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Free Software FPS Games Compared
An anonymous reader writes "Linux-gamers.net has posted a thorough, although harsh, comparison of free software shooters. It compares seven open source shooter games in a lengthy discussion. Few have gone to the trouble of comparing and carefully examining the genre before. The author ranks the games in the following order (best to worst): Warsow, Tremulous, World of Padman, Nexuiz, Alien Arena, OpenArena, and Sauerbraten. In making these choices, it claims to use gameplay, design, innovation and presentation as criteria and includes a short history of free software shooters in the introduction."
Wolfenstein, I still love you!
Just -1, Troll talking to another.
...coming back to frag you once more! I do like World of Padman...funny story, funny graphics....aw heck...funny game. Community 3d games are actually a lot more fun when they try to be themselves (original, don't have to conform to much of the real deal), look at Bz-flag....crap graphics...still fun as h*** to play and there are still hundreds of servers with thousands of players playing it.
What this world is coming to - is for you and me to decide.
They missed AlephOne - the OS marathon development... Still very playable even on very lightweight equipment.
A positive attitude may not solve all your problems, but it will annoy enough people to make it worth the effort.
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Open source and free are not mutually exclusive as most of us know.
Wolfenstein: Enemy Territory is free, but I don't think is open source. Maybe it is, it is based on either Q2 or Q3 engine, and Q2 engine is open sourced (or GPLed), maybe Q3 engine is as well.
But anyway, it seems as if the summary equates open source with free and free with open source.
If you don't know what AltaVista is (was), get off my lawn.
What about Urban Terror? http://www.urbanterror.net/ . Just released a new version. It's a pretty fun game.
and I'm an idiot once again, proper formatting this time!! Here is my draft copy
About two weeks ago, Joe Barr posted a feature on Linux.com titled "New Alien Arena 6.10 blows away its FPS competition" yet gave no real comparisons with other similar games. This was done in the same style as Barr's previous feature, "Tremulous: The best free software game ever?" which described Tremulous but also lacked comparisons and relations to other games. This feature hopes to be a thorough comparison of the major free software shooters.
There have been many free software first-person shooters (FPS) projects over the years, from modded Doom and Quake engines to enhance the existing games (ezQuake, EGL, ZDoom), to free art packs such as OpenQuartz or OpenArena. In 2002, along came Cube, a single and multiplayer FPS based on its own engine, including artwork, maps, models and an ingame map editor. In the freeware (and Linux compatible!) world a little-known game called Legends, a Tribes-inspired game, appeared yet remained closed-source. Filling the FPS gap in the open-source world has usually been left up to commercial companies who release their games with Linux support (i.e. Doom3, Unreal Tournament 2004, Loki Software's work) or freeware games produced by commercial studios(i.e. America's Army, Wolfenstein: Enemy Territory) or simply running Windows games run via wine. In the last few years a few built-from-scratch community-based FPS projects, most built on the GPLed Quake engines, have popped up, among them are Tremulous, Alien Arena, Nexuiz, and Warow. Some have kept their art assets under a closed license (Warow), while others have also released their art under an OSS license (Nexuiz), I consider both categories free software since well, software refers to programs, code and procedures, not artwork. For this comparison, we'll take a look at active, robust and community-developed free software shooters. Most released free software shooters are designed for multiplayer, a logical step for a game developed in an online community, however most also feature a bot-based single-player mode. While others have compared such games before, this feature seeks to be a little more thorough and go a step further, ranking the following seven games: Alien Arena, Nexuiz, OpenArena, Sauerbraten, Tremulous, Warow, and World of Padman. In ranking these games, gameplay, design, innovation and presentation (in that order) will be held as primary criteria.
7. Sauerbraten
Sauerbraten is basically Cube 2, the sequel to one of the most influential free software shooters released to date. The engine is completely reworked with brand new graphics rendering features rivaling that of Quake4. Like Cube, Sauerbraten has a built-in map editor that allows player to edit maps from within the game, making this one of the friendliest games for content-creation. The latest version of Sauerbraten, 2007-09-04, is little more than a subversion snapshot packaged and stabilized for wider distribution; the game is still in heavy development. Sauerbraten gameplay drastically differ from anything Cube offered, with simple Quake-style weapons, game effects, and the same Quake3-like FFA action. It is worth noting that Cube (and Sauerbraten) give you a weapon when you pick up the appropriate ammobox; there is no separation between ammo and weapons.While it has some cool features, the game still feels like more of a concept demo than an actual game, and with only 20-30 servers, half running instagib, there isn't much of a community following. Single player is reminiscent of Quake1, with enemy monsters in a variety of maps. The menu is actually one of the coolest I've seen implemented in a game, it spawns as an object ingame and faces you, however the lack of a main menu upon load adds to the tech-demo feel. Despite the tech-demo nature of the game, Sauerbraten has a good soundtrack, lots of maps, good quality models, well-done artwork and textures. The gameplay isn't anything astounding but with pretty decent maps and gameplay reminiscent
I have yet to see one game that works correctly on a Linux box with Xinerama. At least in full-screen more. Some of them won't even let you change resolution at all, let alone tell them to run in a window.
