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Quake First Person Shooters (Games)

Quake Source in Late 99? 63

Posted by CmdrTaco from the wouldn't-that-be-nifty dept.
Anthony Fuentes writes "According to this .mp3 interview with John Carmack (@37:15), he is planning to release the source to quake in late 1999. Doesn't sound like he has completely committed, but cool none the less. "
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Quake Source in Late 99? More

Quake Source in Late 99?

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  • That's what I heard anyway, from OSS.
  • At home on my cdrom I burned 15 months ago. It's sitting there waiting to become legal. Yes, I grabbed it off one of the ftp sites before it got zapped, but I never did anything with it due to my respect for id.

    Yeah, yeah, I could/should have deleted it before I made the CD, but too late now, so I hope that JC releases the Quake source sooner than later (I have ideas...)
  • Someone asked about releasing the Q1 engine source last fall... Carmack's reply was something to the effect of "it would be in bad taste to release the source when some licensees have yet to release a product..."
  • I've always been impressed with id. I still remember the first time I tried DOOM - it blew me away. Imagine, he was WALKING and it LOOKED LIKE HE WAS! Ever since then I've been a real id booster. With their releases of Wolfenstein and Doom source code, they really do show that they're much more friendly towards free software and consumers in general than most people. They don't make any money off DOOM anymore, so why not release the code? They still own the copyright on their levels. They should be emulated by many companies.
  • Perhaps my internal luser-filter prompted me to ignore them, but I didn't see anyone saying that they should release their current stuff.
    Even a lot of otherwise hardcore OSS folks consider gaming a special case (or support, say, OSS engines and proprietary data files).
  • Shaddup.

    Not all of us have access to such services in our hometowns. I know I dread returning home for breaks because I don't have my wonderful dorm ResNet service. :)

    *DSL doesn't exist in my area, and TKR cable (Bridgewater, NJ) doesn't even know what a cable modem is.
  • It sounds like Ozzy Ozbourne was the interviewer!!
  • This allows young programmers who have never seen professional source code, see how it's done. Think of all of the kids with computers thinking of getting into Visual Basic. But now they have this killer state of the art game they can actually learn from written in some other language.

  • I like the idea of interviews in mp3. Especially because my rvplayer is giving me errors :-(
  • and of course the code you can find on the web is the latest production code, cleaned up with instructions to compile etc...get real

  • It appears the MP3 was pulled because it wasn't
    supposed to be posted to the public :(

    Anyone have a mirror?

    -- Jochen

  • Know why? Because shipping any game is tougher than shit. At the start, everything is exciting and the enthusiasm is high. Writing new code is fun. But at the end, when all you're doing is fixing bugs life is miserable, and your only goal is getting the f****er out the door.

    Not that that is unique to writing games. But games make it tougher by putting a premium on performance (well, not SSI maybe;), and how quickly they become yesterdays technology.

    So since it's not going to be used a decade later, there is no reason to sweat over making it look like the standard C library. Just point out to a kid looking at the code that here is an example of a program that runs on millions of machines without a hitch. I think you'll see some beauty in it then.

  • You can get your Maestro-2 to work by booting into DOS and loading the DOS-based initialization driver, then using LOADLIN to load Linux. It will see the Maestro-2 as a regular SoundBlaster (can't remember if it is Pro or 16 -- probably Pro).
  • I'd rather see more work on crystal space. Why wait for an obsolete engine to come out when you can work on the state of the art
    crystal.linuxgames.com
  • that's ok. Some people want the state of the art and that's what crystal space is for. Some are more interested in stability because a game that crashes means that you "die" when you play.
  • Could that possibly be because the FPU is fast enough anyway? Personally I found the Quake source (not that I've seen it, honest ;) pretty typical of game runtimes. Heavily optimised in places that matter, bit of a hack where it doesn't. It's all about efficiency, including that of development time.

    Incidentally, the information you can glean from the tools is much more informative than the runtime.
  • Carmack has, let me see, how many games out there? And you have?

    The 'Right Way To Do Things' is to ship, even if it's a hack. Remember, this is a game, not an operating system, or a CAD package, a game.

