Beta versions of the Need For Speed III and High Stakes

[VEG]

I'm the author of the NFS3 Modern Patch. I'm looking for full beta versions of these games. I have beta NFS3 demos (builds from 1998/06/22 and 1998/07/15), but they contain only one track, one car, and no menu.

As I can see from these early demos, some content was removed or worsened. For example, version from 1998/07/15 has Ferrari and BMW logos in the texture for flying logos animation in the menu. It's just a leftover, because this demo doesn't have menu at all, and 90% menu files isn't here, but developers had forgotten to remove logo.qfs from this demo.



As you can see, Ferrari and BMW logos were replaced to ItalDesign logo. BTW, I've added this Ferrari logo back in my patch =)

There are much interesting things and I'll write about them sometimes, but the most interesting thing is textures of tracks. Demo from 1998/06/22 has leftovers of textures in much higher resolution. They aren't used by the demo.



The demo uses new file with small textures, like release version of the game does. It seems that that leftovers from the early days of NFS3 when it was much more close to NFS2 SE, because format of this leftover textures differs from the standard NFS3 textures formats. I think that they were reduced because of some memory limitations.

It would be nice to find a full beta version of this game. It may help with improving quality of graphics of the game! I've tried to find some full beta versions without any result. I've found only screenshots and a video of different beta versions. But they are definitely not from the demos, because demos provide only one track (Rocky Pass) and only one car (Lamborghini Countach).

Very early full beta screenshots (from this page, notice the HUD, this version may have leftovers of high-res textures!):
http://reesy05.tripod.com/3.jpg
https://web.archive.org/web/20000930092 ... /nfs35.jpg
http://web.archive.org/web/200009300927 ... /nfs37.jpg

A video from PC Player magazine, it was recorded on a late full beta version (notice that Ferrari logo is used in the menu, cars have the ABS setting, hud is a bit different):

A screenshot from the PC Player magazine (there are plenty of other small differences!):
http://veg.by/z/2016-05-08-16-23-07-fdec8c97.jpg

Manual also uses screenshots from a beta version:


HUD Preview in the settings is based on a beta layout (notice the opponent name element above the map):


Maybe there is someone who knows the place where I can find any full beta versions of this game? I'm interested in Need For Speed 4: High Stakes betas also (inclusive betas of demo versions, if they're exist somewhere). It may help with improving of these games.

[makabro]

Hi there! I have found a copy of NFS 3 in some sort of racing compilation CD that has that Ferrari logo flying on the main menu...

The exe is dated: 29/08/1998

Not sure if this can help

[VEG]

makabro, that's very strange. I have nfs3.exe from 29/08/1998. It has this MD5: 8105f2713ac99eb0cf20b7a3f04d9a07. But this build has only one difference from the final release version: one person was added to the credits. It seems that it was release, and it was used for some batch of CDs. But then developers had figured out that they forgot to mention someone in credits, and as the result the final release build was created 03/09/1998. But both these build don't have Ferrari logo among flying logos in the menu!

Can you share your version? Maybe it will be very helpful.

[makabro]

Yes i can. But just to be sure. How can i check another difference? Where should i look?

Used your patch to run the game but wont go racing, just main manu works. No music, no intro.

[VEG]

makabro, my patch adds Ferrari logo =) So, if you're using my patch, you will see the Ferrari logo among flying logos on the release version of the NFS3. Can you check MD5 of the nfs3.exe from your copy of the game?

[makabro]

Oh!! I see! False alarm then!

Sure, the MD5 is: 0a4404aaa48e6d8c8a9147dbf73492a3 But i don't know if its a legit copy as it's burned on a compilation cd

[VEG]

Can you upload this exe somewhere? I'll check if it has something interesting or it's just a NoCD version of the original release version.

[makabro]

Isn't there any other information i can find instead of uploading the file? Think it's against the rules here...

[Hallfiry]

Isn't there any other information i can find instead of uploading the file? Think it's against the rules here...

Just send it to him privately, so he can do his research and then can publicly tell his findings.

[VEG]

We already had done it. Unfortunately, it is just a NoCD version of that build from 29/08/1998. We need anything older than this one =(

[VEG]

Maybe someone knows anyane from some popular (in 90's) computer game magazine? It seems that EA sent a full beta version before the release to some popular magazines. It would be nice to find it.

UPD. https://www.betaarchive.com/forum/viewt ... 67#p232267

Added: Need For Speed 3 (1998-06-15) (alpha).rar

Maybe someone can check if it is a full beta version, or just a demo beta version with just one demo track?

