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Sphinx and the Cursed Mummy

 
2024-04-21 changelogApr 21, 2024 - Community AnnouncementsThis update comes with lots of bugfixes and gameplay tweaks, improved levels (Cursed Palace, Mummy Sewer and Uruk Temple), and a few higher-quality textures. People with NVIDIA laptops should not get black screens anymore. The fiddly part at the end of Uruk Temple with the moving metal platform has been streamlined. See the full changelog below: {STEAM_CLAN_IMAGE}/31158491/78462b3758bcde3b7db03cfe4ce64d41caae0763.png {STEAM_CLAN_IMAGE}/31158491/124d0bf8860b09592eccbc3b47f8ff636b7b3425.png 2024-04-21 (Sunday) Tweak the Mummy Sewer level to fix the glitchy metal grate that flickered against the water plane, also fix the fast-moving water in the 64-bit version of the same level. Fix a bunch of player-reported crashes and bugs: Fix a crash to desktop when picking up items without a parent trigger. Fix a hairy issue related to «pickupable» frozen enemies who are almost dead. Fix a NULL pointer dereference in the way EngineX draws in-game windows, which led to code execution redirection. Fix a crash when the player tried to look at another nearby character's neck, but the neck bone did not exist. Yes, I know. The NVIDIA driver reports supporting up to MSAA x32 via costly supersampling when the hardware only generally handles up to x8. Detect what is the actual limit to have more reliable performance. NVIDIA laptops also seem to have trouble with the supersampling, causing black screens. Limit the valid MSAA values loaded from Sphinx.ini to x1 / x2 / x4 / x8 / x16 / x32 / +, round them down and avoid possible OpenGL driver issues when players try to run the game with something like MSAA x3 directly. Disable (texture) anisotropic filtering by default during the first startup if MSAA or «advanced» features are not decently supported. Better performance for potentially low-end graphics cards. Close the game properly, without crashing, while having a -dev mode sub-menu open while doing Alt + F4 or closing the window. Add HQ texture overrides for the flying stone platform in the Uruk Islands, the Heliopolis Exterior palace bird heads and the smashed obelisk floor. The low-res bird heads one was suggested by @lordquacksmith. Fix the wrong texture in the throne room wall of the Cursed Palace. Enlarge the spawn radius of torches, characters, breakable pots, and other triggers. Fix more funky texture UV coordinates in Cursed Palace; the triangular glitches in the side door frames, the flipped and misaligned wall design at either side of them. Expand the draw distance of pots, monsters, torches, portals and more. All in all, better. Update the boot-up copyright year to 2024, it was about time. Tweak the Uruk Temple level to fix the biggest collision issue in the game with the moving platform and the window blocker. The released beetle would get stuck in the seam between the moving and static platform; if they detected collision against a "wall" during 15 consecutive frames they would explode, and this often happened in the seam unless the player moved it very fas...Twenty years of SphinxNov 10, 2023 - Community Announcements7305 days ago a game titled Sphinx and the Cursed Mummy was first released in North America. After around three years of development and more than a few name changes, going from «Shadow of Set» at E3 to «Misfortunate Mummy» around summer, they finally settled on what we all know. The project started as a 1996 CGI movie concept from a small team of artists from Valencia, Spain called Anibyte. The team had already worked with Eurocom doing the cutscenes for a previous game of theirs called 40 Winks. In these small demos, which can now be watched here and here, thanks to Ana Amat, we can already see some familiar faces in a different fantasy setting. Eventually, the team could not get their movie funded, and joined game developer Eurocom to mutate the concept into something even more familiar. Merging Egyptian mythology, a touch of Arabian Nights, the Luna project, and a vibrant and friendly animated look. We already see a transforming Sphinx, Anubis, and some early monsters like the Goofy Lizard. {STEAM_CLAN_IMAGE}/31158491/4573bde77570c25e233608037d28b7f7ba708ffa.jpg{STEAM_CLAN_IMAGE}/31158491/5c2ce27ef9387d89a6a3c2d48150fde2cb255504.png Once the game started pre-production we can see the landscapes and architecture solidifying into very different patterns and palettes. {STEAM_CLAN_IMAGE}/31158491/9c571703b68bcd48995a0ecc9ffa9fbbc7223a15.jpg {STEAM_CLAN_IMAGE}/31158491/2d0258ef4659647dcabd659605cd0b62b00cc89f.jpg {STEAM_CLAN_IMAGE}/31158491/ad470d6c891e85ae822065f9531cf840ffa43371.jpg {STEAM_CLAN_IMAGE}/31158491/148c9ccbdb2a9319585675304f364c9f131b5fcf.jpg {STEAM_CLAN_IMAGE}/31158491/5658a4395ac6123660dc7a0e20cf65d7f5b23e1f.jpg {STEAM_CLAN_IMAGE}/31158491/8af9a6f81efce5555aad29f9a851e9e502662e3e.jpg {STEAM_CLAN_IMAGE}/31158491/4ad1664966c322bb8faabef63c22ca3c1104cdfa.jpg {STEAM_CLAN_IMAGE}/31158491/3c3676e17af011abd5234f36fcc984b4f15813e2.jpg We also start seeing the first efforts of getting these concepts into the custom game engine they built; fighting memory and resolution limitations to make it all fit in a console with barely 32 megabytes of RAM. Shown below are extremely early versions of both Abydos and Akaria; the underwater realm, home of piranhas and plenty of other relocated monsters, like the evil skeletal dragon boss that we can find under Abydos in the final version: {STEAM_CLAN_IMAGE}/31158491/4528d9e9bf90fb251a166069b5dbd0a35de5d0d1.png{STEAM_CLAN_IMAGE}/31158491/db07833e60c049c2dc77acddea866126578e4b6f.png{STEAM_CLAN_IMAGE}/31158491/67dc5ce20668459ee53d765d8a2a7fb153e84200.jpg With the titular character growing up and getting some new clothes, here we can see one of the very first concepts for Uruk, the «lava hell», and what seems like a prototype version of Abydos, with the bird design and slanted walls: {STEAM_CLAN_IMAGE}/31158491/5e6c17b72ddb605b8cac85b9a6b328e95e30f20f.png Here