When they run in full-screen they tend to span the displays and have all the action right in the middle so the important stuff is split in two.
And quite a few games crash on the weird resolution.
I'm not saying I've seen Windows games work on dual-head or ever support two monitors, but at least they have the decency to just pick a screen and use that one.
In the land of the blind, the one-eyed man is kinky.
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most of these shooters would be considered pretty good...in 1996.
I think that's a little unfair to say when most retail games have multi-million dollar budgets and these games are made by volunteers.
I can't guess as to whether you went to college or not, but most colleges have a competitive formula SAE team. The team is made up entirely of volunteers, and some of the primary goals for being in such a project is to learn more about what goes into building a functional vehicle and for sheer fun -- it's hobbyist work. Notably, these cars aren't too technologically advanced, and Ferrari with their massive F1 budget could make a mockery out of these SAE cars with one of their F1 cars. But, we all know that comparing an Formula SAE racer to an F1 car would be unfair. But we also know that the Formula SAE teams are breeding grounds for some of the best automotive engineers for tomorrow, and most car companies know this and try to peg their interest by sponsoring these teams.
It's the same case with these open source shooters. They don't have the financial backing to hire skilled artists that are willing to work full days, however I would say that say that a lot of these projects are breeding grounds for tomorrow's John Carmack's and like the SAE teams, companies like id try to do their part in supporting the community.
Yes Quake 3 is free software, but Quake3 can't be called a packagable 'game' in the sense of 'free'. The game materials are still proprietary and not free. The engine is free software, and in fact, all the games on that list use GPL engine that were built on iD's released Quake1/2/3 engines. However they also can be considered packagable 'games' with free content. The article should have made that distinction though.
already posted bug report, its in hand.
me: D2 Reply to hidden parent appears joined to previous thread
pudge: Yes, this is known, and we know it's a problem. We have plans to deal with it.
http://sourceforge.net/tracker/index.php?func=detail&aid=1849018&group_id=4421&atid=104421
liqbase
bzflag is a good free game, which just goes to show that fancy graphics have nothing to do with how good a game is.
expandfairuse.org
Maybe because a game is not just a piece of software and most decent games have hundreds of full time graphics programmers, mission designers, texture artists, concept artists, AI programmers, skybox artists, effects artists, animation engineers, networking programmers etc. These kind of resources just aren't available to open source games, at least not to the same level as commercial games.
seeing as 6 out of the 7 games are Quake-based :P
It strikes me that open source has a reputation for really good code and half-assed presentation, so I wonder why there aren't many free-from-day-1 game engines :-/
I mod down anyone who says "I will be modded down for this", regardless of the rest of their comment
Right on! Because lord knows top-notch games like Portal never get their start from small-budget hobbyists working in their spare time.
Oh, wait...
the problem with myminicity (and indeed most such sites before it) is that they do not consider it spamming. In fact, throwing that URL out as much as you can - on your blog, on forums, in your feeds, by IM and so forth and so on is the whole -point- of that site... as it is visits that cause the 'city' to grow.
:\ )
Good luck finding rules on where a 'player' is allowed to post the URL(s). Even more luck to you finding a 'report abuse' page or contact address. Good luck getting any response whatsoever from contact@ ( if you do get something, by all means follow up here
Quake was released in 1996. OpenArena uses the Quake III engine.
Saying OpenArena "would be considered pretty good...in 1996" is like saying the SR-71 Blackbird would be considered "pretty good" in 1935.
It's such a ridiculous understatement that the only possible explanation is that you're British.
Yes I know, the top of the article mentions that it was written two months ago. The release of the new Sauerbraten was what promoted me to post this before it got too out-of-date.
Also the end of the article contains the following note, "Notes: Since the original writing, Sauerbraten has released a new version that has more RPG elements and seems to make progress in being a more full-fledged game. I actually haven't had time to update the article." Perhaps I should have put that under the Sauerbraten section. I'm very eager to try out the new release though.
