Today I bring you news of yet another rather low profile Darkplaces engine game (e.g. the same engine that runs Xonotic), called Dead Morning:
As you can see in these other, more game-play oriented videos (1, 2, 3), it seems to be quite heavily influenced by another recent 1st person horror game…
The website mentions a fully open-source release at the end of this year, so I am rather intrigued what they will come up by then!
There seem to be not too many Kickstarter projects that promise open-source results (and I have to admit, incentives are lower if you don’t get a copy of a cool game at a discounted price 
), but the Rhythos RPG builder project looks like one very much worth of support:
The guy behind it (don’t miss the slightly goofy video on the kickstarter page ) seems to be quite far along development already, basing the editor on a previous game of his and utilizing the Liberated Pixel Cup graphics.
He is also asking for non-monetary contributions, so check out his newly set-up community website to learn more about how to contribute.
While personally I don’t see myself playing such 2D RPGs much, I contributed because it seems like a great platform for young game developers to start out with… and you have to catch them early as they say (no pedobear reference intended 
).
FreeCiv is now available as a HTML5 implementation that runs right in your (modern) browser:
Load times are quick too, so give it a try. It even supports multiplayer.
Tip: Moving units is either done via the arrow keys (preferably the number key-pad ones as those allow diagonal movement) or by dragging a red line from the unit to the desired location.
(Yes, that is a rather thin common ground to combine these two news in one post ).
Anyways, today there is one for the “FreeGamers”, aka those that are looking for more or less playable games:
There is a new release (2.0) of StuntRally, and I guess I can quote Twain here too:
The reports of my death have been greatly exaggerated!
Because it looks like development was not only resumed after the earlier announcement of a project hold, but even increased in pace 
Anyways, here is a great video:
And the other one is for “FreeGameDevs”:
And as they say: good things come to those that wait, and things are better late then never… so I am happy to also report about the Octaforge 0.2.0 beta1 release.
This friendly fork of the Cube2 engine, brings an impressive list of new features on the table, and should once it becomes more “production ready” be a strong contender for the easiest to mod FPS engine out there!
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| Main menu |
OpenXcom is one of those projects I’ve been following religiously, not only because I’m a huge fan of the X-COM series, but also because it promised to deliver a fully stable and bug free engine port released under a Free Software license.
The last time I talked about it, it seemed like there was still much work to be done, but apparently things have changed, as the developers suddenly just went from a fairly incomplete version 0.4 to a fully playable and enhanced version 0.9.
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| In game |
This is obviously great news to all X-COM fans. OpenXcom now ensures the game can be ported to practically every modern device or OS you can think of. It also allows improved mod support and further enhancements to gameplay and graphics to be made by the community. Sadly the infamously hard sequel to X-COM, known as Terror from the Deep, is yet to be supported, something that will hopefully change in the upcoming versions of OpenXcom.
You can download OpenXcom v0.9 here.
The engine requires an original copy of X-COM: UFO Defense/UFO: Enemy Unknown in order to run, which can be purchased here.
Finally, if you’re interested in modding or downloading mods made specifically for OpenXcom, you should check this page.
Code License: GPLv3
Clint Bellanger, the awesome guy behind the Flare RPG (engine), just landed a surprise hit for the #OneGameaMonth competition(?):
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| Heroine Dusk |
The fully JavaScript (and thus in Browser game) is called Heroine Dusk, and can be played here as a first demo. Game play seems to be heavily influenced by those early 1990ties pseudo 3D dungeon crawlers (similar to the recent indie-game hit “Legend of Grimrock“).
Code and art assets are of course fully FOSS!
The really nice looking modern warfare mod for 0 A.D. is steadily improving:
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| Rogue Republic’s Russian buildings |
You can now also check out their blog and facebook page, and to quote one of the main developers:
With hope of finding a proficient 0 A.D. coder
So please help out these guys, if you know some Javascript and are willing to learn how to code for 0 A.D.!
Hey folks!
Just a quick note. I’m looking to fund work on OpenGameArt.org full time (probably via Kickstarter or similar) once my current work project is done, and I’m interested in hearing what people would like me to work on. If you have any thoughts, please join the discussion on OGA:
http://opengameart.org/content/if-i-could-work-on-oga-full-time-what-would-people-want-me-to-code-or-do
…or on reddit:
http://www.reddit.com/r/gamedev/comments/1d11ir/i_run_opengameartorg_and_im_looking_at_options_to/
Thanks!
Bart
People all over the world are hereby welcomed to participate in Summer of Cards 2013 – the first ever real life gathering of the dev. team and all those of you that want to get aboard and contribute to the worlds first truly pro libre customizable card game, our dear WTactics. 1:st to 28:th of July 2013 is when this is going down in Malmö, Sweden, so do some reading in here and scribble us a mail already so we can start planning for wicked goodness. You come and stay as you may.
“A couchsurfing style gamejam” was approved as a possible description of the event.
Once this returns positive results, I will be hoping for the first free, open source monastery being found by 2015…
For 0 A.D., Erik Johansson steps down from project leadership and Michael D. Hafer assumes that role.
In Unknown Horizons, Nightraven steps back and Kilian fills the project management role.
Leadership in free and open source game projects is an exciting topic with much opinion about which style will lead to a successful game – whatever the subject’s definition of “success” is – and too few examples to make objective statements about it.
Are you following any specific projects and their leadership structures an want to comment on these? I must admit that I am out of the loop with many, many projects, although I am pretty sure that for example Flare, NAEV and Valyria Tear have (successful) Benevolent Dictator for Life style leadership.
On related note: FIFE (the isometric 2d engine used by Unknown Horizons) moved to GitHub.
