One Year Later There's No UT3 Client For Linux

[Thetargos]

Hmm... Just downloaded that code, and there is no source as such for the Engine Core (a development link-to library is provided, but not the source files) or the Game Engine (same deal, only a lib), if only they provided the needed makefiles and .a files for Linux... Alas...

Edit
Actualy it does come with a few Linux makefiles... I don't know if they would build, though.

[xav1r]

There is still some pretty cool stuff that is available for UT99 like a DX9 and enhanced openGL renderers. http://cwdohnal.home.mindspring.com/utglr/ I'm not sure how picky Epic would get since the UT:GOTY edition came with all the textures on a separate disk to freely use at your own will.

By the way, the original UT99 source code was released by epic. You can download it here.

http://unrealtournament2004.filefront.com/file/Unreal_Tournament_Source_Code;50393

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Now if only we could get Ryan to release the linux blob as opensource.

As Thetargos said, full engine source is not included. And that license is your typical run of the mill free-for-non-commercial use bargain bin license. Kinda sucks.

[deanjo]

As Thetargos said, full engine source is not included. And that license is your typical run of the mill free-for-non-commercial use bargain bin license. Kinda sucks.

What's wrong with "free-for-non-commercial"? There is no reason why if some else plans to profit off using their technology that they shouldn't get their cut of the cake too. If all games came like this out initially it would we would see a hell of a lot of more ports. It does not prevent you from sharing your modifications with the rest of the world.

[MamiyaOtaru]

Hmmmm, this gets me thinking of doing a UT99 redux using ioquake............

I've been thinking about this for a while. UT will never be open sourced (and the series obviously has no future on Linux in any state). Replicating the feel in another engine may be the only way to keep it going (and I really do like the feel compared to Quake).

It wouldn't necessarily have to be as ridiculously detail heavy as UT3. Just something passable, and playable going forward. What would the ramifications be of having a game featuring weapons with the same behavior, spread, damage, alt fires etc be? And FOV, movement speed etc? Would one be in the clear to create a game/mod with original art using those details? Or to be safe would one have to make things similar, with the possibility for end users to tweak the stats to be precisely UT like?

[xav1r]

What's wrong with "free-for-non-commercial"? There is no reason why if some else plans to profit off using their technology that they shouldn't get their cut of the cake too. If all games came like this out initially it would we would see a hell of a lot of more ports. It does not prevent you from sharing your modifications with the rest of the world.

Yea true, but unreal 1 is no longer available for any commercial exploitation. Only unreal 2/2.5 onwards, and that one is still around $150k plus % royalties per title sale, it's all on the unreal technology site. In non-commercial work, problems might surge with that license when someone wants to enhance the engine either by heavy modifications of their own, or by incorporating other stuff, which mostly is under a f/oss license like the GPL. GPL doesnt allow linking with non-gpl software, so license incompatibilities arise. It'd be better if they just GPL'ed it like id does with their games.

But youre correct that it'd be good for modding. Thing is, most modders (which really are entire mod teams) nowadays mod mainly for ut2k4. Very few for ut3. I dont know if it was the chaos mod the one i read about that was dropped due to lack of interest from the community. I read about a ut2k4 mod whose team wanted to port it over to ut3, but quit because they didnt see any interest in the community. Might have been that one. And less modders than that work on utgoty.

[xav1r]

I've been thinking about this for a while. UT will never be open sourced (and the series obviously has no future on Linux in any state). Replicating the feel in another engine may be the only way to keep it going (and I really do like the feel compared to Quake).

It wouldn't necessarily have to be as ridiculously detail heavy as UT3. Just something passable, and playable going forward. What would the ramifications be of having a game featuring weapons with the same behavior, spread, damage, alt fires etc be? And FOV, movement speed etc? Would one be in the clear to create a game/mod with original art using those details? Or to be safe would one have to make things similar, with the possibility for end users to tweak the stats to be precisely UT like?

Is there the next killer mod being started in the phoronix boards?? Problem is, if all game content, graphics, sounds, 3d models, etc are gonna be replaced since theyre commercial stuff, and i dont think it'd be possible to connect to real ut servers with it, wouldnt this be a completely different game? Like a total conversion mod for ioq3?

I dont think there would be any problems having weapons that act like unreal tournament's like a flak cannon, bio rifle, etc. No one has the ownership of a rapid-fire gun in an fps game, or the use of a shotgun, or a rocket launcher, etc. So it's ok. unreal tournament didnt invent customability to the player's desire, so that's ok too. In any case, it'd have to have emphasis on being able to tweak everything. I like the unreal tournamet games, and one thing i'd really like to see is the quake3 style console in unreal. The unreal games' console is in my opinion too crappy, too simplistic, and too annoying to use, maybe they made it like that on purpose to differenciate it from the id games.

Heheh, this would be kinda poetic too, having f/oss quake3 keep unreal tournament going.

[Thetargos]

Is there the next killer mod being started in the phoronix boards?? Problem is, if all game content, graphics, sounds, 3d models, etc are gonna be replaced since theyre commercial stuff, and i dont think it'd be possible to connect to real ut servers with it, wouldnt this be a completely different game? Like a total conversion mod for ioq3?

