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

GoldenEye 007 PC Port

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 21 missions (Agent difficulty). It's an early public cut: all 21 solo missions load and run crash-free, but the known issues below are real; feedback is very welcome. 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.

What's new since v0.2.1

Hotfix batch from Steam Deck/Linux user playtest feedback on v0.2.1 — two crash fixes plus two QoL asks:

• Fixed: intermittent SIGSEGV on Steam Deck/Linux when destroying objects (terminals, exploding grenades) (D255). Root cause: vtxstore_fix_refs read a live object's model pointer through a mistyped 4-byte-enum field instead of the real pointer field, truncating it to garbage on 64-bit builds — harmless on the original 32-bit N64, fatal on PC. Verified live on real Steam Deck hardware, held through Facility (repeated terminal destruction) and Caverns' radio-objective terminals with zero crashes.
• Fixed: a second, separate Steam Deck/Linux crash during explosion-heavy combat (D285) — the audio thread's pool-exhaustion scan read the active- sound list without the lock its writer (sndSetupSound) already takes, so a burst of near-simultaneous SFX (an explosion, plus debris/metal) could race a concurrent list mutation. Locked to match the existing write-side guard. Live-tested on real Steam Deck hardware with dense, sustained overlapping-explosion combat (dual grenade launchers plus rocket-launcher-cheat guards) — no crash.
• Front-end menu navigation (main menu, file select, mission-select map) now uses the LEFT analog stick, matching the F10 options overlay and modern controller conventions, instead of requiring the right stick (D282).
• Added a "Quit to desktop" row to the F10 options overlay — previously the only way to exit was Alt+F4 / closing the window, a real gap on Steam Deck / controller-only / fullscreen setups (D293).

What's new since v0.2.0

Small hotfix batch from user playtest feedback on v0.2.0:

• Partially fixed: All unlocked + a completely fresh EEPROM produced silent music/SFX (D259). A brand-new save slot now seeds max volume the same way the N64 does. However, user testing after this fix still found audio (and occasionally right-mouse aim) break when All unlocked is turned on before a save has ever been written — see the Known Issues note below; do not enable it on a fresh install until you've completed at least one level normally.
• Mouse wheel weapon cycling now matches the on-screen wheel-menu order: scroll up = previous weapon, scroll down = next (D260).
• Watch menu: holding a direction now auto-repeats instead of crawling one item per key press/notch (D261).
• Fixed: the watch menu's item-preview 3D model wasn't rendering — weapons now show their model when selected on the watch inventory page (D264).
• Investigated the Facility report of Ourumov never executing Trevelyan: confirmed it's proximity/line-of-sight-triggered exactly as on the N64 (walk toward the room), not a port bug — the full scripted beat, including the execution shot, fires correctly (D263).
• Removed the Skip intro F10 toggle — user testing found it breaks audio. It was already off by default; it's now also pulled from the menu entirely until root-caused (D216).
• Removed the Screen shake F10 slider — it only scaled explosion/effect camera shake, not the always-on walking head-bob or any getting-shot reaction, so it read as broken/useless. Pulled from the menu until it covers all screen-shake/view-bob sources (D181).

