DescentDevelopers/Descent3

[Runtime Issue]: `-mission` doesn’t work

Opened this issue · 5 comments

Jayman2000 commented

Build Version

v.15.cffeb20a

Operating System Environment

  • Microsoft Windows (32-bit)
  • Microsoft Windows (64-bit)
  • Mac OS X
  • Linux (specify distribution and version below)

CPU Environment

  • x86 (32-bit Intel/AMD)
  • x86_64 (64-bit Intel/AMD)
  • ARM (32-bit)
  • ARM64 (64-bit; sometimes called AArch64)
  • Other (RISC V, PPC...)

Game Modes Affected

  • Single player
  • Anarchy
  • Hyper-Anarchy
  • Robo-Anarchy
  • Team Anarchy
  • Capture the Flag
  • Bounty
  • Entropy
  • Hoard
  • Monsterball
  • Cooperative

Game Environment

I’m running NixOS 23.11 and using game data from the Windows Dual-Jewel version of Descent 3 v1.4.

Description

The wiki says:

Original 1.5 Patch Notes

Fixes

[…]

  • Made -mission work as described; that is, it now causes the specified mission to start automatically when the game is started.

When I run the game with -mission, it just takes me to the title screen. It doesn’t start the mission.

Regression Status

I don't know

Steps to Reproduce

  1. Run Descent3 -mission training.
JeodC commented

The wiki is based on patch notes from a v1.5 beta. Inside the menu.cpp file, there is a comment:

 * 194   10/17/01 3:43p Matt
 * Took out Kevin's -mission changes since we decided to change the readme
 * instead.

This appears to be a removed feature.

JeodC commented

https://github.com/DescentDevelopers/Descent3/blob/main/Descent3/menu.cpp#L1152C1-L1194C7

This block checks for the presence of -mission and performs the first-time run logic if it is not present. However, there is nothing here to handle if -mission is present. There is a small block in init.cpp as well, but that only loads custom mission scripts into Osiris.

wof8317 commented

Is this even a bug then if it is a mostly removed feature, or is this something that will be reimplemented later on? If this is not considered a bug, then shouldn't this issue be closed, since there is no bug to fix?

Jayman2000 commented

Is this even a bug then if it is a mostly removed feature, or is this something that will be reimplemented later on? If this is not considered a bug, then shouldn't this issue be closed, since there is no bug to fix?

Regardless of whether what happens to -mission, I think that there is indeed a bug here. Another part of the wiki lists command-line options for Descent 3. It says that -mission <name> “Loads the specified mission file at startup.” At the moment, -mission doesn’t do that. We could consider this to be a bug with Descent 3. In that case, this issue should be closed once Descent 3 is updated to actually start the mission when you use -mission. We could also consider this to be a bug with the wiki. In that case, this issue should be closed once the wiki has an accurate description of -mission.

JeodC commented

It is a wiki bug. As I stated in an above comment, the wiki command line options are based on the v1.5 beta patch notes. The -mission option was apparently removed and the readme updated, but there was no beta patch notes update to reflect that.

Alternatively, -mission could just be reimplemented as it appears to be a wanted feature.