Descent / Descent II

A shooter with no fixed floor

Descent puts you in a small spacecraft inside robot-filled mines. Movement has six degrees of freedom: you can climb, drop, slide and rotate through tunnels instead of staying upright on a floor. The original mission sends the Material Defender to investigate lost mining colonies and find survivors.

That freedom changes how you read a firefight. A passage can be above or behind you, and turning to face a target is only one part of positioning the ship. It is a strong fit for players who want spatial navigation to matter as much as aim.

DXX-Rebirth · original game publisher description

Two engines with a preservation-minded approach

DXX-Rebirth contains D1X-Rebirth for Descent and D2X-Rebirth for Descent II. Its stated aim is to preserve the games while updating their platform support. The project documents compatibility with expansions, third-party missions and original DOS player files, saves and recorded demos.

Display choices include modern resolutions and aspect ratios, with optional filtering, colored lighting and other effects. Keyboard, mouse and joysticks can be used together. That flexibility is useful for arranging the many movement axes, rather than forcing a six-direction craft into one fixed input scheme.

DXX-Rebirth · project documentation

Match the data to the engine

Each engine needs only its own game’s data. Supported shareware and demo sets offer a way to try the games; retail files supply the full corresponding content. PC and Mac data can be used regardless of the operating system running Rebirth, but their required file sets differ.

For Descent II, movies are optional for gameplay. The installation guide recommends the robots movie file if you want the single-player briefings. Use the guide’s exact list rather than copying only a HOG archive and assuming the sound and texture data are included.

DXX-Rebirth · data and engine installation

LAN and online sessions use UDP

Rebirth supports LAN and internet play. Direct-IP hosting and joining through the online tracker have different networking needs; the project says tracker-based sessions usually avoid manual port forwarding. Agree on which game and mission you are playing before connecting. For a source installation, follow the platform build guidance in the repository.

DXX-Rebirth · project documentation · DXX-Rebirth · data and engine installation