Homebrew BillardGL comes to the Wii after 22 years

mudrik

Member
OP
Newcomer
Joined
Nov 18, 2022
Messages
23
Trophies
0
Age
31
XP
199
Country
Turkey
Some of you might be old enough to remember the nice open source 3D game BillardGL from the early thousands (from 2002, precisely). It's written in C++ using OpenGL 1.1, which as we all know, is not supported by the Wii. Well, at least until a wise guy wrote opengx, a library that wraps the GX API presenting it as the OpenGL API. The project was abandoned back in 2009, but the author was so kind to write detailed documentation on the design of this project, that it would have been a waste not to put it into use.

So, recently the opengx project has been revived and functionality has been added to make it support more of OpenGL 1.1. We are still far from the finish line, but it's nice to see that a non trivial game like BillardGL could be ported with almost no changes to the code.
Screenshot from 2024-05-12 23-28-15.png

You are welcome to visit the project at https://github.com/mardy/billardgl/tree/wii-port - see the "Releases" section for a downloadable zip file to add the game to your Homebrew channel.

Please note that not all changes required to builg the game have been integrated into opengx yet, so if you want to build the game from source, you'll need this branch.
 

DDinghoya

Well-Known Member
Member
Joined
Jun 2, 2016
Messages
132
Trophies
0
Age
45
XP
1,935
Country
Korea, South
Some of you might be old enough to remember the nice open source 3D game BillardGL from the early thousands (from 2002, precisely). It's written in C++ using OpenGL 1.1, which as we all know, is not supported by the Wii. Well, at least until a wise guy wrote opengx, a library that wraps the GX API presenting it as the OpenGL API. The project was abandoned back in 2009, but the author was so kind to write detailed documentation on the design of this project, that it would have been a waste not to put it into use.

So, recently the opengx project has been revived and functionality has been added to make it support more of OpenGL 1.1. We are still far from the finish line, but it's nice to see that a non trivial game like BillardGL could be ported with almost no changes to the code.
View attachment 436827
You are welcome to visit the project at https://github.com/mardy/billardgl/tree/wii-port - see the "Releases" section for a downloadable zip file to add the game to your Homebrew channel.

Please note that not all changes required to builg the game have been integrated into opengx yet, so if you want to build the game from source, you'll need this branch.

Is there a way to add Korean fonts for translation?
 

mudrik

Member
OP
Newcomer
Joined
Nov 18, 2022
Messages
23
Trophies
0
Age
31
XP
199
Country
Turkey
Is there a way to add Korean fonts for translation?
It's not easy for me to reply, since I'm not the original author of the game, and it's all written in German :-(

If someone is able to figure out how to add additional fonts I'll be glad to accept code contributions, but I'm afraid I don't have time to spend on this myself.
 

DDinghoya

Well-Known Member
Member
Joined
Jun 2, 2016
Messages
132
Trophies
0
Age
45
XP
1,935
Country
Korea, South
It's not easy for me to reply, since I'm not the original author of the game, and it's all written in German :-(

If someone is able to figure out how to add additional fonts I'll be glad to accept code contributions, but I'm afraid I don't have time to spend on this myself.

I don't know the program, but it seems to call the characters in buchstaben.bmp and buchstabenalpha.bmp as fonts. (\billardgl\Texturen\2)
 

KleinesSinchen

GBAtemp's Backup Reminder + Fearless Testing Sina
Member
GBAtemp Patron
Joined
Mar 28, 2018
Messages
4,475
Trophies
2
XP
15,052
Country
Germany
and it's all written in German
WTF? Who writes programs with file names, comments and variable/method names in other languages?

I don't even do that for my occasional toddler level hobby programming just for myself. I could easily translate all the text in the sources, but man, doing this correctly not missing any references so that it still compiles, that is a hard piece of work.

Somebody good with awk and sed might be able to do it quickly in semi-automated manner. Or maybe some IDE can assist? These bloated things nowadays have 1000s of functions.
 
Last edited by KleinesSinchen,

Site & Scene News

Popular threads in this forum

General chit-chat
Help Users
  • ColdBlitz @ ColdBlitz:
    some of the best selling games on the switch are wii u ports (that are priced way too high
    like come on 60 for a game thats a decade old??)
    +1
  • Xdqwerty @ Xdqwerty:
    @ColdBlitz, i forgot breath of the wild released for the Wii u
  • The Real Jdbye @ The Real Jdbye:
    $60 for a game that's a decade old might be unheard of on PC but actually is not uncommon on consoles
    +1
  • The Real Jdbye @ The Real Jdbye:
    especially Nintendo because they only ever lower the price of games when they do a greatest hits/platinum hits/players choice re-release
  • Xdqwerty @ Xdqwerty:
    @The Real Jdbye, and the HD collections released for 7th gen consoles too
  • The Real Jdbye @ The Real Jdbye:
    but they don't seem to have done any of those for the switch yet and maybe never will
  • ColdBlitz @ ColdBlitz:
    I think we all forgot breath of the wild released for the wii u tbh
    +1
  • Xdqwerty @ Xdqwerty:
    @The Real Jdbye, tbh the HD collections are more justified since they include more than just 1 game per copy
  • Xdqwerty @ Xdqwerty:
    @SylverReZ I read that non-binary people identify as a blend of male and female. The point is i think i'm a blend of those and thus non binary
  • SylverReZ @ SylverReZ:
    @Xdqwerty, Non-binary people are those who don't identify themselves exclusively as male or female.
  • cearp @ cearp:
    I don't identify as anything, unless I need to get on a plane then I show ID
    +3
  • AncientBoi @ AncientBoi:
    👈 [homo, queer, fag, coksuqr, etc......]
    +3
  • Xdqwerty @ Xdqwerty:
    @SylverReZ, I meant that I read that they can also identify as what i mentioned
    +2
  • BigOnYa @ BigOnYa:
    I identify as Long Rod Johnson, cause a cat called me that once.
    +2
  • AncientBoi @ AncientBoi:
    [takes a 👀 in your pants] Liar :angry:
    +3
  • Xdqwerty @ Xdqwerty:
    @SylverReZ, and thus that would make me non binary since i feel like a blend of both male and female
    +1
  • AncientBoi @ AncientBoi:
    @Xdqwerty only time will tell, what/whom you are. At 14, its a bit early to "Define" yourself. :)
    +3
  • Psionic Roshambo @ Psionic Roshambo:
    I only recently have learned who I am and how much I am capable of and I'm 50 lol
    +3
  • Psionic Roshambo @ Psionic Roshambo:
    A thousand epiphanies and unbelievable pain and growth.
    +2
  • Psionic Roshambo @ Psionic Roshambo:
    I wish I could sum it up for children to understand but it truly takes living a lifetime of learning
    +2
  • Psionic Roshambo @ Psionic Roshambo:
    It's more than knowledge it's understanding
    +1
  • Psionic Roshambo @ Psionic Roshambo:
    Both are required
  • Xdqwerty @ Xdqwerty:
    @Psionic Roshambo, ask chatgpt or Google gémini to summarize it
  • Psionic Roshambo @ Psionic Roshambo:
    Lol summarize life's lessons
    Psionic Roshambo @ Psionic Roshambo: Wisdom +1