try jjffe! ...its not a java hack, rather a recompilation of disassmbled code with some c additions to handle sound video and controls. and works perfectly, believe me. there is a high-res hack (rasterizers redone to render to 640x480), and i did a real high-res version (math code assumes high 630x480 screenspace, support for haigh res bitmaps too, but i didn't do any artwork... can send the exe if you want it, my homepage is gone - the university finally let me go), and a nice balnced version (aniso's jjffe) <- (i'll try to merge my high res code with that one)
cheers

had no luck with FFE and dosbox in the past. iam actually using the hires hack of JJFFE. it looks awesome!
theres no need to run FFE with dosbox anymore, trust me. 😉

there is also a opengl version of the Atari ST elite2 on the net, but it has no fullscreen option and some other minor bugs.
you can find it here.

it whould be nice to have an opengl version of FFE in the future too. 😀

I don't think 640x480 has been considered hires since '94 when games started offering 1024x768 😀. Yes I did try JJFFE for a little bit, but everything just looks too jaggie and grainy for me to stand playing it again. Lets be honest the graphics weren't even that impressive when it came out, considering it was released at the end of the DOS days with other games like MechWarrior 2 and Wing Commander III. The reason I have been trying so hard to get it to work with DOSBox is to allow me to play at 1280x960 using the OpenGLHQ mode. In my opinion these scaling/filtering modes improve most game 100%, far exceeding the potential of the original graphics yet still maintaining that classic feel. Even though FFE doesn't seem to work with the current DOSBox, you can at least watch the introduction video with OpenGLHQ if you are curious as to the benefits. I guess I have just become spoiled by these antialiasing filters since even though it is cool to replay those old classics, I rarely if ever play any emulator (whether MAME, DOSBox, SNES, NES, Amiga) without enabling the filtering modes and playing at or above 1024x768 resolution.

Are you guys aware of either a scale2x or a hq2x filtered version of JJ:FFE? I had some programming classes as part of my CE undergrad degree, but no graphics classes and I am too lazy to try to modify the SDL myself to allow either of those two scaling/filtering approaches.

I've never tried JJFFE but if you download OPENGLHQ enabled SDL.DLL from Moe's website and replace the SDL.DLL used by JJFFE with Moe's and use the environment variables required to enable it then it should work.

yeah i know what you mean. but the native resolution of FFE is 320x200, even if you run it in dosbox at 1280x960. the resolution is interpolated and it results in a blurry image quality with opengl hq for example. ok with scalers on the image is sharpen again, but i dont like that comic look and you need a fast cpu to handle games with polygon graphics at a good framerate.

the hacked JJFFE version increases the native resolution of FFE to 640x400. the interface is stretched but the polygon graphics are less pixelated. you can also increase this resolution much higher (take a look at the ffewin.cfg file).

I've never tried JJFFE but if you download OPENGLHQ enabled SDL.DLL from Moe's website and replace the SDL.DLL used by JJFFE with Moe's and use the environment variables required to enable it then it should work.

good idea but there is no sdl.dll in the binary that can be replaced so easily. when you download the source of jjffe, you only find an sdl folder in that archive. maybe someone with programming skills can take a look at this?

Well upon taking your advice, I did check out the HIRES version of JJFFE and I must say that it is quite an improvement over the original and after messing around with the winffe.cfg I can also display at 1280x960 albeit in letterbox mode. It is definitely far more palatable in the HIRES form, but I would still like to see a scale2x or hq2x version of the high res 640x400 version so I get the same resolution with additional filtering. While I agree that the filtering does add a comic book like effect, I am far more forgiving since it looks like a intentional game design choice as opposed to simple low res jaggies.

