Independent Adventuring Leads To New Horizons

Thanks to DIY Games for its column discussing the state of freely downloadable independent PC adventure games for July. The author raves: "I don't think I'm exaggerating if I say that July was by far the best month for independent adventure gaming this year", and goes on to profile titles such as A Very Special Dog ("You play a German shepherd with the task to save a life and find the culprit... you'll sniff objects, bark at people or lick them, all in order to successfully complete the game") and Apprentice II: The Knight's Move ("top quality independent gaming... [with] a very deep story and great character development.") Talking of character development, I'm afraid this is my (simoniker's) last ever Slashdot story post. Read on for details...

Firstly, thanks to everyone who's helped make Slashdot Games (as well as my work on the Slashdot main page) a pleasure to edit over the past 18 months (and 3000+ posts) or so. It's been a wonderful experience, and I'm really going to miss it. Unfortunately, this is the final story I'll be posting, since I'm off to videogame trade site Gamasutra.com, which I've written for fairly extensively in the past, to take up a managing editor position.

I believe there will be an announcement about a new Slashdot Games editor reasonably soon. However, I'm sure the other editors will pick up some of the slack in the interim, so hang in there, everyone. In the meantime, please inundate the submission bin with stories about obscure Japanese console re-issues, why the Infinium Phantom is going to trounce the Megaton, and why the Reggielution is absolutely, positively going to be televised. Later, all.

Re:Slashdot is a site for participants.

[cluke]

Well can't we all participate in discussing games?

Re:Slashdot is a site for participants.

[Futurepower(R)]

We can, but it should logically be on a different site.

Feeding da trolls, feeding da trolls....

[Chmcginn]

Games are for people who want to be spectators of someone else's creation.

Congratulations! You just won the "Ridiculously Sweeping Generalization of the Day" award!

I mean, seriously, you couldn't even say "video games" or "online games" or something slightly more specific? Because by saying "games", no modifier, you've just included sports, word games, party games, board games, and a thousand other types of amusements. It's like saying literature, or film, are just for spectators. It's not even an

Re:Slashdot is a site for participants.

[Macgrrl]

Games are for people who want to be spectators of someone else's creation.

Umm... no. Movies and TV are for people who want to be spectators of someone else's creation. Games are for people who want to interact with someone else's creation.

Thanks!

[keiferb]

You'll be missed, Simoniker!

You've always seemed to maintain one of the lowest dupe:post ratios of all of the editors. Well, either that or my memory's going... =)

Best of luck to you at Gamasutra!

Sure. Mod me off-topic if you must. I'll just go play that dog-licking game.

Re:Thanks!

[Universal Nerd]

Parent may have been moded funny but I agree with him 100%.

You've posted a whole load of great stories on Slashdot without an obvious agenda.

BTW, since you're going to Gamasutra, I'll start reading it. :)

bye, sim!

[Emexies]

Well, I can honestly say that you were my favorite editor here on /.
Of course, I've never really paid much attention to the actual editors, but I liked the fact that /. games weren't just a summary of the latest (p)reviews and press releases: it actually felt like the editor (you, simoniker) wanted to convey something more.

And, I've just gotten myself yet another reason to read Gamasutra. ;)

Thanks a lot, simoniker, I hope that /. games will be as interesting as when you were the editor! Cheers, and good luck with the new job!

Ditto

[sbszine]

Big up Simon, you will be sorely missed. Thanks for posting my half-baked submissions : )

Re:bye, sim!

[eggstasy]

Goodbye simoniker. Thank you for always covering Second Life [secondlife.com] so extensively. The slashdottings really helped the world grow :)

Free adventure gaming

[Nomihn0]

Any month in which a single game worth playing is released for free is a good month. That said, the good folks over at Hack'n'Slash are on their way to delivering. Check it out here [sourceforge.net]. Admittedly, it is an action rpg, not really an adventure game - but I figure that it would appeal to a similar crowd.

Re:Free adventure gaming

[Anonymous Coward]

Wow. "Hack And Slash".

Those Open Source Gamers sure know how to name and market their games! I can't wait for "Car Game" and "Punch and Kick" and "Yet Another Warcraft Clone."

Confused by something on the hack'n'slash site:

[geminidomino]

The site says:

[Hack and Slash] is meant to be re-used and/or altered for use in both free computer games AND NON-FREE COMPUTER GAMES, under the terms of the GPL open source licence.

Now, how can it be used in "NON-FREE COMPUTER GAMES" if its under the terms of the GPL? Doesn't the GPL force any derived work to be freed whether it wants to be or not?

That would be incorrect

[Midnight Ryder]

Now, how can it be used in "NON-FREE COMPUTER GAMES" if its under the terms of the GPL? Doesn't the GPL force any derived work to be freed whether it wants to be or not?

You missunderstand the GPL. I can, with no problems, create a game that utilizes a GPL based engine, but copyright the content that makes up the game. Sure, the engine can be reused at will, and I do have abide by the terms of the GPL (making all of my programming changes available to PURCHASERS. Note that word - purchasers can redistribute it to non-purchasers, but I can choose to only make the source available to anyone who I provide a binart yo.) But the content? That CAN (your option) be strictly copyrighted material. Check the GNU site for more information on the subject.

Re:That would be incorrect

[geminidomino]

I thought that might be the case. I can't stand reading the GNU site, honestly, because its too hard to get an answer without wading through floods of rhetorical navel-gazing.