we can see a more advanced underwater Akaria Dome level, as well as a later version of the Abydos Canals, and early-to-mid versions of Sakkara; the jun...2023-10-09 changelogOct 9, 2023 - Community AnnouncementsHi there! Those wanting to test the first version of the much-requested projected shadows on Windows and Linux + SteamOS can do so now by opting into the «sixty-four-bits» Steam beta branch. At the moment, they look more or less like this, but we are aware that they are way too dark in some places, so some tweaks are to be expected. Toggle the following button to preview them, and we always appreciate any feedback by posting below or by opening a discussion thread: {STEAM_CLAN_IMAGE}/31158491/1a6fd5c2577e2e3145bfb493ebfe4e7592a09d2c.png Other than that, textures now look even better, some levels have been hopefully improved with extended view distances, and we even get two new monkey statues at tricky spots. Phew. Full changelog below: 2023-10-09 (Monday) Add two brand-new save statue spots in critical places where players usually struggled or died frequently, causing frustration and backtracking: One at the Uruk Intro, just before the caged Spike Spider fight. Another at the Heliopolis Wall Section II entrance, for players that did not save after coming back from the second Mummy visit. Spot suggested by @SphinxLuvDuvWuv. Fix music not playing right after launching the game with the -slot 0/1/2 command-line argument (that directly loads a save slot and skips the main menu), until the player respawns. 2023-10-06 (Friday) Add 12 new HQ textures for the Luxor Pyramid, covering environmental surfaces and interactive objects. Add a bunch of extra HQ textures on Luxor Palace, covering the Luxor guards, stained glass windows, some plaster walls and more. Add more miscellaneous textures covering Abydos walls and building windows, Heliopolis exterior shooting target base and bull head on top of the Wall's forcefield, eagle water faucet's cork, beetle breeding jar. Plus breakable vases in Abydos, environmental improvements to the Corridor of Champions and the crocodile owner. Edit and re-export the Abydos Canals/Heliopolis Exterior/Luxor Palace/Luxor Pyramid levels on both 32 and 64-bit to enlarge the spawn distance of fires, items, NPCs, portals (avoiding ugly fade-outs to 2D stand-in cards closer to the player). Fix some railings (like the ones protecting the Shield of Osiris) and other translucent surfaces drawing in the wrong order. Re-export the Mummy Uruk Castle exterior map and cutscene to fix the texture clash that made some castle surfaces look metallic. Reported by @jmarti856 and @lordquacksmith. Vertical particles like falling water droplets and magic lightstreaks now actually face the right direction (Y-axial locking). Before this many particle FX sprites rotated awkwardly and the drops appeared sideways and off center, now they look more natural. Mark the crow textures as 1-bit alpha (alpha-testing instead of alpha-blending) so that their wings and body are drawn in the right order. Seems like the wingspan and crow head are rigged very rigidly and one can't completely avoid the clipping even after setting the texture as 1-bit/alpha-tested. Bu...2023-08-27 changelogAug 26, 2023 - Community Announcements2023-08-27 (Sunday) Add even more HD textures for characters, many enemies, pickup-able 3D items, Abydos Museum jewels, special effects and various environments; like the Abydos minigames, Uruk Castle, Uruk Trials, Heliopolis exterior and many others. A grand total of 304 new files. Toggle the following buttons to see a few before/after example screenshots below: Knives Cat: {STEAM_CLAN_IMAGE}/31158491/23abd29aad41a5e797117c70146442f0f9cb0845.png{STEAM_CLAN_IMAGE}/31158491/f9243539341c706e8a2462a6fc1aa2bfb631c0e7.png Almost-a-Bull: {STEAM_CLAN_IMAGE}/31158491/9f7cf75c86417ac26fc47d63532eae4237afb231.png{STEAM_CLAN_IMAGE}/31158491/f01f012cae109dc90ad37d283d1148ee1f0773a7.png 2023-08-24 (Thursday) Add a very experimental «sixty-four-bits» Steam branch with heavily reworked 64-bit versions of the engine for Windows and Linux, instead of the current 32-bit builds. Not recommended for normal players, this is mostly directed to Sphinx veterans who want to report issues. macOS will be ready in a few days, right now the branch will not work. Most of the existing mods will not be compatible with this experimental version. Seems to work fine on Steam Deck as-is, with some limitations. 2023-08-23 (Wednesday) Fix a crash when projected shadows (or NPC projected shadows) were disabled at startup in the latest version. Thanks to nas#7536 for the report. It's been a long timeAug 22, 2023 - Community AnnouncementsHi there, and happy 20th anniversary since the game's release! We were told that we should probably make some kind of announcement whenever we release a patch, instead of just silently dropping it into the blackhole that is our Official updates thread. ːsteammockingː We might as well start now, because we are still working on your favorite missing Sphinx features. See you again until the next patch notes. Hopefully in less than four years, if everything goes well. -- Here is what many of you missed: 2023-08-22 (Tuesday) Fix potentially not being able to unlock achievements on macOS under specific circumstances. Fix rich presence on Discord and Steam under macOS. Improve rich presence to publish updates faster. Fix macOS DPI scaling again, after more changes that broke it. Make mouse input work well with high DPI/Retina/UHD+ screens. Fix crashing on Linux with a «Value too large for defined data type»; start using 64-bit file offsets when reading files. This was a rare crash. The game should no longer crash for Windows users with AMD Radeon OpenGL drivers between v22.7.1 and v22.10.3. Some laptops are stuck with these drivers from around July-November 2022 and their OEM/manufacturer blocks generic up-to-date web drivers from the AMD site. So add a game workaround. Thanks to @SR. Croft for the report, hope you can play now. Add support for