7 ms·

Freecol – open source colonization game

70 points by galfarragem 11y ago

cauterize 11y ago
How is this different than Freeciv? (http://www.freeciv.org/ http://www.freeciv.org/)
- RobotCaleb 11y ago
  Well, for one it appears to be based on an entirely different game. Not sure where to go from here to continue answering your question.
  - phreeza 11y ago
    The full name of the game Colonization is "Civilization IV: Colonization"
    - whistlerbrk 11y ago
      No, that was a later release. Colonization was a Micropose game in its own right designed by, imho, the real genius behind the series, Brian Reynolds who later designed Alpha Centauri.
      - eterm 11y ago
        So who made "Civilization: Call to power"? Or was that just the publisher still owning the civ name at that point, and neither SM nor BR were involved with that?
        Quinner 11y ago
        Correct, different developer, same publisher.
        smacktoward 11y ago
        Call to Power was the result of some fairly convoluted boardroom-slash-courtroom warfare conducted between 1995 and 1998. In the mid-'90s, legendary boardgame publisher Avalon Hill noticed that MicroProse was doing well with computer games named Civilization, remembered that they had published a board game way back in 1980 with the same name (see https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Civilization_%28board_game%29 https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Civilization_%28board_game%29, https://boardgamegeek.com/boardgame/71/civilization https://boardgamegeek.com/boardgame/71/civilization), and observed that their board game and MicroProse's computer games were, at least thematically, similar. Based on that similarity, AH argued that MicroProse's Civilization games had ripped off their IP. MicroProse and Sid Meier disputed this, with Meier saying he'd never played the board game before designing his Civ, but AH stuck to its guns. Since they'd published the board game, they argued, and since (they asserted) MicroProse's computer game was just a derivative work based on it, all rights to the Civilization name for both board and computer games belonged rightfully to them. They then licensed the name to Activision to use in developing its own computer Civilization games, to compete directly against MicroProse's in the marketplace. MicroProse responded to this by buying the company owned by the original designer of the board game, Francis Tresham (https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Francis_Tresham_%28game_designer%29 https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Francis_Tresham_%28game_design...), arguing that if the board game gave anyone claim on the Civilization name it was Tresham, not his publisher AH, and that in acquiring Tresham's company they'd also acquired not just any computer-game rights the board game would confer, but the rights to the board game itself too. AH was in pretty desperate financial straits by this time, so in 1998 they caved and paid MicroProse $411,000 to settle the dispute, yielding to them all rights to the name and stopping publication of the board game. (See http://home.earthlink.net/~pdr4455/fah.html http://home.earthlink.net/~pdr4455/fah.html) MicroProse then gave Activision a limited license to the Civilization name so they could publish their work-in-progress game as Civilization: Call to Power. Call to Power came out to mediocre-at-best reviews and sank like a stone, ending Activision's dream of taking over the franchise. But MicroProse's victory was short-lived, because their own financial situation by this time wasn't great either; just a couple of months after the Avalon Hill settlement the company was sold to Hasbro, at which point it was more or less dismantled and became just another zombie brand.
        11y ago
      - morb 11y ago
        Alpha Centauri is the only game of the whole genre I could get into. The SF setting, the faction leaders and their personalities, voiceovers, music, atmosphere... That game is basically my reason for installing wine and playonlinux.
        nickpsecurity 11y ago
        Me too. I plan to try another TBS game in the future but Alpha Centauri was only one. And excellent. I loved all the options of gameplay and strategy that didn't exist in an RTS. Plus, the technology tree was well thought out and even gave me ideas. :)
        seszett 11y ago
        > That game is basically my reason for installing wine and playonlinux. Alpha Centauri has a Linux native port though! I'm not sure if it's still available somewhere however (there's probably a torrent somewhere).
        vidarh 11y ago
        There's actually a native Linux version of Alpha Centauri. One of the old Loki ports.
    - benologist 11y ago
      Colonization is an old Sid Meier classic that co-existed separately to Civilization, sharing similarities with it. http://www.gog.com/game/sid_meiers_colonization http://www.gog.com/game/sid_meiers_colonization
