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Never played Pathways, but the Marathon storyline was riveting. I was playing through levels not so much because all the fragging was fun, but because I really wanted to know what was next in store, what was going to happen next. That entire series of games was some of the best I've ever played in my life.

That's hilarious. You rool. Between this and the Master Chief costume, I'm inspired to do something really wacky next year.

I thought you were sneaking in a Pathways reference, but then you didn't pursue it. What it really accidental?

Did anybody remember that Bungie wrote the game & it's backstory? Anybody here remember the three games that came before Halo, and served as its inspiration? Hmmmm... And how about the fact that THOSE games have an amazing story which is still being analyzed & dissected. Oh, and the fact that people are still playing Marathon & it's ilk. So, my opinion is that if Bungie is involved in any fashion, they've probably got some strong story cooking.

Video game movies are bad ideas. The game is made for interactive play with a story line usually tacked on out of obligation.

Bungie games are an exception. See here and here for proof. Halo is apparently even more well-integrated with it's fictional universe, with a "story bible" closely guarded. (Their earlier games had no such thing and were more ad-hoc, and yet STILL fleshed out rich and detailed fictional universes with interesting and complex characters and plotlines). If any game were to be good movie material, it'd be a Bungie game.

Video game movies are bad ideas. The game is made for interactive play with a story line usually tacked on out of obligation.

Bungie games are an exception. See here and here for proof. Halo is apparently even more well-integrated with it's fictional universe, with a "story bible" closely guarded. (Their earlier games had no such thing and were more ad-hoc, and yet STILL fleshed out rich and detailed fictional universes with interesting and complex characters and plotlines). If any game were to be good movie material, it'd be a Bungie game.

Marathon 2 and Marathon Infinity are both also great.

For anyone who wants to check the game out, you should check out Aleph One, the OSS version of the game updated for new systems. It's still worth a play through for anyone who hasn't.

Is it a coincidence that Bungie created (IMO) the two FPS's with the best storylines?

Ok, so I know he isn't published in the USA, but Halo was at least partly inspired (http://marathon.bungie.org/Story/halo_culture.htm l) by an Iain M Banks book, http://www.amazon.co.uk/Consider-Phlebas-Iain-Bank s/dp/1857231384). I think this means that comparison's with films like DOOM is kind of unfair. Btw, Iain M Banks is one of the best sci fi authors alive. If you don't believe me, read it. An awesome book. Steve Crawford

The official site has already launched with trailers and screenshots (mostly prerendered) at http://www.halowars.com./

More importantly, is that Craig Mullins' artwork?

Talk about Bungie connections - at the very least, it's attempting a similar style...

I think it should be him for the voice, and maybe anonymous stuntmen in a suit, depending on whether he can or wants to actually play the walking role of the Chief.

I mean, let's face it, he doesn't exactly look like the Chief.

http://source.bungie.org/get/

I agree that this is one of the most amazing games ever. Not only did it bring us some technical innovations (at the time) such as the ability to look up and down to aim your weapon, dual triggered weapons, etc., but it was one of the first FPS games to actually have an amazing, intricate plot.

If you haven't played it, go for it.

http://source.bungie.org/get/

I agree that this is one of the most amazing games ever. Not only did it bring us some technical innovations (at the time) such as the ability to look up and down to aim your weapon, dual triggered weapons, etc., but it was one of the first FPS games to actually have an amazing, intricate plot.

If you haven't played it, go for it.

http://source.bungie.org/get/

I agree that this is one of the most amazing games ever. Not only did it bring us some technical innovations (at the time) such as the ability to look up and down to aim your weapon, dual triggered weapons, etc., but it was one of the first FPS games to actually have an amazing, intricate plot.

If you haven't played it, go for it.

I think it would sell if they came out with "Halo 2: The Untold Story" for the original Xbox. There are a few story sequences that come to mind:

o When Sarge Johnson gets in the Pelican, leaving MC to take out the lizard-snipers
(" Outskirts " level ) -- Play as Sarge

o Level 9 "Regret" -- Miranda asks Johnson to meet her at the Library. -- Play as Sarge, then as Miranda

o Level 10, Marines fighting the Flood

o When the Arbiter gets in the transport (right before he gets "killed" by the head Brute - the humans are in the other transport and slightly ahead. This is where Miranda grabs the Icon and nearly falls. The humans have a whole battle sequence that Arbiter finds when he enters the last part of the level. -- Play as Miranda

--Thanks to:
http://halosm.bungie.org/story/halo2_level_transcr ipts/lv04_outskirts.html

It was okay, seemed like there were lots of graphical glitches.

What kind of glitches? If you're talking about seeing through walls, that was done on purpose so you wouldn't be fighting blind if your back was up against a wall. If they made a sequel (I wish) they would probably make the immediate walls transparent and fog out everthing behind them, but graphics cards weren't that powerful in 2000. There's also a patch for Win2k and XP that fixes a bug that would cause the game to crash. Other than that, I'm not sure what your problem would be, as I've run the game on ATI and Nvidia hardware without problems.

Also, I wasn't too sure about the hand to hand combat via mouse clicks.

I love it...nice and simple, hard to screw up. I'm an old fart who did well with Mortal Combat, but newer fighting and wrestling games sail over my head with their complicated control schemes. If multiplayer hadn't been gutted before release, and if it had been published with good mod tools, I'm sure you'd still see a big following to this day.

I wasn't aware Halo was being developed concurrently for windows and mac

Yup, Bungie and Blizard were setting good examples for the gaming industry...develop your different versions simultaniously and it's easier, cheaper and you don't have a year and half old game coming out for the Mac at $50 when the PC version is in the bargin bin at $20.

When Halo origionally demoed at a Macworld expo, I showed a guy at school the trailer, and he said "there's no way that's being rendered in real time". Of course, by the time it was ported to the Xbox, the graphics were decidedly average. Damn dirty Microsoft....

"Halo was originally being developed for the PC before Microsoft bought Bungie, so we clearly would still have seen Halo, just on a different platform."

Ditto to the GP... Karma's a bitch I suppose. Virtual mod points awarded. AC unnecessary.

I have seen comments to the effect that people never played Marathon. Now is the time.

Hey, I had to do something useful with the post.

While I won't say anything bad about System Shock or Shodan as a character, I've one minor gripe with this summary. Certainly depth and complexity the likes of which are described here is rare in a video game character, I must object to the phrase "a truly unique character" with one simple retort:

*cough*Durandal*cough*.

What is it with companies who show us videos lots of supposed "in-game footage" that turns out to not be in the final product at all? It seems that all they can do with this next-gen "generation" is provide us with some catchy, shiny pre-rendered graphics, throwing a thousand more enemies at us then normal(which seems to be the "new" next-gen theme), and only show us through videos that more then likely over exaggerate what the game will turn out to really be like. Even the claimed in-game stuff can't really be trusted, the graphics might be crap when you actually get the final product(oops, someone doesn't like lots of enemies, can't handle things and has to have popups), and it could have been done on suped-up/non-final development systems. It is passing FMVs as in-game play all over again, stupid Sony for thinking videos are really going to sell...

Oh wait, this is not a PS3 article? Forget that, I WOV HALO, TEH VIDEO FOR 3 WAS THE GREATEST EVER! And we all know that Microsoft is always truthful, and would never lie about in game graphics or sell us pre-rendered stuff(cuz only teh evil $ONY would do that!!).

If they want some buzz they should throw out some rumors that Halo will be playable on it. Even if its a lame Halo flash game.

How about before we all jump in to Mac Gaming, Apple gives users a way to turn off mouse acceleration in system preferences? Anyone who has tried to play an FPS with mouse acceleration enabled knows it is infinitely frustrating. We, as power users, gamers, etc. shouldn't have to download a third party app/utility just to tweak a basic mouse setting.

I know i'm not the only one, I was just digging yesterday to find a utility that does this so I can finally dig into Aleph One.

Just ask your self this question, which game would more likely entice a player who enjoys an expensive glass of wine while he/she plays video games.

I enjoy wine while gaming and I was the webmaster of Myth.Bungie.Org for most of it's existence. Myst, on the other hand, was pretty pictures and a novel story wrapped up in a boring game.

No, not entirely. It's the PC gaming business that they say is suffering, not PC gaming. There are plenty of games that are free from the onset that are fun. http://tuxracer.sourceforge.net/
http://www.frozen-bubble.org/
http://asteroids3d.sourceforge.net/
http://sourceforge.net/projects/lynn
http://toppler.sourceforge.net/
http://blockattack.sourceforge.net/
http://source.bungie.org/
http://www.secretmaryo.org/
http://www.realtech-vr.com/nogravity/
http://www.classicgaming.com/worminator/
http://www.nexuiz.com/
http://www.armagetronad.net/
http://www.meatfighter.com/
http://www.bzflag.org/
http://wesnoth.org/
http://cubeengine.com/

I mean, this is great and all, but when are we going to get the ability to play Mac games on Windows?

You already can...

Then a small company called Bungie Software(now Bungie Studios, owned by Microsoft) came out with Marathon. It didn't look all that different (at a glance) to Doom (well, IMHO it looked better, and you actually had to aim your weapons with no reticle). You could still shoot anything that moved, even civilians with no consequences (it wasn't until Marathon 2 that the NPCs started shooting back if you killed too many of them). However, suddenly you were immersed in this incredibly awesome, intricate story. IMnsHO, it had one of the best balances of gameplay and story and actually made the game really worth playing and replaying(the Doom games were great for stress relief, but not much more).

I wasn't much of a gamer then, and still am not one (being a Mac user has its drawbacks), but that set the standard for gaming for me. Give me a good story AND good gameplay and I will buy your game. I have and still do follow Bungie, even after Microsoft bought them, becuase they have always focused on excellent gameplay combined with an interesting story, and usually excellent replayability. The Marathon series had both, the Myth series had both, Oni (though it was finished by...RockStar?) had it, Halo had it, Halo 2 had it (though not quite the replayability of Halo).

Anyway, like I said I am not much of a gamer, but, with the exception of the Dead or Alive series, story does matter (DoA is strictly for stress relief). And Bungie has done admirably in these respects.

Then a small company called Bungie Software(now Bungie Studios, owned by Microsoft) came out with Marathon. It didn't look all that different (at a glance) to Doom (well, IMHO it looked better, and you actually had to aim your weapons with no reticle). You could still shoot anything that moved, even civilians with no consequences (it wasn't until Marathon 2 that the NPCs started shooting back if you killed too many of them). However, suddenly you were immersed in this incredibly awesome, intricate story. IMnsHO, it had one of the best balances of gameplay and story and actually made the game really worth playing and replaying(the Doom games were great for stress relief, but not much more).

I wasn't much of a gamer then, and still am not one (being a Mac user has its drawbacks), but that set the standard for gaming for me. Give me a good story AND good gameplay and I will buy your game. I have and still do follow Bungie, even after Microsoft bought them, becuase they have always focused on excellent gameplay combined with an interesting story, and usually excellent replayability. The Marathon series had both, the Myth series had both, Oni (though it was finished by...RockStar?) had it, Halo had it, Halo 2 had it (though not quite the replayability of Halo).

Anyway, like I said I am not much of a gamer, but, with the exception of the Dead or Alive series, story does matter (DoA is strictly for stress relief). And Bungie has done admirably in these respects.

Then a small company called Bungie Software(now Bungie Studios, owned by Microsoft) came out with Marathon. It didn't look all that different (at a glance) to Doom (well, IMHO it looked better, and you actually had to aim your weapons with no reticle). You could still shoot anything that moved, even civilians with no consequences (it wasn't until Marathon 2 that the NPCs started shooting back if you killed too many of them). However, suddenly you were immersed in this incredibly awesome, intricate story. IMnsHO, it had one of the best balances of gameplay and story and actually made the game really worth playing and replaying(the Doom games were great for stress relief, but not much more).

I wasn't much of a gamer then, and still am not one (being a Mac user has its drawbacks), but that set the standard for gaming for me. Give me a good story AND good gameplay and I will buy your game. I have and still do follow Bungie, even after Microsoft bought them, becuase they have always focused on excellent gameplay combined with an interesting story, and usually excellent replayability. The Marathon series had both, the Myth series had both, Oni (though it was finished by...RockStar?) had it, Halo had it, Halo 2 had it (though not quite the replayability of Halo).

Anyway, like I said I am not much of a gamer, but, with the exception of the Dead or Alive series, story does matter (DoA is strictly for stress relief). And Bungie has done admirably in these respects.

Then a small company called Bungie Software(now Bungie Studios, owned by Microsoft) came out with Marathon. It didn't look all that different (at a glance) to Doom (well, IMHO it looked better, and you actually had to aim your weapons with no reticle). You could still shoot anything that moved, even civilians with no consequences (it wasn't until Marathon 2 that the NPCs started shooting back if you killed too many of them). However, suddenly you were immersed in this incredibly awesome, intricate story. IMnsHO, it had one of the best balances of gameplay and story and actually made the game really worth playing and replaying(the Doom games were great for stress relief, but not much more).

I wasn't much of a gamer then, and still am not one (being a Mac user has its drawbacks), but that set the standard for gaming for me. Give me a good story AND good gameplay and I will buy your game. I have and still do follow Bungie, even after Microsoft bought them, becuase they have always focused on excellent gameplay combined with an interesting story, and usually excellent replayability. The Marathon series had both, the Myth series had both, Oni (though it was finished by...RockStar?) had it, Halo had it, Halo 2 had it (though not quite the replayability of Halo).

Anyway, like I said I am not much of a gamer, but, with the exception of the Dead or Alive series, story does matter (DoA is strictly for stress relief). And Bungie has done admirably in these respects.

NO. You have to escape the closing of the universe to become god. DUH!

The game design wasn't particularly bad, and in some ways it was ahead of its time. E.g., Daikatana tried to have a story in a FPS long before Half-Life, for example.

Hello? Marathon had an extremely deep and involved plot, story and backstory. Released in 1994, by Bungie.

It was released more than 5 years before Daikatana, and almost 10 years before Half Life 2.

LK

I'm a hobbyist mod-maker for the ~10yo FPS game Marathon, the engine for which is now GPL'd, spawning the Aleph One project. I've got a near-total conversion mod in progress right now (don't worry about the "near" part, the original game content is also free game for such purposes now), and for the ease of my potential players, I'd really like to include the application program, renamed and with a custom icon (as has been traditional practice for Marathon mod-makers of the pre-Aleph days), in my download. Since Marathon was originally a Mac game, Aleph One requires no "installation" (at least on Mac and Windows); you just download a .zip of the program, put it in a folder with your choice of game files, and play. So including the app with my mod would mean players just download and go, no other downloads or installation necessary. (And yes, players of other Marathon mods do actually get confused by the three-step process of downloading the game, downloading the engine, and putting the two together).

However, I found out not long ago that I can't do that without distributing all the source, including that for my modifications. Nevermind how to distribute what little I modified in "source"; I renamed the files in the Finder and copied some icon graphics into the app package, what's the source to that? Nevermind that I couldn't code my way out of "hello world"; even if I wanted to ship a completely unmodified binary, I'm not even sure how to get the source to it, much less how to distribute it properly.

I'm basically a user of this software, but a developer of art content that is symbiotic with it. A game engine is useless without game content and vice versa; the two are really things that ought to be packaged together. But developers of game content, especially amateurs like me, are quite often not developers of software. They just use the software to present their content.

I think the GPL causes significant problems in cases like these. Another example I could imagine would be an open-source installer program or self-extracting archive maker (not that many things use these anymore, probably for this very reason): if you want to use that installer to ship your stuff, must you also distribute the source to the installer? Even if what you're shipping has nothing to do with the installer, other than that it installs whatever it is you're shipping? Must you ship an "installer package" and make people download the installer separately if they don't already have it? So, self-extracting archives are not feasible under the GPL, since everyone who used one would have to distribute the source to the archive-maker as well?

I'm sure this will probably get a lot of "that's what the license says, if you don't like it don't use it" responses, but I'm just trying to point out that the GPL as it stands is not appropriate for the distribution of all types of applications (like game engines or self-installer programs), even when it is otherwise appropriate for the projects that develop those programs, and thus I think the GPL could use some modifications to allow for such reasonable uses.

The GPL seems to assume that everyone is, or at least ought to be, a software developer and/or distributor. But I think I've shown that there are some cases where software is only incidentally distributed by people who have and want nothing to do with the development or distribution of software, but rather, things that use that software. An apt analogy might be if some bottle-maker distributed instructions on how to make such bottles (i.e. chemical ingredients and such) with every bottle, and insisted that anyone who make and sell copies of those bottles also include those instructions. Maybe you've got an ingenious bottle plastic formula and want it open to the world and not patented or exploited by Coca-Cola for profit; that's fine and dandy. But does that mean I can't serve

I'm a hobbyist mod-maker for the ~10yo FPS game Marathon, the engine for which is now GPL'd, spawning the Aleph One project. I've got a near-total conversion mod in progress right now (don't worry about the "near" part, the original game content is also free game for such purposes now), and for the ease of my potential players, I'd really like to include the application program, renamed and with a custom icon (as has been traditional practice for Marathon mod-makers of the pre-Aleph days), in my download. Since Marathon was originally a Mac game, Aleph One requires no "installation" (at least on Mac and Windows); you just download a .zip of the program, put it in a folder with your choice of game files, and play. So including the app with my mod would mean players just download and go, no other downloads or installation necessary. (And yes, players of other Marathon mods do actually get confused by the three-step process of downloading the game, downloading the engine, and putting the two together).

However, I found out not long ago that I can't do that without distributing all the source, including that for my modifications. Nevermind how to distribute what little I modified in "source"; I renamed the files in the Finder and copied some icon graphics into the app package, what's the source to that? Nevermind that I couldn't code my way out of "hello world"; even if I wanted to ship a completely unmodified binary, I'm not even sure how to get the source to it, much less how to distribute it properly.

I'm basically a user of this software, but a developer of art content that is symbiotic with it. A game engine is useless without game content and vice versa; the two are really things that ought to be packaged together. But developers of game content, especially amateurs like me, are quite often not developers of software. They just use the software to present their content.

I think the GPL causes significant problems in cases like these. Another example I could imagine would be an open-source installer program or self-extracting archive maker (not that many things use these anymore, probably for this very reason): if you want to use that installer to ship your stuff, must you also distribute the source to the installer? Even if what you're shipping has nothing to do with the installer, other than that it installs whatever it is you're shipping? Must you ship an "installer package" and make people download the installer separately if they don't already have it? So, self-extracting archives are not feasible under the GPL, since everyone who used one would have to distribute the source to the archive-maker as well?

I'm sure this will probably get a lot of "that's what the license says, if you don't like it don't use it" responses, but I'm just trying to point out that the GPL as it stands is not appropriate for the distribution of all types of applications (like game engines or self-installer programs), even when it is otherwise appropriate for the projects that develop those programs, and thus I think the GPL could use some modifications to allow for such reasonable uses.

The GPL seems to assume that everyone is, or at least ought to be, a software developer and/or distributor. But I think I've shown that there are some cases where software is only incidentally distributed by people who have and want nothing to do with the development or distribution of software, but rather, things that use that software. An apt analogy might be if some bottle-maker distributed instructions on how to make such bottles (i.e. chemical ingredients and such) with every bottle, and insisted that anyone who make and sell copies of those bottles also include those instructions. Maybe you've got an ingenious bottle plastic formula and want it open to the world and not patented or exploited by Coca-Cola for profit; that's fine and dandy. But does that mean I can't serve

I'm a hobbyist mod-maker for the ~10yo FPS game Marathon, the engine for which is now GPL'd, spawning the Aleph One project. I've got a near-total conversion mod in progress right now (don't worry about the "near" part, the original game content is also free game for such purposes now), and for the ease of my potential players, I'd really like to include the application program, renamed and with a custom icon (as has been traditional practice for Marathon mod-makers of the pre-Aleph days), in my download. Since Marathon was originally a Mac game, Aleph One requires no "installation" (at least on Mac and Windows); you just download a .zip of the program, put it in a folder with your choice of game files, and play. So including the app with my mod would mean players just download and go, no other downloads or installation necessary. (And yes, players of other Marathon mods do actually get confused by the three-step process of downloading the game, downloading the engine, and putting the two together).

However, I found out not long ago that I can't do that without distributing all the source, including that for my modifications. Nevermind how to distribute what little I modified in "source"; I renamed the files in the Finder and copied some icon graphics into the app package, what's the source to that? Nevermind that I couldn't code my way out of "hello world"; even if I wanted to ship a completely unmodified binary, I'm not even sure how to get the source to it, much less how to distribute it properly.

I'm basically a user of this software, but a developer of art content that is symbiotic with it. A game engine is useless without game content and vice versa; the two are really things that ought to be packaged together. But developers of game content, especially amateurs like me, are quite often not developers of software. They just use the software to present their content.

I think the GPL causes significant problems in cases like these. Another example I could imagine would be an open-source installer program or self-extracting archive maker (not that many things use these anymore, probably for this very reason): if you want to use that installer to ship your stuff, must you also distribute the source to the installer? Even if what you're shipping has nothing to do with the installer, other than that it installs whatever it is you're shipping? Must you ship an "installer package" and make people download the installer separately if they don't already have it? So, self-extracting archives are not feasible under the GPL, since everyone who used one would have to distribute the source to the archive-maker as well?

I'm sure this will probably get a lot of "that's what the license says, if you don't like it don't use it" responses, but I'm just trying to point out that the GPL as it stands is not appropriate for the distribution of all types of applications (like game engines or self-installer programs), even when it is otherwise appropriate for the projects that develop those programs, and thus I think the GPL could use some modifications to allow for such reasonable uses.

The GPL seems to assume that everyone is, or at least ought to be, a software developer and/or distributor. But I think I've shown that there are some cases where software is only incidentally distributed by people who have and want nothing to do with the development or distribution of software, but rather, things that use that software. An apt analogy might be if some bottle-maker distributed instructions on how to make such bottles (i.e. chemical ingredients and such) with every bottle, and insisted that anyone who make and sell copies of those bottles also include those instructions. Maybe you've got an ingenious bottle plastic formula and want it open to the world and not patented or exploited by Coca-Cola for profit; that's fine and dandy. But does that mean I can't serve

Picture the Microsoft PDF format, in the same ridiculing manner that you'd consider Microsoft RTF, Microsoft HTML, and Microsoft XML: misshapen parodies of their former, more open, more rational selves.

Almost as if they were infested, mutated, and corrupted by the Flood from Halo. I find it interesting that Microsoft published and promoted a game containing a vivid metaphor of their "EEE" methodology.

Better yet are the quotes from 343 Guilty Spark, the ever-so-polite robotic floating ball (which I like to use as a metaphor for Microsoft PR; anyone who has played through Halo may understand why):

You can see how the body's been transformed by the genetic restructuring of the Flood infection. The small creatures carry spores that cause a host to mutate. The mutated host then produces spores that can pass the Flood to others. It is insidious and elegant. As long as any hosts remain, the Flood is virulent.

Yeah.

Marathon
Myth

Of course we all know what happened to Bungie.. *sigh*

Yeah.

Marathon
Myth

Of course we all know what happened to Bungie.. *sigh*

Or Mac only games that blew the face off PC games... like Marathon! I was saddened when MS bought Bungie... even more saddened when Halo was released and it was complete garbage compared to the Halo that was near production for Mac/PC... and finally even MORE saddened when no one who played Halo played Marathon, so as I pointed all the references out they were like "what?". I remember spending countless hours engaged in the wonderous Marathon world. Thankfully Bungie released the source code and some nice people ported it to the PC http://source.bungie.org/get/. Woo! Now I can play through the whole trilogy again.

What about the Marathon Trilogy? The game was (and still is) awesome. Great gameplay, engaging story, and basically the most advanced FPS of its time. I'm now a PC gamer, but I do miss the good 'ol days of Marathon on my old Mac... thankfully I've discovered this: http://source.bungie.org/get/. Yeah, Bungie released the source code and people modded it for the PC. There's even texture upgrade packs and such... woo!

I used to deal with UAC before. :)

Regardless, there is little reason beyond the philosophical for them to be open source except to ensure that your games will play on all platforms going forward provided someone will take the time to make necessary tweaks so that it will compile.

I think that's a pretty important reason. One of my personal reasons for liking open source is that it limits the amount of abandonware that can't ever be re-used (not to say that projects don't get abandoned in the OSS world, but they at least can be restarted by someone else if there's a desire).

On the other hand, I understand that game companies want to make money, and that perhaps not everyone can survive on the open engine plus closed content model.

What I really like as a compromise is something like what Bungie ended up doing with Marathon: after the game wasn't bringing them in any money anymore, they open sourced the engine and basically turned it over to the fan community. Actually Bungie goes above and beyond the call of duty IMO they maintain a domain (and maybe the server too, I'm not sure) for the GPL effort at http://source.bungie.org/ and they released the game content files for download, so you can grab the GPL engine and the content files, and play the retail version of the game on your modern machine.

There are a lot of games I remember playing and enjoying that I wish had gotten this treatment, but instead just fell off the face of the earth.

Somewhere I read an article/posting where someone described a concept they called "foreverware." Basically it's commercial software, games in partiuclar, which is sold with the promise (in writing) that after a certain amount of time, the source code will be released to the public. I think compromises like this might do a lot of good, in the markets where OSS has so far achieved limited penetration. I could even imagine situations where escrow organizations hold the source code and other documentation, so that even if the company were to go bankrupt, their promise to release would still be valid.

With more and more software being built for a defined life-cycle (e.g. "we're going to support this for 5 years, after that it's done,") I think that there could be a significant demand for software that would open itself up after a certain amount of time, while also giving the maker time to realize profits and stay ahead of the competition in releasing the next version, by not giving up too much of an edge.

Everybody except of course Durandal...

I'd venture a guess and say that Halo's Master Chief is the Mjolnir cyborg from Marathon... post "Destiny". There's always the insinuation that you've been here before, you've done this a million times, you've been this hero and never anything else. And when you're not needed, you're kept on ice.

Bungie just keeps telling the same basic story (guy with gun saves the day and collects pieces of a puzzle) with a time jump between each game (PID + 500 years = Marathon + 17 years = M2, M:Infinity + "T-Minus 15.193792102158E+9 years until the universe closes!" + lots more time = Halo, H2, H3...

And for all you Bungie-lore freaks out there... Halo 3 will be the 7th game.

Maybe you get one movie like that per generation, but certainly more than one thing. For example, in 1994 Marathon came out. A decade later people are still speculationg about the plot. I'm pretty sure that there are a couple more gems like this one spread across the media.

Come on guys, doesn't anyone remember Leela, Durandal, and that crazy bastard Tycho? And all is not lost if you don't happen to have an old Performa sitting around--come join us at source.bungie.org and work on Aleph One, the open source version, now available for Linux, Windows, and just about anything else you can think of! (Some nut even has it working on Irix!)

You can still play Marathon:

http://source.bungie.org/get/

Said the AC: "You need to check out http://source.bungie.org/ and http://trilogyrelease.bungie.org/ "

(Old geezer voice) Well, I'll be dipped in shit. (/Old geezer voice)

Seems the folks at Bungie opened up their source code, and there's now a Windows, Mac OS X, and Linux version called AlephOne ... and it'll play both the original Marathon, Marathon II, Marathon Infinity, and the total conversion datafiles. Plus it has OpenGL accelleration! Isn't that slick.

Although, the odd thing is that the first website calls itself the "Marathon Open Source Project," but the second one clearly says "Marathon is copyright 1994-present Bungie Studios, all rights reserved. Files are freely downloadable, but are not open-source." I'm hoping the latter claim is just out of date.

Anyway, kudos to Bungie and the rest of the AlephOne community if it works as well as it looks. I have yet to check it out but will probably give it a shot tonight. Maybe they didn't lose their entire souls when they got bought by MS...

Said the AC: "You need to check out http://source.bungie.org/ and http://trilogyrelease.bungie.org/ "

(Old geezer voice) Well, I'll be dipped in shit. (/Old geezer voice)

Seems the folks at Bungie opened up their source code, and there's now a Windows, Mac OS X, and Linux version called AlephOne ... and it'll play both the original Marathon, Marathon II, Marathon Infinity, and the total conversion datafiles. Plus it has OpenGL accelleration! Isn't that slick.

Although, the odd thing is that the first website calls itself the "Marathon Open Source Project," but the second one clearly says "Marathon is copyright 1994-present Bungie Studios, all rights reserved. Files are freely downloadable, but are not open-source." I'm hoping the latter claim is just out of date.

Anyway, kudos to Bungie and the rest of the AlephOne community if it works as well as it looks. I have yet to check it out but will probably give it a shot tonight. Maybe they didn't lose their entire souls when they got bought by MS...

You need to check out http://source.bungie.org/ and http://trilogyrelease.bungie.org/

You need to check out http://source.bungie.org/ and http://trilogyrelease.bungie.org/

Bungie existed before Halo.

Rob