Cross-Platform Open Source Video Game: Nexuiz
I’m all about open source – and I know my community is all about gaming. Put these two things together, and it’s a formula for success (usually). Not every project shines, but Samual wanted us to know about this one in particular…
Hey, I’m in a community of developers and game enthusiasts who created the game Nexuiz, built on the Darkplaces game engine (derived from the Quake I game engine). I know you may not normally review open source game projects, but take a look at this game. The physics in this game are the most unique, allowing for strafing and weapon jumping. Since this game is open source and uses OpenGL, you can imagine it has been compiled for quite a few platforms. Including, but not limited to, Windows, OS X, Linux and UNIX. There has been talk about moving the game to a console, but no action has been taken yet.
The community has created a full tournament system (The Ladders) where people can enter into competitions of our many game types. Public multiplayer servers usually have about 20 to 100 active players at one time – if not, bots can be placed into the game. Single player has a large amount of levels which get harder with each stage. In total, the game has 12 game types, most popular being: LMS (Last Man Standing), CTF (Capture the Flag), DM (DeathMatch), TDM (Team DeathMatch), 1v1 (One versus One, mainly on private servers), Race (because of the physics in this game, you can accelerate yourself at very high speeds, allowing you to race through checkpoints in maps), and many more. All in all, the game is developed by professionals with some free time, and is, in essence, able to compete with the industry’s standards.
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3 Comments
Jaremy
April 18th, 2009
at 11:47pm
Pardon my ignorance, but what are the advantages of Nexuiz over, say, QuakeLive? I understand that it’s open source, but the advantages of having a well-known, dedicated game development studio are significant. The price is an advantage, yes, but I also feel that Nexuiz is doubtful to get as much competitive traction as a game like Quake.
Though I applaud the idea of Nexuiz, I just worry that it won’t a) reach as large an audience, b) be able to have the same level of quality and c) sustain itself over a long period of time. That being said, I hope I’m wrong, because it looks like a good game.
Samual
April 19th, 2009
at 2:27pm
Nexuiz has been out for quite a long time, actually. Some main advantages over QL are as listed: QL is only supported inside a web browser, QL requires a proprietary plugin which is not compatible with Linux or OS X yet. (Maybe OS X, not sure actually). QL does not have a welcoming fun community, nor does it have the ability for anyone to create maps or servers or any content.
In just, QL is not effectively cross platform, requires the internet to play (As Nexuiz does not), and is proprietary.
Euan Torano
May 2nd, 2009
at 12:59am
I used to play this game almost 24/7 on my Ubuntu installation – that and Open Arena. Both are great FPS games and easily rival other commercial games.