Gaming Daily A-Z

Cortex Command is a mess, but in a good way. This bizarrely entertaining strategy blend has been undergoing continuous development since the early 2000s, having had its first main release in 2012. Seven years later, its creators decided it's time to let the community have a say. Just one day ago developer Data Realms announced on the game's Steam page it was freeing the game's code under the GNU Affero License v3 . While this release does not include any of the game's data or graphics, meaning you still have to purchase a full copy or replace them with your own, it is nevertheless welcoming news to see game studios embracing Free Software licensing, enabling users to modify the game at their own will. The game itself is as fun as ever. An ungodly hybrid between X-COM, Terraria, and Starcraft, Cortex Command is one of those games whose chaotic approach to physics simulation can lead to some pretty hilarious moments. The game pits several factions in a messy planetary w...

FS-UAE is one of the newest Commodore Amiga emulators on the scene, and perhaps the only true multiplatform emulation project for the system still in development. It has had astounding progress since it was originally released in 2011, and last week it announced the release of version 3.0. The changes in the newest release are many and varied, so feel free to check the full changelog available here . FS-UAE has garnered a very good reputation for being a quality emulator focusing on ease of use and multiplatform support. The developer also maintains the OpenRetro Database , where users can submit information and configuration files to help running the games easier. The FS-UAE launcher tool The Amiga is one of the home computers originally developed by Commodore back in the 1980s. During its heyday it was considered to be a revolutionary platform, notorious for its user friendliness and the quality of its sound chipset. Its game library, although found to be meager by some nowadays, ha...

For the first time I heard of Vegan on a Desert Island I assumed it was some kind of bad joke, and frankly this impression lasted with me for a while. However, through some amazing persistence and determination from the developers, this upcoming title is slowly capturing the hearts of the libre development community through sheer charm and wits. Determination might really be the key word here; lead developer Alex Gleason claims he's set out to answer one of humanity's most sought after existential questions: "What would a vegan do if stranded on a desert island?" Taking it from there, the game promises action, puzzle solving, and more drama and plot twists you can (literally) shake a stick at, because everyone knows that the best way of getting answers for some real world problems is through the semblance of a Zelda-like RPG. Yes, you read it right, this game will be an action RPG at its core, and this should come at no surprise; after all, Vegan on a Desert Island i...

It has been a while since we last spoke of KeeperRL . The hybrid blend of dungeon building sim with roguelike features seems to be doing rather well, with a growing community and regular progress updates. The latest alpha has just been released, and this time it has a flavor for modding. Aside from the regular bugfixing and gameplay improvements, this build adds upgraded mod support and an in-game downloader for community content. As with most roguelikes, the developers seem to have realized customization is key to maintain community engagement, a very positive assessment in our regard. You can read the full changelog here . For those who are not reminded, KeeperRL comes in two versions: a gratis package with plain ASCII graphics and no sound, and a commercial package including pixel art graphics and soundtrack, available for 12.99 EUR on a variety of digital stores. The program code is entirely Free Software, licensed under the GPLv3. Code license: GPLv3 Assets license: Proprietary ...

With city builder games climbing back into popularity, it was about time for a serious libre project to tackle the genre once again. After many years of abandoned efforts, it is now the turn of Cytopia to try to scratch that itch. The project had its inception in 2018, when now lead developer JimmySnails announced in a forum post the intention of creating an engine that could replicate most of the functionalities of the classic SimCity 2000, a game still near and dear to many players up to this day. Ever since then, Cytopia evolved into what appears to a fully-fledged independent game-in-progress, with its own graphics, features, and even an editor planned down the line. Aside from the obvious SimCity 2000 influences, the game also appears to draw inspiration from the recently released TheoTown, with main graphics artist KingTut101 crafting assets in a very similar style. Whether Cytopia will deliver where others have failed remains to be seen, but as usual we encourage you to downlo...

The hide-and-seek simulator The Dark Mod (TDM) has had a new release as of last week. For those who don't remember, TDM is a Doom 3 mod-gone-standalone that aims to recreate a similar game experience to that of Looking Glass Studio's Thief series. It is known amongst both stealth game aficionados and free software enthusiasts as a project of exceptional quality, with a dedicated community of content creators. The latest release 2.07 focuses on stability and performance. Since we last reported on this amazing project, the game has progressed leaps and bounds both in content and quality. The extensive loading times and performance irks that plagued the initial standalone releases, from the project's early emancipation from Doom 3 game asset and codebase requirements, are now mostly a thing of the past, and are set to be improved even further, as multi-core support has finally been added to the engine (albeit as an experimental feature). Future updates will bring the game to...

