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BZFlag goes Platinum

Posted by Zonk on from the you-don't-see-nearly-enough-tank-games-anymore dept.

morrison writes "A little over four years after moving to SourceForge at a current rate of several hundred downloads every day, BZFlag has finally "gone platinum". With over 1,000,000 SourceForge downloads, BZFlag looks to be the third game (following Tux Racer and StepMania) to go 'sf platinum'. While this doesn't include the many tens of thousands distributed prior to the project's migration to sf.net during the SGI days, it's a momentous occasion for open source gaming regardless."

196 comments

  1. ea takeover by babypen · · Score: -1, Troll
    GNAA announces hostile takeover of Electronic Arts
    Zeikfried - Reuters, Nigeria.
    In a hushed press conference held at the GNAA compound in blackest Nigeria, the cream of the journalistic crop from IGN, Gamespot, Gamespy and various other overpriced ad-infested shitholes gathered from across 4 continents to witness what has been described as the most shocking announement of the post-E3 market. The purchase of a controlling stock of industry leading publisher Electronic Arts by the increasingly aggressive venture capitalists of the GNAA.
    After keeping the illiterate troglodytes waiting for several hours, leading GNAA members Timecop, Penisbird and goat-see, along with Electronic Arts president and CEO John Riccitiello, pulled up in the specially commisioned GNAA Limo, now fully armoured to protect from the ever present threat of terrorism from zionist #politics oppers. All four were, as usual, stark naked due to the searing Nigerian heat, and were instantly greeted by a cacophony of flashbulbs and excited chatter from the wretched sodomites and college dropouts that populate the world of gaming, including a shower from the furiously masturbating IGN editor Matt Cassamassina.
    "This is a new day for Electronic Arts" exploded the now fully erect Riccitiello, "and a new day for the Gay Nigger Association of America. Now no longer will the significant Gay Nigger minority be ignored by the racist cartels and Japanese Xenophobes that hold a tight noose on the gaming industry."
    Shortly afterwards, following a brutal anal violation by nordic Gay Nigger DiKKy, the now broken and bleeding John Riccitiello was replaced by the newly appointed head of the GNAAs gaming devision, Zeikfried Tuvai.
    "This change is no mere financial step, or a changing of the guard, this will be an absolute fucking revolution. Work on our titles has already begun, I shit you not."
    Tragically the conference was then cut short by a failed assassination attempt on the GNAA leadership by efnet #politcs opper and known fascist paedophile "Pickle", who was quickly disarmed by GNAA security and silenced by a large black phallus. However a press release has been issued to Reuters and the Associated Press, and is as follows:

    Shitflood Gaia (GC/PS2/Xbox) Q4 2004 - A management sim, where the otaku scum of internet have gathered into a single drinking hole for quick extermination. The player must control his assets wisely to gain the maximum number of bites from the unsuspecting and unintelligent regulars in order to max out his LastMeasure meter and gain access to his most potent weapon, floodphpbb.

    Americas Army - Operation #politics (PC (Windows Only)) Q4 2004 - GNAA/EA and the armed forces of the United States of America unite to bring the reality of the T.W.A.T to your Windows box this Christmas. This third-person shooter throws you in charge of the GNAA efnet black ops, as you struggle against corrupt IRC operators, Mossad agents, Nick Berg's head and eventually FreeTrade himself in an explosive struggle in the name of freedom and democracy.

    Penisbird's Cock Perch Panic (GBA) Q1 2005 - A coup by OSDN shock troops threatens to overthrow the President, defeat the unwashed scum by guiding Penisbird onto their prone member, disarming them once and for all. As you move through the levels you must dodge traps laid by the increasingly desperate CmdrTaco, including CowboyNeal himself. Can you dodge his sentient rolls of lard to perch on CowboyNeal's notoriously miniscule penis? Find out for yourself in 2005!

    About EA:
    Electronic Arts (EA) is the world's leading independent developer and publisher of interactive entertainment software for personal computers and advanced entertainment systems such as the PlayStation®2 Computer Entertainment System, the PlayStation®, Xbox(TM) video game console from Microsoft, the Nintendo GameCube(TM) and the Game Boy® Advance. Since its inception, EA has garnered more than 700 awards fo

  2. GNAA by Commander+Trollco · · Score: -1, Troll

    GNAA GAYCOCKS

    --
    http://persianews.on.nimp.org/?u=Tar_Baby
  3. Woohoo! by Anonymous Coward · · Score: -1, Troll

    n/t

  4. Is it just me by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0, Flamebait

    Or does the graphics really suck?

    1. Re:Is it just me by pdpTrojan · · Score: -1

      it's open source! what do you expect? quality? hahahahahha

    2. Re:Is it just me by m50d · · Score: 2, Funny

      Some would call it "artistic". But yes, the graphics do suck.

      --
      I am trolling
    3. Re:Is it just me by Ingolfke · · Score: 2, Funny

      They do, but no worse than your English.

    4. Re:Is it just me by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      "They do, but no worse than your English."

      Did anyone ask about his English? Furthermore, how do you compare the graphics of a video game to his English after he presented you with one sentence? Did you ever think that maybe English isn't his first language? You're a dumb troll.

    5. Re:Is it just me by AKnightCowboy · · Score: 1
      Some would call it "artistic". But yes, the graphics do suck.

      Artistic? If I want to play a tank game I'll go play DesertCombat. That's a free Windows mod for BF1942 and they seemed to have been able to come up with graphics that blow this away.

    6. Re:Is it just me by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      And so was the parent.

      You're not doing so bad yourself for trolling, at least your parent didn't post AC.

      (I'm posting AC to avoid karma burn, however.)

    7. Re:Is it just me by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 3, Informative

      A lot of things have already been revised for the next release. There are now mirror floors, rain, snow, and arbirtray rain like raining frogs. There are meshes so everything isn't a triangle or block anymore. Objects can have arbitrary textures and alpha transparancy, as well as environmental mapping. Many new flags have been added such as the wings flag that lets you "fly" for a period of time. Many other goodies are thrown in there too. Keep in mind though that bzflag is not focused on graphics, but rather gameplay. The game has an extremely low entry level for gamers (as far as skill goes), but its very hard to master. Tim Riker (the project leader) has been know to say, "Easy to learn, hard to master". Also, the community built up around the game is incredible. Graphics are overemphasized in today's games, try it out sometime, its tons of fun to play.
      -Steve

    8. Re:Is it just me by jackbird · · Score: 2, Informative

      ...but Desert Combat was done as a portfolio piece for a startup game dev shop with 9 employees. In other words, for $$$, not as an open-source project. Keep in mind which kind of free you're talking about.

    9. Re:Is it just me by mrbcs · · Score: 1
      Cool, be interesting to see the new flags. I love Guided Missle... but hate geno.. ;-)

      Yes the graphics aren't the greatest.. and I needed a good video card to bump them up.(nvidia 5200 works fine on windoze)

      The gameplay is awesome. I've been playing this for a couple years now and I love it. Trying to find babels low lag server today... to no avail. That one is my absolute favourite map and it's a ctf. It works through my firewall with multiple hosts inside too.. Kinda fun chasing my wife around a map.. she doesn't know the game well and doesn't know about the hunt key ;-)

      --
      I'm not anti-social, I'm anti-idiot.
    10. Re:Is it just me by black+mariah · · Score: -1
      but Desert Combat was done as a portfolio piece for a startup game dev shop with 9 employees.
      So what you're trying to say is that in the four years that BZFlag has been on SF they haven't been able to do what nine guys accomplished in a few months. I thought OSS was supposed to have all that 'many eyes' bullshit. Oh, wait, that's right. That only applies to code and doesn't have a goddamned thing to do with anything USEFUL.
      --
      'Standards' in computing only impress those who are impressed by things like 'standards'.
    11. Re:Is it just me by bcmm · · Score: 1

      This is offtopic, but your sig doesn't work at all.

      For a start, they moved to sco.com instead of www.sco.com after the virus (if you don't remember the virus, you must be lucky enough not to have to deal with windows boxes).

      Also, Google doesn't read /. sigs. Try logging out, you'll find they disappear.

      --
      # cat /dev/mem | strings | grep -i llama
      Damn, my RAM is full of llamas.
    12. Re:Is it just me by mink · · Score: 1

      It's a free mod, but you have to own BF1942 otherwise Desert Combat is so much wasted drive space.

