Slashdot Mirror

← Back to Stories (view on slashdot.org)

Star Trek - Elite Force 2 Source Code Released

Posted by simoniker on from the half-assed-force-also-an-option dept.

Thanks to Shacknews for pointing to a Ritualistic announcement that the Star Trek Elite Force II game DLL sourcecode is now available for download, thus "allowing people to create their own single and multiplayer mods" for this recently-released PC FPS, which was fairly well-received on its release earlier this year. It joins a number of recent full or partial source code releases from games such as Call To Power 2 and Homeworld, although, as with many source releases, "this code and the dll that it will build will only work with a full copy of [the game]."

16 comments

  1. Re:tsarkon reports greased up yoda doll billie jea by 1arkhaine · · Score: 1, Funny
    Thank you, AC, that was very helpful.

    Except, of course, that Yoda is from Star Wars, not Star Trek. oops.

  2. sources released this year by sardiax · · Score: 1

    no love for the duke3d source?

    1. Re:sources released this year by WWWWolf · · Score: 1
      no love for the duke3d source?

      Bah. ID should release Doom 3 this month and GPL Quake3Arena source as a christmas present =)

  3. The ice has broken! by leonbrooks · · Score: 3, Interesting

    I note that a user-done Linux port of Homeworld followed within weeks of that release. I wonder how long it is before game developers can just supply a script and artwork, then stand back and watch their app being written. (-:

    Either way, it's too late to prod the genie back into the bottle now. Open Source is well and truly coming to commercial gaming.

    This kind of practice might also make the WINE developers' jobs easier, because they don't have to guess at what a game is trying to accomplish with a given weird set of system calls, which means that they don't have to cover all of the possible uses for a call when implementing it, only the actual uses.

    --
    Got time? Spend some of it coding or testing
    1. Re:The ice has broken! by The+Munger · · Score: 1

      I think it's getting to the stage where you could dedicate a site to games with (partially) open source code. The list seems to grow all the time. The list of Doom and Quake modifications people have done since they went GPL is huge. Following Elite Force 2, Call to Power source was released in the last week as well. It just seems to be the way that works for developers (and their publishers) at the moment.

      --
      Refuse to make a statement in your sig!
    2. Re:The ice has broken! by Mike+Hawk · · Score: 1

      Read what you want to read out of this, but this is just a glorified SDK.

      Either way, it's too late to prod the genie back into the bottle now. Open Source is well and truly coming to commercial gaming.

      Just because you state it so firmly doesn't make it true. As soon as an open source game runs on an unmodified Gamecube, then "Open Source" (capitalization yours) will have "truly come to commercial gaming." Until then its just amateurs making crappy, buggy mods.

  4. Dumb question about all these source code releases by wrinkledshirt · · Score: 1

    I'm wondering just how useful having this code released is. For instance, anybody can get at the Linux source but not everybody can understand it.

    What I'm wondering is, are there extra tools for the developer along with these source releases? Map generators and the like? Comments that show where you can twiddle with weapons physics and such? Good modular programming that shows you were to substitute the in-game models for your own user generated ones?

    That's the sort of stuff I wonder about.

    Don't get me wrong, I'd love to find out that it's only a good month's worth of hacking to get your own mod going. I'm just wondering if people who are more experienced dealing with this sort of source can answer...?

    --

    --------
    Bleah! Heh heh heh... BLEAH BLEAH!!! Ha ha ha ha...

  5. Umm.. not complete source code by LocoBurger · · Score: 3, Insightful

    Just a note so there's no confusion.. This is NOT the complete source code of the game, so no one can take this and make it run on FreeBSD or BlueOS or something. It is merely the mod source, so that mod writers can make mods now. Just about every FPS releases this type of source code moments after or even before the release of the game is on store shelves.

    This is a non-news item.

  6. This is not the full source. by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

    Comments like "woo open source rocks, anyone going to port to another platform?" are a little overblown.

    This is only for the *gameplay* specific module - stuff that controls how guns shoot, how the AI behaves and how the player accomplishes objectives. With this you can make new *gameplay* modes. Like, say, capture the flag, tag, etc.

    It doesn't have any of the framework, graphics, sound or networking components exposed - that stuff would be in the closed source Quake 3 engine on which EF2 is based.

  7. good thing by Blob+Pet · · Score: 1

    IIRC, most of the team that developed EF2 had been let go after the game went gold. The chances of any official mods like the add on pack for EF1 are next to nil; they're basically saying, "Go make you're own mods."

    --
    "...today consumers have been conditioned to think of beer when they see a bullfrog..."
  8. Finally! by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

    Elite Force 2 and Half-Life 2 have something in common! =P

  9. Crappy, buggy mods by leonbrooks · · Score: 1
    Until then its just amateurs making crappy, buggy mods.

    That's the whole point. Until now, it's mainly been the professionals making crappy, buggy mods. When you open the field, there's scope for natural selection to operate.

    --
    Got time? Spend some of it coding or testing