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Activision, Raven Release 2 Star Wars Games Under GPL
hypnosec writes "Activision and Raven Software game studios have open sourced a couple of their games so that people can play as well learn from the code. The gaming companies have released the source code of Star Wars Jedi Knight: Jedi Academy and Jedi Outcast through SourceForge."
Are Quake 3 based, if I remember correctly, which is already open-source. What is the point of this, especially since it doesn't look like they've released the game assets?
Someone get started on Linux ports right now!
especially since it doesn't look like they've released the game assets?
Like DuckTales, Star Wars is a Disney franchise, and Disney is famous for sponsoring the Copyright Term Extension Act. I can't foresee what would cause Disney to change its policies to allow the release of anything it owns under a license for free cultural works.
There are files in the zip that indicate at least some rudimentary linux support (joystick, memory handling), dated Dec 2000. This may be leftover from the Quake 3 engine however.
Where can I get the compiled binary for these two games?
While I applaud their use of a revision control system (git, in this case), perhaps someone should explain to them that uploading a single .zip file with all of the code in it somewhat defeats the point...
I am TheRaven on Soylent News
AFAICT, 3D models are not included in the zip, so it probably will not be usable without the original. Yet another in a growing list of "Free" games that are actually not really much used because the data can not be shared.....
Do not see why we would need this.
I wish they'd release the code for Jedi Knight (the first one) if only for nostalgia. I spent many of my 12-year-old nights making levels for that game in JED.
How does releasing this code to OSS interact with trademark law from Lucas (or Disney now, I guess)? If I go fork this now open-source software, am I allowed to release a new version with any affiliation to Star Wars or does it fall on my shoulders to go in and remove anything that might be protected IP?
returns 99.
Use the source!
On your mark ... get set ... go! (Ready ... steady ... go?)
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Emscripten
"Consensus" in science is _always_ a political construct.
I hope SOF2 is next ...
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I always love searching the source code for common swears, where you can tell crunch time came around and everyone is frustrated with everyone else. These codebases are ripe with fun ones.
... always.
\code\game\q_math.cpp(545): i = 0x5f3759df - ( i >> 1 ); // what the fuck?
That''s part of the Quake III fast inverse square root.
Hi. Can you add that note to the article summary? That should head off a lot of comments.
Personally I can't wait to get Linux native binaries of this game. Should be possible to port it to some more obscure architectures like PPC and ARM. It's not just for modding an engine, lots of other platforms benefit too. Jedi Academy on Solaris.
What is the point of this? A lot less than most of you may think. The graphics, characters, dialogue, plot etc., belongs to Disney (as the owner of the Star Wars franchise), as well as Raven. The irony here is that Lucas (the former owner) already allowed not-for-profit use of his intellectual property under many circumstances. This principle does not carry across to the direct use of the game assets.
The engine behind these games has long since been released as open-source by id (PS, that's 'id' as in id, ego and superego- you know, like in "monsters of the id"). These two games will have some interesting code for Raven's proprietary 3rd person combat systems. id created a number of 'tame' software houses to produce addons for their games, and these companies went on to extend id's engines significantly with script systems and bot engines (Rogue, Ritual and Raven were the significant ones).
Open source means these two games can be ported to various devices, but the assets of these games cannot be legally distributed. OK, 99% of all people who will play these games on their tablets or whatever will use pirated copies of the assets (ie., a pirate copy of the games), and presumably Activision has no interest in re-licensing the assets in order to re-release the game of new platforms themselves. These facts make the act of 'releasing' the code for these games a somewhat interesting act.
BTW, there is an interesting legal 'grey' area here. Disney could claim that even the code (say the stuff that makes the light sabres work) defines aspects of intellectual property that they own, and thus is not in Activision's exclusive purview for the purposes of releasing as open-source.
It's a Trap!
An AI_Jedi walks into a bar. Bartender asks, "What'll you have?" AI_Jedi responds, "A Jedi Mind Trick." Bartender asks, "How do you make that?" AI_Jedi replies, "Fuck it, just Force it."
\tools\ModView\oldskins.cpp(596): // {"February", 28}, // fuck the leap years
I guess we won't be playing this on 2016
Holy crap! I hope this results in a co-op mod that lets you play the single-player "campaign" with your friends! Jedi Knight 1 has one, and it's perfect for co-op. I'm sure these two will be even better with co-op.
158 columns? Are you kidding me?
Some of the code in the git repo is licensed incompatibly with the GPL so it is illegal to distribute binaries of these games, unless you manage to strip the incompatible code.
When people say "Mickey Mouse is copyrighted", what they mean is that the character has appeared only in copyrighted works; therefore, any other work featuring the character would be an infringing derivative work. In addition, the precedent in Dastar v. Fox is that trademarks cannot be used to extend the term of an expired U.S. copyright. Therefore, in 2025 when U.S. copyright in Plane Crazy, The Gallopin' Gaucho, and Steamboat Willie is expected to expire, Mickey Mouse's likeness will no longer distinctively identify products of The Walt Disney Company.
released for the two games. Go find a cliff or a bridge somewhere, then take your entire fucktarded family. Have all of them jump off to their deaths and after that jump to yours as you and your entire fucktarded family are obviously too fucking stupid to even exist let alone use a fucking computer.