      --
      Well I've wrestled with reality for thirty five years doctor, and I'm happy to say I finally won out over it.
  5. meh /nt by RLiegh · · Score: -1, Offtopic
    1. Re:meh /nt by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      This game is weak. I think the effort is nice, but it's no Counterstrike.

    2. Re:meh /nt by RLiegh · · Score: 2, Insightful

      "Closed" games can afford touches such as artists and writers. In theory I have to applaud the OSS developers for having the chutzpah to take on such an dauntingly hopeless task as making an OSS game; but the quality speaks for itself.

      Before someone decides I'm an anti-OSS troll, let me say that OSS has made some wonderful servers and if it weren't for the free tools I'd have never been able to try my hand at programming. It's as simple as the fact that quality art and quality writing don't grow on trees...as we can plainly see.

      It takes $$$ and lots of it to create a Halo, a Counterstrike or a Sims. That's just how it is.

    3. Re:meh /nt by RabidChicken · · Score: 1

      Actually Counterstrike started as an independent team making a mod for no money out of sheer love for the game.

    4. Re:meh /nt by Deraj+DeZine · · Score: 1

      Since when do good graphics have to be realistic? I think BZFlag has appropriately simple graphics that work well for the game. It could probably even get away with BattleZone-style line graphics.

      --
      True story.
    5. Re:meh /nt by lawpoop · · Score: 0
      "It takes $$$ and lots of it to create a Halo, a Counterstrike or a Sims. That's just how it is."

      What is all that $$$ spent on? Mining for raw video game material? All that crazy hardware that is only for video game development? No. The only thing is takes to create video games is code, not $$$. You're confused because $$$ is a way of making code, but $$$ does not actually create video games by itself.

      The reason why we don't have great open source video games now is simply a matter of tools. Look at the mods, maps, and levels that fans make freely available for commercial games. Those fans are hardly programmers. Once we get decent open source game engines, development environments, and media, the floodgates will open.

      --
      Computers are useless. They can only give you answers.
      -- Pablo Picasso
    6. Re:meh /nt by grumbel · · Score: 1

      ### It takes $$$ and lots of it to create a Halo, a Counterstrike or a Sims. That's just how it is.

      Halo and Sims, yes. Counterstrike, absolutly not. Counterstrike started as a simple mod, no big $$$ involved in the beginning, only later it got commercially developed but even then I doubt that the cost where very high. The amount of content required for CounterStrike is rather low, a few quite small levels, a few models, thats it, really nothing if you compare it to a 20h playtime game. They reused the HalfLife engine, which in turn is based on the Quake1 engine (which is together with Quake2 GPL since quite a while) so no money involved there either. Counterstrike did the gameplay right, thats all, I doubt that it needed very much money for that.

    7. Re:meh /nt by grumbel · · Score: 1

      ### Once we get decent open source game engines, development environments, and media, the floodgates will open.

      Don't get your hopes too high on the floodgate-theory, even the mod-scene, while it certainly produced some impressive stuff is in most part build out of little additions to existing engines and existing artwork, only very few mods actually manage to stend fully on its own with both gameplay and artwork.

      The advantage of $$$ is that it can buy you a team of people working fulltime together on a project, without that you will only have a bunch of hobby programmers, most of them getting distracted by RL issues after a year or two. So chance that they will really be able to produce a game and not just a small modification are rather low.

    8. Re:meh /nt by be-fan · · Score: 1

      The only thing is takes to create video games is code, not $$$.

      No, it takes artists, writers, designers, musicians, testers, etc. The code is only a small part of the overall thing. It's been shown that coders are willing to release their work for free, but to date, it has not been shown that all the other people required to make a good game are willing to do the same.

      --
      A deep unwavering belief is a sure sign you're missing something...
    9. Re:meh /nt by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      You WHAT?! ARE YOU FUCKING SERIOUS? Just recently iDevGames finished, a competition where people have to develop a game from the ground up in 3 months. How long has BZFlag been around? Most of those games are written by one or two people, for free, and almost all of the kick them shit out of BZFlag in terms of graphics, sound, presentation AND gameplay.

      A few Linux-hippies in denial might say its great, but thats because its typical Linux shite: terrible documentation, terrible presentation, stupid bugs and complete lack of attention to detail. There are plenty of free Windows and Mac games of exceptionally high standard, so whats Linux's excuse?

      And yes, I've played it, and I'm very good at it too. I play it for about 5 minutes every now and then because it takes about 0.1s to load and have me playing. But I'm not under the illusion thats its a good game.

    10. Re:meh /nt by lawpoop · · Score: 1
      "No, it takes artists, writers, designers, musicians, testers, etc. The code is only a small part of the overall thing."

      No, the only thing that matters for a game is gameplay. People play games like card games, dungeons and dragons, pong, pacman, frogger, joust, and legend of zelda because of great gameplay. All of those games have lousy graphics and sound.

      The supposed "need" for artists, writers, musicians, etc., is only because of the past ~5-10 of advanced graphics, but they are not required to make a great game.

      --
      Computers are useless. They can only give you answers.
      -- Pablo Picasso
    11. Re:meh /nt by colmore · · Score: 1

      Funny, Counterstrike was developed on someone else's engine and at first it was done for no cash beyond internet advertizing, and just out of the love of what they were doing.

      There are artists and writers out there who volunteer to help make great free (as in beer usually) games, but they want to see their work widely appreciated, and the install base of a single major game with a moddable engine on windows is larger than the entire linux gaming community.

      There just isn't an open-source equivalent to say, the HalfLife2 Source engine, and people whose primary concern is creating a great game that lots of people will play are going to look to that rather than what's going on in the OS gaming world.

      --
      In Capitalist America, bank robs you!
    12. Re:meh /nt by black+mariah · · Score: -1

      Dude, you're a fucking moron. What do you want us to do? Simply destroy all of our PS2's and fire up the Pong machine? Jesus FUCK I can't believe the amount of luddites that frequent this fucking site.

      --
      'Standards' in computing only impress those who are impressed by things like 'standards'.
    13. Re:meh /nt by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      > "It takes $$$ and lots of it to create a Halo, a Counterstrike or a Sims. That's just how it is."

      Counter-Strike doesn't apply here; the mod was created by two people.

      Maybe you mean Half-Life? That would apply.

    14. Re:meh /nt by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      I don't know that this is completely true, especially in gametypes where the story merges with the gameplay. Examples include RPGs (of course), and adventure games. The gameplay value in these games comes from solving puzzles and in reading the story, not from pure action.

      I'm a bit confused by your inclusion of Dungeons and Dragons, actually. This is a game that's based almost entirely on storytelling; the games I played had combat and the like almost as a hindrance - the actual baggage of the rules took forever to argue out. But this, I suppose, is more of a personal preference. Perhaps you play (and enjoy!) a more rules-heavy game than I did.

      Getting back to the point, I'd argue that writers, at least, have a place, and artists and musicians certainly help, even if they're not entirely crucial. I suppose it really depends on what kind of game you're making.

    15. Re:meh /nt by lawpoop · · Score: 1
      Well, my point is that games are just sets of rules that happen to be fun. Don't ask my why or how they're fun, that's another discussion. Whether it's a card game, a board game, a video game, or a DM, some dice, and paper and pencil, there is a set of rules that are the game itself.

      A lot of people seem to think that you have to make jaw dropping graphics, pixar quality cutscenes, or amazing music in order for a video game to be "successful". I argue that that's not it -- graphics and sound are secondary to gameplay consideration. They might help, but 1. they don't make up for crappy gameplay, and 2. great games with crappy music and sound are still great games.

      So, my plea to open source game makers is this: Make great games. If you do, maybe the game will attract great artists and musicians. If not, hey, we still have a great game!

      --
      Computers are useless. They can only give you answers.
      -- Pablo Picasso
    16. Re:meh /nt by Anonymous+Luddite · · Score: 1


      Yes

      Speaking on behalf of all the /. Luddites, I'd like to ask that you destroy your PS/2.

      Pong kicks ass.

      --
      http://request-header.info
    17. Re:meh /nt by xanadu-xtroot.com · · Score: 1

      Funny you should mention that...

      (see my .sig...)

      --
      I'm not a prophet or a stone-age man,
      I'm just a mortal with potential of a super man.
  6. Momentous? by schild · · Score: 3, Insightful

    How is this momentous? It's a free game. It's small. People play it at work. If it generated any sort of income for the creators, it would be momentous for them. But for the whole open source movement? Please. The only thing the top downloads shows is that people would rather pirate good windows games than bother downloading free mediocre games.

