Difference between revisions of "GoldSrc"
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Latest revision as of 11:36, 4 May 2024
GoldSrc (also known as GoldSource, and formerly just the Half-Life Engine) is a 3D video game engine created by Valve in 1996. It was the driving force behind many famous games of the late 90s and early 00s, such as Half-Life, Team Fortress Classic, Counter-Strike, and Day of Defeat. GoldSrc is a heavily modified version of the Quake engine and runs on C++. GoldSrc and its level editor, Valve Hammer Editor, were released by Valve for public use, making it the source of countless community-made modifications.
GoldSrc was replaced by its successor, Source, in 2004, which currently holds first place as the choice engine for Valve modders. Though GoldSrc is past its prime, many gamers and some third-party developers still seek to use it for mods and level design.
The engine is actively being updated and maintained by Valve as of 2023, recently with the Half-Life's 25th-anniversary updates which increased the engine limits and fixed many bugs.
Contents
Features
- AI flocking - NPCs can group together, seen with Houndeyes
- Skeletal animation - allowing for more stable animation of models, compared to the vertex animation in Quake
- Higher poly counts - GoldSrc allows for far more detailed models than Quake
- HD models
- Scripted sequences - Used extensively to tell Half-Life's story
- Player Bots (only in )
Since 2013 SteamPipe Update
Since 25th Anniversary
- Increased engine limits - Valve has increased engine limitations, allowing for more entities and detailed maps.
- func_vehicle entity support from Counter-Strike
- Steam deck support
- Steam Input support - Steam Input support was added, which allows the game to support more controllers and buttons.
Renderer
GoldSrc has two in-game renderers Software Renderer and OpenGL (previously three as Direct3D 7 support was removed in the 2013 SteamPipe Update) both renderers have differences.
- Colored lighting - Quake simply had monotone lighting
- Transparent textures - Glass can now be used in maps
- Transparent Water
- Water ripple - Quake simply Water ripple
- Water waves
- Dynamic iris simulation - similar to HDR Rendering (only in )
- Detailed textures (only in )
- Texture Filtering - Quake (GLQuake) simply Texture Filtering
- HD models
Since 2013 SteamPipe Update
- FBO renderer - A new method of rendering the game, which allows MSAA to work with GoldSrc engine. This also allows the game to run on fullscreen in a borderless window.
-nofbo
command line, note that this will also disable MSAA.- MSAA anti-aliasing - GoldSrc now natively support anti-aliasing, specifically, MSAA 4X, which is enabled by default on most modern hardwares. This will reduce the amount of jagged edges/staircases effect on the geometry.
Since 25th Anniversary
- Stencil Shadows
r_shadows
must be set to 1
- Software Renderer support on Linux
Versions and forks
Year | Version | Company | Features | Base | Notes |
---|---|---|---|---|---|
1998 [Clarify] | v1.0.x.x/SDK v1 | Valve Software | Per-texture palettes, Coloured lighting | Quake (id Tech 2) | v30 .bsp, v10 .mdl |
1998[Clarify] | v1.1.x.x/SDK v2.0 | Valve Software | VGUI | v1.0.x.x/SDK v1 | v30 .bsp, v10 .mdl |
2001 (leak)[Clarify] | Dreamcast | Gearbox Software | Compressed model textures | v1.1.x.x/SDK v2.0 | v30 .bsp, v11 .mdl |
2002 | 007 Nightfire | Gearbox Software | Direct3D 8 renderer MSAA support |
v1.1.x.x/SDK v2.0 (For PC) Modified Id Tech 3 (For consoles) |
v42 .bsp, v14 .mdl |
2003 | PlayStation 2 | Gearbox Software | LOD models | Dreamcast | v40 .bs2, v10 .dol |
2003 | Xbox | Ritual Entertainment | Improved lighting | Counter-Strike: Condition Zero engine branch earlier version | v30 .bsp, v11 .mdl, .sxwad format instead of wad |
2003 | Counter-Strike Neo engine branch | Namco | Heavily modified OpenGL Renderer Native linux support |
v1.1.x.x/SDK v2.0 Confirm:only for ver.1 Counter-Strike: Condition Zero engine branch (ver.2) |
v30 .bsp, v10 .mdl [confirm] |
2003 | Steam | Valve Software | VGUI2 | v1.1.x.x/SDK v2.0 | v30 .bsp, v10 .mdl |
2004 | Counter-Strike: Condition Zero engine branch | Valve Turtle Rock Studios Gearbox Software Ritual Entertainment |
Player Bots Detail textures |
v1.1.x.x/SDK v2.0[confirm] | v30 .bsp, v10 .mdl [confirm] |
2007[Clarify] | Paranoia HLSDK fork | Paranoia Team | New OpenGL Renderer | Counter-Strike: Condition Zero engine branch | v30 .bsp, v10 .mdl [confirm] |
2013 | Cry of Fear engine branch | Team Psykskallar | Improved paranoia's OpenGL Renderer | Paranoia HLSDK fork[3] | v30 .bsp, v10 .mdl [confirm] |
2013 | 2013 SteamPipe (SDK 2.4) | Valve Software | Linux and Mac support MSAA (4X) support Removed support for EAX/A3D surround sound and Direct3D 7 renderer |
Steam | v30 .bsp, v10 .mdl |
2016 | Svengine | Sven Co-op Team | Extended engine limits | 2013 SteamPipe | v30 .bsp, v10 .mdl |
2023 | 25th anniversary (SDK 2.5) | Valve Software | Shaders | 2013 SteamPipe | v30 .bsp, v10 .mdl |
Half-Life SDK
As of August 2013, it is available on Steam under the "Tools" section. With it comes Hammer 3.4, the 3ds Max sources for many cut and retail NPCs as well as player and weapon models, tools for packing textures into WADs, and detailed documentation on implementing baseline features such as voice chat into a mod.
