Thread

What reversing, modernising old games tells us about the economic impact of AI

135 points · 90 comments · keeda

0x000xca0xfe · 1790644602 · focus · HN ↗
Interesting, I did the same with an old RTS and it also worked very well.
But instead of cloning their assets and rewriting their code, a dynamic x86 to WASM JIT recompiler with some web platform support code proved fast enough to run the original binaries. It is even playable on an old Android smartphone in Firefox.
The final web player is ~600KB and only needs the game installer as input, so people still have to buy/possess the game. I think this is a lot fairer for the original devs...
1. debo_ · 1790650796 · focus · HN ↗
  Which RTS is it? I'm a fan of the genre.
  1. 0x000xca0xfe · 1790679805 · focus · HN ↗
    The Settlers IV ( <a href="https://www.gog.com/en/game/the_settlers_4_gold_edition" rel="nofollow">https://www.gog.com/en/game/the_settlers_4_gold_edition )
    But the approach should work with all of those ~2000s simple 2D/light 3D Windows games, like Anno, C&C etc. that have less than 1GB of assets and no serious multithreading. Newer ones probably won't fit into a browser tab anymore or would take too long to load.
    The biggest problem for the smartphone browser version is extensive use of left+right mouse input of that era which is naturally not a good fit for touchscreens.

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