    --
    schild
    editor, f13.net
    1. Re:Momentous? by pronobozo · · Score: 5, Insightful

      "If it generated any sort of income for the creators, it would be momentous for them."


      If I had created anything that was downloaded a million times I'd sure be proud and I'd surley remember it forever.


      Takes a lot to get a million downloads of anything.


      --
      ------
      insert sig here,here, and here
    2. Re:Momentous? by psifishdot · · Score: 1

      But for the whole open source movement? Please. The only thing the top downloads shows is that people would rather pirate good windows games than bother downloading free mediocre games.

      While it may be true that open source games lag proprietary ones, Battle for Wesnoth and Freeciv have taken on lives of their own. They beet out BZFlag on the happy penguin top ranked games.

      --

      Long live Schrodinger's cat...
    3. Re:Momentous? by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      Write something better, then comment. Otherwise, you're nothing but a no talent consumer with a worthless opinion.

    4. Re:Momentous? by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      You can donate to bzflag on sourceforge. I did. . But the total amount of donations could buy a pizza for each of the registered developers :(

    5. Re:Momentous? by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      > If I had created anything that was downloaded a million times I'd sure be proud and I'd surley remember it forever.

      Just post a photo of modding or perhaps having some sort of weird intercourse with your iPod, that'll get a million hits on slashdot

    6. Re:Momentous? by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 1, Insightful

      > Write something better, then comment. Otherwise, you're nothing but a no talent consumer with a worthless opinion.

      You are an idiot. By your logic, we should abolish discussion, or require users to replicate, and surpass the work referenced in every article, just so they are allowed to form an opinion.

    7. Re:Momentous? by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      If I had created anything that was downloaded a million times I'd sure be proud and I'd surley remember it forever.

      I have. I am. I do. But I've also found that it's remarkably easy to reach a million downloads with free stuff when you have some publicity, let alone repeated mentions on Slashdot. The internet is a big place.

    8. Re:Momentous? by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      you're the idiot, schild. btw your site sucks ass. hahaha.

    9. Re:Momentous? by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 1, Insightful

      There's a fine line between forming a valid opinion and deriding something out of ignorance. The developers of this game went out on a limb developing something for free (as in, they didn't get paid to do it, and don't expect to be paid for the final product).

      The thread starter is stacking up this kind of game against something put out by a multi million dollar company. How can a homemade project compare to something with that kind of financial backing? If the thread starter knows this distinction, then his comment was one of ignorance, not of a valid opinion.

      Of course the grandparent poster could also be a troll...

    10. Re:Momentous? by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      You can donate [sourceforge.net] to bzflag on sourceforge. I did.

      Sucker.

    11. Re:Momentous? by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      So what? It's still shit.

    12. Re:Momentous? by grazzy · · Score: 2, Funny

      Congratulations, you have just won a million downloads of your signature.

      Proud yet?

    13. Re:Momentous? by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      So hows that crack your smoking?

    14. Re:Momentous? by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0
      So what? It's still shit.

      Then stop playing it!

    15. Re:Momentous? by iceborer · · Score: 1

      If I had created anything that was downloaded a million times I'd sure be proud and I'd surley remember it forever.

      Just post some naked pics of your daughter and let the pride flow.

  7. rox by mmu_man · · Score: 1

    it looks really nice, even on BeOS (I did the port :P), though MESA doesn't make it much playable yet (well it gets better on a 1.5GHz box :).

  8. Gameplay? by FiReaNGeL · · Score: 3, Insightful

    I sure hope the gameplay is good, cause the graphics look like they date from the 80s Era. Sure, graphics ain't everything and its a major achievement for the open source gaming community... but couldn't they hire an Open-GL guy / artist? 6 polygons trees... and the tanks themselves look like LEGO blocks.

    --
    Eureka Science News - automatically updated
    1. Re:Gameplay? by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 2, Insightful

      You haven't played it, have you :)

    2. Re:Gameplay? by CaptnMArk · · Score: 1

      Once you start improving the graphics, where do you stop?

    3. Re:Gameplay? by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      Hire someone?

    4. Re:Gameplay? by eddy+the+lip · · Score: 2, Interesting

      If anything, they're too good. One of my favorite things about BattleZone was the monochrome vector graphics. Damn, I miss that game.

      I love shiny graphics as much as the next guy (UT2004 is a current favorite), but give me a good game over whizzy graphics any day. Hell, I just whacked Morgoth again a couple of weeks ago. Not using any of those silly tiled graphics, either. I look like a '@', as god intended.

      --

      This is the voice of World Control. I bring you Peace.

    5. Re:Gameplay? by _Sprocket_ · · Score: 1, Insightful


      I sure hope the gameplay is good, cause the graphics look like they date from the 80s Era.

      Do you have any memory from the 80's? Graphics like this didn't appear on home computers until at least the early to mid 90's. Granted, by today's state of the art, that's dated. But then - so's the game.


      Sure, graphics ain't everything and its a major achievement for the open source gaming community... but couldn't they hire an Open-GL guy / artist? 6 polygons trees... and the tanks themselves look like LEGO blocks.

      Exactly. Graphics aren't everything. There's a wasteland of games out there that were little more than a bit of flash. And they're all but forgotten. Yet this game, five years later, is still being played by an active community. You won't find many tittles with that.

      And, of course, this is Open Source. Don't like the graphics? Jump right in there and contribute. Or not.

      Don't get me wrong - constructive criticism is fine. But your statements were'n constructive in the least.
    6. Re:Gameplay? by cosmol · · Score: 5, Informative
      The gameplay is addicting. Basically its all about positioning your tank. Since the tank doesn't move very fast you have to think ahead. Also the shots are pretty slow so you have to shoot out way ahead of a moving target. Newbies will get outsmarted by more experienced players, but will get enough lucky shots now and again to keep them interested in playing.

      There is a lot of opportunity for team strategy, especially in CTF mode. Many server operators tweak the map/rules to yield some interesting play possibilities.

      Yeah, it's fun. The graphics look like they date from the 80s because they do! Actually I turn the graphic settings down from the default.

    7. Re:Gameplay? by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 1, Funny

      > Do you have any memory from the 80's?

      Yes, actually. I have four 256K, 30-pin SIPPs lying around for no particular reason.

    8. Re:Gameplay? by brittm · · Score: 1

      What you may not realize, is that BZFlag is a take off of the classic wire frame arcade game, Battle Zone. Primitive graphics just keep it close to its roots :)

    9. Re:Gameplay? by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 1, Funny

      > Once you start improving the graphics, where do you stop?

      Once you start digging a hole, where do you stop?

      Once you start growing a beard, where do you stop?

      Once you start posting stupid comments on slashdot, where do you stop?

    10. Re:Gameplay? by be-fan · · Score: 1

      Graphics aren't everything. There's a wasteland of games out there that were little more than a bit of flash. And they're all but forgotten.

      Graphics are a part of the whole package. A game may have great gameplay, but if it has terrible graphics, it's still missing omsething.

      --
      A deep unwavering belief is a sure sign you're missing something...
    11. Re:Gameplay? by ozbird · · Score: 1

      I agree - but my LAN buddies took one look at the graphics refused to play it even though the game play is more fun than eye-candy games they did play. Go figure.

      P.S. Is there a way to save the settings of your favourite server in addition to the map? The settings are just as important for the game play, and many of us don't have the time, skill or patience to fine tune the default settings to suit a given map.

    12. Re:Gameplay? by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      bzzt, thanx for playing... nethack has NO gfx and yet is V. fun game.

    13. Re:Gameplay? by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      The problem with the graphics isn't that they aren't great, it's that they're offensively bad. As in, they hurt my eyeballs in a way Battlezone and Ballblazer and so forth never did. There's no excuse in this day and age for huge ugly smeared textures, especially in a game where you spend nearly of your time looking directly at those textures in first person.

    14. Re:Gameplay? by SeanAhern · · Score: 1

      The graphics look like they date from the 80s

      Well, kinda. They are rather flat, and could use some improvements. But I think this is primarily in the world model. You didn't have mip-mapped textured polygons in the 80s. You certainly didn't have projected shadows and accurate sky simulations back in the 80s. There are still parts of the graphics that are nice.

    15. Re:Gameplay? by kirun · · Score: 1

      Graphics like this didn't appear on home computers until at least the early to mid 90's

      Driller (scroll down) was out in 1987. It wasn't nearly as fast, but it *was* solid 3D.

      --
      I'm scared of numbers that can't be written as a fraction. It's an irrational fear.
    16. Re:Gameplay? by _Sprocket_ · · Score: 1


      Driller (scroll down) was out in 1987. It wasn't nearly as fast, but it *was* solid 3D.