communicating between the in-game viewer and the Euroland editor on macOS and Linux via a /tmp/XLink FIFO/named pipe, previously this functionality was Windows-only, and crashed in the other OSes. 2023-06-26 (Monday) Fix glitchy particles due to the Intel Xe/ARC driver not knowing how to draw triangle fans; add a workaround. Thanks to @jmarti856 for the report. Updated the bundled/fallback OpenAL Soft library on Linux, to make it work great without Steam Runtime. Add missing hashcodes.h. Some errors weren't as descriptive as they should be. 2023-06-16 (Friday) Fix the Steam Deck scaling problems, where misaligned text overflowed the screen. Make the UI 8% bigger than normal on portable/handheld PCs, like Steam Deck. Make the Book of Sphinx/inventory infobox wider to improve readability. Don't needlessly recreate the graphics when the menu option hasn't changed. Don't show a green rectangle during dialog mouse-clicking. Implement drawing debug menu borders. Update the bundled/fallback SDL2 library on Linux. 2023-06-12 (Monday) Add a working 30 FPS mode. In the future this will engage dynamically, as needed. Right now it can be set via configuration file. It should improve performance in weaker hardware. VideoFrameRate=30 This can be used to override the display's refresh rate and make the game render at less than 60 Hz, like 30 Hz, 20 Hz, 15 Hz, or even less. So if you put a 30 there it will only render every other frame, improving performance by virtue of having half of the workload (and twice as much time allowance) to draw stuff, at the cost of looking slightly choppier. Fix sound not working under Linux after ...Soundtrack: Improved sound quality, advanced looping support and a new trackMar 11, 2022 - Community AnnouncementsHi there! Time for a song refresh. Updated all the song files; now the songs are based on the recovered high-quality 1411 kbps / 44100 Hz master files instead of derived lossy versions. Instead of ~500 MiB for the combined FLAC+MP3 package, now it weights around ~300 MiB for the MP3 version and ~930 MiB for the lossless FLAC version. One can freely choose between either version by toggling the «Download high-quality audio files» checkbox at Steam's Settings > Music section. Renamed most of the tracks to more friendly names, instead of using the internal, or early development tags. For example; the Book of Sphinx menu music is no longer called Nomads, the Heliopolis theme is no longer known as Sakkara Main, and the Luxor Palace theme is no longer attributed to Abydos. Added a Readme file with optional playback instructions through foobar2000 + vgmstream, for advanced fans wanting seamless loop point control of the tagged FLAC files. Please take a look at the guide via «Browse local files». Improved tagging, added BPM and other extended attributes where possible. Added an extra track; «Sun Shrine Island». Have fun, let us know what you think. ːsteamthumbsupː Note: Those with less disk space can still access the older, combined version of the soundtrack by right-clicking the «Sphinx and the Cursed Mummy: Soundtrack» entry in their Steam Library, selecting Properties, clicking on the Betas tab and selecting the «older» branch. https://store.steampowered.com/app/733200/Sphinx_and_the_Cursed_Mummy_Soundtrack/Discord community giveaway underway!Feb 25, 2021 - Community AnnouncementsTo celebrate the Sphinx and the Cursed Mummy -75% off sale ending March 1st, the Discord Community Staff (@lordquacksmith and @SphinxLuvDuvWuv) have organized to give away three copies of Sphinx on Steam! Today's winner is @Shrev64#0089. Here's how to enter: Join the official community Discord. React to the latest announcement containing information about the giveaway with an emoji of your country's flag. Wait for the winners to be announced. That's it! All draws are at random, and not in control of the hosts. Now is your chance to potentially win a free copy of this classic gem! If you are a fan of Sphinx and would like to see more events like this, let us know. So far we have featured plenty of original artwork in our previous creative contests. Maybe we'll post some modding updates in the future. There are a lot of interesting things underway. {STEAM_CLAN_IMAGE}/31158491/0884a8998427a9ce2154419a1b4cdcbf3e684165.png https://store.steampowered.com/app/606710/Sphinx_and_the_Cursed_Mummy/ Sphinx Monster Contest results announced!Nov 6, 2019 - Community AnnouncementsA lot of things happened in the Sphinx community since our last announcement; the Sphinx Discord server got verified, meaning that it is now officially the place to hang out to talk about the game, and is now jointly managed by THQ Nordic and the previous community staff. Also, the Sphinx wiki got a big overhaul, jmarti856's huge beta restoration mod is chugging along after we released even more beta content last summer and retrofitted more deleted gameplay mechanics into the engine... and, you guessed it, we had another nifty contest organized by our resident duck lordquacksmith, of course helped by the rest of the moderation team. This is what they have to say. -- Calling all goblins and ghouls! Another contest is upon us, this time it's a... Design your own Monster contest! What better time to hold this event other than Spooktober? This contest required the participants to design a monster that would fit in the world of Sphinx, using any sort of visual medium to do this: drawing it, painting it, making a 3D model, using Photoshop, making a sculpture, making it out of cheddar. The lucky winner wins a currently released THQ Nordic game of their choice! -- We had some excellent entries this time around, very imaginative designs and styles and in a wide array of mediums, with the Hippo lady taking the crown. Take a look. super cutie/Amnit: Hippo lady (7 votes) Anubis told me to bully sphinx, so that's what I'm gonna do! {STEAM_CLAN_IMAGE}/31158491/846f45cfacaa9c07a521eaa0203cbe465252f7f2.png SphinxLuvDuvWuv: Seahorse (5 votes) I was making a sculpture for my entry, today I was adding the