Alfheim Development Thread

Due to the number of small but annoying issues in Midgard, I'll be putting out the next release, 3.40.27, probably sometime this week.

Here's a pic of part of the new enhancements that have been made to Master Levels mode:

New developments:

• PNGs are now supported almost anywhere EE loads a patch, via runtime format detection and conversion.
  
• Invalid patches shouldn't be able to crash the game any more as a result.
  
• Every font can now have its own table of translations, either in raw 256-byte lump format or in ZDoom's translation string language embedded directly in EDF.
  

Taste the rainbow:

ZIP/PKE/PK3 support is currently being added, as it's needed on the Aeon development branches (js-branch and python-branch).

Quasar said:

ZIP/PKE/PK3 support is currently being added, as it's needed on the Aeon development branches (js-branch and python-branch).

God I'm loving this port so much more with every little addition. Yesterday I was importing hi-quality oggs into wads. I really didn't know wads have size limits (or do they? maybe it was slade's fault) so I had to split my music wad into parts.

I'd like to know more about the js-branch and python-branch, tho. Can you please elaborate what does this exactly mean for port users / port-map authors?

ellmo said:

God I'm loving this port so much more with every little addition. Yesterday I was importing hi-quality oggs into wads. I really didn't know wads have size limits (or do they? maybe it was slade's fault) so I had to split my music wad into parts.

I'd like to know more about the js-branch and python-branch, tho. Can you please elaborate what does this exactly mean for port users / port-map authors?

Aeon will be a general-purpose application extension API exposed through multiple scripting languages (users can take their pick of the one they like most). It'll allow extension of the engine in, eventually, more or less any way you can think of. It'll be used to power such things as (beyond simple map scripting, of which it will be capable too of course) customized HUD, status bar, intermission, finale, title loop, and menu behaviors/appearance, AI scripting in EDF, per-spawn-point actor customization through UDMF, etc.

It'll take a lot of time to bring all of these subsystems online; I expect it to be an ongoing process from here on out. Aeon will go live supporting JavaScript and Python as target languages; there is not a current time frame but, js-branch is progressing rapidly so I'd anticipate a release containing it before or shortly after the new year.

PS: I intend to release Alfheim (the current trunk version) as soon as ZIP support has been fully finished and tested.

Quasar said:

(...) multiple scripting languages (users can take their pick of the one they like most).

Fingers crossed for an eventual Ruby implementation, then. JS for starters sounds nice, too.