      None the less, it doesn't compare to BZFlag. Nice link, though.
    17. Re:Gameplay? by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      Some of us like to be able to play games w/o having to fork over $300 for the newest fastest best whizbang graphics card there is in order to play it.

  9. That's amazing. by b00m3rang · · Score: 4, Funny

    I could tell the exact moment when the story went live (I was looking at the subscriber preview), when an image suddenly stopped loading halfway through.

    With friends like Slashdot, who needs test load generators?

    1. Re:That's amazing. by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 4, Funny

      > That's amazing.

      Have you ever felt the all mighty power of god within you, as if you where him, with the power to do anything, tranquilly floating in the everlasting, vibrant, stunning, spectacle of the universe, feelings of absolute pleasure, and total bliss enriching, and surrounding your every breath, while a million stunningly beautiful virgins pleasure you for eternity. No? Well you don't need to, because you've seen an image stop loading when it got slashdotted.

    2. Re:That's amazing. by b00m3rang · · Score: 1

      I guess you run a server so popular that it's visitors can generate enough traffic within literally a few seconds to bring down web servers, right? Oh, no... that's right, you're just some joyless anonymous punkass cynical fuck. You must be fun at parties.

    3. Re:That's amazing. by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      Wow, you sound like the fun one at parties! The partents post was one of the funniest things I've read all day on this dreck-filled site, and you take it all personally. He was just making fun of your use of the word "amazing" to describe a droll effect. Then you punk all out on him. You sound like a bore to me.

    4. Re:That's amazing. by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      Wow. You, sir, are a retard.

      Have fun playing with your pee-pee?

    5. Re:That's amazing. by b00m3rang · · Score: 1

      I guess I've read too many thousands of pointless arrogant trolls to see any humor and cleverness in any of them anymore.

  10. Hmmm... by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

    For as much flak as some (unnamed) software companies get on /. for not being original, it's interesting to note that a full 1/3 of the games on Sourceforge to reach 1,000,000 downloads is a complete knockoff of Dance Dance Revolution and clones. Screenshot:

    http://www.stepmania.com/stepmania/images/screens/ cvs%20linux/tn/linux20030729-1.jpg.html

    1. Re:Hmmm... by NintenDoctor · · Score: 1

      Stepmania has moved so far beyond DDR at this point. Above and beyond all the new features they added to the main DDR game (constant scroll modifiers, mod-scripted courses, mines, etc.) it supports practically every other rhythm game in existence. Add expandability into the mix and you have a game that outdoes the official DDRs on almost every level. Even that screenshot is a picture of Magic Dance mode, which was only available in one specific version of DDR, and is greatly improved upon by the additional modifiers in Stepmania.

      --
      I've moved on.
    2. Re:Hmmm... by GeorgeMcBay · · Score: 1

      The other two are also heavily based on other games. bzflag - Battlezone (natch) and Tux Racer - Pen Pen Tri-Icelon.

      But, as they say, all games are Pong.

    3. Re:Hmmm... by Spoing · · Score: 1

      Tux Racer - Pen Pen Tri-Icelon. Best as I can tell, Pen Pen preceeds TR by only 4 months. Are you sure that TR is a Pen Pen clone?

      --
      A firewall can not protect you from yourself. Turn off what you do not need. Do not use the firewall to do your work.
    4. Re:Hmmm... by grumbel · · Score: 1

      I am quite sure that Tuxracer is not a Pen Pen clone. The major source of inspiration when I remember correctly was Nintendos 1080 snowboard game on N64, the Mario64 race-against-a-penguin levels might have been another source of inspiration. Actually I have never heard of Pen Pen before and I have read the Tuxracer mailing list in its very early days, so unless I missed something I doubt that Pen Pen played any role in the Tuxracer development.

  11. horrah! by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

    that's cool. I used to love playing that game. Though I much preffer tux racer. Any other fans?

    http://boink.qdork.com/

  12. Is this really anything close to an accurate count by detain · · Score: 3, Interesting

    What about all the distributions that bundle bzflag, most do. Im curious what kind of totals there would be if we could count all the people including those who use things like apt and install it from debians repository, or redhat, etc.. Im willing to bet the actual total number of bzflag installs is much much higher than 1 million

    --
    http://interserver.net/
  13. bzkitty by KillerHamster · · Score: 3, Funny

    http://bzflag.org/screenshots/bzkitty.jpg

    1. Re:bzkitty by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      OLDER THAN THE INTERNET!!!!

    2. Re:bzkitty by focitrixilous+P · · Score: 2, Funny

      bzkitty is not pleased.

      --
      SAILING MISHAP
    3. Re:bzkitty by goon+america · · Score: 1

      It's just limecat...

  14. Memories by gnarled · · Score: 2, Interesting

    My father is a computer science professor, and I remember going to his lab some days and playing Battle Zone against his grad student's on SGI workstations. Good times!

    --
    I'm a firm believer in the philosophy of a ruling class. Especially since I rule. -Randal, Clerks
    1. Re:Memories by iammaxus · · Score: 1

      Wow, I had the exact same experience with my father's CADD SGI machine but I didn't even realize I was playing the ancestor to BZflag (or using an SGI machine) until your post. That's pretty cool.

    2. Re:Memories by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      I used to work at a Univ using an SGI O2 (about 7 years ago). At the end of every day, people always wondered what the hell that sound was coming from my office. Remember, these where the days when gl on windows sucked. The SGI romped the PC boxes even as recent as 7 years ago. People forget that their super-nitro- dual fan video card is still fairly new.

      For all you fags that think the graphic quality sucks, the game just aint for you.

      Some bzflaggers might know the name. I pretty much suck, but the game rocks.
      "jake"

    3. Re:Memories by silicon+not+in+the+v · · Score: 1

      We had an SGI lab at my university ('97-98 timeframe). They had this game called PointBlank in their section of demos that was apparently also an early form of this. It featured a plane in addition to the small, medium, and large tanks. I have looked all over for this game, and it seems to have disappeared.

      --
      We may experience some slight turbulence and then...explode. -Capt. Mal Reynolds
  15. Impressive by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

    I just wonder how many people downloaded BZflag multiple times. I.e. everytime a new version comes out. Did the 1000000th downloader get an extra free copy?

  16. Dammit by orangesquid · · Score: 2, Funny

    I *knew* there was something wrong with that wget script I wrote. Forget to actually increment the loop variable...

    --
    --TheOrangeSquid Is it any wonder things seem so awry? We swim in a sea of confusion and don't have to think to survive
  17. First thing I do after installing a new gentoo box by Andrevan · · Score: 1

    emerge bzflag

    --
    "All it takes to fly is to hurl yourself at the ground... and miss." - Douglas Adams
  18. Re:Is this really anything close to an accurate co by mmu_man · · Score: 1

    It even went into fedora: http://www.redhat.com/magazine/001nov04/features/f edoracore3/#multimedia-fun

    "While Alan Cox was studying for an MBA, he couldn't help but provide extensive quality assurance testing of BZFlag, which is now included in Fedora Core 3. BZFlag replaces Chromium, which now enters Extras."

  19. yeah but... by mmu_man · · Score: 1

    does it also count evyerone who does cvs up every 2 days and waits for an hour for the beast to build ? :)

    1. Re:yeah but... by MrApathyCream · · Score: 1

      i takes me about 3 mins to do a full build of bzflag. What kind of Franklin are you using?

  20. Graphics... Anyone? by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

    I'm sure there are a few people out there who could spend a couple of hours making graphics for this game that don't suck so get it done already because right now it is really ugly

  21. Monumentous? by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 1

    The graphics look similar to those of the original MechWarrior that I used to play on my Dell 386sx16 laptop back in 1990. What the hell is great about thing?

    1. Re:Monumentous? by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      uhm... you're full of shit. i saw mechwarrior on PC on the 386, and it didn't impress me back then. of course i had an amiga 500, so no all PC gfx back then looked like something from the 70's. ;)
      and so back to the subject. bzflag gfx aren't bleeding-edge Doom3-like, but they as hell aren't anything like that old PC game. hell even the flisht simulators from back then look really really primitive compared to bzflag.
      i mean shit dude, this game was developped on an sgi, you didn't have no OpenGL on your stinking MSDOS game. ;)

    2. Re:Monumentous? by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      "The graphics look similar to those of the original MechWarrior that I used to play on my Dell 386sx16 laptop back in 1990. What the hell is great about thing?"