Hopefully someone will implement the filtering, but I realize that typically that is a low priority since the average user isn't running a 2.6+ Ghz A64 and like you mentioned filtering is quite intensive. I would be interested in hearing more kolijoco, especially if you do in fact get around to merging yours with aniso's verions. Thanks,

-Malichite

i'll try to add openglhq scaling (if that is in fact a shader - i've been away from sdl for a couple of years) to my jjffe 640x480 version - the current version can use opengl for scaling already, so it might not be a big deal.

ok, i've started checking things.. problems:
the current sdl cvs build doesn't really like moe's patch (or apps linked with the cvs lib his dll. appearently the binary compatiblity has been broken... don't ask. he just posted in another thread, a nd sais he's looking into the stuff) so openglhq will have to wait a little. (i got it to start, and the intro sequqnce start runnig, but no input is handled and the window just goes into not responding if you keep clicking it).
i'm currently working on adding supprt for 16 bit colors including 16bit high res bitmaps for the cockpit. when thats done, i'll try to merge with aniso's code. i'll get back as soon as i get something done (could also do a 1280x800 version, but the line rasterizers would need more tweaking, otherwise unit width lines would be hairlines 😀

...
i'm currently working on adding supprt for 16 bit colors including 16bit high res bitmaps for the cockpit. when thats done, i'll try to merge with aniso's code.
...

that sounds realy nice. hope you get it done.
i dont like the old cockpit .bmp files, because there to colorfull and distractive when using the starmap for example.

maybe you can add support for .jpg, .png or animated .gif files also. i whould appreciate this. 😉

Well I appreciate that you even took the effort to give it a try kolijoco. I really didn't expect anyone would look at it that quickly, especially after I mentioned I was too lazy to try to figure it out myself. 😉 That is also very good news that you are playing around with hires cockpits, since that is something that still looks horrid on the HIRES version. Seems like I read in the JJFFE readme that it was easy to replace the cockpit bitmaps except that most ships have their own style so it might turn out to be a lot of work. Thanks again for messing around with it.

-Malichite

well i figured merging with aniso shouldn't be that hard. i'm also making that my main project now, so all updates will go in there (all the high res, high color stuff to come - hopefully). all interested can grab the binary at my sorry excuse for a homepage at:

http://geocities.com/kolijoco/

if you find bugs or have comments, let me know...

- kolijoco

ive tryed your binary today with a clean FFE, but only got an application error.
ive also copyed a sdl.dll in the FFE folder and to windows\system32 with no other results.

maybe there is a other file missing i dont know...

edit: iam using winxp sp2.

hmm... no clue what it could be. tried it all in a clean directory (extracted firstenc.zip the one that has the 'game' subdirectory, copied the exe and sdl.dll to the 'game' subdirectory - i don't keep one is system32, and it works) try this sdl.dll. if you can get jjffesdl.exe to run, this should run too. anyone else getting this?

ok, i tried it on yet another computer and got the error. went back and rebuilt with vs 6.0 (the screwy one was built with vs 2005 express), and this one works on the other box as well. updated the homepage thing, but i'm attaching it too (use a jjffesdl.cfg for config options, i've included mine).
sorry (f@#$ vs 2005 express?)
j

nice, very nice. now it works. it runs a little choppy in fullscreen with fsmode set to 1 so i changed it to 0 (GL).
the intro looks great using 1280x800x32. have you changed the bottom graphic with the FIRST ENCOUNTERS logo? it looks different but good. 😀

iam playing arround with this and let you know if i found some bugs. hope you get the landing gears looking correctly.

keep up the good work. 😉

yeah, the bottom logo is the only high res (but still 8bit) bitmap i took the curage to replace (the code support is there, i'm just not an artist - besided i want to add high color support before i reauthor any of the bitmap contetnt). happy testing 😀

fixed the landing gears this morning, go to geocities.com/kolijoco for the updated version

good work. ive tryed some different ships, theyre all looking good.

but i only have one problem: no music with your binary.
ive found that the jjffe sdl version has no music support at all but with anisos mod the music works fine (with converted midi files). i thought that it uses jjffes sdl too or am i wrong?

Just curious if the versions you tried SysGOD, that had the music enabled, did they work properly? I have been playing around with kolijoco versions and I am quite impressed and didn't miss the lack of music since I always had to disable it anyways (notes get stuck and songs begin overlapping in the base JJFFE versions). Again thanks for the hard work kolijoco,

-Malichite