View source for Oddworld: Stranger's Wrath HD

'''''Oddworld: Stranger’s Wrath HD''''' is a remastered version of the original 2005 [[Xbox]] game ''[[Oddworld Stranger’s Wrath]]''. It was developed by [[Just Add Water]] and published by [[Oddworld Inhabitants]]. It was released on the [[PlayStation Network]] for [[PlayStation 3]] in December 2011 and will be released for [[PC]] and [[PlayStation Vita]] in 2012.

The game can also be referred to as '''Stranger’s Wrath HD''', '''Stranger HD''' or '''SWHD'''.

== Changes ==
The biggest changes made to ''Stranger’s Wrath HD'' are its increased video resolution and improved audio, character and environment quality; the menus were rebuilt based on original designs by Oddworld Inhabitants; a number of easter eggs and unlockable media galleries were added; and refinements were made to the game’s achievements and difficulty, including the introduction of difficulty settings.<ref name="changelist"/>

=== Display ===
; Menus, gameplay and FMVs now mostly run at 720p.<ref name="makingof"/>{{rp|13}}
: The original [[Oddworld Stranger’s Wrath]]’s FMVs ran at 640 &times; 370.
: The three fortune teller sequences were left untouched.<ref name="oldteller"/>
: The story-based FMVs were rendered from 720 &times; 416 TIFFs.
: The main menu background is 720p, with the matte painting extended by Dugan Jackson.
: The original CG compositing tool and scripts, Shake v2.51, were found and run on a Windows XP virtual machine to render the revised credits FMV at 720p.

; 60 FPS<ref name="makingof"/>{{rp|10}}
: Gameplay almost constantly runs at 60 FPS, although slowdown is present in some areas.<ref name="slowdown1"/><ref name="slowdown2"/>
: The triple buffering feature of PSGL meant that when frame rates drop, it’s to 40 FPS rather than 30 FPS.
: PPU memory was quickly filled by the larger assets, so textures and meshes were transfered to RSX local memory, with scene sorting added to increase RSX performance.
: Decorators are batched according to instance type and rendered together instead of individually.
: The particle systems optimized for DirectX had to have custom renderers written using instancing.

; MLAA<ref name="makingof"/>{{rp|15–16}}
: Unlike MSAA, MLAA doesn’t impact on RXS performance, and produced a better result than FXAA, while making use of the relatively unused SPUs.
: For fogging and post-rendering effects, the MLAA was mostly applied to PSGL textures, which required making changes to the EDGE libraries.
: When MLAA was applied to the final rendered frame, artefacts were produced in the GUI, so MLAA was applied to the 3D render only, with the GUI overlain.

; Textured stamina and bounty bars<ref name="changelist"/>
: Original unused textures were found in the code and activated.

=== Assets ===
; Improved character models
: 84 character models were improved with increased polygon counts and higher texture resolutions.<ref name="changelist"/>
: The existing pipeline required Maya 4.5-specific plugins, so models recreated in Maya 2011 had first to be pulled in Maya 4.5 before being exported to the game.
: The Stranger was increased from his 3161-polygon Xbox model<ref name="dev1pic"/> to a 20 000-polygon model by downgrading his 500 000-polygon CG model.<ref name="dev2"/>
: The first Live Ammo model to be remade, the [[Fuzzle]] was remade from scratch because a high enough original model could not be found to work with.<ref name="dev2"/>

=== Menus ===
=== Extras ===
For a list of achievements in Stranger’s Wrath HD, see [[Achievements in Oddworld: Stranger’s Wrath]].