    - dgant 11y ago
      Colonization was originally released as a separate game. It was in the same genre as Civilization ("4X": Explore, expand, exploit, exterminate) but otherwise shared nothing in common but its creator. Colonization was recently re-released as a mod of Civilization IV. It was built in the Civ IV engine, but for the most part was just a re-skinned Colonization.
      - pjc50 11y ago
        The Civ IV mod plays differently in detail (esp "Founding Fathers") and to me lacks quite a bit of the charm of the original. It's more like a Civ reskin than an modernisation of Colonization.
  - lambda 11y ago
    It's a different game, but it seems to be in the same genre. The blurb even describes it as "similar to Civilization". It's reasonable to ask for two games in the same genre, and with the primary description of one as being similar to the main influence for another, "what are the differences? Why would I want to play this game over that game?" To answer that, you can click through to the "About" page (http://www.freecol.org/about.html http://www.freecol.org/about.html), which spends most of its time answering exactly this question (which demonstrates that this is a reasonable question to ask): In Civilization the objective was to build a nation that could stand the test of times and that could also do one of the following: conquer the world or be the first to launch a spaceship. In Colonization things are bit different ... A Colonization game starts in 1492 and the objective is to colonize America. You begin the game with one vessel and two colonists.
ilek 11y ago
Hosted on sourceforge ugh. Seems quite a few of these open source revivals have been written in Java (possible mild confirmation-bias here.)
- douche 11y ago
  FreeCol is a relatively old project (I think I recall giving it a spin way back in 2006 or 2007), dating back to when SourceForge was not-evil and that's where everybody was. At the time, I'm not sure there really were better options than Java for a cross-platform open-source game like this. Maybe Python with PyGame.
  - distances 11y ago
    Qt became available under GPL in 2000, so that would have been a potential match. Anyway, technology choices are of course very dependent on the project founders' skills and preferences.
- DanBC 11y ago
  There's a bunch of old, mature, projects that were started at a time when Sourceforge hosting made sense. I agree that sourceforge is a scumbag company now, but what's the alternative for people who want a place to host binaries, source code, and user forums?
  - ascagnel_ 11y ago
    Github has binary/release hosting support now, but doesn't do user forums or mailing lists.
kenrick95 11y ago
I came to know the existence of this project because it listed it's translation messages on TranslateWiki.net, the platform where MediaWiki software (software that runs Wikipedia) got translated. But I never tried to go on and play the game. Maybe I shall try this out sometime.
galfarragem 11y ago
Interesting thread about the evolution of this project. http://sourceforge.net/p/freecol/discussion/141200/thread/19a409c8/ http://sourceforge.net/p/freecol/discussion/141200/thread/19...
davidjhall 11y ago
Not like civilization - - but is it like Seven Cities of Gold? Anyone remember that?
thinkmac 11y ago
I can't seem to figure out how to play turn-based strategy game (I love classic Chess game, but this Civ stuff isn't working out for me). Not long ago, I stumbled upon 0 A.D (The real time, not turn based), and it brought back much memory from Age of Empires.
hNewsLover99 11y ago
It's hard to think of anything more vapid (not to mention insulting to American Indians and African-Americans) than a game about American "colonization" that lets users ignore the roles and effects of two of the worst genocides ever inflicted by any existing or nascent "civilization." Here are a couple of other equally-vapid new-game ideas for Sid Meier and his ilk: -"Nazi Military Contractors," in which the "winner" sells the most supplies to the Third Reich. (Jewish extermination? Nothing to see here...") -"Palestinian Undertaker" in which funeral directors compete to direct the most funerals. No doubt Meier can sanitize these scenarios sufficiently to meet his stated goal: "One of the things we really try to avoid our games is this kind of this choice would be the right thing to do, but this choice is gonna help me win the game’ put the players in those kind of moral dilemmas. That's not what our games are about. We want you to feel good about yourself when you finish the game." * RPGs like this are the ultimate in mental masturbation. Which probably explains their popularity with emotional adolescents. *-from http://sourceforge.net/p/freecol/discussion/719665/thread/28272bc1/?limit=25#6a84 http://sourceforge.net/p/freecol/discussion/719665/thread/28...

