Portal 64 – A demake of Portal for the Nintendo 64

[0xC0ncord]

It's worth mentioning that the author has a YouTube channel[1] where he periodically posts videos showcasing updates he's made to the game over time. I'm surprised there isn't a link or even any kind of screenshots of the game on the Github repo, even if it is still very early in development.

[1] https://www.youtube.com/@happycoder1989/videos

[driscoll42]

Agreed, this repo is in desperate need of a few screenshots/video on the ReadMe to showcase what it looks like.

[frfl]

Was wondering the same thing. If you search "screenshot" in the issues, there are a few screenshots people have uploaded, primarily in regards to demonstrating bugs.

https://github.com/lambertjamesd/portal64/issues?q=screensho...

[beebeepka]

Looks much better than I expected. Hard to believe people are complaining about things this cool.

[nsxwolf]

It looks so good it's a lot closer to a port than a demake.

[Ideenfindung]

I did not know this concept existed, Wonderful Idea, no doubt demakes would be a lot more frequent if we valued ecology and actually tried to curb digital obsolescence as much as possible, in a permacomputing way.

I imagine it would be much more straightforward to port pretty much any indie games to consoles like Xbox original onwards, PS3 onwards, Wii onwards, maybe Windows 7 average desktop and notebooks (lots of indies already use older direct x and are compatible with windows 7 , another win for the pc master race). The AAA Games would need to be done with less scale and no 4k dlss ray tracing whatever.

[MayeulC]

While I agree with the sentiment, and it's awesome that a lower-specced version of the game exists...

> port [...] to consoles like Xbox original

Uuh, in the name of energy efficiency, let's not. My smartphone is much more powerful and has a much lower power consumption than these systems. My Steam Deck even more so, though it's higher-power than a phone.

Targeting energy-efficient, low power hardware should be the goal, not porting to inneficient obsolete HW, IMO (though it's pretty cool, and demonstrates that you can do a lot with little computing power).

Still, I agree that something that runs well on old commodity hardware can run well on most existing hardware, reducing the need for hardware upgrades.

But my point is, running ond old HW is probably counterproductive if you only value ecology. At best, you could emulate old HW with much more efficient modern HW, and integrate most of the system on a single low power chip.

[indolering]

> I imagine it would be much more straightforward to port pretty much any indie games to consoles like Xbox original onwards, PS3 onwards, Wii onwards, maybe Windows 7 average desktop and notebooks (lots of indies already use older direct x and are compatible with windows 7 ,

Not a game developer, but given the lack of ports between current gen gaming systems I would assume that it is not straightforward. Sure, a game engine will magically pump out your game for different backends but even supporting Vulkan and Metal results in much gnawing and mashing of teeth (and a lack of games on Apple hardware).

Then there is the developer ergonomics. I know that I hate having to write code to maintain compatibility for even 5 year old standards. Each GPU and game engine is also a unique clusterfuck of incompatibility and subtle bugs that crash the shit out of games. If you want to support that old hardware, you will need to test on the actual hardware. Why bother with all that when there is no money in it and your team just wants to move on from a project that already took 5 years of their lives to develop?

Forward compatibility is something I strongly agree with but backwards compatibility is a logistical nightmare.

[nonethewiser]

This demake is an additional game. Seems like it will just add to the energy load required to run a computer programs. Which I think is fine, frankly. Perhaps some people will play it instead of portal but even still there is the overhead of developing it. I guess if we cared about ecology we'd shut down more game servers faster.

[runlevel1]

> PS3 onwards

By most accounts the PS3 was not fun to write software for due to its unusual specialized processing units.

[p0w3n3d]

I was thinking the same - ecology. People need to have 3d Tetris with raytracing while there are millions of hours of old games to be played through. There are few titles that are avant-garde and IMO better in 3d, like GTA VC/SA, Minecraft is revelation of a sandbox game. But otherwise we don't need such good graphics and DLC, when we want story and playability. Recently we played with kids Pokémon fire Red - the world is huge and full of secrets. But I guess this only applies to me and my kids, because other kids I know (my brother's e.g.) don't like pixel games at all

[anthk]

The PS3 sucked. OTOH, targeting at most GL 2.1 for a game would be one of the best tools to avoid buying new machines.

[andrepd]

By far my favourite demake of Portal is this one: https://www.ticalc.org/archives/files/fileinfo/451/45101.htm...

[derrasterpunkt]

Mine is Mari0: https://stabyourself.net/mari0/

[bluescrn]

There's also a 2D demake for the C64: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=pK140z-ZX4Q

[sillywalk]

Cool.

