goldeneye-pc-port/.github/release-notes.md

GoldenEye 007 PC Port v0.4.0

The full single-player campaign runs at a steady 60 fps with audio (music + SFX) playing throughout, on Windows and Linux including Steam Deck, and it is completable end to end: the whole campaign has been playtested through all 20 missions (Agent difficulty), on both Windows and Steam Deck with a physical controller. This is a pre-1.0 release, not a finished product — expect rough edges and missing features until v1.0; see the README's Roadmap section for where this is headed. v0.4.0 ships the NTSC-U (US) region only — PAL and JP ROMs are on the post-release roadmap.

What's new since v0.3.0

Native widescreen

• The world now renders natively at your display's aspect ratio (D334/D335): undistorted world geometry at any aspect (wider view, same vertical FOV), the HUD keeps its shape and anchors to the screen edges, and the 4:3 front-end menus are pillarboxed. The ending-credits sequence wraps widescreen too. The F10 Native widescreen toggle restores the old stretched frame if you prefer it.

Aim, reworked for every input device

• Reticule jitter in aim mode is gone: mouse aim now uses the Perfect Dark PC port's aim model (D332) on top of v0.3.0's direct-look rework.
• New Aim style option (D333/D337): N64 (the crosshair deflects and the camera follows at the edge; internally it runs on the PD aim model above) or Centred (crosshair fixed at screen center, input moves the camera directly). In v0.3.0 the centred mode only worked with a mouse; v0.4.0 makes it work with a controller too, with full-stick speed matching the N64 original's top turn rate (D404).
• New Aim range option (D338): PC (full-screen feel, the default) or N64 (original 65% stick limits). A single mouse-sensitivity control with a wider range remains from v0.3.0.

A modern, regrouped options experience

• Both options screens were reorganized into functional sections (video/ graphics, sound, bond file) with per-section reset-to-defaults, and the confusing "save file" wording is now "profile" — settings are scoped per profile (D353–D356).
• The F10 in-game overlay got a GE-style refresh: category headers, controller value-adjust with hold-to-repeat, pointer/keyboard navigation fixes, plus five new settings — Skip Intro, Show FPS, and pad invert/deadzone/trigger rows (D237/D345–D347/D360–D370).
• The front end gained a PC Options screen next to the file-select bar, and file-select Copy/Erase moves into the bottom bar (D343).
• Options that only existed in the in-level watch (auto-aim, look-ahead and friends) are now editable from the PC options — and they stick: the "auto-aim won't stay on" report (issue #103) is fixed (D330/D350/D352/ D354).
• New HUD scale option (75–150%): scale the ammo counter, pickup text, and subtitle bars for smaller/larger displays (D226).

Crosshair, your way (opt-in)

• On/off, colour, size and style rows were added to the options. All default to the untouched N64 crosshair — nothing changes unless you ask (D373/D379/D381/D382).

Key rebinding + new default layout

• A two-slot key editor (PC layout + in-level layout) lives in both options screens, alongside a GEPD-style preset layout that is the new default and a crouch/reload binding set. INI-file bindings still work (D371/D374/D383/D385).

Controllers

• Crouch now uses the engine's real crouch input (D375); Xbox-variant controller parity (D394); pad invert/deadzone/trigger rows (D237); the F10 overlay is fully gamepad-driven with value-adjust and hold-to-repeat (D347).
• The N64 Rumble Pak now drives real gamepad haptics on supported pads, with a Rumble strength slider (D401).

All unlocked, now a documented EXPERIMENTAL feature

• It works for its intended purpose (skip to any mission, 007 mode, full cheat menu) — including on a fresh install, which now yields the game's own fresh-slot layout instead of corrupting (D281). But enabling it can still leave odd audio/aim state in edge cases: complete a level normally first, and back up data/ge007.eep before enabling it (D387). The in-game warning says the same.

Audio

• Gunshot SFX cadence now matches the N64 original's rate, and the intermittent silence under sustained fire near a looping sound is gone (D240/D241).
• Windows audio now prefers the DirectSound backend over WASAPI for lower, more robust latency (D322), and long-session audio degradation (issue #87) got pool hardening plus an optional GE_D322=1 telemetry probe if it ever recurs.
• The particle "rainbow" effect is fixed (D252): the intermittently recoloured explosion/spark particles from v0.3.0 no longer occur.

Graphics fixes from the final playtest wave

• Water is fixed (D245): the IsWater shimmer/cross-fade (Dam, Frigate, Surface 2, …) now matches the N64 original — the moving seam and the pattern "resetting" as you moved are gone, verified against an era-correct 1994 reference.
• Surface 1/2: the tree backdrop that rendered as a solid wall of texture now renders as proper camera-facing tree cards (D236).
• Frigate (and the rare "model briefly out of place" quirk): both were the same never-written-fields read in the head-bob animation; fixed (D336/D311).
• Ejected shell casings now render (D331); the intro gun-barrel blood drip draws correctly (D341); the extra erroneous long muzzle-flash on some guns is gone (D303); the occasional z-fighting is fixed (D308); backwards-facing security-camera props fixed (D307); the front-end Rareware logo work narrowed to a subtle filtering residual and the Nintendo logo/copyright page renders correctly (D403/D75); the train-intro soldier pose is correct (D392); file-select background/gun-barrel comb rendering fixed (D397); stale-texture artifacts after level transitions fixed (D235).
• Distant-geometry dropout on the biggest open levels (Streets, Egyptian) is substantially improved at default settings (D249).