I played many games over a several days. I almost never saw the humans win unless there was a huge skill stack on the human side. Far more often I saw the aliens win, and occasionally a sudden death which inevitably went to the aliens.
What was the most frustrating for me was not being able to buy upgrades or evolve because I hadn't killed enough people yet. Especially at later stages in the game where practically everybody had evos and upgrades, it was incredibly difficult and frustrating running around as the weakest player in the game trying to kill players far more powerful than me so that I could get the upgrades I needed to be able to take out these powerful players. It's a chicken-and-egg problem. It's the same problem I have with counter-strike, if you're on the losing team with no money, how are you supposed to take out people with body armor and AK-47s when all you have is a pistol? This kind of problem is frustrating and I consider it to be bad game design. I vastly prefer games that level the playing field by giving players equal abilities and not penalizing teams for losing.
Make me a friend and I'll mod you up
I know what you mean. But if you think about it, a good part of open source software is filling a "need." There is a need for a java IDE that has x features. There is a need for a full featured text editor with extra utilities for editing code. There is a need for convenience installers for linux programs. There is a need for games. Wait, what kind of games? There is where it becomes very open ended and not well defined. The passion of wanting to develop an open source application to fulfill a need does not mesh with the artistic vision of commercial game developers. So they can implement bland imitations of popular games, or games that just don't have widespread appeal. It would help if when someone was inspired to make a ground breaking game, they would say "I'm making this for linux, screw making money." After this point I'm guessing, but it seems more likely that given significant inspiration for a game, someone will go to work for commercial companies. At that point making a linux version becomes laughable among bean counters who only see numbers of customers, and don't share a passion for free software. There's probably more to it, but that is my initial take on it.
your comment would be considered insightful... in 2005.
If I have seen further it is by stealing the Intellectual Property of giants.
Unless you're really trying to push the limits of your target platform hard, programming is a drop in the bucket compared to the work done by the artists and level designers. The level designers probably have more to do with good gameplay than the programmers.
Level design is also a REALLY tedious process. Making a good level requires replaying the level over and over slightly tweaking things to get them just right. It gets old fast, and you get really sick of the level in the process. And of course you have to deal with the issues that come up from playing the level that many times. It's very easy to memorize the level you're working on, and end up making the level way too difficult because of that.
That's spelling though. Version 1 of his post had issues with spelling and grammar. Version 2 had the grammar fixed. Why are you complaining about the spelling in Version 2? Didn't you read the release notes? WAIT FOR VERSION 3! Bug reports concerning spelling for Version 2 WILL BE IGNORED.
echo -e 'global _start\n _start:\n mov eax, 2\n int 80h\n jmp _start' > a.asm; nasm a.asm -f elf; ld a.o -o a;
The in-game logic source code was released in 2004 to aid 'modders' but the game engine itself remains closed to this day (although it may eventually be released).
I know it sounds paradoxical but W:ET was never derived from GPL code (in the licensing sense) because id Tech 3 was under a closed license when it was licensed to SD (This may lead to issues with SD/Activision ever being able to relicense the source)
Ripping an new rectum in the fabric of spacetime.
Err no
I wish that wasn't true but it is. I'm a FOSS game developer, this month a saw a musician advertise himself on one FOSS gaming site and he was asked by at least three different projects to work for them. Programmers outnumber artist something like 10-1 or 100-1. Most of them are not Geeks or Nerds like us programmers who spend our life on the Internet. They seem to be in different communities and speak in different groups to us. Not to say we don't get along with them they are just not like us. Also they view some licensing issues different to us because they are artists of a different sort.
BTW in your list the people tasked with the jobs of graphics programmers, AI programmers, networking programmers are all available but because most FOSS projects are small in size it is hard to find specialist like these when you want them. Most programmers in FOSS game development have to wear multiple hats.
Exacto-friggin-lutely. I've always liked the Mario Kart approach to game balance. Where Counter-Strike consciously emphasizes the difference in skill between the two teams, Mario Kart tries to minimize it by giving better powerups and more speed to the players in the back of the pack, creating a close and competitive race even between players of different skill levels. This keeps the game fun and exciting for all players instead of simply handing an easy victory to the better player. Lopsided games are *never* fun for anyone involved, you always have the most fun in a game that's so close you don't know who's going to come out the winner. It's a shame that more game designers don't understand this.
Make me a friend and I'll mod you up