finishing touches and had just finished making his teeth, eyes and hooves (made out of polymer clay so they looked more like actual teeth) when he fell off of the table. Sadly he cannot be salvaged as he's shattered into multiple pieces. {STEAM_CLAN_IMAGE}/31158491/bb36765f3e8260220a83f8b05653409bfbceb6e2.png HeavensBullet: Krow (4 votes) Alright, here's my finished product straight from my mind, I'm pretty proud of it. So his name is Krow, and he's a woodland creature that protects the woods. He is known as nature knight, he used to be human but when he died he was mummified and reincarnated into a wood-like creature. {STEAM_CLAN_IMAGE}/31158491/86cdc9dbe5d8f8c52f89264197fb16417ec99017.jpg Basket/braxwheeler: Ancient mummified goose (4 votes) Here's my submission. It's an ancient mummified Goose! It's used for annoying/ distracting your enemies. Very rare. Its honking was praised for its ability to wake even the deepest sleeping evils. {STEAM_CLAN_IMAGE}/31158491/ef137089c0c48f178afc0e894824d6c677e7a849.png BQoverlord: Golden cobra (3 votes) {STEAM_CLAN_IMAGE}/31158491/141cf2c0c0e542fa5ae86222e8bf71190db24376.jpg Egyptian-Enthusiast: Full brute (3 votes) LuvDuv recommended I submit the joke I made in one of my more recent Sphinx Videos -- the full brute! As described by LuvDuv in the video, it's like a human centipede made of two brutes. {STEAM_CLAN_IMAGE}/311584...Sphinx Art Contest results announced!Apr 30, 2019 - Community AnnouncementsFor those that didn't know, the good folks at the Sphinx Discord server have been running a community-led art contest to gauge interest. The results are pretty good. Nefertiti, by veteran Sphinx artist Norvadier. Here is the speedpaint in video form. https://steamcdn-a.akamaihd.net/steamcommunity/public/images/clans/31158491/9551aa769b9eec3711825da474ba0d0025a82a88.jpg Bye Hater, by DaxDraggon. https://steamcdn-a.akamaihd.net/steamcommunity/public/images/clans/31158491/ab4a4d3079f1ac7396ea4ad86048bf36a2e24de9.jpg The Grand Battle, by SphinxLuvDuvWuv. https://steamcdn-a.akamaihd.net/steamcommunity/public/images/clans/31158491/8c10b1cce8c3817e6682078ce1b9636733d15581.jpg -- Kudos to lordquacksmith for organizing the event, and also props to the rest of the moderation staff and our resident meme expert, Ven7roX, for the… art. Right now the community seems to be organizing to revamp the unofficial wiki, check it out and contribute if you find it interesting. Every little bit helps. See you next time, hopefully with more game updates. https://cdn.discordapp.com/emojis/549512947798507530.png?v=1 P.S. Which one is your favorite? Pretty big cumulative update with a good mix of HD visual upgrades, bug fixes and modding improvementsFeb 16, 2019 - Community AnnouncementsWhile we generally don't post Steam announcements for every single patch, and we usually update the forum thread instead, we have been improving the PC version while developing the Nintendo Switch port that was released three weeks ago. The community is growing lately, mainly around the Discord server. We have pretty interesting fan art and we have been beta-testing the upcoming Steam Workshop support. https://steamcdn-a.akamaihd.net/steamcommunity/public/images/clans/31158491/3f352aae48f169f5516e9fa3977b007a55835b1f.jpg Patch by patch, the game is slowly being restored graphically using mainly the original artwork from Eurocom and Anibyte, with small tweaks. This is a respectful restoration, not a makeover. https://steamcdn-a.akamaihd.net/steamcommunity/public/images/clans/31158491/85d768814f97dbe4ff6f62239d31f2c34fe69396.jpg Four of the most problematic defects have been fixed. Some of them were introduced during the PC port, others are still present in the original 2003 console release. A savegame corruption, suddenly vanishing NPCs, uninitialized memory as well as a few others that are less severe. https://steamcdn-a.akamaihd.net/steamcommunity/public/images/clans/31158491/0f8ee4c2ba96a32da892ce03400d275a3801078e.jpg We are still planning to add most of the remaining features that had to be temporarily delayed due to the Nintendo Switch port: Things like projected shadows, better lighting and some shader improvements will appear in both platforms. Remappable controls will probably stay PC-only for the foreseeable future. We read your reviews and comments, and while we can't get some things done as fast as we would like, we will persist. https://steamcdn-a.akamaihd.net/steamcommunity/public/images/clans/31158491/9bbf866246f18f41a7626023e615efaa1901f7cb.jpg This last update should be equivalent to the Nintendo Switch v1.1 patch that we also released yesterday. Also, here is the complete cumulative changelog since our last announcement: 2019-02-15 (Friday) Remove the limit of 128 characters that caused truncation for long-ish paths. Properly NULL-terminate savegame paths. Fix spurious quotes in the Filelist.bin loader when given a mod path via arguments, it caused an occasional crash when ending a mod path in /" and sometimes the last path separator doubled as escape code. Don't enable the 50 Hz PAL mode in the PC version, as it works in EUR60 mode; this should change the rate at which some physics calculations are carried and doesn't affect framebuffer sizes. Properly zero-initialize some fields in the Enemy Mobility Path component that caused an ugly bug where if the leftover memory was 0xFFFFFFFF the value gets interpreted as -nan and first corrupts the rotation and that invalidates and corrupts the item matrix, the NPC visually disappears and collisions stop working so they fall to their death. To find this I instrumented the mobility code at strategic points and tested things in a modified mum_temp map for Sphinx full of container-cobras an...Now with mouse-controlled blowpipe, restored Abydos Museum/character HD textures and more stuffJun 28, 2018 - Community AnnouncementsYesterday we added the much requested mouse-controlled blowpipe controls, this is the first step towards having full-featured mouse and keyboard mapping support in