events 10 and 11).
  • Revision: 2306
  • Author: irritant
  • Date: 5:26:54 PM, Thursday, January 13, 2011
  • Message:
  • Massive renderer cleanup and re-organization.
  • Revision: 2307
  • Author: irritant
  • Date: 6:12:39 PM, Thursday, January 13, 2011
  • Message:
  • 1. Fix broken envmap shader.
  • 2. More re-org.
  • Revision: 2308
  • Author: irritant
  • Date: 2:18:18 AM, Friday, January 14, 2011
  • Message:
  • More renderer cleanup and re-organization.
  • Revision: 2309
  • Author: irritant
  • Date: 5:56:14 PM, Friday, January 14, 2011
  • Message:
  • Removed pointless legacy code.
  • Fixed bullethole glitch.
  • Revision: 2310
  • Author: irritant
  • Date: 11:11:39 PM, Friday, January 14, 2011
  • Message:
  • Updated with more new weapon sounds.
  • Revision: 2315
  • Author: irritant
  • Date: 2:20:13 PM, Saturday, January 15, 2011
  • Message:
  • Removed more pointless render code.
  • Revision: 2316
  • Author: irritant
  • Date: 11:59:23 PM, Tuesday, January 18, 2011
  • Message:
  • 1. Batch surfaces for big increase in fps.
  • 2. Fix bug with normalmap setting in menu causing crashes.
  • Revision: 2317
  • Author: irritant
  • Date: 2:13:29 AM, Wednesday, January 19, 2011
  • Message:
  • Fixed shader being called when it shouldn't be.
  • Revision: 2318
  • Author: irritant
  • Date: 2:29:15 AM, Wednesday, January 19, 2011
  • Message:
  • Cleaner surf code.
  • Revision: 2320
  • Author: irritant
  • Date: 3:48:26 PM, Wednesday, January 19, 2011
  • Message:
  • Only non-glsl surfaces used the old fixed function self shadowing for normalmapped surfaces.
  • Revision: 2321
  • Author: irritant
  • Date: 4:41:46 PM, Wednesday, January 19, 2011
  • Message:
  • Dynamic lighting fix.
  • Revision: 2322
  • Author: irritant
  • Date: 5:22:48 PM, Wednesday, January 19, 2011
  • Message:
  • More surf code cleanup and reorg.
  • Revision: 2323
  • Author: irritant
  • Date: 12:37:10 AM, Thursday, January 20, 2011
  • Message:
  • Fixed bug with missing lava/slime renders.
  • Revision: 2325
  • Author: irritant
  • Date: 1:21:17 AM, Friday, January 21, 2011
  • Message:
  • Some nice improvements in shadow mapping performance and appearance.
  • Revision: 2326
  • Author: irritant
  • Date: 9:52:40 AM, Saturday, January 22, 2011
  • Message:
  • Yet more bsp optimizations.
  • Revision: 2330
  • Author: irritant
  • Date: 12:02:03 PM, Sunday, January 23, 2011
  • Message:
  • Removed unneeded parallax map settings(parallax maps are always rendered if normalmapping is enabled).
  • Revision: 2331
  • Author: irritant
  • Date: 2:18:57 PM, Sunday, January 23, 2011
  • Message:
  • Another performance increase, using another surface culling layer.
  • Revision: 2332
  • Author: xempx
  • Date: 9:54:58 PM, Sunday, January 23, 2011
  • Message:
  • lamps for Zorn/Dismal
  • Revision: 2334
  • Author: irritant
  • Date: 12:10:49 AM, Monday, January 24, 2011
  • Message:
  • Fixed bug with lowest settings and water/warp surfaces.
  • Cleaned up rscripts, and replaced ancient glbegin/end routines with vertex arrays.
  • Revision: 2348
  • Author: irritant
  • Date: 1:02:10 PM, Thursday, February 03, 2011
  • Message:
  • Fixed shader bug.
  • Revision: 2352
  • Author: irritant
  • Date: 3:44:10 PM, Thursday, February 03, 2011
  • Message:
  • UPdated violator bsp file.
  • Revision: 2355
  • Author: strat
  • Date: 1:00:53 AM, Tuesday, February 08, 2011
  • Message:
  • First editions of developer reference in html and pdf (mostly done).
  • Update game_data.am.
  • Revision: 2356
  • Author: strat
  • Date: 3:58:22 AM, Tuesday, February 08, 2011
  • Message:
  • Improve timerefresh and viewpos commands for performance testing.
  • Revision: 2357
  • Author: irritant
  • Date: 1:40:27 PM, Wednesday, February 09, 2011
  • Message:
  • Better shadow culling.