This sort of "reverse NWN" approach does have some promise though, especially if it means I can stop having to actively AVOID GPLed code.

Re:That would be incorrect

[Tim C]

Note that word - purchasers can redistribute it to non-purchasers, but I can choose to only make the source available to anyone who I provide a binart yo.

I think you misunderstand the GPL in that respect. gnu.org appears to not be responding at the moment, but from memory the FAQ refers to "the users of the program" when speaking of source code availability, not "the users of the program who obtained it from you". As I understand it, if you (re)distribute a GPLed program, then anyone who receives it from

Re:That would be incorrect

[Clover_Kicker]

Sort of like the Doom/Doom2 demos - the only difference between the demo and the full game was the WADs (data files).

Re:Free adventure gaming

[NoMoreNicksLeft]

Can't believe that no one has mentioned Peasant Quest. Joke or not, one of the funnest games I've played in years.

Comment removed

[account_deleted]

Comment removed based on user account deletion

Re:hmmm

[NanoGator]

"maybe the new Games editor will change the color scheme to something other than retina-blasting ultraviolet?"

SURGEON GENERAL's WARNING: Use of this color range may result in skin cancer.

Re:hmmm

[TMLink]

It's better than the IT [slashdot.org] color scheme.

Has Slashdot gotten to the Daryl and Daryl stage of color schemes? There's gotta be better colors out there somewhere...

Re:hmmm

[ConceptJunkie]

It's a hyperintelligent shade of the color blue, you insensitive clod.

Re:hmmm

[Chmcginn]

That explains why I keep hearing voices when I check Slashdot...

having colour trouble ? try this :

[DrSkwid]

having colour trouble ? try this :

http://www.slashdot.org/users.pl?op=edithome

[x] Light (reduce the complexity of Slashdot's HTML for AvantGo, Lynx, or slow connections)

Heheh good luck pal

[NanoGator]

"I believe there will be an announcement about a new Slashdot Games editor reasonably soon."

And a new hot-pink color scheme!

interesting modpoint distruíbution.

[Emexies]

So, let me get this straight:

About half of the comments so far are about simoniker being missed, and they're all modded off topic. Why? Wasn't more than HALF the newspost about this very topic?
And come on, moderators, where's your sense of compassion, anyway? =)

Now THIS post, on the other hand, is clearly off topic, and SHOULD be modded likewise.

Re:interesting modpoint distruíbution.

[stefanlasiewski]

Perhaps they should have had two articles to cover the two different topics?

Re:

[account_deleted]

Comment removed based on user account deletion

Congrats

[sien]

Good to hear you're going off to gamasutra. The slashdot games section has been great, maybe excepting the color scheme. If only there were as many posts in the other sections.

back to Cliff

[gmhowell]

So now we are back to just Cliff for editors on slashdot who don't suck. Oh well, at least there will now be one writer on gamasutra who DOESN'T suck:)

Thanks Sim

[focitrixilous P]

Indeed, games.slashdot is one of my favorite sections. Thanks for the lack of dupes. Hope your new job goes just as well as this one.

And a big old 'rock on; for good measure.

Thanks for a good run.

[mrseigen]

You've made Slashdot Games one of the most mature and interesting games-related pages I've ever read. The signal-to-noise ratio is great.

Good luck, you'll find a lot of other great writers to buddy with at Gamasutra.

Add this to the pile...

[Axem]

You'll be missed simoniker. Ever since the games section has introduced on Slashdot, it was my most regularly checked section of the site (aside from the main page of course ;-)).

I gave up on reading IGN, and gamespot a long time ago. Way too many ads, flash elements, and sponsored garbage. But here, it was much easier to digest. Thanks for making it so enjoyable, and good luck on your new job. =)

PS I think it needs to be said that this color scheme is my favourite (No joke).

Peasant's Quest!

[mh101]

How could a discussion about adventure games have missed Peasant's Quest! [homestarrunner.com]

Re:Peasant's Quest!

[Alkaiser]

Seriously. Peasant's Quest was WAY cool and free...and somehow totally ignored by the article.

http://www.netjak.com/review.php/668

What's extra cool is how the guys at HSR kept updating the game. =) Try making friends with Kerrek now.

I'm glad to see

[ricotest]

I'm glad to see such a strong community [agsforums.com] that has centred around adventure games. It's hopeless commercially, it seems, with many small projects still looking for a publisher. But free games keep getting cranked out!

I think this is because there is so much fun to be had in actually making these games. There are dozens of engines [adventureg...udio.co.uk] that can handle virtually all of the programming work for you. What's left is the art, dialogue, story, puzzles and witty responses. For a creative group of people this kind of thing enables them to do what they do best without being boggled down in engine specifics. That's why recent games [the-underdogs.org] seem to reach almost LucasArts quality with much less work.

I feel that the only issue is the number of one-man projects there are. It's very hard to collaborate on these projects with no source control or commercial incentive. People have their own independent visions for how the game will come out, and most of these guys are artists or writers, not leaders. With the tools that are already there, a group of 20 or so people could apply the open source methodologies and develop a game that would even surpass LucasArts standards, and be just as long and fun to play. I think - well, I hope - that this is the way forward for adventure games, because the results would be really promising.

Prior Art?

[ulcer_boy]

I'm guessing the reason simoniker is leaving is that he needs to file a patent infringement lawsuit against the makers of the German shepherd game. His usb-enabled leash controller is almost done!

Seriously though, thanks for all the thousands of posts!!!