  • correct me if i'm wrong
    but, at least, one of the ways the FSF says you can make money off a GPL'd program
    is to sell technical support (ala RedHat)
    while this is fine for something like Linux, which can be daunting to the new user
    a game like Quake is not that hard to figure out

    the reason i post this, is becuase i see some of you griping that they don't GPL or OpenSource thier current moneymaking programs
    well, the reason is they would have been out of business shortly after wolfenstien3d.
    and we really couldn't have that could we?

    i know i would be an even sadder person than i already am without Wolf3D, DooM, and Quake

    just a thought...
  • When this happens, this will be amazing. Source code to a really high quality game. I can't wait, I want to poke around the OpenGL code, rendering code, etc. It will be interesting to see how a game as complex as Quake is coded.

    Too bad the network code will be rather old and crusty, but even then it'll be a pleasure to look at :)
  • id has released the source to every major game they did. No reason to assume they wont keep doing it.
  • Who in the world puts >5mb mp3 files on a server that does not support resumes?? How RETARTED. Anyone have a mirror of the two files?
  • Actually I have cable modem access, but I can't keep it connected for more than a few minutes at a time!

    I get it thru Mediaone. Just stay away from them if you are thinking about cable.. THEY SUCK!
  • Yes, it is most fsck'd up. One-way cable, one way phone line, and it disconnects me every few minutes lately.. definitely not worth what its costing me
  • >Imagine if MS were to release the source to Win3.1. What the hell would you do with it?

    Laugh at it??
    :)
  • iD releasing the source for Quake is a far cry from the conventional attributions of Open Source. It is not open, but released as a useful tool for people to learn from and advance with. Essentially iD is giving away 'obsolete' technology, since no one will want to license it anymore with the coming advent of Quake3:Arena.

    Not that this isn't a good thing, it just isn't the same as Open Source with Capital Letters. It will still be useful and helpful for cadres of programmers wanting to learn something about graphics and real time rendering, and maybe even network stuff if they release the QuakeWorld stuff. Anyhow, it's still not official, so we'll have to wait!

    AS
    AS
  • Actually, yeah =)
    After the release of the Doom source, a whole bunch of improved versions came out; Boom, PRBoom, ZDoom, GLDoom, WinDoom, etc. In fact, most of them have added significant improvements(Key bindings, jump, z-look, more special effects, less limitations, better graphics/sound/resolution, hardware acceleration), and are currently in the process of rolling them up into one. Just because its old does not make Doom outdated. In very many ways Doom was more fun and satisfying than Quake ever was, and good games does not rely on state of the art engines. Look at Jedi Knight and many of their 2d adventure games... They are all hits without relying on technology beyond Commander Keen or DooM. Someone will see the Quake code, see how good it is, and add to it 3d sound support, or voice over network, maybe some real dynamic lighting/shading code, more real world physics, portals, etc.

    It is far from useless. I really do think someone will take it and run with it...

    AS
    AS
  • I agree. I don't see any way for the engine to be open source, if we compare the gaming engine to new technology coverable under patents and property laws. The source art, sounds, models, etc, things that actually make the game, have long been 'open' from iD/Id, ever since the popularity of hacking into DooM/DooMII, so in one real sense the game itself is open source; anyone can make any game they want, with the QuakeC or DLLs, and with their own or Id/iDs art, sounds, and models... Only stipulation I believe is to pay for a license if a commercial product is to be released.

    For all intents and purposes, I think iD/Id games do satisfy open source and public licenses in a loose way, just that the really important/special/money making parts are closed and covered up... The rendering engine, the network engine, and the data format/world representations...

    AS
    AS
  • Ah, but the difference is that by modifying the Quake source and game engine all these benefits could retroactively be applied to every single Quake mod, conversion, TC, derivative, and even the original... As well as new games and such, since all the editors, tools, and support structure for Quake already exist, whereas for Crystal Space a lot of it is still in development. That is one of the biggest reasons people work on the DooM code, because of the widespread support and infrastructure already in place; imagine how much more exists for Quake, which some still think offers the best internet play despite Quake2...

    AS
    AS
  • Any open source is good open source. Bring it on!
  • Hmmm.... IIRC real Quake source *was* released by some hackers who got it by hacking crack.com's server. So yeah... *full* source is out and has been out for 2-3 years already.

    mtor
  • Don't get mad at id for their "open" release of doom. They wanted to make it an Open release, but they had licensed the sound engine, remember? Even though I doubt it'll be open in the GPL sense, it stands a good chance of being darn close. These guys still care about the community... most of the folks at id now WERE "the community" within a measurable timeframe.

    -Chris

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