70 points by galfarragem 11y ago

cauterize 11y ago

How is this different than Freeciv? (http://www.freeciv.org/ http://www.freeciv.org/)

RobotCaleb 11y ago
Well, for one it appears to be based on an entirely different game. Not sure where to go from here to continue answering your question.
- phreeza 11y ago
  The full name of the game Colonization is "Civilization IV: Colonization"
  - whistlerbrk 11y ago
    No, that was a later release. Colonization was a Micropose game in its own right designed by, imho, the real genius behind the series, Brian Reynolds who later designed Alpha Centauri.
    - eterm 11y ago
      So who made "Civilization: Call to power"? Or was that just the publisher still owning the civ name at that point, and neither SM nor BR were involved with that?
      - Quinner 11y ago
        Correct, different developer, same publisher.
      - smacktoward 11y ago
        Call to Power was the result of some fairly convoluted boardroom-slash-courtroom warfare conducted between 1995 and 1998. In the mid-'90s, legendary boardgame publisher Avalon Hill noticed that MicroProse was doing well with computer games named Civilization, remembered that they had published a board game way back in 1980 with the same name (see https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Civilization_%28board_game%29 https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Civilization_%28board_game%29, https://boardgamegeek.com/boardgame/71/civilization https://boardgamegeek.com/boardgame/71/civilization), and observed that their board game and MicroProse's computer games were, at least thematically, similar. Based on that similarity, AH argued that MicroProse's Civilization games had ripped off their IP. MicroProse and Sid Meier disputed this, with Meier saying he'd never played the board game before designing his Civ, but AH stuck to its guns. Since they'd published the board game, they argued, and since (they asserted) MicroProse's computer game was just a derivative work based on it, all rights to the Civilization name for both board and computer games belonged rightfully to them. They then licensed the name to Activision to use in developing its own computer Civilization games, to compete directly against MicroProse's in the marketplace. MicroProse responded to this by buying the company owned by the original designer of the board game, Francis Tresham (https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Francis_Tresham_%28game_designer%29 https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Francis_Tresham_%28game_design...), arguing that if the board game gave anyone claim on the Civilization name it was Tresham, not his publisher AH, and that in acquiring Tresham's company they'd also acquired not just any computer-game rights the board game would confer, but the rights to the board game itself too. AH was in pretty desperate financial straits by this time, so in 1998 they caved and paid MicroProse $411,000 to settle the dispute, yielding to them all rights to the name and stopping publication of the board game. (See http://home.earthlink.net/~pdr4455/fah.html http://home.earthlink.net/~pdr4455/fah.html) MicroProse then gave Activision a limited license to the Civilization name so they could publish their work-in-progress game as Civilization: Call to Power. Call to Power came out to mediocre-at-best reviews and sank like a stone, ending Activision's dream of taking over the franchise. But MicroProse's victory was short-lived, because their own financial situation by this time wasn't great either; just a couple of months after the Avalon Hill settlement the company was sold to Hasbro, at which point it was more or less dismantled and became just another zombie brand.
        11y ago
    - morb 11y ago
      Alpha Centauri is the only game of the whole genre I could get into. The SF setting, the faction leaders and their personalities, voiceovers, music, atmosphere... That game is basically my reason for installing wine and playonlinux.
      - nickpsecurity 11y ago
        Me too. I plan to try another TBS game in the future but Alpha Centauri was only one. And excellent. I loved all the options of gameplay and strategy that didn't exist in an RTS. Plus, the technology tree was well thought out and even gave me ideas. :)
      - seszett 11y ago
        > That game is basically my reason for installing wine and playonlinux. Alpha Centauri has a Linux native port though! I'm not sure if it's still available somewhere however (there's probably a torrent somewhere).
      - vidarh 11y ago
        There's actually a native Linux version of Alpha Centauri. One of the old Loki ports.
  - benologist 11y ago
    Colonization is an old Sid Meier classic that co-existed separately to Civilization, sharing similarities with it. http://www.gog.com/game/sid_meiers_colonization http://www.gog.com/game/sid_meiers_colonization
  - dgant 11y ago
    Colonization was originally released as a separate game. It was in the same genre as Civilization ("4X": Explore, expand, exploit, exterminate) but otherwise shared nothing in common but its creator. Colonization was recently re-released as a mod of Civilization IV. It was built in the Civ IV engine, but for the most part was just a re-skinned Colonization.
    - pjc50 11y ago
      The Civ IV mod plays differently in detail (esp "Founding Fathers") and to me lacks quite a bit of the charm of the original. It's more like a Civ reskin than an modernisation of Colonization.
- lambda 11y ago
  It's a different game, but it seems to be in the same genre. The blurb even describes it as "similar to Civilization". It's reasonable to ask for two games in the same genre, and with the primary description of one as being similar to the main influence for another, "what are the differences? Why would I want to play this game over that game?" To answer that, you can click through to the "About" page (http://www.freecol.org/about.html http://www.freecol.org/about.html), which spends most of its time answering exactly this question (which demonstrates that this is a reasonable question to ask): In Civilization the objective was to build a nation that could stand the test of times and that could also do one of the following: conquer the world or be the first to launch a spaceship. In Colonization things are bit different ... A Colonization game starts in 1492 and the objective is to colonize America. You begin the game with one vessel and two colonists.

