The Continuum Project

[Holes]

I have just read this entire thread.... and it took a long time.

 

Anyways I really like the idea of a story mode, with co-op. I've hated how if my internet goes down I can't play any of my games. ): Offline continuum would be pro. Also, storymode continuum over LAN (co-op) would be cool, hamachi > all.

 

I'm not a programmer but I'm a gamer and I love Continuum.

 

Dev. people, I SALUTE YOU!

[L.C.]

Had that some time ago. My server's been gone for quite some time, even though I still have all the stuff on it.

You lost some of your files? Do remember my offer of free webhosting in support for Thirdspace still stands. I may even be able get some free gameserver hosting for Thirdspace (for one zone/server).

[psyko]

Time to bring this topic back on top.

 

First off all, I agree with DAW.

 

The linux market would JUMP ALL OVER THIS GAME. They just need to know about it. Distros would probably include it in their repositories, and you'd have LOADS of people playing overnight more than likely. I recommend advertising this project to Ubuntu, PCLinuxOS, and Fedora Core users. You'll probably find a lot of bored game programmers there who would hop onto the project in a heartbeat.

 

Indeed. Having this future game in Ubuntu, SuSE, Fedora distributions as a built-in game would be something. People would find game easily and our community would get thousands of new players. And of course it should be available for Windows systems too. There a lots of programmers willing to participate in project that would help OS community to gain more users. Maybe Kontinuum could be "the killer application" for masses, maybe Kontinuum would be the the thing why people would start to use Linux. As we all know, games are the reason why so many people still "stick" with Windows. I myself use both OS, Suse and WindowsXp.

 

I'm no programmer, but I would offer up all 8 machines I run linux from to do further server and client testing. Its not much, but its what I can offer since

 

I have some experience with Java. I am trying to learn couple others languages also but mainly I could support this project with planning and background stuff.

 

Continuum on linux would increase the population and popularity of the game exponentially.

and

I !@#$%^&*ure you it will be worth every effort to continuing continuum's future to port this over to linux (and not just through WINE).

 

I believe that Open source is the key for Kontinuum to gain new users in future.

 

Btw I havent saw any real suggestions for new name. What about Kontinuum? KDE developers would love it

[Drake7707]

As we all know, games are the reason why so many people still "stick" with Windows. I myself use both OS, Suse and WindowsXp.

 

Untrue, i personally hate any linux distro's because they manage to piss me off each time i use them. You might say that it's much better once you know all the functions and stuff of linux, but i'm not willing to look for it when i have a perfectly running windows xp that i know everything about and is imho much better structurized and allows the user much more without asking the user it each time.

Linux are for those who fail at managing their computers and have a lack of security feeling (You can't destroy a windows xp if you know how to work with it) + the fact that those who start using a computer choose for windows because it's easier to do things you want.

Free isn't always better.

 

Though, linux is good for security and speed (memory & cpu) thus just want a server wants to have.

 

Btw I havent saw any real suggestions for new name. What about Kontinuum? KDE developers would love it

 

Kontinuum (kde) or Gontinuum (gnome) ?

[psyko]

Kontinuum (kde) or Gontinuum (gnome)?

 

Xontinuum

 

Anyways, what about questions like

 

1) should we start to collect list of people who would like to participate this project

2) should it start from scratch or use stuff already been made

 

Most important is to make this all organized. I bet we could find how-to-make-succesfull-project how-to's if we want to.

 

Freshmeat and sourceforge are perhaps the best places to start with this.

[Bak]

well, start by finding a single average or experienced c/c++ programmer with time to help out.

[»D1st0rt]

You don't have to be mean Drake, everything has its merits

 

 

With the overall development for the game in the state that it is, getting a bunch of new blood could do wonders

[psyko]

I will later today make up project to sourceforge. Lets see if I can get programmer/programmers via it.

 

You don't have to be mean Drake, everything has its merits

 

Opinion is like a-hole. Everyone has one.

