Joined: Wed Jan 16, 2008 5:27 pm
Posts: 167
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Anaerin wrote: ddb174 wrote: JWPlatt wrote: ddb174 wrote: If the content is not open-sourced, then they would still be restricting and controlling its use. Ah, so you don't like that. I get it. I am, and I think most people are, satisfied with the generous prospect of developing the code and tools, and using Cyan's content as Cyan sees fit. It's User Created Content (UCC) that most of the community has really been concerned about all these years, legally and publicly using it, and being able to fix the code Cyan has not be able or willing to fix. There are some issues to fix or rearrange content (e.g. instancing, "Descent") that would need to be addressed with Cyan, but UCC on public shards and open code would now be possible and that's really what we've been waiting for, isn't it? Cyan has a right to their IP, considering the big give of open source code, don't they? But that's not open-source then. Just Plasma & tools are; that's what I've been getting at. So it's deceptive to say "open-source Uru" as that indicates a large freedom with regards to Uru, and Cyan does not intend to give us that freedom. They are legally able to do just that. Whether it is morally justified is a whole other can of worms, and such a discussion would apply to copyright in general. I'll try not to rant about that, I'm sure to everyone's relief ;) It's "Open Source Uru" in exactly the same way as "Open Source Quake", "Open Source Doom", and others, work. They all have "Open Source" engines, and "Closed Source" assets (Though in the case of Quake and Doom, there is a "Shareware" demo version you can get that has the content for the first part working and "free"). And, at the end of it all, there is absolutely nothing stopping you taking "Open Source Uru", writing age(s) that use no Cyan assets whatsoever, and releasing it for free for everyone (As many Mod makers have done with Doom/Quake - They're generally called "Total Conversion Mods").
Quake is not open-source, and neither is Doom. The *Quake Engine* is open-source. The *Doom Engine* is open-source. Whether those communities call the Quake Engine "Quake" or not, that's their own issue: that doesn't mean that such phrases are not just as deceptive there. When a person says something is open-source, it is implied that you can modify and redistribute that thing. That is *not* the case here; end of story.
And sure, if one creates their own avatars, animations, controls to replace the KI, sounds, fonts, Ages, etc, you could redistribute that (provided you also don't mention the D'ni, Linking Books, etc). But such a thing is certainly not Uru. I think most people like making Ages for Uru to somehow have them all in the same "universe". If they just wanted a stand-alone game and had to redo all the content, they would choose another engine, because Plasma simply is not very good. And that's an important point for everyone to realise: even if you like Uru, the technology it is built on is not well made. The rendering engine isn't great(see blendspans), the networking engine is atrocious, it has no physics engine(you have to plug one in), the sound engine is okay so far as I know, there is no threaded loading of resources, the mechanism for scripting is inexpertly devised and consequently extremely difficult to script unbuggy code, it's DirectX only, it's not cross-platform(even ignoring DirectX. The mac version is run within Cedega's compatibility layer), it's inefficient, etc, etc. It doesn't really even have any notable features :P I guess its close ties to 3dsmax is a feature for some people.
Still, it would be nice to have the source code, though it wouldn't make a huge difference really. The 3dsmax plugin would be appreciated by quite a few, I imagine. But use it for a standalone game? Not a chance.
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