ilek 11y ago

Hosted on sourceforge ugh. Seems quite a few of these open source revivals have been written in Java (possible mild confirmation-bias here.)

douche 11y ago
FreeCol is a relatively old project (I think I recall giving it a spin way back in 2006 or 2007), dating back to when SourceForge was not-evil and that's where everybody was. At the time, I'm not sure there really were better options than Java for a cross-platform open-source game like this. Maybe Python with PyGame.
- distances 11y ago
  Qt became available under GPL in 2000, so that would have been a potential match. Anyway, technology choices are of course very dependent on the project founders' skills and preferences.
DanBC 11y ago
There's a bunch of old, mature, projects that were started at a time when Sourceforge hosting made sense. I agree that sourceforge is a scumbag company now, but what's the alternative for people who want a place to host binaries, source code, and user forums?
- ascagnel_ 11y ago
  Github has binary/release hosting support now, but doesn't do user forums or mailing lists.

kenrick95 11y ago

I came to know the existence of this project because it listed it's translation messages on TranslateWiki.net, the platform where MediaWiki software (software that runs Wikipedia) got translated. But I never tried to go on and play the game. Maybe I shall try this out sometime.

galfarragem 11y ago

Interesting thread about the evolution of this project. http://sourceforge.net/p/freecol/discussion/141200/thread/19a409c8/ http://sourceforge.net/p/freecol/discussion/141200/thread/19...

davidjhall 11y ago

Not like civilization - - but is it like Seven Cities of Gold? Anyone remember that?

thinkmac 11y ago

I can't seem to figure out how to play turn-based strategy game (I love classic Chess game, but this Civ stuff isn't working out for me). Not long ago, I stumbled upon 0 A.D (The real time, not turn based), and it brought back much memory from Age of Empires.

hNewsLover99 11y ago

It's hard to think of anything more vapid (not to mention insulting to American Indians and African-Americans) than a game about American "colonization" that lets users ignore the roles and effects of two of the worst genocides ever inflicted by any existing or nascent "civilization." Here are a couple of other equally-vapid new-game ideas for Sid Meier and his ilk: -"Nazi Military Contractors," in which the "winner" sells the most supplies to the Third Reich. (Jewish extermination? Nothing to see here...") -"Palestinian Undertaker" in which funeral directors compete to direct the most funerals. No doubt Meier can sanitize these scenarios sufficiently to meet his stated goal: "One of the things we really try to avoid our games is this kind of this choice would be the right thing to do, but this choice is gonna help me win the game’ put the players in those kind of moral dilemmas. That's not what our games are about. We want you to feel good about yourself when you finish the game." * RPGs like this are the ultimate in mental masturbation. Which probably explains their popularity with emotional adolescents. *-from http://sourceforge.net/p/freecol/discussion/719665/thread/28272bc1/?limit=25#6a84 http://sourceforge.net/p/freecol/discussion/719665/thread/28...