What's new since v0.1.0

• Drop-in ROM, no tooling: unpack the bundle, drop your NTSC-U (US) ROM in data/, launch; the first run generates the derived assets automatically. No Python, no installer, nothing to set up.
• Steady 60 fps in normal play (the software RSP runs off the presentation critical path); Video.DisplayFPS in the F10 overlay shows it.
• Audio: in-level music and sound effects throughout (the alpha was silent). A previous wrong-sounding-instrument bug (bad bass synth on Control/Cavern/Runway) is fixed as of v0.2.0.
• Mouse: click-to-lock capture (click to grab, ESC to release) with a proportional GEPD-style aim mode; sensitivity / Y-inversion / aim-turn split tunable in ge007.ini or the F10 overlay. The legacy always-grab mode is gone.
• Rendering: outdoor skies render correctly; water no longer renders green/pulsing; reflective surfaces (glass, chrome weapon skins) work.
• Crash fixes: the two v0.1.0-era crashing levels (Bunker ii, Statue) and the AI-pacing bug that broke Cradle are fixed and playtest-verified: all 21 solo missions load and run crash-free. Also fixed: the Steam Deck / Linux Facility crash triggered by walking into the crouch-forcing spot at the level's opening (D253); this also revives the auto-crouch and ladder signals, which were dead on PC before.
• QoL: F10 in-game options overlay (fullscreen, resolution, frame cap, MSAA, texture filtering, FOV/draw distance, sensitivity), F12 screenshot.
• Sharper defaults out of the box: draw distance and LOD swap distance now default to 150% of the authored N64 values, so props no longer fade in just before they become visible (Dam's alarms and wall switches being the tell); F10 → Draw distance / LOD distance set back to 100 restores the console-authentic look. MSAA now defaults to 4× instead of off.
• All-unlocked toggle (experimental — see Known Issues before using): F10 → All unlocked makes all 21 solo levels selectable at every difficulty, adds 007 mode, and fully populates the cheat menu. It is off by default (faithful N64 progression). No active cheats are enabled either way (weapons remain per-mission pickups, as on N64).
• Steam Deck first-run preset: on SteamOS the first launch seeds Deck-friendly defaults (native 1280×800 fullscreen, VSync, MSAA 4, 150% draw/LOD distance); an existing ge007.ini always wins. If you first launch it in Desktop Mode (e.g. to add it via Steam) before ever running it in Game Mode, the preset can be skipped — an ini gets created before Game Mode's Deck-specific environment is detected, and once an ini exists it always wins over the preset on every later launch. If your resolution isn't 1280×800 on first Game Mode boot, just set it manually: F10 → Resolution (D283). One more F10 row: No hit flash (suppresses the damage-flash overlay).
• Modern dual-stick controller layout (the scheme used by the console re-releases): left stick move/strafe, right stick look, right trigger fire, left trigger aim, A/X use, B/Y crouch/cancel, RB/LB cycle weapons.
• Linux / Steam Deck: the Linux bundle now ships its own SDL2, so it runs as-is on any distro, and sideloads onto a Steam Deck with nothing installed. Saves and F10 settings now persist no matter which directory you launch from (previously Linux wrote them relative to the launch directory only, so they silently failed elsewhere; D256); the options overlay is fully gamepad-driven on the Deck.

Known issues

• Cutscenes still glitch, mostly with James Bond: in scripted sequences Bond is the one who gets misplaced, hovers, or spins; the other actors are fine for the most part now. The Dam level-end cutscene is racy (D243). Still the most visible gap in this release.
• Particle colours cycle through a rainbow palette: bullet-impact sparks and lingering smoke/explosion residue drift through the hues over time instead of holding their intended grey/orange palette (D252).
• Water on IsWater levels shows a moving seam between two patterns (D245); thin pixel strips at the left/right screen edges at non-integer window scales (D246).
• The front-end Nintendo logo renders as two white blobs, and the Rareware logo is close but its texture filtering looks off (D75).
• The F10 overlay's bottom row duplicates whatever item is currently selected (e.g. the MSAA value appears both on its own row and again at the panel bottom); earlier builds showed it as an intermittent 4K- fullscreen ghost of the top row.
• Surface 1: the 2D billboard trees near the start render as a solid wall of tree texture instead of discrete sprites (D236). Under active investigation; no fix in this release.
• No true widescreen support: at 16:9 the game stretches the 4:3-authored view (world geometry and HUD) rather than properly expanding the horizontal field of view. The F10 FOV scale % slider is a manual, imperfect workaround for the resulting distortion, not real widescreen.
• No controller rebinding UI, and no macOS or ARM builds.
• Distant geometry can drop out on the biggest open levels (Streets, Egyptian) at default FOV — a culling/LOD issue that sometimes self-corrects as you keep moving (D249).
• Gunshot SFX can sound off during sustained/rapid fire: cadence can drift from the N64 original's rate, and PP7/AK47 fire can occasionally go silent under heavy automatic fire near another looping sound (e.g. an alarm klaxon) (D240/D241).
• All unlocked is highly experimental — do not enable it until you have at least one save written. Complete a level normally first (e.g. Dam on Agent), then turn the toggle on. Enabling it on a brand-new install with no prior save can still cause silent audio and odd right-mouse-aim behavior even after the D259 fix above. We recommend leaving it off unless you specifically want the unlock goodies and are willing to accept an experimental feature (D259/D257).
• Linux / Steam Deck: an intermittent SIGSEGV, reproducible by destroying Facility's computer terminals or other exploding objects FIXED (D255). Root cause: a 32-bit pointer read through a mistyped field (ChrRecord.chrflags, a 4-byte enum aliased onto a real 8-bit pointer field) silently truncated the pointer on 64-bit builds — harmless on the original 32-bit N64, broken on PC. Verified live on real Steam Deck hardware: held through the entire Facility level (including repeated terminal destruction) and through Caverns' radio-objective terminals with zero crashes. Please still report any other Deck/Linux-specific faults.

Downloads

File	Platform
goldeneye-pc-port-<version>-win64.zip	Windows x86-64
goldeneye-pc-port-<version>-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 what this build supports (PAL / JP are on the 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.

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-<version>-win64.zip.sha256
sha256sum -c goldeneye-pc-port-<version>-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.