[Drake7707]

naw it didn't want to be mean, just saying stuff

[»doc flabby]

Windows still owns linux on the desktop. But linux is catching up. I say give it 5 years and linux will be on a par with microsoft.

One of the big areas we are ignoring however. There is the large lack of MAC as well as Linux games. Now that new macs run on x86 it should be easy to port a linux compiled app on to the Mac i imagine (lol i say "easy" i have no idea)

-------------------------------------

FreePascal is pretty close to C speeds.

Object Pascal has a much nicer object model than c++ imo.

 

I dont think it would necesserly need to be programmed in c/c++. Or at least not all of it. Personally i would avoid the use of C++ altogether. We could stick to using C/C++/FreePascal to perform sections of the code that require high perfromance. The areas i can see the use of C or FreePascal (c++ if you must ) might be necessery

 

- the Physics engine

- network stack (including encryption)

 

The areas it could be necessery, but probabbly isnt.

 

- the Graphics engine

- responding to user interaction (mouse + keyboard + joystick events)

 

There is an arguement for using c/c++/FreePascal however. The main one being is they just work. You dont need to install "java" or ".net" or nething else to get the program to run. You can supply all the needed files in the installer. I think it would be a mistake to start on this project without having a plan. So far no such plan exists.

[»doc flabby]

An afterthough:

 

I think intending to remake, or duplicate the functionality of the current continuum client is a waste of time and energy.

Also it is hard to attract interest and investment for what would be essentially a conveluted bug fix

[Drake7707]

imo recreating continuum is a good way to get familiar with the physics and code involved. I made DCME (tho there were good editors available) because i learn a lot from it, how to handle problems that occur along the way.

[L.C.]

You don't have to be mean Drake, everything has its merits

 

 

With the overall development for the game in the state that it is, getting a bunch of new blood could do wonders

Drake wasn't mean, and if you think he was in that post, you're weak (this part of my reply isn't exactly directly on you, but anyone who does think his post was mean). He was just disagreeing and stating his feelings, and that's perfectly fine and acceptable. I never found it "mean" in any fashion. ;o Of course, everything does have its merits (or degrees?).

 

I don't agree with Open Source, to a degree of course. If you have a team (of professionals or working professionally), with the proper and acceptable designing of how you are going to make it open source, it's fine by me. I highly disagree making it open source in the first place, but making it open source "when its all over" (development is just looking for new ideas and such to improve the game at this point) shouldn't be a problem. You see, if you keep it closed source, people who are going to hack or abuse exploits are wasting there time. We don't have much of a problem with cheaters in Continuum any more. SSCI has an alternate banning trick by taking the IP of the violator (or abuser) and literally banning connections from the IP to the server itself in any way. Cheating isn't a problem. The developers just have to fix this bug or make an anti-hack to prevent an exploit or hack to be further continued and release a patch. Wallah! Time for the losers to find another exploit/hack. Infact, this should actually be almost just as helpful as if the game were open source, because those exploits, hacks, and bugs are still getting to the developers and allowing them to fix it.

 

Both ways you've got support; theoretically using Open source, you will have bugs patched faster, errors corrected faster, etc. But hey, Continuum here on the other hand, works just fine! The current bugs, exploits, and hacking abilities are either minor, easy to fix, or just new stuff of the modern 2006-07 (which means the security for Continuum is slowly becoming outdated). However the difference to Continuum and what I am talking about in the above paragraph is that Continuum's development is out of sight while my imagination of a "new Subspace" development would be continuous, active, and consistent with time. (Continuum is not because it's development support is missing at the moment, so we cannot update any part of it to be up to date with modern hardware, software, and technology).

 

I agree with both open and closed source to a degree. My opinion, so respect it like you would want yours.

 

EDIT :: I want to make an addition to my opinions and comments.

Personally I am against having anybody buy an engine or use someone else's. Please, make it from scratch by yourself or with your development team. Take the pride too. This is one of the reasons I admire Valve's Source engine to a degree.

