Alice Averlong🏳️⚧️I kinda wonder if they generated this code out of some non-C++ language with a poor optimizer.
Everything has a vtable. Even classes where there's no subclasses, and there's only ever one object, because it's a big magical global singleton.
YOU DON'T NEED VIRTUAL FUNCTIONS WHEN THERE'S ONLY ONE OBJECT THAT NEVER CHANGES
also while I'm at it, when you call a function called "resolveName" that returns a pointer, you shouldn't have to check the result against both NULL and -1. Something went wrong if you think -1 is a valid pointer.
20 ::mbinary_search functions and no ::nonbinary_search. sad.
(hard mode: there's no templates here. they seriously wrote 20 variants on their binary-search algorithm)
okay yeah they DEFINITELY built this game on top of a cross-platform engine (their own, I believe).
I just found a function for getting the state of the mouse-wheel.
On a wii.
NOW LOOK, TECHNICALL YOU CAN PLUG A MOUSE INTO A WII, YES.
BUT WHY WOULD A GAME BOTHER TO SUPPORT IT?
The same developer did make a game for the PC the year before, but it's GONE.
Like, the only hits are wikipedia and the linked-in page for the project manager.
Like, the only hits are wikipedia and the linked-in page for the project manager.
But the internet archive helps! Apparently this wasn't even exactly a game, it was some kind of training tool? interesting.
yeah I think wikipedia has the wrong title for this game. It's GeoStorm, not Geo-Storm.
Not that it helps.
I'm guessing this game didn't come out. All the info is from that one page and resumes of people who worked on it.
Not that it helps.
I'm guessing this game didn't come out. All the info is from that one page and resumes of people who worked on it.
mind you if it was an internal training tool, why would it need to come out?
anyway I just did some checking. So the wii version has bundles that start with
"Pipeworks bundle v1.20 (big endian)".
Guess what the xbox 360 version says?
"Pipeworks bundle v1.30 (big endian)"!
"Pipeworks bundle v1.20 (big endian)".
Guess what the xbox 360 version says?
"Pipeworks bundle v1.30 (big endian)"!
And it's using the same script/VM system.
The Wii version is v3.01, xbox360 is v3.81.
The Wii version is v3.01, xbox360 is v3.81.
oh hey, it turns out one of their next windows games (from 6 years after the wii game, and 4 after the xbox 360 game) is free to play on steam. Time to download 5gb of game I have no interest in playing just to look at some data files!
Nope. It's unreal engine.
Also, I accidentally launched it, and it has a broken EULA. You can't decline it, it just tells you to accept before you can continue. I'm not trying to continue, I'm trying to QUIT
grabbed another 2009 game for the wii: "Pipeworks bundle v1.03 (big endian)".
JUST HOW DEEP DOES THIS RABBITHOLE GO? AM I GOING TO HAVE TO BECOME THE OFFICIAL EXPERT ON THE PIPEWORKS ENGINE?
Another 2008 game: Pipeworks bundle v1.03 (big endian).
let's see. They released a gamecube game back in 2002. is that Pipeworks v0.01?
at least there's no references to it in the 2001 Palm OS game demo that was on tucows
"Pipeworks Bundle File version 1.18"
WHAT?
Why is the 2002 GameCube game showing versions that are newer than the 2009 games?
looks like their distinctive engine isn't in use for their DS game Godzilla Unleashed - Double Smash (2007)
but it is used for the wii games Charm Girls Club: Pajama Party (2009) and Merv Griffin's Crosswords (2008)
ugh. I'm gonna have to set up a wiki page for this.
in addition to the one on Wikipedia, which needs fixing
in addition to the one on Wikipedia, which needs fixing
Monopoly (2010) for the PSP:
"Pipeworks bundle v1.13 (little endian)"
Yep.
checking Wii U games is harder.
Their Wii U port of Wheel of Fortune is "Pipeworks bundle v1.30 (big endian)".
