We are proud to announce the release of The Dark Mod 2.09!
TDM 2.09 marks a new phase of performance improvements aimed lowering CPU overhead in the graphics engine.
A whole new graphic backend has been created by Cabalistic which uses modern OpenGL features to eliminate the need for the CPU to constantly issue commands to allow the Graphic Processor to render scenes.
This gives TDM some of the performance advantages of rendering using a low level API like Vulkan.
Stgatilov has been very busy this release cycle. He has put heroic efforts into improving the way that TDM upgrades and hosting operate in addition to the vast improvements to TDM itself. (He also refactored the entire particle engine and created a link system to connect TDM to Dark Radiant.)
A full changelog can be viewed here, but some highlights include:
Better performance:
A brand new Backend that uses UBO, Persistent Mapping, Bindless textures, and Multi-Draw has been added.
“Frontend Acceleration” (Multi-Core job based rendering based on Doom 3 BFG) now works as expected.
Normal Map compression now uses RGTC resulting in lower storage, VRAM requirements, and less artifacts ( load times should improve in future TDM versions when pre-compressed RGTC textures are added )
Background texture loading has improved. This should shorten load times and reload.
Better visuals:
A new Sharpening Filter has been added. It can make 70% Render Scale look almost like native resolution (more performance).
( It also cleans up some blurry textures for all Render Scales. )
Bumpmap lighting is smoother, so that lighting does not instantly flip to off when getting close to edges of occluded objects.
Particle physics have been substantially improved for both accuracy and performance.
Borderless Fullscreen works properly on Windows.
Water and other GUI effects that did not respond to Gamma now brighten properly.
AMD and Intel fixes have been added for SSAO rendering
Better gameplay:
Experimental Gamepad support has been added.
Creep works in alway-run mode
Better mapping:
A new linking system allows The Dark Mod to act as a real-time preview of Dark Radiant
The redesigned particles now have improved setup and configuration.
Automated fixes have been created for “rotation hacked” models
Prefabs have been seen numerous fixes and reorganization to make them easier to use
Better Sound:
Conversation and other sounds are no longer stopped by saving or going to main menu.
EFX reverb has been added to “Mission 1: A New Job”
Extinguished gas lamps are no longer noisy when doused
New Assets:
Dragofer, Epifire, Bikerdude, LDAsh, Kingsal, Dram have all added substantial asset updates ranging from updated Werebeast animations, Steam Engines, fireflies
More stable:
A huge number of fragile code areas have been overhauled to either fix crashes or prevent likely crashes due to risk of divide by zero, uninitialized values, or dangling pointers (leftover settings) on entities and functions.
We recommend that you upgrade using the new “tdm_installer” available here. Please be aware that old saved games will not be compatible with 2.09, so finish any missions you might be in the middle of first!