by mrugiero » Tue Feb 04, 2014 14:13
SagMyPants wrote:Was the source code for the Wolf3D engine ever disclosed? Without open source code, a TC still can't be free software like FreeDoom.
You have some misunderstanding there. You see, FreeDoom implements the game data. You can create a free total conversion if you implement a free engine (like ECWolf), regardless if the original one became open source, as long as your total conversion mod doesn't depend in the assets of the original game. At the same time, even if the source code for the original engine became open source (which is the case for Wolf3D), if your mod depends in the original game data, you need this game data to become open source to be able to distribute it really freely (otherwise, you can distribute your modifications as long as the EULA doesn't prohibit that, and only users who own a copy of the game can use it). Game data is not free, although it's available in a repo from John Carmack, he explicitly asks not to use it if you don't own a copy (he made it available mostly for convenience in the repository for a port to iOS he did based on someone else's source port called Wolf3D Redux).
However, the original release of vanilla engine was with a custom license that disallowed commercial use. They later released it as GPL.
[quote="SagMyPants"]Was the source code for the Wolf3D engine ever disclosed? Without open source code, a TC still can't be free software like FreeDoom. :([/quote]
You have some misunderstanding there. You see, FreeDoom implements the game data. You can create a free total conversion if you implement a free engine (like ECWolf), regardless if the original one became open source, as long as your total conversion mod doesn't depend in the assets of the original game. At the same time, even if the source code for the original engine became open source (which is the case for Wolf3D), if your mod depends in the original game data, you need this game data to become open source to be able to distribute it really freely (otherwise, you can distribute your modifications as long as the EULA doesn't prohibit that, and only users who own a copy of the game can use it). Game data is not free, although it's available in a repo from John Carmack, he explicitly asks not to use it if you don't own a copy (he made it available mostly for convenience in the repository for a port to iOS he did based on someone else's source port called Wolf3D Redux).
However, the original release of vanilla engine was with a custom license that disallowed commercial use. They later released it as GPL.