EngineX. https://steamcdn-a.akamaihd.net/steamcommunity/public/images/clans/31158491/0576f0619e5e0510776f688a693a64870ff48d2d.png Now that most of the groundwork is in place it should not take long. We still need to add extra sub-menus and configurable options; ensuring that everything runs as expected will probably take most of the remaining work. In other news, we also added several high-quality textures for the Abydos Museum and brought back some original (really high resolution) character textures for Sphinx and the mummy that will be tweaked in future updates to better match their final look. We also improved the draw distance for various Abydos NPCs like the ones in the main plaza, as requested. https://steamcdn-a.akamaihd.net/steamcommunity/public/images/clans/31158491/6af53891ca6166b28738aadb87fea19afb55d031.png Today's update also brought many other fixes and improvements; we brought back the iconic thunder sound that sounds when you first enter the main menu, we made the back/cancel labels clickable, fixed a bunch of long-standing collision issues, skipping cutscenes now works even if the dialog is in wait state, brought back or implemented some beta/modding features needed by the beta map restoration project, and little tweaks everywhere. https://steamcdn-a.akamaihd.net/steamcommunity/public/images/clans/31158491/2070f1bd00b8e09f799a225d5f779077d38ba6a0.png Also, here is the complete cumulative changelog since our last announcement: 2018-06-28 (Thursday) Made the fan-favorite intro logo thunderous again. The sound was broken on release due to a little hashcode header mismatch. Add initial support for the mouse-controlled camera that we have been teasing for a while, we still need to add a mouse sensitivity control. The player can shoot with the left mouse button and exit first-person mode via right-click. The groundwork for keyboard action mapping is laid out and it will probably come after this. Save the vertical sync changes to Sphinx.ini, fixes disabling v-sync in the in-game options. Prefix the screen name with a number in the graphics options, useful to distinguish them in case there are two or more screens with the same name. Add support for clicking the "(B) Back" labels in the pause and main menus, now the user can go back and cancel via mouse. Carefully hex-edit the level data to improve draw distances of NPCs and triggers in the Abydos Canals. Now characters like the the boat owner, the Mad Boy/Juggler and the giggling lady in the Main Plaza can be seen from afar. Add several much needed HQ textures for the Abydos Museum, refurbish some wall textures to add some lost detail. Make some signs and canopies partially transparent via alpha-testing/alpha-to-coverage. Remove the squarish/invisible roadblocks in the middle of the ramp in the Great Wall Entrance II Room, th...Now with improved, and mostly original, HD texturesMay 23, 2018 - Community AnnouncementsDuring the past few months we have been recovering and tweaking more than ~130 environmental textures from original sources, and now we are transplanting them back into the game 15 years later. Many scenes and props now look crisp and more detailed than their sixth-generation, compressed counterparts. https://steamcdn-a.akamaihd.net/steamcommunity/public/images/clans/31158491/eaf1b980e78917fa273d4f51a867aad417360caa.png The Eurocom and Anibyte artists originally painted their images at bigger sizes, but due to serious console and memory limitations at the time they had to be downsized and compressed to Heliopolis and back. These upgrades mostly cover common gameplay elements; like buttons, statues and levers and, more specifically, Heliopolis Exterior, Anubis Wall, Abydos Canals and the Uruk Intro. We will probably keep adding more original assets in zones that still need some care, like the Lost Temple, some Mummy dungeons and Luxor. https://steamcdn-a.akamaihd.net/steamcommunity/public/images/clans/31158491/f4440ef0af162f2510d51d64a2e4e7a240907004.png Modern computers are much more capable than a PlayStation® 2 or GameCube™. Enjoy playing Sphinx as it was originally meant to be seen, it holds up pretty well. https://steamcdn-a.akamaihd.net/steamcommunity/public/images/clans/31158491/2e9b5a3144b06bcaa3e0803512a07d35bc73b15c.pnghttps://steamcdn-a.akamaihd.net/steamcommunity/public/images/clans/31158491/a9bef0dc134aff6482bcb8b01d4a2ceb0bf7c8b6.png Also, here is the complete cumulative changelog since our last announcement: 2018-01-30 (Tuesday) German translation improvements by @MagicianMana. Make the health Gold Ankh UI indicators scalable by the TextHudObjScaling key in the section of Sphinx.ini, too. As requested by @DaxterSpeed. Add a texture override (hudRotatorSelect.png) for the golden highlight frame around the currently selected item in the pop-up rotator of the HUD. This one has higher resolution and it doesn't look half as stretched as the original one, specially after making that list wider a few weeks ago. Disable the EGXGL_ATTRIB_DIVISOR_INSTANCING / glVertexAttribDivisor hack, it didn't seem to help. It was disabled by default; let it autodetect, as intended: http://steamcommunity.com/app/606710/discussions/0/1621726179559230606/ Disable glObjectLabel'ing again to improve performance. Update the Windows version of the SDL2 (to 2.0.7) and OpenAL Soft (to 1.18.2) libraries. Don't link/import the SDL2 library symbols by ordinal anymore; do it by name, because it breaks dragging and dropping new SDL2.dll versions that don't share export order. Let the user choose if she wants to bound/restrict/confine the mouse cursor within the window borders through a new InputGrabbed key in the section of Sphinx.ini. It is set to 1/TRUE by default. Suggested by @DaxterSpeed. InputGrabbed=0 Make the left analog stick WASD keyboard button support remappable for people that use AZERTY/QUERTZ. It can be done through new configuration keys in Sphinx.ini. ...First Sphinx mod released, restoring a good part of Akaria, early Uruk, old Mummy missions and the beta storylineMay 2, 2018 - Community