[»doc flabby]

You may be interested to note in my original post i did not cite cheating as a reason to create a new client.

My main concern was vista, which has since ceased to be a problem. This has started to lead me in a different direction.

[Bak]

you're never going to get a team of professionals to invest time and energy unless they're getting paid. And there are cheats for Continuum.

[»D1st0rt]

Drake wasn't mean, and if you think he was in that post, you're weak

Excuse me?

 

I was fine with the part where he stated his opinion (was fine with the whole thing actually), this particular passage just seemed a little shortsighted to me.

Linux are for those who fail at managing their computers

 

Instead of "mean" would you have preferred I said "arrogant and condescending"? Because that carries a harsher connotation than I had intended.

[Drake7707]

it's just, most linux ppl i know tend to piss me off with their windows bashing. I was a little frustrated when i read that Sorry

[»D1st0rt]

Oh don't worry its cool Drake, that was for L.C.'s benefit

 

I wasn't offended and I'm pretty sure you knew what I meant

[Dav]

there is another factor with Linux.

 

Get the Linux community in and we will more then likely have an influx of very talented devolpers who could help get some movement in this game.

 

Lets face it very few tech novices use Linux and a very high proportion of Linux users have talent i could only dream of when it comes to coding when compared to the windows user base.

[Electric Zombie]

Moving the project to Source Forge will attract professional developers who work on these kind of projects in their spare time. Often this will lead to cross-platform development for other OSes. We could have a Subspace/Continuum compatible client for OSes ranging from Windows 95, to Vista, to various distros of Linux for both x86 and PPC, as well as OS X for x86/PPC.

 

I would imagine some OpenGL and DirectX programmers out there might take some time to move the graphic elements to a 3D API with some basic 3D effects. Explosions, bombs, etc. could be rendered using some pretty darn cool particle effects. Thor's Hammers could emit shockwaves and stuff.

 

On a side note, I would like to mention that bringing Discretion and ultimately Continuum to a creative platform such as Mac OS X would help out a lot with the visual dynamics of the game. If there's one thing about Mac OS is that it attracts a large proportion of creative individuals.

 

Just my US $.04 (adjusted for inflation)

[Samapico]

Windows 95

lol.

[Electric Zombie]

Windows 95

lol.

 

Half of my work is still using Windows 98 machines. Don't knock it.

[jake13jake]

Okay, so Continuum doesn't work on Vista? Or why was there a strike-through on that first post? I didn't read the entire thread.

 

Anyway, yea, Continuum does need a cross-platform client. I'd be willing to help, but I'd definitely have to do a lot of learning, since I have no experience in network coding or OpenGL (though I know people that do).

 

Second, didn't someone make a linux testing client that was under the FreeBSD license? Can that be relicensed under the GPL? It would probably be a good idea to pick up that project instead of starting from scratch. Essentially, getting the clone done before anything else would be wise.

 

Looking on sourceforge:

http://sourceforge.net/search/?type_of_sea...;words=subspace

 

Anyone recognize any of these?

[Hakaku]

Yes, a forum below this one and you'll notice Discretion, currently the only project that hasn't been abandoned and that shows a promising future. It can do basic things with a modified version of ASSS, but not yet play (only in offline mode).

 

The rest on that Sourceforge search page are just vaguely or not related at all. Except Pspace, which is another client which was developed by Pyxlz a long time ago, but then faded out. It was and still is the only client capable of connecting to ASSS zones and display a graphical interface/ability to play. Unfortunately further releases were never made public, so the client's full potential is unknown. - The sourforge (which I hope Maverick will be able to finish up sometime) is intended to revive that project.

 

There were other client attempts, but they came and went. Snnnrubspace was one of them, but it never got anywhere, let alone the source was neither released.

[»CypherJF]

Didn't read the full couple of posts above but Continuum does work on Vista. As I play it all the time.