1PrBoom demo support 2=================== 3 4PrBoom has lots of demo options compared to most Doom ports, so I decided to 5write a brief document outlining the features. If you're thinking of 6recording demos, you're strongly advised to read this. 7 8To play demos, you of course use "prboom -playdemo demoname" (the .lmp is 9optional). To the best of my knowledge, PrBoom should play all MBF and new 10PrBoom demos perfectly. It also plays most Doom v1.9 demos (significantly more 11than Boom or MBF); almost all demos recorded with ultimate doom or doom2.exe 12version v1.9 should work (please let me know if you find ones that don't), but 13there are still problems with doom95 and final doom though. It should play most 14Boom v2.01 and v2.02 demos, although I don't know of that many to test with. It 15will also try to play older Doom demos, LxDoom demos, and Boom v2.00 demos. 16 17Recording demos is done with "prboom -record demoname". **IMPORTANT** PrBoom 18will record to a number of demo formats, namely Doom v1.9, Boom v2.02, MBF, 19and PrBoom - which format it records is determined by your current 20compatibility level, see README.compat. The purpose of this feature is so 21people like me that won't let DOS anywhere near their computers can record 22demos compatible with other engines. 23 24PrBoom supports the -recordfrom parameter, which starts recording a demo 25from a given savegame. "-recordfrom demoname n" is a synonym for "-record 26demoname -loadgame n", which records a demo from savegame number n. 27 28People doing speedrun demos may be interested in the comp_moveblock option, 29see README.compat. 30 31PrBoom supports loading and saving games during demo recording and playback 32(but only for new PrBoom demos, not for older demo formats, obviously). 33Don't worry, saves in demo playback are written with different names, they 34don't overwrite your own saves. Saves when recording, do. You can load games 35during recording, but they'd better be games saved during the same 36recording, otherwise it won't play back. 37 38PrBoom supports continuation of recorded demos. This is the scenario this 39feature is designed for: say you're beta testing a level for someone, and 40you want to send them a *complete* demo of how the level went (saves, deaths 41and reloads and all). You start with "prboom test.wad -record test", play 42for half an hour, save and exit. Next day, you go to play again, with 43"prboom test.wad -record test" again. PrBoom will scan the existing 44test.lmp, find the savegame command, and insert a loadgame command to reload 45that game; it will reload the game and continue recording of the demo. This 46is an experimental feature, but hopefully it works :-). 47 48**IMPORTANT** The observant will have noticed from the above that PrBoom 49won't overwrite existing demos anymore. If you want to record over a demo, 50delete it first. 51 52I think that's all for now. 53 54- Colin <doom@cph.demon.co.uk> 55