Unreal Tournament - Status

[petter3k]

Decided to create a separate topic for this.

Lead developer of UTDC is going to get an estimate about the costs of recovering data from his now busted HDD back from when Secret Level where shut down. While he cant actually guarantee the servers in either binaries or sources exist on the HDD, most likely it does - at least something we can work with, as even the slightest source-file from either the game or servers would be of huge help if we were to have no other options but to write new ones.

I have already set up a fundraiser for it but are going to wait for the price estimate before it goes public.
He also agrees that this is probably our best shot - and the servers may have to be modified for todays computers as well as operating systems.
So, he has found the HDD, took backup of EVERYTHING (which makes it hard for me to believe there is NOT a single file from the game on it), and given us the right to use the sources and modify them to our needs with approval from Epic Games..

So keep tight as the fundraiser goes public *asap* and hopefully we get what we need.

There is not a open source license to this, however we have got permission to actually host what would probably be a slightly modified version of the original set of servers once they are found (because of how long ago this was actually made). Other companies have alot to learn from these guys in regards to helping out communities just trying to play the game(s) they've made.

However, as we know, the possible risks is that the HDD do not contain anything of the kind but seeing he is saying this is our best shot, I will atleast pay for something that even remotely has a chance of being rescued when it comes to titles like this. There is also the risk of the HDD not being repairable at all..

They might be able to see if the HDD repair is possible for a much lesser cost before trying to recovering everything they can though.

So updates will be posted here while I remain in contact with him through the following days while pcwzrd13 is following up on his SegaNet-lead.


Best regards,
Petter(3)k

[pcwzrd13]

I'm expecting to hear back from my SegaNet contact soon so we have a couple possible ways of getting what we need. I'll give an update once I hear from him.

[-drez01-]

[Thmanx]

THIS



Totally subscribed to this thread for life now. Crazy to think we have the OK from Epic/ExTeam members, this really is our last best shot at this. I know the entire DC community (whether they know it or not) are behind you in this endeavor.

[Xiden]

Im optomitc we will find something and look forward to contributing to this.

Would you guys say its virtually impossible to reverse engineer our own server if we had to do that with Unreal?

[Cornerb0y]

HELL YES!!!!

[petter3k]

Would you guys say its virtually impossible to reverse engineer our own server if we had to do that with Unreal?

Not at all - and probably less work than many other games since its a PC port - still, we do not know how the originals differ from PC version and especially since the game is running on dedicated servers and not just a lobby/P2P system, it would be ALOT of work just to go from 90% to 100% (like the guys who have gotten connected for example). The game is also special in that the port was basically built from the ground up and not "just" A WinCE port.
The game is an incredible tech-demo for the Dreamcast imo.

[petter3k]

I'm expecting to hear back from my SegaNet contact soon so we have a couple possible ways of getting what we need. I'll give an update once I hear from him.

That would be great - especially if he has the sources too

[petter3k]

THIS


Crazy to think we have the OK from Epic/ExTeam members, this really is our last best shot at this. I know the entire DC community (whether they know it or not) are behind you in this endeavor.

Im really glad to hear that and I agree - absolutely crazy to have approval to do something like this being not exactly Toy Racer, lol - this is actually Unreal Tournament which makes the developer and Epic Games even more awesome for even trying to help, ie. trying to find backups from Secret Level at Epic (and letting him assign such a task to the IT guys at Epic in the first place) which he gladly did just to help instead of just ignoring, and being constantly polite and trying to help out with anything he can - even before he really knew anything about what we wanted, he did everything he could back when I first started a dialog with him.

[Xiden]

THIS


Crazy to think we have the OK from Epic/ExTeam members, this really is our last best shot at this. I know the entire DC community (whether they know it or not) are behind you in this endeavor.

Im really glad to hear that and I agree - absolutely crazy to have approval to do something like this being not exactly Toy Racer, lol - this is actually Unreal Tournament which makes the developer and Epic Games even more awesome for even trying to help, ie. trying to find backups from Secret Level at Epic (and letting him assign such a task to the IT guys at Epic in the first place) which he gladly did just to help instead of just ignoring, and being constantly polite and trying to help out with anything he can - even before he really knew anything about what we wanted, he did everything he could back when I first started a dialog with him.

Much love is deserved to Sega and Epic Games for being to gracious to the retro and homebrew communities