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Game Source Code Collection

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Re: Game Source Code Collection

#41
post #24

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Game companies are learning old IP can be modernized for fresh new profits so most likely a lot of old game copyrights will become retroactively enforced and sources hunted down and expunged as they're remastered and made exclusively available in whatever online shop or subscription service. https://www.polygon.com/2018/7/22/17600008/nintendo-roms-law... https://www.maxim.com/entertainment/best-video-games-remaste...

People have been reworking old IP, neglecting or enforcing various rights, etc for years. I don't think it's some new trend game companies recently learned or that it affects how aggressive (or not) owners are that much. Old sources in particular are not all that valuable in many cases, beside historically.

Right, but at the moment there are dozens of old movies being reworked and dozens of old games being reworked and the volume feels like it's growing with new announcements all the time. Over the last 20 years I have only seen a few games remade to maintain compatibility, usually unofficially patched by fans or as open source homages.

I think this is being fueled by movie and game outliers today being able to achieve their first $billion in their first week. That outsized ROI on gaming, like movies, completely changes the calculus on what old stuff is worth today. FAANG will throw billions into making games as soon as their movie pipelines are sorted.

Re: Game Source Code Collection

#42
I've been looking a collection like this, but for startups/sites/internet companies.

Something that would have Facebook's[0] and Snapchat's[1] source code.

Or even something that would have Staffjoy's[2](a startup that shut down then open sourced their source code).

[0] -> https://gist.github.com/nikcub/3833406

[1] -> https://github.com/JonnyBanana/Snapchat-Source-Code-Leak

[2] -> https://github.com/Staffjoy/v2

Re: Game Source Code Collection

#44
post #43

Unrelated; but I always find myself drawn to game development, yet I have no desire to work in the industry. Does any other programmer feel the same, and do you know why?

> Does any other programmer feel the same

Of course.

> and do you know why?

Because games are fun, and programming is fun, and programming something that will be fun for other people is fun.

But the games industry is crowded, and highly profit-optimized, and you just instinctively know that getting a tour of the budget sausage factory wouldn't bring a true sausage lover any significant pleasure.

Re: Game Source Code Collection

#47
post #37
post #34

Earlier quoted context omitted.

It didn't go missing. Square had an institutional policy that had them deleting source once projects were mastered and shipped, through to the early 2000's. FFVII-FFIX, Parasite Eve and numerous other games lost their source. What's been recovered has been occasionally the code from contracted PC ports.

Why did they have such a policy? That seems crazy!

The BBC used to have a policy of wiping tapes for reuse, seems crazy in retrospect but there you go. Sometimes people just don't realise what they've got.

Re: Game Source Code Collection

#48
post #17
post #13

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The problem is these work owners are using archive.org to play both sides of the argument, even worse consider the Tibetan Buddhist Resource Centern they digitized works they didn’t author, don’t own any rights to for the works that are 100s of years old, and then put them up on Archive.org under DRM. How is that in any way ethical to take someone’s work and do that? https://archive.org/details/buddhist-digital-resou…

Are you sure they don't own the rights? When you create a "derivative work" of a work under copyright, you're creating a new work that "samples" the original, and then asserting your own copyright to it—that's why you need a license from the rightsholder in the first place, to allow you to claim those IP rights on the derivative work. In the case of a public-domain work, if you create a "derivative work" from it, you…

"the diary of Anne Frank"

A poor example, or interesting example depending on how you want to look at it.

https://www.theguardian.com/books/2016/jan/18/anne-franks-di...

Re: Game Source Code Collection

#49
post #43

Unrelated; but I always find myself drawn to game development, yet I have no desire to work in the industry. Does any other programmer feel the same, and do you know why?

> Does any other programmer feel the same Of course. > and do you know why? Because games are fun, and programming is fun, and programming something that will be fun for other people is fun. But the games industry is crowded, and highly profit-optimized, and you just instinctively know that getting a tour of the budget sausage factory wouldn't bring a true sausage lover any significant pleasure.

The games industry being crowded is a bit of a myth, though initially breaking into it does present a barrier. Lots of studios seem hungry for anyone with experience. Though, a lot of the actually interesting projects are crowded. Which is a real concern if that's the only type you want to work on (I'm in that camp...)

Like programming, once you have a few years under your belt, things really open up.

Re: Game Source Code Collection

#50

Nice, this also includes the infamous half-life 2 leak from 2007 as well as some other ones that definitely weren't officially released. Or like re-volt, which is now owned by a company still actively trying to take down mirrors of the code that pop up, hence any unofficial port of it only releases in binary form. But then again a lot of the older leaked ones, nobody probably cares about too much. There's definitely…

Wow, I had no idea about Re-Volt's history. [1]

* Throwback Entertainment acquired 190 titles from Acclaim on July 7, 2006, including Re-Volt. [2]

* Throwback sold the rights to Re-Volt to WeGo Interactive Co. on February 23, 2011. [3]

* WeGo released Re-Volt Classic for iOS in Oct 2012, then April 2013 for Android. PC version was launched in Oct 2013, but was pulled in Jan 2014 due to a community patch misunderstanding. [4]

* Appears there's still a largish rewrite/port out there [5], which is a rewrite of the v1.2 community patch, based on the leaked Xbox version [6].

Anywho, thanks for mentioning that. Brought me down a fun rabbit hole.

[1] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Throwback_Entertainment

[2] https://throwbackentertainment.com/throwback-entertainment-c...

[3] https://throwbackentertainment.com/throwback-sells-re-volt/

[4] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Re-Volt

[5] https://rvgl.re-volt.io/

[6] https://forum.re-volt.io/viewtopic.php?t=139

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