      Lets get this straight: you were playing a texture-mapped OpenGL based networked FPS on a 386 laptop in 1990? Because that isn't the MechWarrior I remember...

  22. woot! 7P by Anonymous Coward · · Score: -1, Offtopic

    the pr0ject faces, This post bro0ght from the OpenBSD

  23. Gameplay rocks! by menotume · · Score: 4, Interesting

    Hey, for those who don't like the graphics, they're not all that bad, especially if you take the time to fine-tune the many graphics options. To me, BZflag is all about the gameplay. Fancy graphics are for short-lived games that try to impress (sell) by looks alone, or for people who just want to impress their friends, play for a week, and try something else. There are MANY people that have played this game almost daily for years (myself included). For a game so simple to control and start playing, it has many challenges for a real tanker to master.

    1. Re:Gameplay rocks! by stilleon · · Score: 1

      Played BZFlag twice. Done with it. Have played Halo 2 on Live 435 games and counting. Long live Halo 2.

    2. Re:Gameplay rocks! by LeiGong · · Score: 3, Insightful

      Isn't this what people with ugly girlfriends tell themselves to make themselves feel better? "Sure the hot chicks are hot and look great, but they re all dumb I'll get bored with them. On the other hand my ugly girlfriend has a personality and I won't get bored with her." Nevermind the fact that there are plenty of great looking games/women that can look amazing but are also fun to play with. Blanket generalizations like this are pretty ignorant.

    3. Re:Gameplay rocks! by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      > Blanket generalizations like this are pretty ignorant.

      Just like you!

    4. Re:Gameplay rocks! by miu · · Score: 1

      How can people play those stupid games? Like a lot of suckers I bought a copy of the first Halo because of the rave reviews and gushes about how wonderful it was. In gameplay terms it was less fun than Doom or Quake. FPS are not a console strong point yet by any measure - especially when measured against PC shooters like UT2004 or HL2.

      --

      [Set Cain on fire and steal his lute.]
    5. Re:Gameplay rocks! by be-fan · · Score: 1

      Hear hear!

      --
      A deep unwavering belief is a sure sign you're missing something...
    6. Re:Gameplay rocks! by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      Simple really, usually involving opening the gaming case to insert the disk into the Xbox.

    7. Re:Gameplay rocks! by djdavetrouble · · Score: 1

      I used to play q3a and unreal tournament every day at work, and became addicted to playing with other 'real people', so much so that playing against a computer isn't much fun for me anymore. The problem that I ( and many others ) had was that after 1/2 hour of ultra fast high twitch factor action, I was completely ready to HURL, and felt physically ill. I started playing bzflag because it is the same concept (fps) but the action is more slowed down and calculated, and the feeling of wanting to barf is gone. other pluses for me are a higher maturity level in the community, and just a great sense of community overall that I don't find on the mega games when I go online. I have been playing with some of the same players for years now. There are also several servers with active admins that keep them clean for children, no cursing, abuse, etc. and they also police cheaters and teamkillers.
      Gameplay is totally addictive, but obviously it isn't for everyone. This is why I like it.

      --
      music lover since 1969
    8. Re:Gameplay rocks! by menotume · · Score: 1

      Yes, yes, I've played many 'good' games too. The Halos and the like - and they're great. But how many games have you played ongoing for years? Perhaps I did generalize too much, just sick of the trolls putting down such a great game when they don't even give it a chance.

    9. Re:Gameplay rocks! by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 1, Insightful

      Nevermind the fact that there are plenty of great looking games/women that can look amazing but are also fun to play with.

      Bullshit. I'm lucky enough to be engadged to a girl who's smart and pretty, but it's taken me a decade of looking to find someone like that. Being intelligent, or rather just having a strong curiosity about the world around one is incredibly rare among males. As rare as it is there, among females it tends to crop up even less often. The reasons are debatable, but look at almost any field of intellectual pursuit and women are going to be outnumbered by a huge margin. After that, take into account how rare above average looks are, and the additional probality that someone with them isn't going to push themselves any harder than they have to. The end result is very, very slim pickings when it comes to girls who are both hot and smart. I think anyone who says otherwise has very low standards in one, or both, of the criteria.

    10. Re:Gameplay rocks! by grazzy · · Score: 1

      And thus we can deduct that eveyone that uses open source software has ugly girlfriends!

    11. Re:Gameplay rocks! by zbaron · · Score: 1

      and as seasoned players know, that if you look at the main window too long, you get killed a *lot*. Its best to spend most of your time fixed on the radar window ... oops ... giving away secrets. So, come join use over at ajax sometime and have some fun.

    12. Re:Gameplay rocks! by wattersa · · Score: 1

      > Blanket generalizations like this are pretty ignorant.

      Like the one you just made? yeah.

    13. Re:Gameplay rocks! by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      Well then what is ugly and what is not? I like ut2004 running in everything set to highest, I like NWN everything set to max too, but I dont find the graphics of BZFlag ugly! The gameplay is about reflexes AND thinking ahead, and I dont see how more polygons and effects would enhance the game. This is a FAST game, you actually play it, rather than marvel at the graphics. Now as I think this is really a gameplay issue, just like Nethack, where 3d graphics and whatnot would be totally pointless.

  24. Re:Is this really anything close to an accurate co by psifishdot · · Score: 1

    All you Sarge users say it with me:

    apt-get install bzflag

    --

    Long live Schrodinger's cat...
  25. What is this? by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

    Someone tell me what this video is of!

  26. OSS builds your CV by tepples · · Score: 3, Insightful

    If it generated any sort of income for the creators, it would be momentous for them.

    It's a big resume booster for the maintainers.

    1. Re:OSS builds your CV by csbruce · · Score: 3, Funny

      It's a big resume booster for the maintainers.

      "Macroeconomic cost of personal projects to world GDP: $1.25-billion."

      Yeah, that'll look really great on a person's resume.

  27. ok, so now that i have it by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 1

    how does one go about finding other living organisms to battle?

    1. Re:ok, so now that i have it by menotume · · Score: 3, Informative

      Start it up, hit enter three times.

    2. Re:ok, so now that i have it by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      Start it and goto Find Server, you'll see a server list. Select a server, Secretplace is best. Note: I'm a secretplace admin:)
      -Steve

  28. Continuous improvment! by Cid+Highwind · · Score: 1

    Once you start improving the graphics, where do you stop?

    You don't. Duh...

    --
    0 1 - just my two bits
  29. little things that count by icepick72 · · Score: 1
    I just downloaded it. I don't understand why the menu screens support only keyboard mode (use up down to move, enter to select, etc). It was frustrating that I had to stop using my mouse after opening the game. It could make life so much easier.

    I think this one of the differences between a commerical game and a free game. I can see why BZFlag is so popular; I can also see why it isn't more popular.

  30. Re:Is this really anything close to an accurate co by Jeff+DeMaagd · · Score: 1

    I have to ask, why count those? For a person that downloads the latest version for every release, is every such download counted? If there were ten versions, one person could be counted ten times.

  31. Re:First thing I do after installing a new gentoo by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

    I thought the first thing you'd do is shave and shower since it would've been a week or so since you've last stepped away from the machine. :)

  32. A momentous occasion in the history of crap games by stilleon · · Score: 1, Flamebait

    Idownloaded it. It is very bad. Bad gameplay, bad graphics. Bad bad bad.

    Why does these open source games seem so out of date. Graphics that are 10 years out of date (not even as good as Doom) based on a 20 year old game.

    I'll stick with Xbox games from private companies, because even though it is closed sourced they are at least FUN!

  33. Wake me up.. by grumbel · · Score: 2, Insightful

    Wake me up when we have OSS games with 1'000'000 downloads every few weeks or even every few days and that probally short after the release, not with games that are a decade old or older. As long as it is something that is only happening every few years and with rather ancient games its actually not much a good sign for OSS gaming, not even much of a start. Especially when the quality of OSS games still is rather low, no matter how good the gameplay is of BZFlag, nethack or any other OSS game actually is, the overall impression of the games is often rather low[1]. Nobody can tell me that under all the 1'000'000 downloaders there wasn't a single artists which would have been able to produce better art and improve the overall look of the game a lot. So either the tools for creating art are missing, the project coordination is flawed, the game isn't good enough that anybody cares enough to improve it or maybe those Linux folks are really a whole bunch of non-artists types, but maybe its just that OSS model of games isn't all that much attractive to artists who knows.

    Overall OSS gaming still has a long long long way to go, 1'000'000 downloads might sound nice, but don't really tell you much at all about the overall state of OSS gaming.