AnnouncementsAfter working on it for three long months and beta-testing it in the Sphinx Discord servers for a few weeks, @jmarti856 has announced the first public mod for the PC version of Sphinx and the Cursed Mummy. https://steamcdn-a.akamaihd.net/steamcommunity/public/images/clans/31158491/112c96862a77a0ba45f878504f776b26f9082bf0.jpg He is now trying to bring back to life the lost levels of Sakkara as best as he can, given that many cutscenes and mechanics are missing or unfinished. https://steamcommunity.com/app/606710/discussions/1/1696045708662788270/ There are still many cozy secrets tucked away in the files that we released with the Authoring Tools DLC. As more modders start learning the EngineX tools and making their own mods we will feature them in announcements like this. Have fun! https://steamcdn-a.akamaihd.net/steamcommunity/public/images/clans/31158491/02f72ecc89ffc80307a533ef3b6a3ed41ebd6271.jpg https://steamcdn-a.akamaihd.net/steamcommunity/public/images/clans/31158491/34fa39000e1280b08c361f48cc72b1407d144297.jpg https://steamcdn-a.akamaihd.net/steamcommunity/public/images/clans/31158491/0ff02a618d427433f9cc99a6d5f9231b82838fff.jpg https://steamcdn-a.akamaihd.net/steamcommunity/public/images/clans/31158491/70338ec3065d890d633c48a0f17da923a89f8296.jpghttps://steamcdn-a.akamaihd.net/steamcommunity/public/images/clans/31158491/13e11f74cd3a0e8ffadacc7c9dbfacb16edc3a0f.jpg https://steamcdn-a.akamaihd.net/steamcommunity/public/images/clans/31158491/46dc5a89070d9efa864dc1f615f5e485e4fc17d8.jpg https://steamcdn-a.akamaihd.net/steamcommunity/public/images/clans/31158491/e0cbd28cf27b48e9124a2ffac3bd12d363a41d80.jpgSphinx Modkit Out Now!Feb 19, 2018 - Community AnnouncementsHello, We just shipped the Authoring tools that were also used crafting the game. It also includes source assets. You can find it here: http://store.steampowered.com/app/750430/Sphinx_and_the_Cursed_Mummy_Authoring_Tools/ Please be aware that you need to tell Steam to download it. We prepared a guide here on how to set it up and first steps with it: http://steamcommunity.com/sharedfiles/filedetails/?id=1306820082 Enjoy! Sphinx Modkit Out Now!Feb 19, 2018 - Community AnnouncementsHello, We just shipped the Authoring tools that were also used crafting the game. It also includes source assets. You can find it here: http://store.steampowered.com/app/750430/Sphinx_and_the_Cursed_Mummy_Authoring_Tools/ Please be aware that you need to tell Steam to download it. We prepared a guide here on how to set it up and first steps with it: http://steamcommunity.com/sharedfiles/filedetails/?id=1306820082 Enjoy! Now with dynamic lights, better gamepad support, new achievements and more stuffJan 10, 2018 - Community AnnouncementsHappy new year! Things haven't slowed down since our last Sphinx announcement, and we have been hard at work expanding the font support, with improved glyph sizes and tweaks for all the six languages. Also, for those wanting even more flexibility, we have made the dialog text scaling entirely configurable (take a look at the TextHudObjScaling option in the changelog below), in case you want to play on your couch without eye strain. This Monday we added support for points of dynamic omnidirectional light. Which subtly enhance the mood when you open a chest, get a new item or there are fireflies moving nearby. http://cdn.edgecast.steamstatic.com/steamcommunity/public/images/clans/31158491/9d54b2a5646b6c12beabf0bc9b8f5cbf86f05b51.jpg http://cdn.edgecast.steamstatic.com/steamcommunity/public/images/clans/31158491/c4cbabc831781fbe47071fa439bf6b71881c8c93.jpg A bit more subtle is the expanded item rotator, now 1.7 times wider. The golden frame has been centered and the list extended, lending more space for the bigger typography. Previously, the overflowing text only displayed partial item names, causing problems like selecting the correct Portal Amulet while playing in Romance languages. http://cdn.edgecast.steamstatic.com/steamcommunity/public/images/clans/31158491/3e0c52ffadeb04f05980d4d77c6d1bd9c9030994.png Many of you probably noticed the two new achievements we added in the middle of December, rewarding exploration. They cover getting all the health Gold Ankh Pieces for Sphinx and all the Onyx Scarabs found across the six mummy visits. The latter will require a new game to work properly, sorry about that. We have also fixed a few typos, improving the flow of our Italian/Spanish/German translation of the game and achievements. Thanks to contributions by @LetsPlayNintendoITA and @MagicianMana. http://cdn.edgecast.steamstatic.com/steamcommunity/public/images/clans/31158491/5e150208b01f83dcfb1aba66b37012ddc3639f75.png You can now plug several gamepads at the same time and switch between them. Having things like joysticks, flight sticks or fight sticks connected while playing won't cause detection problems anymore. Also, Steam Controller users should be able to turn it off and on and still being able to play after idling. The elephant in the room is contextual mouse/keyboard support. It is still being done, and it turned out to be slightly more complicated than all the other problems we have fixed so far. Hopefully, it will be out soon. In other news, we are also working on releasing the original editor and tools that Eurocom used to make the game in 2003, so that people can make mods and custom levels. We will also try to include most—if not all—of the unpublished beta content, like the infamous worlds of Akaria and Sakkara, so that the community can fix and improve those incomplete levels, bringing them back to life, 15 years later. Also, here is the complete cumulative changelog since our last announcement: 2017-12-09 (Saturday) Remake all the defau...Now with dynamic lights, better gamepad support, new achievements and more stuffJan 10, 2018 - Community AnnouncementsHappy new year! Things haven't slowed down since our last Sphinx announcement, and we have been hard at work expanding the font support, with improved glyph sizes and tweaks for all the six