Their Wii U port of Wheel of Fortune is "Pipeworks bundle v1.30 (big endian)".
they made a free-to-play match-three game with a Godzilla license in 2014. Let's check...
Nope, unity.
Boogie for the PS2 (2007): "Pipeworks Bundle File version 1.4"
Night at the Museum: Battle of the Smithsonian, 2009, Wii:
"Pipeworks bundle v1.03 (big endian)"
Godzilla: Unleashed, 2007, wii:
"Pipeworks Bundle File version 1.4"
I suspect this game doesn't use the whole engine, and may just use the bundle files. It has a non-standard layout.
One similar to Destroy All Monsters Melee, in fact, which makes me think they reused some code.
NHRA Drag Racing - Countdown to the Championship, 2007, PSP:
"Pipeworks Bundle File version 1.4"
"Pipeworks Bundle File version 1.4"
I'm definitely going to need to do more research to figure out which ones of these are really using "Pipeworks engine" vs which ones are just reusing their bundle format.
oh hey it's not just games.
uDraw Studio: Instant Artist, 2009, Wii:
"Pipeworks bundle v1.30 (big endian)"
uDraw Studio: Instant Artist, 2009, Wii:
"Pipeworks bundle v1.30 (big endian)"
interestingly, PRINCE OF PERSIA RIVAL SWORDS (2007), wii, seems to be no. Completely different internal structure.
oh, probably because they just handled porting it. Ubisoft made the PSP version.
I grabbed the wrong Zumba game for Wii (there's FIVE), but if anyone wants to try hacking Zumba Fitness Core by 2012, it shouldn't be hard: the game is scripted in unencrypted Lua files.
Wreck-It Ralph (2012, Wii) seems to be a new engine. Not Pipeworks
Godzilla: Save the Earth (2004), for PS2, uses "Pipeworks Bundle File version 1.3".
1.3! This is the earliest game I've seen using Pipeworks, and it's got a surprisingly late version number. Weird!
okay now I've got the right Zumba game. Zumba Fitness, 2010, Wii:
"Pipeworks bundle v1.20 (big endian)"
"Pipeworks bundle v1.20 (big endian)"
I found a reference on their 2003 homepage that their Destroy All Monsters game uses the "Spigot Engine".
I don't think that's the same engine as what I've been calling "Pipeworks".
I don't think that's the same engine as what I've been calling "Pipeworks".
I'm going through assorted linkedins. Looking for someone saying "I used to work at Pipeworks on the Foobar engine".
The closest I've seen is Terry Fernham, who says they were "[r]esponsible for tools and technology included in the core custom game engine on multiple platforms."
The closest I've seen is Terry Fernham, who says they were "[r]esponsible for tools and technology included in the core custom game engine on multiple platforms."
I guess I'm gonna call it Pipeworks Core for now.
oh huh! According to the 2011 version of their website, they helped develop part of the Xbox and Xbox 360 boot roms. Neato.
yeah. Nothing. Just "internal" and "custom" and "core".
Spigot. I think it's still called Spigot.
Ian Sabine's linked-in said he "Maintained and updated Spigot engine".
He's credited on Charm Girls Club: Pajama Party, Jeopardy, and Wheel of Fortune, all of which use the same engine.
Ian Sabine's linked-in said he "Maintained and updated Spigot engine".
He's credited on Charm Girls Club: Pajama Party, Jeopardy, and Wheel of Fortune, all of which use the same engine.
for what it's worth, there's no references to Spigot in the executable that I can find, and this thing is positively lousy with debugging metadata and strings.
there is a reference to something called the RockNRoll engine, but I'm pretty sure that's just the collision engine.
interesting find: the "Colossal Kaiju Combat" games licensed the Spigot engine from Pipeworks. So if they are showing some of the same files, then it's gotta be Spigot.
