Prey 2006 Remake Demo (RTX 4090 or better) file

103rd download was first since update.

Originally this mod was free, but it also was massively inferior to the final product as I wasnt using the correct compression technology at the time. Now it uses DXT1 for diffuse, DXT1 for specular maps, DXT3 for transparency sharp transition alpha maps, DXT5 for gradual transparency alpha maps, RXGB DXT5 for heightmaps + normals (bump mapping).

With proper compression technology with most assets minus a few insanely heavy on the memory levels, its feasible to create a mostly per pixel texture resolution, not only point blank, but camera turned slightly so the texture is even closer. This applies to shaders like specular heightmaps to normal maps as well to the extent which the visible bottleneck allows me to hide the lower resolution of some layers to not waste memory. One of the marketed features of this engine is per pixel lighting, the highest version of this mod you are getting maybe 95% of the textures are at per pixel resolutions custom sculpted for 4k. Considering trading up strategically some less obvious layers compensated for using ray marching and path tracing heightmap injection to make the per pixel texture resolutions 100% throughout the entire game.

"These pixel razor sharp shadows that scale to any resolution."
-Digital Foundry

=Per Pixel Lighting

@ 17:02

Soft shadows in id tech 4 as is looks like trash as they are very unstable warping around character models and the edge of the screen even adjusting the radius. To resolve this issue is not feasible at my skill level. Interestingly the optimization for shadow culling behind objects is partly responsible.

Parallax mapping does not support DDS and even if its a nice touch to the game render, using TGA format for everything to get it working is going to make the game look objectively worse by a lot. If other versions of the game support it, I will go ahead and add it to those. Not having the source code to this game only leaves the SDK, so im making the best with how its programmed.

Ray marching atop geometry glow adds a subtle shine to the top of some objects that intensifies in the presence of sufficient triggering light as cues from the game render. And ambient occlusion has multiple layers of radius to achieve more stable coverage in the render both for objects like the players weapon up close and further out. Screenspace path tracing is tuned to a reasonable amount given its injection after the game has drawn the graphics. So its tuned to not look bad being a tacked on stage in the rendering pipeline. The texture and shader aspect of this mod is the star of the show with ray marching and raytracing being pretty mild to be honest, but also a very memory efficient way to add another layer of basically bump mapping thanks to the path tracing (SSR). And it also adds load to otherwise pretty dormant shader processors for a game this ancient. Getting more value out of modern hardware in an older game. So its punching crazy above its weight to the point im flirting with calling it a Remake.

This is a tech demo for 2024 hardware using a pretty ghosted engine by developers at the time. Sad because its probably legitimately the first what I would in my opinion call the emergence of modern graphics engine technology. I mean its good enough that pushed to the limit its overall capable of looking like a modern game if the lack of 3D geometry count doesnt stand out too much in that particular scene. It might not be targeting true dual cores like the Source engine, but its also definitely more efficient in general. And the thread scheduler tuned correctly (instructions provided in download) having most of the game logic on 1 core as long as your hardware is modern even while pushing it really hard well beyond intended from the factory floor has pretty good latency. Games today use more and more cores, which can have certain side effects in reality.

Loading times are also wildly superior despite pushing the engine harder than my id tech 3 Jedi Academy mod. The second thread is definitely compiling textures. Or the C++ vs C is just in a league of its own just wildly dethroning id tech 3 which it replaced using slower inferior coding technologies if you want to go vroom vroom.

The most interesting thing ive found modding had to have been the ancient game Painkiller where using crossfire DX10 GPUs the loading times improved over using one GPU. Sometimes software can surprise you trying to figure out what its doing from the outside. The way I have the thread scheduler set leverages an actual full core and not a logical core which in theory accelerates level loading times. I havent had the time to test that yet as the mod is still in development.

What it feels like to use this mod with high end hardware.