languages. Also, for those wanting even more flexibility, we have made the dialog text scaling entirely configurable (take a look at the TextHudObjScaling option in the changelog below), in case you want to play on your couch without eye strain. This Monday we added support for points of dynamic omnidirectional light. Which subtly enhance the mood when you open a chest, get a new item or there are fireflies moving nearby. http://cdn.edgecast.steamstatic.com/steamcommunity/public/images/clans/31158491/9d54b2a5646b6c12beabf0bc9b8f5cbf86f05b51.jpg http://cdn.edgecast.steamstatic.com/steamcommunity/public/images/clans/31158491/c4cbabc831781fbe47071fa439bf6b71881c8c93.jpg A bit more subtle is the expanded item rotator, now 1.7 times wider. The golden frame has been centered and the list extended, lending more space for the bigger typography. Previously, the overflowing text only displayed partial item names, causing problems like selecting the correct Portal Amulet while playing in Romance languages. http://cdn.edgecast.steamstatic.com/steamcommunity/public/images/clans/31158491/3e0c52ffadeb04f05980d4d77c6d1bd9c9030994.png Many of you probably noticed the two new achievements we added in the middle of December, rewarding exploration. They cover getting all the health Gold Ankh Pieces for Sphinx and all the Onyx Scarabs found across the six mummy visits. The latter will require a new game to work properly, sorry about that. We have also fixed a few typos, improving the flow of our Italian/Spanish/German translation of the game and achievements. Thanks to contributions by @LetsPlayNintendoITA and @MagicianMana. http://cdn.edgecast.steamstatic.com/steamcommunity/public/images/clans/31158491/5e150208b01f83dcfb1aba66b37012ddc3639f75.png You can now plug several gamepads at the same time and switch between them. Having things like joysticks, flight sticks or fight sticks connected while playing won't cause detection problems anymore. Also, Steam Controller users should be able to turn it off and on and still being able to play after idling. The elephant in the room is contextual mouse/keyboard support. It is still being done, and it turned out to be slightly more complicated than all the other problems we have fixed so far. Hopefully, it will be out soon. In other news, we are also working on releasing the original editor and tools that Eurocom used to make the game in 2003, so that people can make mods and custom levels. We will also try to include most—if not all—of the unpublished beta content, like the infamous worlds of Akaria and Sakkara, so that the community can fix and improve those incomplete levels, bringing them back to life, 15 years later. Also, here is the complete cumulative changelog since our last announcement: 2017-12-09 (Saturday) Remake all the defau...Now with bigger, and more legible, English fontsDec 8, 2017 - Community AnnouncementsWe have just pushed a tentative update that should make things easier on the eyes by improving the glyph sizes for things like the dialog-heavy cutscenes, inventory and HUD. Let us know what you think and provide screenshots in the likely case you find something wonky or misaligned. If feedback is positive we will do the same thing for the other languages, if not we can roll it back. Take a look: http://cdn.akamai.steamstatic.com/steamcommunity/public/images/clans/31158491/e3066211df098a4192e330685d22a9606ff99b61.jpghttp://cdn.akamai.steamstatic.com/steamcommunity/public/images/clans/31158491/7a464bdedbfa668ff4b66b2bb0ff695ec61d32b8.jpg Also, here is the complete cumulative changelog since our last announcement: 2017-11-22 (Wednesday) Add five graphics options (FOV, particles, anisotropic filtering, multisampling, vertical sync) and one sound option (reverb toggle) in the pause menu of the remaining languages (French, German, Spanish, Italian and Korean). Better alignment for the graphics options of the English/Italian main menu. 2017-11-23 (Thursday) Localize the "degrees" suffix in the Field of View display of the graphics menu. Attempt to fix the occasionally black dynamic object, due to invalid ambient light. Always use the highest quality 3D model for each character and object by disabling LODs. Should reduce the geometry pop-in and improve graphical fidelity. More grammatical corrections done to the Italian translation by @LetsPlayNintendoITA. Tell the player how to close the version information window by pressing F10, in case it was opened by mistake. Minor cleanups. 2017-11-24 (Friday) First attempt at fixing the root of the problem that causes the pure black objects and the black screen/teleport issues. Add colours to some of the new toggleable graphics options (Particles/V-Sync). More in-deep Italian translation fixes courtesy of @LetsPlayNintendoITA. Minor cleanups. 2017-11-27 (Monday) Second attempt at fixing the occasional player/NPC teleport floating point NaN issue. The black objects issue (due to invalid ambient light coloring) at least seems to be fixed. Fix several logic defects with the help of a static analyzer. Turn down the debug switches a notch. 2017-12-04 (Monday) Replaced the existing title screen logos with HQ versions that combine original sources ("SPHINX") with remastered subtitles ("and the cursed mummy" in various languages). Minor cosmetic changes done to the oxygen bubble indicator. Minor tweaks done to the Italian translation for consistency. 2017-12-05 (Tuesday) Let the player skip most of the cutscenes in the PC port by pressing the Back/Select button, this is now enabled by default. Dedicated to speedrunners like Remi and turothking. Add a HQ version of the Book of Sphinx section pointer texture, repainted with added details that didn't exist before. Changed the localized versions of some achievement names to match with their original in-game names. Minor fixes. 