Current Events > Zelda Ocarina of Time reverse engineered; new open source engine for Zelda OoT

(+) Yeah! (+)

https://arstechnica.com/gaming/2021/11/reverse-engineering-team-completes-its-ocarina-of-time-decompilation/

A team of dedicated fans have reverse engineered Ocarina of Time, and it has a new open source engine.

This does enable them to easily port the game to other platforms. You'll see OoT on everything now, going back to older consoles like Dreamcast. You'll see a far superior OoT on Switch compared to what Nintendo offers with their emulator.

But more importantly, imo, this blows the doors wide open for what is capable with mods. You'll see Ocarina's graphics get completely overhauled and upgraded, even its game mechanics depending on what people do.

If workable tools are developed, which they no doubt will be, you could see new content, even things like new quests and lands. Zelda is actually a really good candidate for an Elder Scrolls style modding system, because it doesn't rely so heavily on voiced dialogue, or at least these early games don't.

Going further though, because this is open source no doubt there will be a fork, or possibly already is for multiplayer, things like coop. But as the engine improves due to its open nature, this could easily grow in some years to eventually having Ocarina of Time/Majora's Mask MMORPG servers.

And I keep mentioning it, but I have no doubt that it will grow to encompass Majora's Mask/Master Quest as well, seeing as it's all on the same engine.

Everything I'm speculating about here would take years, different for each thing. But it is what the community will do given the time

You do need your own Zelda OoT rom to supply the game assets to play this new version on your PC

Macho Man mod in 3...2...

Questionmarktarius posted...

Macho Man mod in 3...2...

Followed shortly by Thomas the tank engine mods, of course.

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neat

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Nintendo won't allow any of that to happen.

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Incoming C&D from Nintendo.

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Fans do what Nintendont

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Heartomaton posted...

Incoming C&D from Nintendo.

Solar_Crimson posted...

Nintendo won't allow any of that to happen.

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For anyone interested in a glimpse of where projects like this can go, Elder Scrolls III Morrowind has a similar project that is further along, OpenMW. The last year or so they've basically fully reverse engineered the original engine's function, but it runs a lot better usually and almost never crashes. But now, they are actually starting to implement deeper fixes and improvements to Morrowind's engine and gameplay.

https://youtu.be/_9sUhduT-K4

Also, OpenMW does have MMO servers like I was saying I think Zelda will get. You download TES3MP to play, its the mp branch of openmw. When I play Morrowind, I play on a server that routinely has 20 people on, just doing their own thing also playing. You can own your own house in the server that is actually yours, and you can decorate/design the inside to your liking, here's mine, come visit me sometime (Nerevarine Prophecies server):

Solar_Crimson posted...

Nintendo won't allow any of that to happen.

Heartomaton posted...

Incoming C&D from Nintendo.

My question to you all is, when Nintendo does this, are you just not gonna care and keep buying their shit? When they relaunch old games with literally zero improvements lmao.

If so, then you have submitted to the fact that these corporations want to hold game design back, and you are okay with it.

If you're not okay with that, then good on you.

I am fine with these companies not allowing such projects, but we as fans should demand they give us something every bit as good.

Right now, it's not quite the same fragile limbo as fan games being announced too early, but damn close. Fart out source code, and there's nothing Nintendo can actually do about it.

Nintendo has no real legal standing until someone tries to capitalize a rebuild or something, and general distribution of the source code will quickly become streissand'd when Nintendo does finally send in the ninjas.

JimmyFraska posted...

If so, then you have submitted to the fact that these corporations want to hold game design back, and you are okay with it.

No they don't. They just hold back re-designing their games.

Questionmarktarius posted...

Right now, it's not quite the same fragile limbo as fan games being announced to early, but damn close. Fart out source code, and there's nothing Nintendo can actually do about it.

Nintendo has no real legal standing until someone tries to capitalize a rebuild or something, and general distribution of the source code will quickly become streissand'd when Nintendo does finally send in the ninjas.

