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The GoldSrc engine (also known as Goldsource) is a heavily modified version of the QuakeWorld engine codebase, which in turn is a development of the Quake engine's codebase. Some minor fixes from the Quake II engine were incorporated as it was developed.

Originally, GoldSrc's netcode, the coding that handles online multiplayer, was similar to the one in the QuakeWorld engine. However, in 2001, Valve implanted a new netcode that was designed to make it easier for players with high ping to play well via "lag compensation".

During the early development of Half-Life 2, an experimental engine known now as Source was made, debuting with Counter-Strike: Source and Half-Life 2 in 2004.

The engine has been officially abandoned in favor of the Source engine (except for minor maintenance updates) although the GoldSrc engine is still used by third party developers, mainly for mods.

Similarities with the Quake Engine[]

  • GoldSrc's map format, ".BSP", is very similar to Quake's map format, ".BSP" as well. The only major differences are with how it handles lighting storage and how the game loads textures. The .BSP versions of GoldSrc and Quake are so similar that early versions of Hammer could edit Quake and Quake II maps. With a few alterations, version 3.3 of Hammer can be used to create Quake maps.
  • Uncompiled GoldSrc maps use the .MAP format, which is also used by Quake's uncompiled maps.
  • Both the GoldSrc and Quake engine use the .WAD format to store and load textures. The only differences between the two formats is that each texture in a GoldSrc .WAD file has its own pallet, instead of sharing from one pallet used by all of the textures, and the file header; Quake uses WAD2, while GoldSrc uses WAD3. The WAD2 (and thus, WAD3) format itself is based on the .WAD format used in the Doom engine. In addition, the Half-Life SDK includes a tool for making .WAD files called qlumpy.exe. Qlumpy.exe is also used to create Quake .WAD files.
  • The GoldSrc and Quake engines use .pak files to store data, such as levels and models.

Licensed games[]

See also[]

External links[]

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