2017-12-08 (Friday) Add a bigger, more legible ...Now with bigger, and more legible, English fontsDec 8, 2017 - Community AnnouncementsWe have just pushed a tentative update that should make things easier on the eyes by improving the glyph sizes for things like the dialog-heavy cutscenes, inventory and HUD. Let us know what you think and provide screenshots in the likely case you find something wonky or misaligned. If feedback is positive we will do the same thing for the other languages, if not we can roll it back. Take a look: http://cdn.akamai.steamstatic.com/steamcommunity/public/images/clans/31158491/e3066211df098a4192e330685d22a9606ff99b61.jpghttp://cdn.akamai.steamstatic.com/steamcommunity/public/images/clans/31158491/7a464bdedbfa668ff4b66b2bb0ff695ec61d32b8.jpg Also, here is the complete cumulative changelog since our last announcement: 2017-11-22 (Wednesday) Add five graphics options (FOV, particles, anisotropic filtering, multisampling, vertical sync) and one sound option (reverb toggle) in the pause menu of the remaining languages (French, German, Spanish, Italian and Korean). Better alignment for the graphics options of the English/Italian main menu. 2017-11-23 (Thursday) Localize the "degrees" suffix in the Field of View display of the graphics menu. Attempt to fix the occasionally black dynamic object, due to invalid ambient light. Always use the highest quality 3D model for each character and object by disabling LODs. Should reduce the geometry pop-in and improve graphical fidelity. More grammatical corrections done to the Italian translation by @LetsPlayNintendoITA. Tell the player how to close the version information window by pressing F10, in case it was opened by mistake. Minor cleanups. 2017-11-24 (Friday) First attempt at fixing the root of the problem that causes the pure black objects and the black screen/teleport issues. Add colours to some of the new toggleable graphics options (Particles/V-Sync). More in-deep Italian translation fixes courtesy of @LetsPlayNintendoITA. Minor cleanups. 2017-11-27 (Monday) Second attempt at fixing the occasional player/NPC teleport floating point NaN issue. The black objects issue (due to invalid ambient light coloring) at least seems to be fixed. Fix several logic defects with the help of a static analyzer. Turn down the debug switches a notch. 2017-12-04 (Monday) Replaced the existing title screen logos with HQ versions that combine original sources ("SPHINX") with remastered subtitles ("and the cursed mummy" in various languages). Minor cosmetic changes done to the oxygen bubble indicator. Minor tweaks done to the Italian translation for consistency. 2017-12-05 (Tuesday) Let the player skip most of the cutscenes in the PC port by pressing the Back/Select button, this is now enabled by default. Dedicated to speedrunners like Remi and turothking. Add a HQ version of the Book of Sphinx section pointer texture, repainted with added details that didn't exist before. Changed the localized versions of some achievement names to match with their original in-game names. Minor fixes. 2017-12-08 (Friday) Add a bigger, more legible ...Ten days of daily updatesNov 21, 2017 - Community AnnouncementsAs many of you already know, we have been busy since launch day updating the game with several stability fixes and gameplay improvements as they were reported by the community. Now that the game is in much better shape we will start implementing some of the most commonly requested things: scalable text during cutscenes and remappable keyboard controls. We know that some of you don't read the discussions section, so here is the cumulative changelog to date: 2017-11-10 (Friday) Fixed an off-by-one bug in the resolution selector that skipped one entry while going to the left, never showing the biggest resolution unless pressing the right key again. Don't show a message-box showing GLSL compilation errors when the compilation was successful but the error string was not zero; this only happened under the Intel OpenGL driver. Mitigate the occasional sound-looping problem. A more comprehensive fix is in the works. Added a workaround for people reporting black screens and framebuffer issues: http://steamcommunity.com/app/606710/discussions/0/1483235412207725225/#c1483235412209019801 Minor cleanups. 2017-11-11 (Saturday) Rename «Antialiasing» to «Anisotropic Filtering» to make it less confusing. Make the windowed mode bigger by default. Add five graphics options (FOV, particles, anisotropic filtering, multisampling, vertical sync) and one sound option (reverb toggle) in the English version of the pause menu. More languages coming up. Don't make the window resizable to avoid possible sprite misalignment issues. Disable Alt+Enter for the same reason. Lock the mouse within the window bounds while the game is in the foreground. Added a configuration key to let the player choose PlayStation-style button prompts: http://steamcommunity.com/app/606710/discussions/0/1483235412206736841/#c1483235412208681177 Added a Sphinx.png icon file for the Linux version of the game, it will be used in the game window. Move the Sphinx.ini configuration file to the following folder, ensuring that settings are always writable: Windows: %appdata%\Sphinx\Sphinx.ini macOS: ~/Library/Application Support/Sphinx/Sphinx.ini Linux: ~/.local/share/Sphinx/Sphinx.ini 2017-11-12 (Sunday) Fix the Crocodile Scales Steam achievement. Make it so that players can also unlock the Crocodile Scales achievement if they beat their best time in the Heliopolis swimming course. Avoiding having to start a new game just for this. 2017-11-13 (Monday) Second attempt at fixing the sound loop problem. 2017-11-14 (Tuesday) Fix the Harvest Moon achievement. Trigger it the last time the farmer gives you what they found while digging in the farm instead of when marking the last plot of land. All the achievements should now be obtainable. Fix the occasional sound loop problem once and for all. Tested in the Anubis wall entrance and verified various times. But one can never be completely sure. Always disable the original 'fake' widescreen option on load, as the option will be inaccessible very soon. Don't store the ...

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