Time to find out. 5$ to find out
"Pipeworks bundle v1.30 (little endian)"
It's got the .pvd/.pvm files and everything.
This is 100% the same engine.
THIS IS FUCKING SPIGOT
wait
this giant monster fighting game...
uses MYSQL!?
this giant monster fighting game...
uses MYSQL!?
anyway they remembered to strip the debugging info for the Kaiju game, so that's not as useful to reverse. Still, it's a nice comparison to have: it's an example of the x86 version of the same engine. Maybe I can still make use of this.
also, side note, the list of games on their wikipedia page is missing a few on their games lists, like if you hit it at 2013, you also get "Gremlins Gizmo" and "Plantsville", alongside the other ones we know about and the typo'd GeoStorm (not Geo-Storm)
they're also credited with uDraw Studio, but their own list says they made uDraw Studio AND uDraw Instant Artist.
Started building a wiki page listing all the versions and such.
hey found another game missing from wikipedia!
Plantville, which they made for Siemens, is an edutainment game about factory management from 2011.
Plantville, which they made for Siemens, is an edutainment game about factory management from 2011.
I could also go through all these games and make sure their build info is on TCRF but that's maybe too much work
here's the really fun part:
they clearly were fine with licensing out their spigot engine, given that they licensed it to that kaiju game.
How many other games did they license it to, and it just never was mentioned anywhere?
brb downloading all Wii, PS2, PS3, PSP, Xbox, Xbox 360, and Windows games.
I'm gonna need more floppy disks
So they made a few demos (for the xbox) with Microsoft prior to announcing their "first" Spigot game. I don't think those demos were ever released, they were just shown as promos for the Xbox.
It's possible that's where Spigot came from. Maybe they built the engine for that, then reused it for their Godzilla game.
if I see one more place where this code is like "(if x!=0 && x!=0xFFFFFFFF)"...
LEARN TO USE ONE SENTINEL AND STOP PRETENDING -1 IS A POINTER
interestingly their Wii game "Gremlins: Gizmo" calls itself "GForce" internally, not to be confused with G-Force for the Wii, which they didn't make and doesn't use the Spigot engine.
Alanna 🏳️🌈🏳️⚧️@foone who does this?
Canageek@foone But how else do you reference imaginary memory that doesn't exist?
Riley S. Faelan@foone: There are sometimes good reasons to use multiple sentinels, though.
One of my favourite pieces of Now Ancient Tech is the Pick database system. It popularised (well, for a while) the use of structured data by way of multi-level separators. But one effect of that is, as you're scanning along a data field, there's a bunch of different sentinels you may need to detect and recognise.
AMS@foone I've done that on embedded stuff a bunch to catch uninitialized values both in RAM (0) and Flash (-1).
Alexander The 1st@foone Have you checked to see what the Nintendo Wii does if you *do* use -1 as a pointer?
Maybe there's some arcane use of it (My guess would be to indicate when the Wii switches to GameCube Compatibility?).
GreenDotGuy@foone Plantville: The terrifying prequel to Plants vs. Zombies, where an industrial accident and a misunderstanding create an army of the undead.
Vivian 🏳️⚧️ BLM@foone I've always wanted to get some udraw tablets and see if there's an easy way to hook them up to things like Jackbox
Diego Elio Pettenò@foone how's Wikidata about those? I would love to see that be the source of truth for connections like these as it's easier to deal in facts that narrative… in theory.
(How to handle merged/split/renamed/absorbed companies makes things complicated.)
Cyber Yuki@foone JFC with his secret herbs recipe, what a trip.
I love this, so I@foone don’t leave us hanging, are there any tasty-looking SQL queries stashed in there?
Eniko (moved ➡ gamedev.place)@foone at least it's unlikely to corrupt your save? :D
Fenyx4@foone MYSQL is a Kaiju? Makes sense.
endrift 🏳️⚧️
the vessel of morganna
Esi@foone DICK.B*ttS*xF*ck