    [1] "low" as in "I have seen better art on my C64", not as in "can't compete with latest multimillion dollor blockbuster game"

    1. Re:Wake me up.. by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      Why does the success of an open source game have to be determined by comparing it what is required for a successful commercial game? They each have different goals and should be evaluated based on how well each type of game realizes these goals.

      ps. u r an asshat

    2. Re:Wake me up.. by grumbel · · Score: 1

      ### They each have different goals and should be evaluated based on how well each type of game realizes these goals.

      So the goal is to look sucky? Come on, good graphics don't hurt, at worst they might attract a whole bunch of new players. As said, I don't expect OSS games to look like the latest blockbuster, just good enough so that not everybody jumps back and screams "Eww... UGLLLYYYY!!!" on the first try, it doesn't take much to get better then that, but still more then a bunch of OSS projects can offer.

    3. Re:Wake me up.. by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      I can't comment on what the developer's goals are but I can imagine they might be to make a game that is fun to play and fun to develop, and are probably not to keep up with the endless stream of games that have so many graphics effects that it is unplayable on virtually all modern computers and have playability aimed at eight year olds with the IQ of pond scum. I very much doubt that having improved graphics would improve the popularity of the game; the earwax artsits that won't play the game now due to its graphics will be the same people that won't play in a year because the improved graphics still aren't up to contemporary commercial games.

    4. Re:Wake me up.. by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      wake me up when you're ready to fun free game devlopment out of your pocket, and release it open source right away.
      even id software doesn't do taht (they wait a generation or two before releasing the engine code)
      basically what you're asking is impossible except if someone independantly wealthy wants to fun a project in that manner. good luck waiting for that. ;)
      anyway there's no reason to piss in the pool, so to speak. if you odn't like OSS games don't play them. no need to denigrate what some poor coders are doing for free on their own time (some of who probably could be working on some business code that makes their bank account fatter).

    5. Re:Wake me up.. by nagora · · Score: 1

      Bullshit.

      BZflag on full res/textures etc looks great and plays better.

      Spending millions on artwork and music which nobody notices anymore is one reason EA games aren't worth buying. BZFlag is good looking and more damn fun than any commercial game I've seen in years.

      TWW

      --
      "Encyclopedia" is to "Wikipedia" what "Library" is to "Some people at a bus stop"
    6. Re:Wake me up.. by Lord+Apolon · · Score: 1

      Mandatory plug for another great open-source game:

      Battle for Wesnoth!
      http://wesnoth.org/

      Give it a try... it's a turn-based strategy game, but not like Civ. More like a turn-based Warcraft. Except better. :)

    7. Re:Wake me up.. by Reapy · · Score: 1

      Think panzer generals in a fantasy setting. Very well made game.

  34. Me and 10,000 other Slashdotters by auburnate · · Score: 1

    Just downloaded BZFlag and jumped right in. Needless to say I got wasted. Looks like a lot of fun. I'm impressed by the OSS community. Wonder what the latency spike on the bzflag.org website was along with all the mirrors holding the game?

    1. Re:Me and 10,000 other Slashdotters by TheRaven64 · · Score: 1
      A hint for new players:

      Avoid Jumping

      When you start, jumping seems like a really good way to avoid getting shot. The problem is that between jumping and landing your position is 100% predictable, meaning that the odds are good that you will land on a bullet. If at all possible, try to dodge sideways, rather than up.

      --
      I am TheRaven on Soylent News
  35. Re:A momentous occasion in the history of crap gam by tomstdenis · · Score: 1

    "bad graphics" and "not fun" shouldn't be the same idea. Admitedly the game ain't your typical run/shooter like say halo... but neither is solitaire....

    If anything this game proves that the average "pr0 g@m3r" is nothing more than a low IQ mongrel looking for the next visual stimuli...

    Yeah sure some flash is good but not if you sacrifice game play.

    For instance, doom3 looks beautiful. It's also a horrible game. Way too repetitive and really didn't have any "new" game elements [e.g. think of board game rules] that make it stand out from all the other FPSes.

    You don't need a TFLOP rated game to have fun. You just have to engage the persons creativity/thought process in a positive way.

    Tom

    --
    Someday, I'll have a real sig.
  36. Re:Is this really anything close to an accurate co by gnalle · · Score: 3, Informative
    The Debian popularity contest, rates bzflag as number 66. It counts the number of computers, who that have install the popcon package as well as bzflag.

    inst vote old recent no-files (maintainer)

    451 84 347 19 1 (Tim Riker)

  37. In The Groove isn't quite StepMania! by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

    That title, "In The Groove", isn't actually StepMania. The company (RoXoR Games? What a name...) states that it has licensed the StepMania game and used its core engine as an "engine" to run entirely new content following similar gameplay. Of course, it also employs a few of the key StepMania coders to add the new ITG features and all that.

    So while StepMania may currently mimic Dance Dance Revolution to the best of its ability, In The Groove is an entirely new creature that is, as I've found from playing dozens of games at my local arcade (afc troy!), worlds above the arcade DDR series.

    It even drops straight into our old DDR machines: we previously had three DDR Extremes. We've now got an Extreme for nostalgia's sake and two "ITG" machines. I may sound like I'm gushing a little, but there hasn't been a new game in the DDR series in almost two years. I think I'm a justified fanboy. :-)

  38. Re:Is this really anything close to an accurate co by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

    But then again the popcon page predicts that there are no Hurd users at all.

  39. Re:Is this really anything close to an accurate co by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

    Now that you mention it, is the number of albums sold really anything close to an accurate count of how many people have a copy of the songs? Not after Napster ;-)

  40. Re:A momentous occasion in the history of crap gam by stilleon · · Score: 1

    Doom was very fun. Used to play it via modem with my firend. Hours of gameplay. BZFlag has poor gameplay, bad controls and documentation. I don't mind lesser graphics but this game is NOT FUN.

  41. Wonder if my download was the 1,000,000th one by majkqball · · Score: 1

    It's funny that I downloaded that game very near to the 1,000,000 mark. I wonder how close I was.

    --
    SBC stands for Stupid Bell Company
    AT&T stands for All Telephones Tapped
    1. Re:Wonder if my download was the 1,000,000th one by bsharitt · · Score: 1

      Congratulations, you're the 1,000,000th downloader. You get a free copy of the next version of BZFlag.

    2. Re:Wonder if my download was the 1,000,000th one by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      You were 999,943.

  42. Linux Games Suck by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0, Flamebait

    Who cares is this game has been downloaded 1 million times?

    When will Linux get *real* games?

    Don't count any of the FPS games either.

    1. Re:Linux Games Suck by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      nobody cares what you classify as real games. we're having too much time making and playing games we like. ;)

  43. Game of the year vote revised by y2imm · · Score: 1

    I was going for HL2, but this kicks the shit out of that and everything else I've sene this year.

    Um, yes, I am being sarcastic.

    1. Re:Game of the year vote revised by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      Be as sarcastic as you want, because in the long run, people will still be playing games like BZFlag and NetHck that have substance and quality to them 10 years from now, while Half-Life X is a thing of the past.

    2. Re:Game of the year vote revised by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      Actually, *linux nerds* will still be playing BZFlag and Nethack because they'd rather be zealots and convince themselves that they're REALLY happy with their 10-year-behind-the-times games than actually do something normal, like enjoy a game that the rest of the civilized world thinks is good.

  44. Turbo Tanks by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

    The Turbo Tanks game has even worse graphics, but it is still more fun than BZflag.
    http://www.turbotanks.com/

    1. Re:Turbo Tanks by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      shit that's java, i can't play that (my browser don't use java).
      can't play bzflag either coz no 3d-gfx card. :( well at least i got Xmame, and i KNOW there's gotta be some tank battle roms for that...

  45. They look like Open Sores to me. by glrotate · · Score: 0, Flamebait

    It speaks volumes about the movement.

  46. Re:A momentous occasion in the history of crap gam by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

    I like it, you don't.

    Solution: Try another game!

    Problem solved.

  47. tux racer? Bah... by diegocgteleline.es · · Score: 1

    Latest new from tux racer in the tux racer's news site is from 2001. It can be called very well "dead". Yes, lots of downloads, probably because there're no lots of better options..

  48. Correction by Mike+Hawk · · Score: 1

    shown that * coders are willing to release their work for free

    * some

    And the debate will rage on about which of those two types is exercising common sense. But we do know which type produces more games that more people play.