The full source code for the latest version of the SDK can be found on Valve's Github Page.
Products using GoldSrc
Year | Title | Developer(s) | Publisher(s) | Platforms | Notes |
---|---|---|---|---|---|
1998 | Half-Life | Valve | Sierra Entertainment, Valve (digital) | PC, macOS, PlayStation 2, Dreamcast (cancelled) | First official game to use the GoldSrc engine. The Mac port (for Mac OS 9, OS X on PowerPC systems) by Logicware was originally cancelled in 2000 before it's was silently released for Intel Macs running OS X/macOS in 2013 by Valve. The game received a major update in November 17, 2023, for it's 25th anniversary, which fixes tons of bugs, added new maps and content and increased engine limits. |
1999 | Half-Life: Opposing Force | Gearbox Software, Valve | PC, macOS | ||
Team Fortress Classic | Valve | Valve, Sierra Entertainment (digital) | PC, macOS | ||
Sven Co-op | Sven Co-op team | Sven Co-op team | PC | GoldSrc was later forked into Svengine since version 5.0, which was slightly different than GoldSrc, and has support for Hor+ FOV, better audio via FMOD, and so on..., aswell as increased engine limitations. | |
2000 | Counter-Strike | Valve | Sierra Entertainment, Valve (digital) | PC, macOS | |
Gunman Chronicles | Rewolf Entertainment | Sierra Entertainment | PC | ||
Ricochet | Valve | Valve | PC, macOS | ||
2001 | Deathmatch Classic | PC, macOS | |||
Half-Life: Blue Shift | Gearbox Software, Valve | Sierra Entertainment, Valve (digital) | PC, macOS, Dreamcast (cancelled) | ||
WANTED! | Maverick Developments | Maverick Developments | PC | ||
Half-Life: Decay | Gearbox Software | Sierra Entertainment | PC (unofficial), PlayStation 2 | ||
2002 | James Bond 007: Nightfire | Eurcom, Gearbox Software | Electronic Arts | PC, Original Xbox, GameCube, PlayStation 2, Mac OS X, Game Boy Advance | Highly modified engine. |
2003 | Day of Defeat | Valve | Activision, Valve (digital) | PC, macOS | |
Counter-Strike (Xbox) | Ritual Entertainment, Turtle Rock Studios | Xbox Game Studios (formerly Microsoft Studios) | Original Xbox | ||
Counter-Strike Neo | Namco | Namco | Arcade | ||
2004 | Counter-Strike: Condition Zero Condition Zero Deleted Scenes | Valve, Ritual Entertainment, Gearbox Software, Turtle Rock Studios | Sierra Entertainment, Valve (digital) | PC, macOS | Last official game to use the GoldSrc engine. |
2007 | Paranoia | Paranoia Team | Paranoia Team | PC, Dreamcast | |
2008 | Counter-Strike Online | Valve, Nexon | Nexon | PC | Free to play game based off Counter-Strike: Condition Zero with microtranscations and skins, aswell as many other game modes like Zombies. This version doesn't require Steam, and is only available in Asia. The console commands has been restricted to only some commands to prevent cheating and other exploits. |
2013 | Cry of Fear | Team Psykskallar | Team Psykskallar | PC | Runs on older, but highly modified version of GoldSrc with better graphics. |
2014 | Counter-Strike Nexon: Studio | Valve, Nexon | Nexon | PC | Last officially licensed game to use the GoldSrc engine. Worldwide (America, Europe) version of Counter-Strike Online. Originally called as Counter-Strike: Nexon Zombies. |
- See GoldSrc games category for more games, and for articles about the game which uses the GoldSrc engine.
Specifications
Limits | GoldSrc Pre-25th | GoldSrc Post-25th | Xash3D | Svengine |
---|---|---|---|---|
Maximum number of dynamic sound channels | 8 | 32 | N/A | N/A |
Default max number of server entities (MAX_EDICTS ) |
900 | 1200 | 600 - 4096 | 8192 |
Absolute max number of server entities (via liblist.gam edits) | 2048 | 2048 | N/A | N/A |
Maximum number of temporary entities (MAX_TEMPENTS ) |
500 | N/A | 300 - 2048 | N/A |
Maximum number of particles (MAX_PARTICLES ) |
4096 | N/A | 1024 - 8192 | N/A |
Maximum number of beams (MAX_BEAMS ) |
64 | N/A | 64 - 512 | 256 |
Maximum number of visible entities in the package (MAX_VISIBLE_PACKET ) |
256 | 1024 | 512 | N/A |
Maximum number of pre-cacheable models and sprites (MAX_MODELS ) |
512 | N/A | 2048 | 8192 |
Maximum number of pre-cached sounds (MAX_SOUNDS ) |
512 | N/A | 2048 | 4096 |
Maximum number of entries to read sentences made up of sentences (MAX_SENTENCES ) |
1536 | 2048 | N/A | N/A |
Maximum number of user messages (MAX_USER_MESSAGES ) |
128 | N/A | 191 | N/A |
Max number of loaded textures (MAX_TEXTURES ) |
2048 | N/A | 4096 | N/A |
Max number of GL textures (MAX_GLTEXTURES ) |
4800 | 10000 | N/A | N/A |
Number of messages titles.txt (MAX_MESSAGES ) |
1024 | N/A | 2048 | N/A |
Maximum size of indexed textures | 512х512 | 512x512 | 4096х4096 | N/A |
Maximum size of full color textures | 512х512 | 512x512 | 4096х4096 | N/A |
Maximum number of models on the map (MAX_MAP_MODELS ) |
256 | N/A | 1024 | 4096 |
Maximum number of map leafs (MAX_MAP_LEAFS ) |
8192 | N/A | 32767 | 65536 |
Maximum number of entities per packet (MAX_PACKET_ENTITIES ) |
256 | 1024 | N/A | 512 |
Maximum number of spans (software renderer geometry limit) | 3000 | 6000 | N/A | N/A |
Maximum number of surfaces (software renderer geometry limit) | 2000 | 4000 | N/A | N/A |
Maximum number of edges (software renderer geometry limit) | 7200 | 14400 | N/A | N/A |
Bugs and Limitations
Use GitHub in order to prevent duplicate or outdated bug reports at the wiki.
Other games like Team Fortress Classic was also affected, but appears to work almost perfectly fine aside from HUD scaling fixes were non-functional. And another one such as Counter-Strike, which has been fixed to support the 25th anniversary update, may have other problems and issues that can crash the game. Additionally, mods that use custom OpenGL renderer (such as Paranoia (non-Xash3D version) and older version of Cry of Fear, etc...) will be also crashed on startup aswell (Issues #3710).
steam_legacy
on Half-Life (and in some games such as Counter-Strike) by going to Half-Life > Properties... > Betas > select steam_legacy
. Once those games has been fixed, you can opt out by set the beta branch to "None".
gl_overbright 1
) is broken due to an OpenGL extension used for multi-texturing, which is required for the detail textures used by Counter-Strike: Condition Zero, Day of Defeat, and some third-party mods. This make the color less saturated and lighting much less brighter, as well as introduce chromatic aberration on brightly lit lightmaps.
The issue was fixed in the 25th anniversary update, which deprecated the
gl_overbright 1
in favor of gl_use_shaders 1
. However, there are more issues that was yet to be fixed with the new overbright lighting.This issue can be also found on GLQuake, but for different reasons.
steam_legacy
branch) and most standalone mods, see Overbright lighting section in PCGamingWiki's Half-Life page for more information.
- Set the game (
hl.exe
) to "High Priority" in Task Manager. - Disable multitexturing.
hl.dll
and client.dll
) on the mod folder itself was renamed. But keep in mind that this method may breaks some mods and cause it to crash, or made several new additions such as new weapons, new NPCs, etc... from the mod stops working.Trivia
- The term "GoldSrc" comes from development of the Source engine. A few months before the release of Half-Life, the Half-Life engine's source code was split into two branches: Src and GoldSrc. The GoldSrc branch was the gold master version of the codebase, and would be used for the proper release of the game. The Src branch, comparatively, would be continually iterated upon, adding and changing features for use in the sequel, with the term "Source Engine" eventually being picked up by marketing.[1]
See also
- For information about converting GoldSrc content to the Source engine, see Porting GoldSrc content (maps, models, etc.) to Source
- GoldSrc on Wikipedia
- GoldSrc SDK (Half-Life SDK) Documentation
- GoldSrc SteamPipe Directories
References
- User talk:Erik Johnson (Revision as of 12:53, 1 September 2005)
- Half-Life 25th Anniversary Update
- Relation between Paranoia & COF