D2X-XL is an improved and modernized version of the classic 3D shooters Descent 1 and Descent 2. It uses OpenGL and offers many improvements over the original games, like high resolution textures, models, sounds and music, effects like smoke, lightning, and glow, multiplayer online matchmaking and gaming via the internet, bigger and better levels, and stereoscopic rendering including Oculus Rift support.

D2X-XL allows you to play both Descent 1 and Descent 2 with a single program, using appropriate game elements and behaviour for each of the titles. Despite its enhancements, D2X-XL is 100% true to the original games, allowing you to turn off all extras and play Descent 1 and 2 just the way they looked back in the day when they were new.

Due to its many enhancements, D2X-XL offers a greatly enhanced single player experience as well as improved and expanded multiplayer capabilities.

Click here to learn more.

Although D2X-XL contains a lot of enhancements and new features, it is still fully backwards compatible to every other Descent 2 version and particularly to D2_Win98 and d2_3dfx (which constitute the reference for every other D2 version). As many fixes simply restore features of the original Descent 2 that were missing in D2X (like availability of all cockpit views, or working mouse steering), it is even closer to them than D2X itself. Keeping full backwards compatibility is my concern, and where I break it, it happens accidentally and will be fixed as soon as I notice it, or get notified of it.

In multiplayer games, all game-relevant features of D2X-XL (e.g. mouselook, dual missile launch, or the cockpit window 'radar') are completely turned off if the game host does not use D2X-XL. If the game host uses D2X-XL, he has full control over these features and can turn them on or off at his free disposal.

D2X-XL fixes virtually all bugs found in D2X 0.2.6 and adds a plethora of new features. Find a pretty complete list here.

 
Binaries

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	32 & 64 Bits (self extracting archive)	current D2X-XL executables and DLLs for MS Windows
	Source code and make files	(make files are contained in an extra rar file inside the source archive)
	Mac OS X executable and required SDL library	current D2X-XL executable for Intel Mac OS X 10.7+ (~3.9 MB)
	D2X-XL on Heise software repository	Mirror for all supported OS-s

 

Source repository

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You can download the source code from the SVN repository of the D2X-XL project on SourceForge.net. The repository path is https://d2x-xl.svn.sourceforge.net/svnroot/d2x-xl. Read access is anonymous. If you want to store updates you made to source code in the SVN repository, you must become a member of the D2X-XL team on SourceForge.net and be granted write access to the repository. Windows users may want to use TortoiseSVN, which integrates with Windows Explorer and can be accessed using the file context menu.

 

D2X-XL Data

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D2X-XL addon data archive

additional data required for running D2X-XL

 

Libraries

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D2X-XL 3rd party libraries

Source code and project files for 3rd party libraries required by D2X-XL (~7.8 MB)

 

Descent 2 Demo Data

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Descent 2 Demo Data

Get a taste of Descent 2 with D2X-XL using the free Descent 2 demo data