[dezodor]

It was me who sent that in. Its an 1 level (track003) alpha demo with 1 car (cout) to select and there are cops and traffic in it too.

[VEG]

Oh, what a pity

And what about this one:

Added: E3 1998 Promotional Disc.rar

Does it have something according to NFS3? E3 1998 was in May 1998, in early days of development of the PC version of the game.

You can watch gameplay of the NFS3 on the E3 1998 here:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ugYtWnwtkiI&t=2h43m43s

[MrFlibble]

NFS3 Modern Patch

That's a pretty cool project! Did you completely reverse-engineer the game?

Also, does it support the demo versions? (BTW I didn't know there were sereval until today)

[VEG]

Did you completely reverse-engineer the game?

No, just some parts of the machine code.

Also, does it support the demo versions?

The patch is based on the executable from the release version of the game. You can't use it with beta versions. Of course I can do patches for beta demos also, but it doesn't make any sense. It requires redoing of all work for every version of the game, it is not possible to do it in a universal way. It's better to spend this time to porting the most useful changes to the NFS4

[VEG]

There are these beta demos around:





Still looking for a full beta.

[makabro]

There are these beta demos around:

Still looking for a full beta.

Hey VEG!, there is also this one: "Need for Speed III: Hot Pursuit v0.4 pre-beta", nfs3demo.exe is dated: 09/09/1998 and you play with Chevrolet Corvette.

Here are some screens of the loading menu and exit menu:



Would you aware of it?

EDIT: opps! Sorry i think it's the final demo, is it?

[VEG]

Yeah, it is the final demo =)

[Hallfiry]

There seem to be at least 3 demo builds of NFS 3.

The earliest demo build is of course the version dated to 1998-06-22 and labelled Need For Speed III for Win32 Alpha Preview (0, 4).

Code: Select all

ELSA 3D-Demo-Sampler A-99
Hacker (Hr) CD #10
IO (Polish) #03/98
Kompuutteri Kaikille News 05/98
Level 08/98
PC Gamer Po Polsku 10/98
PC Gamer UK #061 B
PC World Komputer 11/98 B
Score 58 CD1

One instance has additional anti-virus report files that were added by the magazine editors, altering folder sizes a bit:

Code: Select all

PC PowerPlay #29

The next build is from 1998-07-14 and labelled Need For Speed III for Win32 MSDemo (0, 7). It has two exe files, one of which is 4mb in size. Its gamedata file has 30,611,027 bytes and it appears only on one CD:

Code: Select all

CDA (30) 11/98B

The final build is dated to 1998-09-09, is labelled Need For Speed III for Win32 Final Web Demo (-1, -1.-1):

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Level 10/98
Level (Romania) 10/98
PC Gamer (Italian) CD #036 A
PC Player 11/98 A
PC Joker 12/98 CD2
The Games Machine #049
PC Team CD 40 Ludi
PC Fun CD 44_2
Generation 4 CD 116_2
GameStar 12/98

One instance has altered carriage return symbols due to a copying error:

Code: Select all

Online Today 12/98

[makabro]

Mistery solved then!

[VEG]

https://web.archive.org/web/20010705220 ... o/home.jsp
https://www.ign.com/articles/2001/08/03 ... web-racing
https://web.archive.org/web/20021010080 ... toplay.jsp

There was an NFS3 build from 2001 as an ActiveX component for IE named Need For Speed Web Racing. Looking for the installer and a copy of downloaded game files also (of the demo and the full game also).

[makabro]

VEG, have you seen this: https://archive.org/details/nfs3_oem ?

Description says: OEM release of Need for Speed 3: Hot Pursuit. OEM release was most likely shipped together with a GPU for example, and therefor the labels says not for resale. Because the disk should not be sold individually, but in combination with the GPU. The OEM release didn't came with a box. This version contains development left-over files (despite being a PC release, it contains unused loading screens for PS1 release for example). This CD doesn't contain movies, most likely due to lack of space on the disk. CD was created on 04-11-1998.

[VEG]

This OEM version was investigated long time ago. Game executable file is the same, but the intro movie files are removed, and some leftovers from development process are present instead.

Actually, I had an OEM version of the game in my childhood. It was in the box of the Gigabyte GA-660 Plus (Riva TNT2 Pro) GPU =) But it was another OEM version, basically a copy of the US retail release.