Which was my point when I said that in order to avoid any potential liability of copy right infringement, the end result would be anything but Unreal-releated (a big chunk of what makes Unreal, Unreal is the engine in itself).

I dont think there would be any problems having weapons that act like unreal tournament's like a flak cannon, bio rifle, etc. No one has the ownership of a rapid-fire gun in an fps game, or the use of a shotgun, or a rocket launcher, etc. So it's ok. unreal tournament didnt invent customability to the player's desire, so that's ok too. In any case, it'd have to have emphasis on being able to tweak everything. I like the unreal tournamet games, and one thing i'd really like to see is the quake3 style console in unreal. The unreal games' console is in my opinion too crappy, too simplistic, and too annoying to use, maybe they made it like that on purpose to differenciate it from the id games.

I don't think either that the "weapon's" mechanics" would implicate a problem as such, unless the models and textures of said weapons could be attributed as derivative works of those found in the game.

The Unreal Engine has relied more in an easy to follow configuration file rather than a complex console, and it also supports a lot of console commands that are not present in the configuration files. However, I agree with you, in that the Quake-style console makes it rather easy to make changes "on-the-fly" to the game, for example in the case of a dedicated server, and as runtime-command-line arguments. Which approach is better? IMVHO Unreal's approach is "better" suited for single player-oriented games, while the Quake-style is better suited for multiplayer games, but both are euqally fitted to either "task".

Heheh, this would be kinda poetic too, having f/oss quake3 keep unreal tournament going.

IIRC there were some Quake 3 maps re-done in Unreal Tournament with pretty much all the Q3A textures (except model skins, obviously) packed for UT, so yeah, kind of ironic that the GPLed Q3 engine (or "should we wait" for the idTech 4 engine to be GPLed early next year?) would keep the good-old UT99 game-style alive.

Regarding game "configurability" it would be great if the players could change the behavior of some weapons (within a given scope, of course) and in on-line games, other players could see these modifications, even when their preferences make the same weapon behave differently, that would be like ultimate personalization. The real problem would be to asure adequate balance, despite weapon's behavior modifications.

[xav1r]

Which was my point when I said that in order to avoid any potential liability of copy right infringement, the end result would be anything but Unreal-releated (a big chunk of what makes Unreal, Unreal is the engine in itself).

Yep, completely agree there.

I don't think either that the "weapon's" mechanics" would implicate a problem as such, unless the models and textures of said weapons could be attributed as derivative works of those found in the game.

It'd be way better to have all the weapons redone from scratch. At least in a final release. The community would appreciate the extra effort.
[/QUOTE]

The Unreal Engine has relied more in an easy to follow configuration file rather than a complex console, and it also supports a lot of console commands that are not present in the configuration files. However, I agree with you, in that the Quake-style console makes it rather easy to make changes "on-the-fly" to the game, for example in the case of a dedicated server, and as runtime-command-line arguments. Which approach is better? IMVHO Unreal's approach is "better" suited for single player-oriented games, while the Quake-style is better suited for multiplayer games, but both are euqally fitted to either "task".

Ah, didnt know that. I guess that im too used to the id software games quake style of doing configs. So are the unreal config files like q3a's config.cfg? I would really like to learn more about customizing unreal tournament, both goty and ut2k4, since i'd like to play them again more often.

IIRC there were some Quake 3 maps re-done in Unreal Tournament with pretty much all the Q3A textures (except model skins, obviously) packed for UT, so yeah, kind of ironic that the GPLed Q3 engine (or "should we wait" for the idTech 4 engine to be GPLed early next year?) would keep the good-old UT99 game-style alive.

Yea, i've played a remake of the classic q3a map The Camping Grounds in ut2k4, it's a very popular map in some servers. Hmmm, it would probably be more appropiate to wait for id tech 4 gpl release from a purely technical standpoint, but in practical means it'd be much more difficult to make a total utgoty conversion for id tech 4. And besiedes, id tech 3 was made to compete with utgoty, so it'd probably be closer to utgoty's atmosphere.

Regarding game "configurability" it would be great if the players could change the behavior of some weapons (within a given scope, of course) and in on-line games, other players could see these modifications, even when their preferences make the same weapon behave differently, that would be like ultimate personalization. The real problem would be to asure adequate balance, despite weapon's behavior modifications.

Yep, that would be some major daunting task to accomplish, making it easy to modify, yet keep it balanced. :P

[Dragonlord]

Regarding game "configurability" it would be great if the players could change the behavior of some weapons (within a given scope, of course) and in on-line games, other players could see these modifications, even when their preferences make the same weapon behave differently, that would be like ultimate personalization. The real problem would be to asure adequate balance, despite weapon's behavior modifications.

UT2k3/2k3 showed already that this fails and people misuse it to get unfair advantages ( like using player models with increased defense values so they can take more damage ).

[xav1r]

UT2k3/2k3 showed already that this fails and people misuse it to get unfair advantages ( like using player models with increased defense values so they can take more damage ).

You meant ut2k3/2k4? :P Really? didnt know about the unfair advantages. Does the original ut have that problem as well?