Some of you might remember previous coverage of Solarus, the Free Software Zelda-like ARPG engine that comes with its own complete game creation suite and a pretty impressive palette of Zelda fan games already available under its wing. As of last December, version 1.6 has been released, and while the changes under the hood are too many to number (check the full announcement and changelog here ), it is worth highlighting the package now includes a more varied amount of libre tilesets, meaning developers now have available a wider choice of default non-proprietary graphics to use on their own creations. While the community is still very much focused around Zelda fan-games and their respective copyrighted graphics, this is an important first step to attract more developers and spark future libre game projects. The Ocean's Heart tileset, now part of the Solarus package. One such project is Ocean's Heart , the brainchild of Solarus community member Max Mraz. The game follows a game...

Lasers, rockets, shields, health regeneration, pixels. You know. The good stuff. Just nicely packaged with levels of just the right duration and hardness, persistent upgrades, shaders, reverb... Two buttons are enough to play, since that was one of the themes of Ludum Dare #34 , in which the game came #74 among 1638 jam entries. Super Space Invader Review Supser Space Invader was made with  LÖVE  (v0.9) and thus runs on Linux, OS X, Windows. The source is available on GitHub under  zlib/libpng .

Many of us know Space Station 13 as "that awesome game I never played". Along with games like Dorf Fortress it stands as one of the pinnacles of the gameplay philosophy of fun through massive amounts of diversity. Originally developed in one of the most broken and unupdated platforms ever imaginable, BYOND, fans of the game have been trying to develop a standalone remake of the game for a while. After a long period of development, the team of Robust Games, in charge of the project, decided to liberate the whole thing and turn to open development. This means all of the code is now GPLv3 and all of the art assets are now CC-BY-SA, effectively making the game 100% free-as-in-free-domes.  So what are you waiting for? Get to developin'! EDIT: Apparently only the placeholder sprites (not the fancy ones in the screenshot) have been released under CC-BY-SA. The game should still be 100% playable with these, though. Official page Source Code (github) Code License: GPLv3 Assets ...

Galaxy Forces is an open-source moon lander shooter single-/multiplayer game hosted on SourceForge, it is nearly finished. It is unique of its kind in offering global hiscores and achievements. Replays and AI enemies also available. Try it . It plays on Win, Mac and Linux.

Godot winter icon A game dev jam to create a winter-themed open source game was community-initiated at the Godot forums . The (vote-determined) winner will get a budget of USD 50 to have donated to an open source project of their choice. What is Godot? Godot editor Godot  is a game engine. No wait, it's actually a game development IDE with its own Lua-based scripting language. As far as I can tell, it's a promising project that is a bit buggy, especially when it comes to mobile exports. It has some UI flaws  (subjectivity warning) but still, open source Godot is more appealing than proprietary Unity 3D. If you want to try making a game in Godot, I recommend this official tutorial as a starting point. Good luck & great success to you! What else? Another way to support Godot: "like" it as a Unity 3D alternative on alternativeTo .

Just in case you can stand having Steam DRM installed in your system, I recommend taking a look at Strife: Veteran Edition . Strife is a Shooter/RPG based on the Doom Engine and dating back to 1996. The developers for this new remake had the wits and sensibility to use the Chocolate Doom engine as the main code base, which is, of course 100% licensed under the GPL. With so many top quality Free Software engine remakes around here, it really astounds me why so few developers choose to use them on modern HD remakes and ports (I'm looking at YOU, upcoming remake of Heroes of Might and Magic III not using VCMI ). As mentioned, so far the game is available exclusively on Steam, but I'm pretty sure a DRM-free GOG version will eventually follow, as it usually does. Code License: GPLv2 + LGPL Assets License: Proprietary Website Source Code (Github)

There's a new big remake effort a-brewing in the Free Software world, this time for prominent shooter/RPG, System Shock . under the shape of project Citadel . According to project description, the goal is to recreate the original game using the widely known GPLed platform Darkplaces Engine , upgrading the game's graphics to full 3D but keeping game aesthetics close to the origianl game. Added modding capabilities and cooperative multiplayer will also be a part of the project.  Details, however, are somewhat scarce, so far, as development is happening behind closed doors, and creator Josiah Jack just announced the existence of the project itself after months of programming in secret. While the code will certainly be all GPL or GPL-compatible due to Darkplaces licensing requirements, the game appears to rely on original proprietary assets, as well as using its own whose license nature is yet to be disclosed. With a release date planned for the the 23rd of December, System Shock...

