In recent years we’ve started to see something beautiful happening: fans of classic console games are taking old code and creating native PC versions of games that were never officially released. We’ve seen it on some Nintendo gamesbut now we’re seeing it with a PlayStation platformer too.
This is neither a port in the usual multiplatform sense nor an emulation. This will recompile the entire code base of the game Jak and Daxter: The Legacy of the Forerunnersreleased for the PS2 in 2001 now runs as a native application on the PC.
The project which is about 80% complete now is an incredible shitbecause it turns out Jack and Daxter was “written in GOAL, a custom Lisp language developed by Naughty Dog,” meaning the small team working on it “decompiled the original game code into human-readable GOAL code” and then “created our own compiler for GOAL needs to develop and recompile game code for x86-64”.
Interestingly, it isn’t a direct port either, as mainly some small changes have been made to the game, mostly related to the options available to the players:
We’ve added a plethora of options to the game settings (and removed some that didn’t make sense) so you can have a more updated experience, or a more PS2-like experience if you choose. It depends on you! There are also a few extra goodies and extra secrets to figure out. However, we aim to keep the core gameplay (controls, physics, behavior, etc.) identical. So if you find any problems or differences, don’t hesitate to let us know.
Some of these “up-to-date” options include better subtitle controls, custom resolutions, and camera controls, but in terms of overall gameplay, they’ve also made the orbs “easier to see.”
While the project isn’t 100% complete yet, it’s downloadable (and it can be beaten, it’s just that there might be bugs). from the project’s Github site. Here are some shots of the project running in 4K at 60 FPS:
