Slashdot Mirror
Source Code to Homeworld Released
ceejayoz writes "The source code for Relic Entertainment's 1999 Game of the Year, Homeworld, has just been released. Details are available at Homeworld Universe. Not GPL'ed, but pretty nifty all the same." Note that any sort of property aside from the source such as graphics or codecs have been stripped out, but it's still cool to look through the game engine.
Imagine a world without copyright.
Imagine a world without any good games.
Imagine a world without any good games.
I don't have to imagine.
Philip Sandifer's academic website
It will be interesting to see what the community does with the source. I think the first thing that will be done is a Homeworld Plus version of the original game, with extra features etc... but with all the great homeworld mods out there, some of them could be made into standalone games that have their own look and feel. I guess we'll just have to wait and see.
In linux libertas
Imagine a world without copyright.
Yes imagine no credit for your work, people being able to do whatever they want with your work. WIth you having no say. If there were no copyrights I would be a lot less inclined to release my source, wouldn't you? someone could qutie literally steal yoru work and it'd be legal.
It'd only be stealing if your code was deleted when it was copied.
-Libertarian secular transhumanist
Phooey. You have to click through an obnoxious EULA then fill out a nosey registration form-- which doesn't seem to work for me; no matter how many times I filled it out and hit "submit" it kept bouncing me back to the same registration page-- before the mighty lords of the Relic Development Network deign to confer upon you the rank and honour of "RDN access level 1", which may or may not include a single whiff of source code. "Not GPL'd"?! Not only is it not GPL'd, it's total jive. A curious would-be game developer would be better off poking through some of the many existent game engines rather than playing Relic's silly registration game.
yeah but who'll kill the last one?
I don't have to imagine.
You bought a Mac, didn't you? =P
So it's not stealing. There's a term for those who can't differentiate between a physical object and information. It's called insanity. Come back to the real universe.
-Libertarian secular transhumanist
any sort of property aside from the source such as graphics or codecs have been stripped
Also released in 1999 was Unreal Tournament, which shipped with it's game engine avaliable to modders out of the box. Its done them no harm at all, they created the levels for the game within the sandbox they created for modders and used the same tools as they shipped modders and more developers should do the same.
Unless we're talking about a kind of game engine (Id Software type stuff) that sets the standard for others to follow, isn't the main part of game development making the content? IMHO releasing the source for a 1999 game engine is not all that exciting.
Open Source 3d engines already exist, what's the big deal with this one?
I cant wait to see what come out of this. the whole homeworld "series" of things has just been extremely impressive. I never liked RTS games until Homeworld and i actually turned up the volume on the music. normally i just turn down the volume. i hope someone does SOMETHING in any case... time will tell
Says it all, really. (-:
Don't panic, nutsy, just be patient. HomeWorld was/is sufficiently shiny that someone will port this source to Linux, assisted by the graphics, sounds etc suplied on the MS-Windows games CDs as necessary. Then for the first time, we'll see HomeWorld2 on the XboX.
Got time? Spend some of it coding or testing
The argument is made: but without a barrier to entry, there wouldn't be so much incentive to produce good music; to which I respond: "Oh, you mean boy bands?" I think supporting artists is a good idea, I think forcing and industrialising that support sucks.
Do we really need a large music "industry"? I think not. I suspect that what happened to The Santa Cruz Operation (opening them to subsequent abuse from The Canopy Group) and is happening to Sun and Microsoft is about to happen to the RIAA and their cronies. It's become feasible once more for a garage-band sized operation to publish their stuff widely.
If you are a musician, please consider sticking your stuff up on a page somewhere and aiming a few of the music sites at it. If you want to sell stuff rather than just have people appreciate it or make a name for yourself, put up low-quality compressed or truncated versions and tell people that they're crippled. Some people will be happy to listen to highly compressed versions of your music - fine, count that as free advertising. If enough people hear it, some of them will want better.
Got time? Spend some of it coding or testing
Not GPL'ed, but pretty nifty all the same.
:)
:)
Agreed. The availability of the source code to Homeworld is really cool, since it's one of the most awesome games ever released.
But can anybody here tell us under what kind of license the source code has been released? What are the major differences with the GPL and is it close to any of the generally accepted "Open Source" licenses?
It seems likely to me that it would be a highly restrictive "non-commercial use only" license, similar to the one under which Volition released the source to Freespace a while back.
At any rate, beggers can't be choosers. With this code, we'll be able to port it to various non-Win32 platforms, regardless. Especially since the game's engine supports not only Direct3D, but OpenGL as well. Good job, Valve!
"Oooh, does that mean we get to kick some puffy white mad zionist butt?"
Um? the GPL builds upon copyright ... without copyright, no GPL.