Thanks to Tangram Games for pointing out to us that they just released version 1.0 of their local multiplayer game Duck Marines . They describe it as: Duck Marines is a cross-platform free software PC remake of Sonic Team’s ChuChu Rocket . Duck Marines attempts to recreate the magic from the local multiplayer of ChuChu Rocket while adding new elements like mini games, a level editor, colorful pixel art and more. But see for yourself: For those not familiar with the original on the Dreamcast here is a small description of the gameplay: The goal of the game is to get as many ducks into the submarine of your color. Gray ducks give you one point, gold ducks give multiple points and pink ducks will trigger an event or mini game. Guide the ducks towards your submarine by placing arrows on the ground. When walking over an arrow ducks will instead walk in the direction the arrow is pointing. Beware of the blue predators. Predators love to eat ducks and will kill a large number of your ...

OpenRA is a Free Software recreation of the famed Command & Conquer engine, and it aims to support and enhance all Westwood games originally built upon it, namely Tiberian Dawn , Red Alert , and Dune 2000 . However, unlike most engine remakes, OpenRA isn't a simple 1:1 recreation with a little streamlining here and there, as the project also aims to optimize and rebalance the gameplay for purposes of online multiplayer. The project has recently released the latest stable version, fixing a lot of bugs and adding plenty of new features, as seen on the following release trailer: Interestingly enough, in order to play all the games supported by OpenRA, you are not forced to own an original copy of any, given that all three ones were released gratis a few years ago . Though the package comes without any of this data, it immediately invites the player to download it from the project's own repositories, thus making all the games readily available to play. The campaign mode is sti...

We have previously mentioned OpenXcom on several occasions before, but now the massive UFO: Enemy Unknown engine reimplementation project finally hit the long-awaited 1.0 mark, and they decided to celebrate by releasing this lovely trailer that sums up quite well the insane amount of detail and improvement put into the project over the course of 4 years. I'll let it do justice by itself, but not without thanking all the contributors for raising one of the most acclaimed DOS-era strategy classics from the stagnating swamps of buggy unsupported legacy releases and platform incompatibility. On a final note, the engine is, of course, free-as-in-freedom, though it relies on original game data of proprietary nature. You can download OpenXcom here , and buy an affordable digital copy of the original game on Steam, or somewhere around the web. Code License: GPLv3 Assets License: Relies on original proprietary data files. All new original art assets included in the OXC package available ...

This week saw finally saw the official release of version 3.0 of FlightGear . Notable changes: Highlights in this release include integration of the FGCom voice communications client within the simulator, improved terrain rendering, faster scenery loading, and improved usability. This release also coincides with the release of FlightGear World Scenery 2.0 – massively improved scenery data covering the entirety of the planet and incorporating OpenStreetMap roads and detailed terrain information from a variety of sources. Also interesting is the " Bombable " add-on, which adds combat mechanics:

Merry Christmas from FreeGamer! As a nice present from the 0 A.D. team, the new Alpha 15 Osiris was released today: Lots of great new features and especially multiplayer games should be now much easier to do with hosting improvements and a lobby for browsing available games. Another open-source RTS engine (using Mono/C# though) has also released a new version: OpenRA . Currently it is still geared toward running an assortment of older Command & Conquer based games, so you need to own these for the data. But this release adds lua scripting for the creation of custom missions, so maybe someone will come up with a libre game to run on this engine. Last but not least, a new version of Warzone2100 was released about a week ago. This one actually includes some higher resolution textures, which is hopefully the first step to officially integrate all the awesome new art assets from the art revolution project . Speaking of WZ mods: There is also an interesting new tower-defense mod cur...

Not only from the clutches of Ganondorf, but also from the dominion of proprietary software. All thanks to the magnificent Solarus Engine , a GPLed , SDL-based , 2D action RPG engine. This amazing project aims to provide a stable and easily customizable platform for users to create their own Zelda-like games, and so far, I must say, I am darn impressed by what I've seen. The engine already has two incredible launching titles, named The Legend of Zelda: Mystery of Solarus DX , and a parody of the former, Mystery of Solarus XD . Both are true love letters to the classic SNES RPG, The Legend of Zelda: A Link to the Past , and amazing and enjoyable games on their own. Mystery of Solarus DX But hark, the mere words of a mortal make no justice to the grandiosity of this undertaking. Sheathe thy sword, get thy green cap and ready yourself to adventure! You can start by marching straight to the Solarus download section , or, if your intentions are more creative, you can check the various s...

If you follow our planet , this is no news, but the recent advances in graphics, networking a other stuff from SuperTuxKart are quite nice. This is basically a result of them being accepted to this years Google Summer of Code . Not showing most of the new features yet is this nice video featuring the mascot of OpenGameArt.org as a new player character: But their blog has many interesting technical details (and other screenshots + videos) to show off the new features. So if you like to also contribute, or just want to praise the great work, have a look at their FreeGamer hosted forums :)