  49. Wh-wh-WHINE! by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

    Get over it. BZFlag is a GREAT game, it plays fast even on dial up, it is FREE (beer, speech), and you want to sit here on a Saturday and whine because you don't think it is "pretty enough" for your discerning tastes?

    Come on over to ducati server 5156, CTF style, and I'll show you why you don't need fancy graphics - your system will bog, trying to keep up displaying the various parts of your tank as they fly all over the field, over and over and over...

    Second thought - stay where you are.

    1. Re:Wh-wh-WHINE! by FinalCut · · Score: 1

      wow, how dare someone crit. the game you love. the gall of such people. We all know that only sure path to improvement of a product (be it free or not) is via pure adoration and no contrary opinions allowed.

      In my experience with many open source projects it is exactly this kind of attitude from its current base that cause it problems with wider adoption.

      Sure, this game may not want/need wider adoption - but attacking anyone who doesn't love the project seems pretty symptomatic of 90% of all Open source projects.

      Its too bad. Sad really.

      oh, and the graphics do suck and weather you agree or not - alot of games are judged by their pretty pictures before someone will go through to trouble of trying it. If the graphics don't shine - people will whine.

    2. Re:Wh-wh-WHINE! by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 1, Insightful

      "Sure, this game may not want/need wider adoption - but attacking anyone who doesn't love the project seems pretty symptomatic of 90% of all Open source projects."

      This is true. Look, if OSS is to progress beyond the interested amatuer phase (that is, actually be adopted by governments and business so we can all benefit) the chip on the shoulder has to go, and developers will have to start thinking in terms of what other people might want from the word go.

      Of course that isn't easy, considering the needs of others might be put a dent in some egos and it involves extra work, but you can't realistically expect everyone to have to learn coding in order to adopt your product. Microsoft wins* in the public mind because they do market research before offering a product, include features that the clueless ask for, and provide it in a neat little (ok, big) bundle that even a retarded monkey can install. Remarkably little OSS matches Microsoft's for sheer convenience (gaaah! I can't believe I wrote that!); until this changes, it will be the fringe dweller.

      Some developers are terrific, and if asked will either add a feature, or explain politely and logically why a feature won't be included; this professional attitude is highly commendable (hi, Murat!). There are a lot of mindless comments (this topic contains quite a few), but that's what /dev/null is for. Take it from a long-time musician: any time you do something in public, some wise-ass is going to yell "YOU SUCK!", but two years later when you're the next big thing they'll be saying "I was there back when...". OSS advocates need to exercise greater maturity in this regard: software isn't disposable pop music, its the basis of business infrastructure worth billions of dollars, and making an impact in this world takes a business-like attitude rather than the "I'll take my ball and go home" approach we see far too often.

      In short: the customer is always right, which is why OSS has no customers, because for OSS the developer is always right. See the problem?

      And yes, BZFlag's graphics are primitive by today's standards, but then the game play of most FPS games is hardly any different (run around, shoot, pick up weapon, shoot some more), so without new graphics there's nothing to sell. I regard the continuous need to spend $XX on new software (+$XXX on suitable graphics card) to be little more than a con perpetrated by lazy game designers attempting to hide their lack of original ideas. At least BZFlag isn't pretending to be new, or asking for money for the same old game...

      *Not that I use any of their bloated, buggy rubbish.

    3. Re:Wh-wh-WHINE! by Killall+-9+Bash · · Score: 0, Redundant

      MOD PARENT UP!!!

      --
      "Prediction: within 10 years, Windows will be a Linux distribution." Me, 7-6-2016
  50. MOD PARENT UP by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

    Meno is right on - other games come and go, BZFlag entertains year after year after year, never gets boring, and still remains a challenge.

    KR

  51. BZ flag .. game play wins out. by bone_idol · · Score: 1
    Its a great game, with loads of well designed maps, and server variations that stimulate a fantastic range of gameplay.

    You can play on a single shot, no jumps, no rebounds minimal map one to one against an opponent for an ultra skilled game, to magnificent free for all, frag fests with 10 shot (or more) speeded up maps.

    The careful positioning of a few blocks make for killer rebounds, and ace sniper points, and great team action in "capture the flag" mode.

    Download it and now and find out for yourselves

  52. Poo stilleon must have died a lot by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

    when he tried this bad, no fun game.

    I hope I was one of the ones killing him, and keeping him away because of it. :)

  53. Hmmm.... by ThomasJS · · Score: 0, Flamebait

    To bad the game's controls and gui suck.

    --
    Thomas-
  54. Ah...the good old days.... by JakiChan · · Score: 4, Informative

    When I joined SGI in 1997, BZFlag was an institution. The IT group in the MIPS Group would play it at lunch every day. Shooting your boss with something that looked like a photon torpedo (if your box had good graphics - I had a dual-proc Octane with very nice graphics) was very cool. It was a fun thing to do and felt like part of the culture there.

    There was a program, at least inside of SGI, that was a sequel. You could be a plane or one of a couple of types of ground vehicles, and it had voice chat. It was fun and the graphics were better but things were pretty grim by the time I found it, and there wasn't a lot of game playing being done.

    --
    "Where quality is like a dead stinking rat - you just can't miss it."
    1. Re:Ah...the good old days.... by glanois · · Score: 2, Informative
      There was a program, at least inside of SGI, that was a sequel. You could be a plane or one of a couple of types of ground vehicles


      You are thinking of pointblank. We played this every day at lunch hour. God how I loved that game.

    2. Re:Ah...the good old days.... by silicon+not+in+the+v · · Score: 1

      Is there any way to get PointBlank any more? I used to play that a lot but haven't played BZFlag yet. Was PointBlank ever ported to any other type of system?

      --
      We may experience some slight turbulence and then...explode. -Capt. Mal Reynolds
  55. Re:tux racer? Bah... bwaah! by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 1, Informative

    Yep, even if TuxRacer was only a freebie to debug and sell "usual commercial game", I'm thankful to Sunspire Studios they've let out this homely piece of work under the license that allowed to create OpenRacer and PlanetPenguinRacer!

  56. Just as fun as xpilot, nethack, or bolo by green+pizza · · Score: 1

    BZFlag is a very fun game. It's not pretty, but then, it's about 13 years old.I have a great deal of fun with bolo, nethack, and xpilot as well and their graphics are even more dated!

  57. Graphics Issue by KrackHouse · · Score: 3, Informative

    There was an attempt to fork Bzflag and use an updated graphics engine called OGRE but it turns out that the bzflag code isn't very modular so it has stalled.

    I think open source games are on the cusp of a major breakthrough because of the maturation of third party graphics and physics engines like OGRE and ODE. I'm helping with a project that has been running for a little under a year and we've released a pre-alpha already because we didn't re-invent the wheel.

    I think a lot of people go into these open source game projects without an understanding of the amount of work involved. It's sad because a lot of great ideas and great code are lost when developers become overwhelmed with the details. Flight/driving simulators are much easier to create in an open source environment because of the lack of a plot requirement so you'll probably see them first. My point is that as soon as flegling OSS game devs look to open source middleware first then hand code things only when necessary, we'll see a lot of great stuff in a very short amount of time. An entertainment singularity :) Don't take my word for it though...
    "Some good news from down under! Primed Games have won the Best Indie Game award at the Australian Game Developers Conference with their Mario-kart inspired title 'Scootarama', which is based on OGRE, ODE, RakNet and FMod. It's especially impressive considering they only had 12 weeks to come up with it with a 10-man team."

    --
    What if Digg added local news and a Slashdot inspired comment karma system? ---
    http://houndwire.com
    1. Re:Graphics Issue by KrackHouse · · Score: 1

      "which is based on OGRE, ODE, RakNet and FMod."

      Prediction. Those 4 APIs will become the LAMP of gaming in the not too distant future. ROOF maybe? Sounds sufficiently all encompassing.

      --
      What if Digg added local news and a Slashdot inspired comment karma system? ---
      http://houndwire.com
    2. Re:Graphics Issue by jeffm2501 · · Score: 1

      Actualy Firestarter used at totaly new codebase, using OGRE as the engine. It was droped due to lack of intrest in the bzflag development comunity. The code is being moved into it's own SF project called opencombat.

  58. Re:A momentous occasion in the history of crap gam by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

    get what you pay for...