  • Revision: 2360
  • Author: irritant
  • Date: 2:18:00 PM, Friday, February 11, 2011
  • Message:
  • Changed pain distortion effect. This now uses a blood graphic with a radial blur applied that gets stronger towards the edges.
  • Revision: 2362
  • Author: irritant
  • Date: 10:25:35 AM, Saturday, February 12, 2011
  • Message:
  • Pain effects completed and now scissored properly no matter what resolution is used.
  • Revision: 2363
  • Author: irritant
  • Date: 11:03:39 AM, Saturday, February 12, 2011
  • Message:
  • Post processes glsl effects now completed(rewrite).
  • Revision: 2365
  • Author: irritant
  • Date: 11:27:43 PM, Wednesday, February 16, 2011
  • Message:
  • Fixed bug with ATI drivers and radial blur shader. Effing ATI....
  • Added new files to linux install.
  • Revision: 2368
  • Author: strat
  • Date: 5:11:56 PM, Thursday, February 17, 2011
  • Message:
  • Minor cleanup and one small performance optimization.
  • Revision: 2369
  • Author: irritant
  • Date: 11:50:14 PM, Thursday, February 17, 2011
  • Message:
  • Added max's color console patch.
  • Added simple alpha/anim scripting capability for vehicle huds.
  • Cleaned up some stupidity in postprocess effects.
  • Revision: 2370
  • Author: irritant
  • Date: 12:34:44 AM, Friday, February 18, 2011
  • Message:
  • Added fx for vehicle huds.
  • Revision: 2371
  • Author: irritant
  • Date: 7:31:21 PM, Friday, February 18, 2011
  • Message:
  • 1. Fixed bug with steam and fire ents not getting broadcast to all clients.
  • 2. Fixed bug with vbo and flowing surfaces(cannot use vbo for flowing surfaces!).
  • Revision: 2378
  • Author: irritant
  • Date: 11:27:12 AM, Sunday, February 20, 2011
  • Message:
  • Fixed coord calcs of explosion heat wave effects.
  • Revision: 2379
  • Author: irritant
  • Date: 12:31:12 AM, Tuesday, February 22, 2011
  • Message:
  • Changed player model downloads to iqm.
  • Revision: 2382
  • Author: strat
  • Date: 11:00:07 AM, Tuesday, February 22, 2011
  • Message:
  • Add configure option for Unix/Linux ANSI color console output.
  • Update game_data.am.
  • Minor Unix/Linux mouse move math type conversion cleanup.
  • Revision: 2386
  • Author: irritant
  • Date: 1:12:46 AM, Friday, February 25, 2011
  • Message:
  • Added dm-vesuvius2k11
  • Revision: 2391
  • Author: strat
  • Date: 3:18:44 AM, Tuesday, March 01, 2011
  • Message:
  • Integrate ODE library into Unix/Linux build.
  • - Uses double precision math for better ragdoll physics.
  • - Avoids potential problems with incompatible distro-provided libode's.
  • Revision: 2396
  • Author: irritant
  • Date: 12:04:51 PM, Friday, March 04, 2011
  • Message:
  • Fixed default game cvar setting.
  • Revision: 2397
  • Author: irritant
  • Date: 6:26:16 PM, Friday, March 04, 2011
  • Message:
  • A couple of shader updates.
  • Revision: 2399
  • Author: strat
  • Date: 10:23:48 PM, Friday, March 04, 2011
  • Message:
  • Fixed bug in gamedir cvar initialization which caused video restarts.
  • Fixed bug in logfile creation for Unix/Linux dedicated server.

New in Alien Arena: Combat Edition 7.50 (Dec 16, 2010)

  • Ragdoll physics using the Open Dynamics Physics Engine
  • Implementation of AutoTools
  • Extensive re-write of in-game IRC client
  • Two brand new maps - Annihilation and Neptune
  • Player models and skins updated
  • Fixed LOD meshes for all player models
  • Added alphamasking to ppl lit BSP surfaces
  • Fixed dodge-chaining exploit
  • Extensive code cleanup in many areas
  • Faster particle rendering
  • Updated MacPorts build
  • Fixed bugs with exiting vehicles
  • TTF fonts for console and game messages
  • Fixed issues with colored names and kick/ban routines
  • Reworked auto-bot kick and auto team balancing
  • Fixed and cleaned up various rscript issues
  • Option to replace vehicle consoles with 2D HUDS
  • Listen servers automatically passworded
  • Fixed OpenAL segfaults when no devices are defined
  • Fixed precaching of base player models and their weapon models for much smoother gameplay
  • New music added for various maps
  • Fixed server issues with intermissions, and player names
  • Revamp of dm-babel
  • Updated/improved various shaders
  • Streamlining of several bsp surface renderer functions