Centurion_13 Posted July 30, 2011 Report Share Posted July 30, 2011 So recently I was messing around with linux set up that I normally use for android development and I randomly decided to check out some of the games available through synaptic. Lo and behold, perhaps due to some unintentionally strategic naming, (0 followed by an a? It's an alphabetical order dream come true) 0ad sat at the top of the list. Some time ago, (my inbox suggests ~2005?), long before it open sourced) I used to work on in the art department (although, in retrospect I was pretty terrible and was constantly busy with high school and stuff so I don't think I really ended up helping much). So anyway, I decided to check it out.Firstly, Hey cool, it's actually playable - kind of. I think the only major/noticeable difference from last time I checked it out (it was still on an SVN I believe) is the addition of AI and the path finding seemed a little better. I'm sure there has been much added to it since but that's pretty cool. Some of the new maps are pretty awesome too. Rather liked the Peloponese one, did Michael make that? It's very similar to the one he made for AoM. Sadly it runs pretty slow and has a lot of graphical glitches on my computer, but I suspect that is mostly due to my poor video drivers on linux than it is the games fault. It used to run buttery smooth on my old integrated intel graphics chip and ~1.2GHz celeron processor from 2002 so yeah. I take it we overshot the planned release date of late 2006 or whatever though, seeing as we seem to be still in alpha builds. What happened there? Just not enough programming support? We seemed to be pretty on schedule at the time.I used to rather enjoy hanging out here and it had some really great community forums. Sadly it seems they've mostly become archived which is kind of disappointing. Also I noticed that the TLA sections got archived, although it's still on the website? Is that canned or what? It seemed like a pretty cool spin-off project.Anyway, I hope you are all doing well, how's it going these days? Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Jeru Posted July 30, 2011 Report Share Posted July 30, 2011 Hi Shan, nice to see you. I contributed around 2003-'04, but your nick doesn't ring a bell. I only interacted with a few team members, though.How old were you when you contributed? How old are you now? What are you doing these days? And do you feel that 0 A.D. has contributed something to your own life?TLA is on the backburner, as it has largely been abandoned. And I guess the 2006 deadline has been pushed back to 2012. I think the game suffered from near stagnation for a while in the mid-00's, particularly in the programming department. Going open source and releasing regular alphas has attracted new developers and sped up development tremendously. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Centurion_13 Posted July 30, 2011 Author Report Share Posted July 30, 2011 (edited) Not sure when I started, working on it, maybe 2004? I don't really have any old files as a reference. I would have been around 14 I guess? Give or take. I'm 22 now, seems so long ago. It did help me make some friends once, when I moved states back in 05 or so. It was pretty cool to be part of the project.I vaguely remember you, well your name at least, as you said I don't think we got to interact much though.EDIT: How long has it been open sourced now? Edited July 30, 2011 by Centurion_13 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Jeru Posted July 30, 2011 Report Share Posted July 30, 2011 2 years. Nice to have you back. What do you study or do for a living? Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Ykkrosh Posted July 30, 2011 Report Share Posted July 30, 2011 Hello I think the game suffered from near stagnation for a while in the mid-00's, particularly in the programming department. Going open source and releasing regular alphas has attracted new developers and sped up development tremendously.Yeah, and I think a lot of features worked superficially but had fundamental problems (that would really hurt with multiplayer (which never properly worked), saved games (which weren't even attempted), AI (not attempted), etc, and was inflexible and crash-prone and generally painful to work with), which contributed to programming stagnation since it was too hard to improve the code and nobody wanted to work on it and there wasn't much point working on the rest of the game if the gameplay couldn't work. That's all redesigned and reimplemented now, building on the benefits of hindsight, and (in my (admittedly pretty biased) opinion) works much better - the game doesn't really look more advanced than it did many years ago, but the technology is much more complete and robust and can actually work this time, so we're in a much better state Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Jeru Posted July 30, 2011 Report Share Posted July 30, 2011 Philip is, of course, being modest. He almost singlehandedly navigated the project's codebase through dire straits in much of '09-'10. Without his contributions, the game would almost certainly be abandonware. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Mythos_Ruler Posted July 30, 2011 Report Share Posted July 30, 2011 abandonware. Not too dissimilar to used underwear. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
chaosislife Posted July 31, 2011 Report Share Posted July 31, 2011 I thought the abandonware term only applied to commercial games and software? Meaning that anything which was already free of charge couldn't be considered abandonware. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Mythos_Ruler Posted July 31, 2011 Report Share Posted July 31, 2011 I thought the abandonware term only applied to commercial games and software? Meaning that anything which was already free of charge couldn't be considered abandonware.Sure it could, if it was never finished. Abandonware has a specific meaning that you outline, but it can also have a broader usage as Jeru has done. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Centurion_13 Posted July 31, 2011 Author Report Share Posted July 31, 2011 Hello Yeah, and I think a lot of features worked superficially but had fundamental problems (that would really hurt with multiplayer (which never properly worked), saved games (which weren't even attempted), AI (not attempted), etc, and was inflexible and crash-prone and generally painful to work with), which contributed to programming stagnation since it was too hard to improve the code and nobody wanted to work on it and there wasn't much point working on the rest of the game if the gameplay couldn't work. That's all redesigned and reimplemented now, building on the benefits of hindsight, and (in my (admittedly pretty biased) opinion) works much better - the game doesn't really look more advanced than it did many years ago, but the technology is much more complete and robust and can actually work this time, so we're in a much better state Ah fair enough. I'm not overly familiar the the codebase on this but I've inherited a mess of a codebase on an android project before and it was pretty depressing to work on. Anyway, I'm glad to hear it's sorted out now (fairly recently it seems). Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
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