Here's one for the Apple II [ http://www.deater.net/weave/vmwprod/portal/ ]

and the C64:

https://tasvideos.org/2122G

[etaioinshrdlu]

Is there any guide to getting this running on a real N64? I have an everdrive.

[bhaney]

I went ahead and built the newest version of the ROM into a .z64 (happened to have a copy of Portal on hand). Here's a magnet link for it if you just want to use it:

magnet:?xt=urn:btih:5FAD6DBBF02D39AA40062D7F0F498F3F341F8DB3&tr=udp://tracker.opentrackr.org:1337/announce

[danbolt]

Lambert has also created new homebrew works that run on original hardware with the N64 SDK. His team has always been a finalist in the yearly jams.

[1] https://teamultrarare.itch.io/telocation-gemini

[2] https://teamultrarare.itch.io/mission-lost-control

[3] https://teamultrarare.itch.io/styx

[bluescrn]

Looks like you need a PC copy of Portal:

https://github.com/lambertjamesd/portal64/releases

(There's some older releases below as a ready-to-go .z64 rom image, though, which should be ready to run on an Everdrive)

[kristianp]

From [1]. " A demake is a video game remake on an older platform, or one which converts the game to an older graphical or gameplay style."

[1] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Category:Video_game_demakes

[idonotknowwhy]

This works on the new N64 FPGA core for the MiSTer

[tmountain]

Sounds like a really cool project, but I would love to see some screenshots or videos.

[dale_glass]

Here: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=OCBHdgbickE

[binarymax]

Latest demo video by the creator, mobile friendly: https://m.youtube.com/watch?v=OCBHdgbickE

[tempodox]

I so wish they remade the Portal games for 64-bit macOS!

[CaesarA]

I was just watching a video about this, it's pretty cool and honestly impressive that it could be done on N64. They don't even have Half-Life 1 on N64, which makes me wonder if recreating Portal 1 decently in Goldsrc is possible.

[Thedarkb]

Sven Co-op got portals working on their branch of the GoldSrc engine but I think they abandoned development because of FBO issues.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Lbniay4bfJU

[idonotknowwhy]

The got tomb raider one demake running on a GBA recently. Anything is possible

[araes]

Not having seen the info in the post. Is this a downport of the Half-Life engine, or using the Portal art in a different engine, such as the Goldeneye engine?

[mr_sturd]

Would probably make it liable to DMCA, but I wish they could have the rotating 'N cube' passing through two orthogonal portals on boot up.

Looks like a great project. I'm going to have to give it a go on the emulator.

[Janicc]

He should publish an emulated version on steam with an option to download the rom through it. Valve usually lets others use their IP then.

[StevenXC]

Maybe an option to provide your own ROM with that asset would be a work around?

[cbxyp]

Pretty awesome project, cool to show what can be done downscaling and running a customized game engine with the original assets like this. Cool!

[psychphysic]

How long before versions are distributed ready to play?

[autoexec]

Hopefully before the project is taken down due to a DMCA notice!

[crtasm]

https://github.com/lambertjamesd/portal64/releases

You need a file from the official Portal game, then it's an easy single step with an online tool to generate the demake ROM.

edit: or see bhaney's download link on this thread.

[0xC0ncord]

A lot of times a demake is a challenge. Video game technology has evolved significantly, and being able to take a (relatively) modern video game and remake it on much older hardware while still having most of the game's original features is an impressive feat.

[pests]

CTRL+T, "demake", Enter

That was a quicker solution to your question than posting on here.

[Waterluvian]

Yes and yes. It’s a hobby.

[hinkley]

> demake

Maybe the author will explain what a “demake” is.

Nope, he doesn’t. No introduction section, just straight into compiler instructions. You have to make people care about your project, and right now I don’t.

[jrajav]

If there are many Wikipedia articles, and Youtube videos with millions of views on a given concept, at what point is the burden on you the reader to already know the concept or be able to look it up and learn it quickly?

[atom-morgan]

I mean, I've never heard of the term either but the context of the title alone was enough for me to figure it out.

[0xC0ncord]

A "demake" is just a spin on "remake". Instead of remaking a game to be newer and "better", you remake it to be "older".

Edit: adding that most demakes specifically involve remaking a game on much older hardware.

[xcv123]

> Maybe the author will explain what a “demake” is.

First result on Google search for "demake".

> You have to make people care about your project

No he does not. This is a personal Github repo. A non-commercial hobby project. No one gives a f*** whether you care or not.

[floydnoel]

just curious, who made you the boss of what other people "have to" do with their hobby projects? seems like a big responsibility