The hope with all of these projects, for me as a fan, is that they get so far along that it's too late by the time the corporation does this, where the community has the engine and so much power with it there's nothing the publisher can do, except keep making money by selling the original form of the game in order to bank on the open source engine.

Now, if a developer stated that as their intention, I think that may start to get a bit icky legally. But me as a fan, I'm really hoping for that, especially with this Elder Scrolls engine. OpenMW could eventually encompass all the games on that engine, up through Skyrim/Fallout 4, and beyond.

What sucks is, there are often cool people among these game publishers who are willing to just ignore this shit and let the community do their thing. But corporations change leadership so much, it wouldn't surprise to see every project of this nature come under siege.

Questionmarktarius posted...

No they don't. They just hold back re-designing their games.

People love the corporations, what can you say.

Edit: This is a fair point, but I'm not here to play fair with the billion dollar corporations, because they have no interest in playing fair with us.

Did Nintendo ever try to do anything about the Mario 64 PC port someone made?

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YellowSUV posted...

Did Nintendo ever try to do anything about the Mario 64 PC port someone made?

Well, there was something that resulted from the Gigaleak, but they couldn't do anything cause it was posted anonymously.

But there actually is a similar decomplication project for Mario 64, similar to this Zelda project. And that one seems to be safe for now because like this project it was properly reverse engineered (clean room is the term I've read, but I don't know/understand absolutely everything).

YellowSUV posted...

Did Nintendo ever try to do anything about the Mario 64 PC port someone made?

The usual law-ninja beatdown on distributing complied object code, and probably also audio/graphic assets. Source code itself got streissand'd, as far as I know.

Nintendo probably doesn't care anymore, because the first step to recompiling is "install linux".

Solar_Crimson posted...

Nintendo won't allow any of that to happen.

They can't do shit about it other than stop public websites from peddling it.
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Mr Hangman posted...

I am not fine with companies fighting projects like this, and Nintendo's general hostility toward hackers and anything that remotely brushes up against their IP is a big part of why I haven't bought anything from them since the Gamecube days.

However there's an established history around reverse engineering, and if it's done carefully it can skirt around legal restrictions. The show Halt and Catch Fire covers how this was done with IBM PCs.

legal restrictions mean nothing when you're talking about a small team getting fucked by a giant corporation with bad lawsuits. the corporations know that they can bury a small group in legal fees, so even if they know they cant win in court they can force the group into bankruptcy.

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voldothegr8 posted...

They can't do shit about it other than stop public websites from peddling it.

This is why the streisand effect needs to be allowed to happen. Don't announce anything legally questionable until it's complete and functional, and don't bottleneck your distribution channels.

Mr Hangman posted...

I am not fine with companies fighting projects like this, and Nintendo's general hostility toward hackers and anything that remotely brushes up against their IP is a big part of why I haven't bought anything from them since the Gamecube days.

However there's an established history around reverse engineering, and if it's done carefully it can skirt around legal restrictions. The show Halt and Catch Fire covers how this was done with IBM PCs.

I'm not speaking legally, but for me, to restrict people in modifying software, or hardware, or anything of that nature, takes away one of the best parts of having a computer: everyone has one. Your computer can do what the corporations computer can do in 99% of instances, outside the most ridiculous needs, or something like Hollywood CGI rendering.

Computer technology is the biggest enabler and equalizer to individual humans ever. You are not limited by your technology, only by what you know how to do.

Questionmarktarius posted...

This is why the streisand effect needs to be allowed to happen. Don't announce anything legally questionable until it's complete and functional, and don't bottleneck your distribution channels.

Absolutely. The GTA engine guys should have kept their mouths shut.

Questionmarktarius posted...

the first step to recompiling is "install linux".

I don't have Linux >_>

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Solar_Crimson posted...

Nintendo won't allow any of that to happen.

Didn't stop the Super Mario 64 PC port from happening

Now that it's out there, there's pretty much nothing Nintendo can do to stop it from spreading

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