Windows / PC stability

• Game exit is now orderly, so quitting no longer lands inside the graphics driver (a class of driver bugchecks seen during testing) (D344); an idle-then-click mouse-mode fix cleared a Windows non-self-recovering freeze (D287); plus a port-wide code audit (missing returns, prototypes, undefined-behaviour shifts).
• The Facility execution-scene watchdog from v0.3.0 stays enabled as a safeguard; the animation-pinning that motivated it is root-caused and fixed at the tick level (D329).

Steam Deck / Linux

• The first clean SteamOS/glibc build (D402), plus a first-launch preset (native 1280×800, 2× MSAA, vsync) for decks without a config yet (D283).

Renderer robustness (community contribution, PR #106)

• Setting MSAA above your driver's maximum no longer risks a black screen (the request is clamped to GL_MAX_SAMPLES), and two framebuffer-state bugs in the render/resolve paths were fixed. Affects both Windows and Linux builds (D405).

Also this cycle (research, not yet features)

• ROM-level mod support was investigated and found viable (the game's file table lives in the ROM) (D325–D328); HD-texture packs and the drop-in-ROM flow are tracked post-1.0; a measured CPU budget on low-end hardware reshaped the #92 performance investigation toward the GPU (D339).

Known issues

• On Facility, if gas leaks during Ourumov's monologue he can pause for up to ~10 s before resuming the scripted shootout — a latent race that exists in the N64 original too (where it softlocks permanently); the port detects and auto-recovers it (D318).
• Native widescreen is new in v0.4.0: the world renders undistorted at your display's aspect and the HUD keeps its shape; front-end menus are shown 4:3 with side bars. The F10 Native widescreen toggle restores the old stretched frame.
• The front-end Rareware logo shows a subtle texture-filtering artifact (Nintendo logo and legal page are clean). Cosmetic only (D75).
• This release ships NTSC (US) assets; PAL/JP ROMs are not supported in this version (D258).
• All unlocked is experimental: back up data/ge007.eep before enabling it. Any save while ON — even a profile-settings change — can leave odd audio/aim state; completing a level normally first avoids the fresh-install case (D387).

Downloads

File	Platform
goldeneye-pc-port-0.4.0-win64.zip	Windows x86-64
goldeneye-pc-port-0.4.0-linux-x86_64.tar.gz	Linux x86-64 (incl. Steam Deck)

Each contains the engine executable, a README, license texts, and the prepare-assets tool. No ROM, no game assets. The Windows bundle carries its runtime DLLs; the Linux bundle carries SDL2, so on both platforms nothing needs to be installed first.

Running it

You supply your own GoldenEye 007 N64 ROM (.z64, big-endian) that you legally own: the NTSC-U (US) release is the only region this build supports (PAL / JP are on the post-release roadmap). No Python, no toolchain, nothing to install.

1. Unpack the archive.
2. Make a data/ folder next to the executable and put the ROM in it, named ge007.ntsc-final.z64.
3. Run the executable from that folder. The first run takes a few extra seconds: it detects your ROM, generates the two derived asset folders (data/pcmodels-ntsc-final/, data/pccg-ntsc-final/) once, and saves them for every future run. (The generator is prepare-assets/ge007-convert inside the bundle; you can also run it manually; it prints what it's doing.)

Steam Deck: sideload the unpacked folder (USB or a file manager), do steps 2–3, then add the executable to Games → Add Game as a non-Steam game. The first launch in Game Mode picks up the Deck preset (native 1280×800, 2× MSAA, vsync) automatically if no config exists yet.

In-game settings on the Deck: the options overlay is fully gamepad-driven: it opens with Select, the D-pad or left stick (up/down) moves between options, A steps the selected option forward, B steps it back, and Start (or Select again) closes. No keyboard needed.

Full steps are in the bundled README.md.

Verify the download

sha256sum -c goldeneye-pc-port-0.4.0-win64.zip.sha256
sha256sum -c goldeneye-pc-port-0.4.0-linux-x86_64.tar.gz.sha256

Source & docs

https://github.com/jkdansereau/goldeneye-pc-port, built on the GoldenEye 007 decompilation, architecture after the Perfect Dark PC port. Non-commercial fan preservation/research project; not affiliated with any rights holder. AI disclosure: built through agentic AI coding (Claude Code + a local open-weight model), directed by one person in their spare time — as much a study of what agentic development gets wrong on a game-sized codebase as it is a port. See the README's Background section for the full account.