Descent • Parallax Software 1995 (DXX-Raytraced Source Port / First 5 Levels)

Descent was develeped by Parallax Software and published by Interplay in 1995 for PC DOS and Mac and in 1996 for Playstation. In the craze of DOOM clones it innovated with 6 degree of freedom control and fully 3d environment and enemies (before Quake), sprites were still used for pick ups and some of the effects. It supported high res SVGA graphics modes, but at the time there was no PC that could handle that at fluid framerates.
Here I'm using a port that adds raytracing to the old game. Get it from the link below, it comes with sharware version of descent.hog and descent.pig files, but if you own the full release you can swap those files from the full version.
DXX-Raytraced Source Port:
github.com/Bre...
This port adds physically-based renderindg, pathtraced global illumination, soft shadows and other modern rendering stuff. It adds a subtle headlight, probably to light some places that would end up totally dark due to way RTX works, you can change the instensity of it if you like in the options. You would think that it defeats the purpouse of the flares, but it dissipates rather quickly so it has pretty small "range" so flares are still pretty useful not only for opening doors ;)
I'm uploading playthorugh of the first 5 levels, but let me know in the comments if you would like to see more.
This port probably requires RTX capable GPU though I didn't find any info on that on its github page. The only bugs I've seen so far is a bit broken rear view and the map will render sometimes some junk lines that are not part of level geometry.
Want to support this channel directly - Join now:
/ @damsonn

[@RightCenterBack321]

I remember how popular this game was, though nobody really talks about it any longer. I'm amazed at how many bangers came out during this era that exist only really in our memories any longer.

[@happyloaf]

Gog still sells many of these games and they are still great.

[@Stickers96]

Man I don't remember the music slapping this hard.

[@TurboNutterBastard]

How old are you? 5?

[@CYON4D]

I remember this game being almost a benchmark for PCs back then. Never really played it extensively. 6 degrees of freedom was thought to be the next big thing in games :)
Such a cool game.

[@meshugeah]

Damn, this looks like Overload (new game from creators of Descent)!

[@CakePrincessCelestia]

Best thing about that game is the VR support! :)

[@damsonn]

@@CakePrincessCelestia Yeah, it even supports Track IR if you don't have VR.

[@RetroAmateur1989]

really hoping to see an RTX Descent 3

[@damsonn]

This might actually happem simce its source code was recently released.

[@JohnTheBodge]

Could never get into this. When I watched videos on cover discs I thought it looked great, but when I played myself, even recently, it just didn't seem so much fun as it looked.

[@borisrazulin8111]

Hello damsonn, sorry for hijacking this thread, can I ask how many FPS you get in EECH? Mine are 60 FPS in menus and 40 FPS hard capped in game. Vanilla retail release with dgvoodoo2.

[@ScottAhearnShipbuilder]

Do you get the jittery mouse movement in the source ports too?

[@LRK-GT]

RT's been being used wrong, this whole time!?
A lot of these classics *do* look nicer w/ RT lighting and I bet it doesn't take a 4090 to run at smooth framerates.

[@damsonn]

Yeah, I really enjoy the retro graphics with RTX lighting. First Half Life got similar fan mod and it looks great.

[@Jani_Ikävalko]

Is there Descent 2 in the works?

[@damsonn]

@@Jani_Ikävalko no clue, but it would be great if there was.

[@MoTheAviator]

Is Descent 2 also raytraced?

[@damsonn]

This is a port for the first one only AFAIK.