  59. more than just graphics by sapphire_bullets · · Score: 1

    pretty apps can be nice but what is more important than that to many bz players is the easy learning curve, tremendous competitiveness amongst the league players, and most importantly, the community, people for the most part are friendly, fun and always willing to help new players. Im not, but most of them are :) On the issue of graphics, when you first play you think wow, the graphics are a little basic. As you gain skill however you will find yourself taking every step possible to becoming a good player, one of those is to turn of all the enhancements, turn off shadows and enhanced radar so that you may see enemy bullets more clearly, this is after all a tank war!

  60. How do they count the downloads? by Nyder · · Score: 1

    after all, if they keep updating the programs, does it count as a new download. I mean, if they did let say, 100 updates, then only 10,000 different people downloaded it.

    I mean, it's cool and all that it's reached the 1,000,000 download mark, but it's not like it's a finished product that recieved all the downloads.

    I'm not trying to knock this or anything, but it reminds me of the crappy advertising that seems to be accepted by people. Like the monitor size bullshit, or the Mega-BIT/BYTE crap. Or using months instead of years to make it look like you worked somewhere longer.

    Yes, BZFlag has had 1,000,000 downloads... ...by 3 people.

    --
    Be seeing you...
  61. I guess you ain't a nethack fan. by Ayanami+Rei · · Score: 1
    --
    THIS THING CAN TURN ON A DIME, MACROSSZERO STYLE ALSO FUCK BETA, ~NYORON
  62. There isn't. by Ayanami+Rei · · Score: 1

    The operating system means nothing.
    Of course, all games have a target audience. Right now, Linux is not deployed widely enough to be worried about.
    Of course, nothing is preventing from being used (many games get linux compatibility, through ports or emulators).
    It's a platform.
    Period.

    but thats because its typical Linux shite: terrible documentation, terrible presentation, stupid bugs and complete lack of attention to detail.

    Like what?

    --
    THIS THING CAN TURN ON A DIME, MACROSSZERO STYLE ALSO FUCK BETA, ~NYORON
  63. It helps, of course. by Ayanami+Rei · · Score: 1

    But then, isn't HAVING FUN the reason why you play, not wanking off to pixel shaders?

    --
    THIS THING CAN TURN ON A DIME, MACROSSZERO STYLE ALSO FUCK BETA, ~NYORON
    1. Re:It helps, of course. by It'sYerMam · · Score: 2, Insightful

      Realistic/good graphics add to the fun by making the game more believable or immersive. It's a lot more satisfying to blow up a tank with a gout of flame, black smoke and mangled bits of tank flying around than to watch, say, a brown box disappear. Or turn into 6 brown rectangles.
      Graphics ADD to the fun. They don't create it, but real people often value graphics about as highly as gameplay, so if BZFlag wants to be a "momentuous" project, they need to start thinking beyond those people stuck in the 90s.

      --
      im in ur .sig, writin ur memes.
  64. And - what have you done lately? by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

    Oh, that's right - NOTHING.

    Why am I not surprised.

    IOW - STFU. Go check to see if any of your pubes have grown in yet, clueless mariah. Whadafrigginidiot...

  65. Re:A momentous occasion in the history of crap gam by grumbel · · Score: 1

    ### "bad graphics" and "not fun" shouldn't be the same idea.

    While that is true, its a rather bogus argument. Sure, graphics are not a replacment for fun, but a good game can only get better when the graphics, sound and music play along. There little excuse to let the whole presentation of a game down, just because gameplay is half done. Sure there is always a lack of man-power and artists, but with 1'000'000 downloads you for sure will find somebody if you just search a bit. Last not least, with better graphics we could also finally get rid of all those "Hey, gameplay is ok, so its ok that graphics suck", no wonder some people disagree with that.

  66. Re:First thing I do after installing a new gentoo by endersdouble · · Score: 1

    Well, we'll be the first to hear how the 12/10/2005 build is from you, won't we?

  67. WTF is StepMania? by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

    'nuff said in the subj.

  68. Advocacy is difficult ... by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

    with old-school graphics. I've been asking my ISP to put this on their servers for a while. Unfortunately, they seem to think that it's better to host a dozen empty CS servers. For as much as this game is about gameplay (and exceptional multiplayer gameplay at that) a graphical update might bring in a few more bums on seats.

  69. Re:First thing I do after installing a new gentoo by /dev/trash · · Score: 1

    That's Debian

  70. The gameplay is 'tarded by Rogerborg · · Score: 1

    As is the network design. Before you all go apeshit rating me down, the open source games Netrek and XPilot are examples of smart, clean and original designs that build simple elements into emergent gameplay complexity. BZFlag in comparison is derivative and less than the sum of its parts. The only thing that it has going for it is that it throws polygons rather than bitmaps or polylines at the screen.

    Now that I think about it, it's actually kind of sad that far superior games have been eclipsed by something that boasts only eye candy, and awful eye candy at that.

    --
    If you were blocking sigs, you wouldn't have to read this.
  71. Congratulations, BZFlag! by Rogerborg · · Score: 1

    You are now the third least awful FOSS game!

    --
    If you were blocking sigs, you wouldn't have to read this.
  72. Re:Is this really anything close to an accurate co by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

    ... and who have installed and configured sendmail, or one of its clones.

    I've been using Debian since before we had Apt, and using Linux since before we had Debian, and I still can't figure it out.

    Debian guys are email-happy. Gah. You can't even report a bug to their bug tracking system without email. (So I only end up reporting about 1 in 50 bugs I hit. It's just too painful to type up bug reports and send them in by hand.)

    World to Debian maintainers: there's this new thing called the web...

  73. They don't count THAT much... by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

    "I don't understand why the menu screens support only keyboard mode"

    Easier to port? Fewer graphics involved? No tracking problems? Mouse might be overkill for a menu with so few options? There are lots of possible reasons, and it is a minor corner to cut. Besides, I've noticed that mouse-driven menus on newer games are actually slower and harder to navigate because of annoying animations (and I've been a Mac user since 1987, so the mouse is usually my first choice for anything).

    "It was frustrating that I had to stop using my mouse after opening the game."

    You're kidding, right? I take it you've never used a spreadsheet, worked as a data enty op, or played any game older than 2000. Perhaps you're not aware of why the cursor keys are called cursor keys? Either way, you get frustrated WAY too easily. Key navigation really isn't that difficult to figure out. Up the Ritalin dosage*.

    "I can see why BZFlag is so popular; I can also see why it isn't more popular."

    I stumbled on BZFlag by accident while searching SourceForge for games a couple of months ago; its not like its hyped to the poo-pipes in "PC Gamer" next to the ads for Halo II, Doom III, or SameGameWithSlightlyImprovedGraphics MMIV. I'm thinking that might be a slightly more significant factor than a lack of mouse support on menus...

    In all fairness, it isn't as polished as commercial games, true. But unlike commercial releases, you can easily get a complete refund for BZFlag if you aren't satisfied ;)

    *Apologies to anyone who really does suffer ADD; I'm an insensitive clod!

  74. Does that count apt-got versions? by Trogre · · Score: 1

    How do they count how many people have downloaded it? Hit count on their sf site? If so, then I suspect the actual number of times this has been downloaded will be much higher.

    I apt-get nearly all my software, and the only server that process hits is my apt mirror. I don't know, perhaps it periodically sends stats back upstream?

    --
    "Nine times out of ten, starting a fire is not the best way to solve the problem." - my wife
  75. One word, one number. by StikyPad · · Score: 1

    Tanarus -- 1997.

    --
    https://www.eff.org/https-everywhere
  76. Augh! by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

    Can someone tell me how a reductionist, misogynistic argument that completely misses the point gets modded +4 Insightful?

  77. Re:Is this really anything close to an accurate co by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

    Uhhh, that's #66 (out of 718) in the games category. It's #2539 (out of 40400) in the overall list. Let's not have anyone think that some dinky game is the 66th most popular debian pacakge.

  78. What OSS Gaming Needs? by dbc001 · · Score: 1

    I agree that Open Source gaming is "on the cusp". I think the bottleneck is that the Developers (coders) keep trying to write content for their games. Most open source games have great potential, but lousy content. To make things even worse, creating content for most games is such an arcane, laborious task, that good artists and writers are scared away.

    There are scores of modders and amateur level designers out there just waiting for an engine that is easy to mod...

  79. CTF with no jumps dominates by midshipman_geek · · Score: 1

    I haven't fallen in love with the same guy with modified source code always having a guided missle flag whenever he wants, but Capture-the-Flag with no super-flags and no jumps is actually quite fun. Not only does it take more brains than reflexes, but its strategy often parallels that of football or rugby as far as defending or attacking a flag carrier goes. Very fun indeed.

    --
    Miserable failure