Latest Humble Bundle Comes With Uplink Source Code

SharkLaser writes "The latest Humble Bundle comes with four great indie games from Introversion. Included in the pack are Uplink, Darwinia, DEFCON and Multiwinia. Bonus games include Aquaria, Crayon Physics Deluxe and the recently added Dungeons of Dredmor. Introversion also showcases some of their prototypes, like Subversion City Generator which demonstrates procedural generation of complex city environments, and Voxel Tech Demo for showing destroyable environments using voxel technology. Hackers and open source programmers around the world should also celebrate — Introversion will release source code for their games Darwinia, Multiwinia, DEFCON, and most importantly, Uplink, the legendary hacking simulation that is one of a kind."

Woo! Uplink!

[Bovius]

I know that admitting this means I have to turn in my Obscure Indie Game Enthusiast card, but I didn't know about Uplink until yesterday when I bought the newest Humble Bundle. Played it some today. Still amazed that they made the idea work at all, and that it's actually quite a bit of fun.

We all owe a huge debt of gratitude to Introversion for their pioneering work in indie games. I know that their games have a particular flair that doesn't appeal to everyone, but *that's the whole point* of indie games; with enough independent developers, you eventually get something quirky and awesome that fits your particular tastes.

Re:The License

[bonch]

There's a big difference between "source code available" and FOSS.

Good thing nobody is claiming this is "FOSS."

Re:Woo! Uplink!

[Anonymous Coward]

Still amazed that they made the idea work at all, and that it's actually quite a bit of fun.

This.

Business models based on data theft and/or vandalism for hire, chained anonymizing proxies with various levels of logging capabilities (or compromise :), SWATting opponents by (by faking records to send law enforcement after them), anonymizing bank transfers through the use of expendable proxy accounts, and you did all your hacking by renting a hardware platform of RAM/CPU/disk that existed (and was configured) through the cloud. And shadowy organizations whose agendas only become apparent when it's probably too late to change the color of your hat.

The game - written in 2001 - was set in 2010, which turned out to be just one year away from commercial botnets, Anonymous, Wikileaks, the Lulzsec-vs-Sony-howling-thru-the-wires world tour, and the rise of EC3 and other cloud virtualization/hosting services.

And the soundtrack, which someone else mentioned. They completely nailed the look-and-feel of all those goofy hacker movies of the 90s, while being not only fun, but downright prescient.

Re:The License

[CmdrPony]

Well, I like that I can modify the game the way I like, including all gameplay elements. And just look at the code to see how it's done. Most companies don't offer this. No one here is claiming it's FOSS. They've given source to it, which most companies don't do. The Introversion guys are also quite nice, so if you have some plans (ie., release your own version and such), just contact them and work it out. They just don't want to get screwed over.

Re:The License

[CmdrPony]

There is SVN and developer wiki and forum access to everyone who has bought humble bundle (and for previous developers). It's yours for whatever amount you choose to pay.

No other company goes that far. Almost no one releases sources for their games. And honestly, after reading this crying, I can't really blame them. No matter how much they try to please geeks, they always rant about how it's not exactly something they want, how they don't want to pay for it (even if that's $1) and how it's not on their favorite repo. They even have Linux versions of their games, which is a common rant topic here on slashdot. But now that it doesn't fit, you still have to rant about something just for the hell of it.

Even sometimes, be thankful for something good.

Re:News or an advert?

[migla]

Note to self: Do not forget to close tags or click the fucking preview button.

Re:The License

[shish]

Even sometimes, be thankful for something good

It's possible to be thankful *and* point out possible improvements

Re:The License

[Ginger Unicorn]

A handful of people noisily whinging on internet forums are not usually representative of the general population. People don't usually feel the urge to rant about how content or satisfied they are.