== History ==
Just  Add Water announced ''Stranger HD'' on their website on 3 September 2010, reporting the game would be released digitally for PlayStation 3 at Easter 2011. The press release declared that the remaster would feature ‘<q cite="www.jawltd.com/?p=574">720p visuals; much more detail in the characters; normal mapping and self-shadowing; re-mastered dialogue, support for PlayStation®Move; and additional bonus material</q>’.<ref name="SWHDannounce"/>

== Platforms ==
Although the announcement of ''Stranger’s Wrath HD'' only explicitly named PlayStation 3 as a release platform,<ref name="SWHDannounce"/> within a month Just Add Water clarified that they were talking to Microsoft about releasing also on Xbox 360, but that the final decision  was not theirs to make.<ref name="X360maybe"/> As of December 2011, this is still the case.<ref name="X360stillmaybe"/>

''Stranger HD'' can't be published on Xbox Live Arcade because XBLA titles have a 2GiB size limit,{{citation needed}} while the original ''Stranger's  Wrath'' is 2.1GiB<ref name="X360maybe"/> and the HD remaster is 3.2GiB.{{citation needed}} The game can't be published through Games On Demand because Oddworld Inhabitants have not previously published on Xbox two videogames selling more than ten thousand units.{{citation needed}}

Users who already own ''Stranger's Wrath'' on  [[Steam]] will automatically have their game patched with the HD updates 2–3 months after the PlayStation 3 release,{{citation needed}} which is roughly the end of Q1 2012.

== References ==
<references>
<ref  name="SWHDannounce">Just Add Water (3 September 2010). ‘[http://www.jawltd.com/?p=574 Do be a Stranger – Oddworld returns!]’. News. Just Add Water official website.</ref>

<ref name="X360maybe">Just Add Water (27 September 2010). ‘[http://www.jawltd.com/?p=630 Xbox360 yes/no?]’. News. Just Add Water official website.</ref>

<ref name="X360stillmaybe">Alf (19 December 2011). [http://www.oddworld.com/?p=1190&cpage=2#comment-6897 Reply to comment by EEB] on ‘Stranger’s Wrath HD release dates’. Blog. Oddworld Inhabitants official website.</ref>

<ref name="changelist">Just Add Water (17 November 2011). ‘[http://www.jawltd.com/?p=967 Stranger’s Wrath HD – Development Complete!]’. News. Just Add Water website.</ref>

<ref name="oldteller">H., Vaughn (20 December 2011). ‘[http://thegamershub.net/2011/12/oddworld-strangers-wrath-review/ Oddworld: Strangers Wrath Review]’, paragraph 4. TheGamersHub.</ref>

<ref name="slowdown1">Lee, Dan (20 December 2011). ‘[http://www.thesixthaxis.com/2011/12/20/oddworld-strangers-wrath-hd-review/ Oddworld: Stranger’s Wrath HD Review]’, paragraph 15. TheSixthAxis.</ref>

<ref name="slowdown2">Feltham, Jamie (20 December 2011). ‘[http://www.thatvideogameblog.com/2011/12/20/review-oddworld-strangers-wrath-hd-ps3/ Review / Oddworld: Stranger’s Wrath HD (PS3)]’, paragraph 11. That VideoGame Blog.</ref>

<ref name="makingof">Caslin, Steven & Gilray, Stewart (28 January 2012). ‘[http://www.eurogamer.net/articles/digitalfoundry-the-making-of-oddworld-strangers-wrath-hd The Making of Oddworld: Stranger's Wrath HD]’ interview by Richard Leadbetter. Digital Foundry. Eurogamer.</ref>

<ref name="dev1pic">Just Add Water (16 September 2010). ‘[http://www.oddworld.com/wp-content/uploads/2011/11/StrangerComparison1.jpg Stranger Variations]’, image in ‘[http://www.oddworld.com/2010/09/strangers-wrath-hd-dev-diary-1/ Stranger’s Wrath HD – Dev Diary 1]’. Oddworld Inhabitants and Just Add Water websites.</ref>

<ref name="dev2">Just Add Water (8 October 2010). ‘[http://www.oddworld.com/2010/10/strangers-wrath-hd-dev-diary-2/ Stranger’s Wrath HD – Dev Diary 2]’ by Antony Ward. Oddworld Inhabitants and Just Add Water websites.</ref>

</references>
[[Category:Oddworld videogames]]