Comment by eterm | Hacker News Reader

Comment by eterm | Hacker News Reader

I mean no disrespect to anyone who maintains a game on this list.

But I find this list incredibly sad.

A list containing mostly clones of other (old) games, or previously closed source games that have since had their source released. ( And few outside of iD software titles at that ).

It's difficult to get excited about a game when the promise is, "Play this game that was fun 20 years ago".

For all the creativity that ought to be present in the open-source "community", how come there's never really been a true open source gaming hit?

How is that the open source community can appear to organise to deliver millions of unpaid hours of cutting edge work when it comes to operating systems and it's applications, but falls so flat when it comes to the creative side, especially gaming?

I'm not saying you shouldn't enjoy things like openTTD, it's fine to enjoy that if you do, but it's just difficult to get too excited about a game if the goal is simply to recreate an experience that was available 20+ years ago, and when the screenshots page unironically links 600x400 images.

If that's the best example of open source gaming, then there's no hope.

Perhaps I'm being unfair, certainly Mindustry looks like it actually fits the trifecta of being:

    * Original
    * Credible
    * Modern

I can't see anything else on that list that fits that description though.

Lists like this do a dis-service to gaming, if someone was getting into PC gaming was presented this list, they'd be more put off than encouraged when many of the games appear to have fewer pixels than their mobile, and are loving re-creations of old games, many of which you probably wouldn't enjoy if you hadn't played the original.

If this list were simply a short list of the 2 or 3 games which do appear to be more modern and original, it would be a better list.

fwiw, Overgrowth is probably another exception to your grivances. But it's also only semi-open source; the assets still require a purchase, but it's neat that it's an option at all for a modern, "AA" scoped game without being a gray area reverse engineering project.

>If that's the best example of open source gaming, then there's no hope.

It's a difficult conundrum. Very few programmers can create a "modern" game from scratch by themselves. So you contract artists or buy asset packs. The former means you either eat a huge cost or try to sell the game to make it back, and the latter 99% of the time means you cannot make the game truly open source (unless you do an in-between like Overgrowth).

Those that can do that probably may only be able to scope to make games like Open Golf[1]. As a programmer I can respect the tech here. game made without an engine in plain C, which has lighting, physics, an in-game editor, and a full game loop. While being cross platform for web, mobile, and PC. We both know this isn't a trivial matter, but without those fancy shaders, global illumination, and maybe some VFX no one would see it as "modern". Without higher fidelity models and textures you get the feel of an N64 game from first blush, despite seeing effects and techniques no Gen 5 game could accomplish.

I agree with you internally, I do want to see some more ambtious open projects that can help teach the next generation what goes into a modern, shippable game. But looking (and partially being) in the weeds makes me understand why very few sizeable business can do what you request. Especially businesses targeting console, a whole other can of worms. I want to try and also prove the exception, but I'd also probably take the Overgrowth route so I can get some money on the side.

[1]: https://github.com/mgerdes/Open-Golf

Games are harder to self-start than, say, OpenSSL because you have to make art and music and stuff.

The expensive is only worth it if an existing game has already justified it, like with mods (mods whose scale and complexity can be staggering).

Take a look at https://github.com/FakeFishGames/Barotrauma

Battle of Wesnoth fits the bill and is on the list.

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