Software archaeology / DOS / 1991–92
Taking Corncob
for a walk.
Corncob 3D lets you land, get out and walk away. We followed it through its files, its source code and some wonderfully strange decisions.
THE GROUND CREW
Original geometry in our adapted model viewer.
An unusually open flight game
You can just
get out.
Walk across the airfield. Take a pistol, plant a charge, call a rescue van, or fly your aircraft by remote control while you stand on the ground. Corncob was happy to let a flight simulator get distracted.
These are some of the places, objects and oddities we found while working towards a native reconstruction. The full technical investigation lives in the research archive.
Have a look around
Maps, models and a little assembly
The worlds, laid out
Start at the training airfield, find an alien installation, or follow the marker rows through the source-only slalom experiment.
A very small cast
Rotate the aircraft, ground crew and alien hardware. Switch poses, compare distant models and try the flashing colours.
How it came apart
The source-code detour, invisible tower walls, a sun with an attitude and a mission briefing about suspended tofu.
Inside the renderer
Sixteen colours.
Eight drawing orders.
Follow an aircraft from its model coordinates to the video hardware. Step through original drawing lists, clip an edge and watch four bits become a pixel.
Read the graphics article ↗
Inside the flight model
Keeping Corncob
in the air.
What changes in Advanced mode? Why does the engine prefer a little altitude? Explore the lift curve, stall protection and two-wheel landing logic, measured from the original program.
Read the flight-physics article ↗
Already want to fly it? Our faithful C++ reconstruction brings Earth and Other Worlds together in one native executable. Corncob Redux adds higher resolutions, configurable controls and a few merciful fixes. This site is for exploring the recovered material.
One more thing
The soundtrack survived too.
Jim Collymore’s AdLib pieces, heard through the recovered sequences and instrument banks. No music starts until you press Play.