this post was submitted on 18 Sep 2023
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I'm usually a fan of open source games but rarely do they manage to be actually great. People like giving recommendations like Super Tux Kart that haven't aged well and don't play well. What are some open source games that are legitimately good that I've missed?

My favorites are:

  • Mindustry

  • Sonic Robo Blast 2 Kart

  • Powder Toy

  • GZDoom (and all the amazing mods for it)

  • Veloren (even though it's still in alpha)

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[–] milicent_bystandr@lemm.ee 29 points 1 year ago (1 children)

Endless Sky.

It's an open world 2D spacefaring game, with a good core story and more being added by the surprisingly-active dev community.

Not without its flaws, but anyway I think it's a fantastic game in its own right. And it's both "finishable" and under continued development & expansion.

[–] Moobythegoldensock@lemm.ee 7 points 1 year ago

It’s surprisingly well written. Both major story arcs had me on the edge of my seat.

[–] Quik@infosec.pub 27 points 1 year ago* (last edited 1 year ago) (3 children)

My favorites:

  • OpenTTD: Old transport tycoon game, but really fun especially in multiplayer
  • Minetest: Minecraft-like voxel game engine, which means there a many different game modes
  • Beyond All Reason: Great RTS, also great in online multiplayer or with some friends. (Disclaimer: Possible unfree licenses for artwork)
  • Dwarf Fortress (free but not open source, thanks for telling me that one): not everyone’s cup of tea, but sometimes you just get stuck in it for hours on end
[–] JackbyDev@programming.dev 16 points 1 year ago

Dwarf Fortress is not open source. It is freeware. Parts of the game (some graphics stuff) has the code available but you have no license to distribute it.

[–] Jummit@lemmy.one 10 points 1 year ago (1 children)

Possible unfree licenses for artwork

I'd still consider the game open source, even if the art is copyrighted.

Dwarf Fortress

Is there an open source version? It's a great game (also try the steam edition if you check it out), but I thought it was closed-source.

[–] JackbyDev@programming.dev 7 points 1 year ago

Dwarf Fortress is not open source. You are correct.

[–] zwerdlds@lemmy.ml 6 points 1 year ago (1 children)
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[–] s20@lemmy.ml 24 points 1 year ago* (last edited 1 year ago) (1 children)

Battle for Wesnoth

This one never gets the love it deserves. It's a fantastic turn based strategy game with multiple campaigns and storylines, multiplayer, and campaign design tools. It's an old project (started in 2003, IIRC), but it's still fantastic

Hedgewars

Basically, this is Worms but with adorable little hedgehogs instead of, well, worms. Single player is okay, and it has online multiplayer I guess, but the real fun (just like in Worms) is local multiplayer. Also, it has Portal Guns. There's really no downside to this one.

Re-volt io and RVGL

This one's a little iffy. Re-volt was a fantastic R / C racing game with bright graphics, fun tracks, excellent controls, and a killer soundtrack. For good or ill, it was put out by Acclaim, which self destructed in 2004. The Re-volt fan community, however, doesn't know the meaning of the word "quit."

Nowadays, you can join a lively community with regular online tournaments of the game. There's a new cross platform engine called RVGL (that's Re Volt Game Launcher), and metric tonnes of mods and fan content. You still need the original game's assets, though, which is where it's dicey; they're technically abandonware not open source, unless I'm mistaken.

Anyway, links!

Unciv

This project's aim is to be Civilization V, but with more abstract visuals, and, or course, free. In short, it's FreeCiv, but Civ V instead of II and a UI from the 2020s rather than the 80s. (Not throwing shade here; FreeCiv is an amazing project that is exactly what it wants to be!)

If that's not enough to keep ya' happy, I know a few more, but they've mostly been covered by other folks here.

Edit: formatting

[–] miss_brainfart@lemmy.ml 3 points 1 year ago (1 children)

I never even knew about Hedgewars' existence, but Warmux on the other hand... Now that's my childhood right there

[–] s20@lemmy.ml 3 points 1 year ago

I feel you. Warmux was really neat. Sadly, it never got as much development as Hedgewars, even though the mascot theme was really cool. AFAIK, Warmux has been inactive (or at least extremely slow) for years, while Hedgewars has been thriving.

[–] raptir@lemdro.id 24 points 1 year ago (1 children)
  • 0 AD
  • Battle for Wesnoth
  • Tales of Maj'Eyal
[–] ShaunaTheDead@kbin.social 3 points 1 year ago

Tales of Maj'Eyal is a great little game if you're an rogue-like fan! I played so many hours of that game a few years back, it's seriously great!

[–] redcalcium@lemmy.institute 22 points 1 year ago

Does open source implementation of proprietary game counts? OpenMW

[–] starman@programming.dev 15 points 1 year ago* (last edited 1 year ago)

OpenTTD. IMO mindustry, for example, is better but it's still worth to try OpenTTD

[–] Jummit@lemmy.one 14 points 1 year ago* (last edited 1 year ago) (2 children)

osu! is an amazing rhythm game. Try osu!lazer, it's the new client: https://osu.ppy.sh/home/download

I also like Pioneers and Endless Sky, both space sims.

This might not count, but both Lichess, a chess website, and OGS, a Go website are open source.

There is also Mindustry, but I haven't played it.

[–] TheThirdAccount@kbin.social 3 points 1 year ago

Not only is Endlessly open source, it has been crowd developed for years and years. It's still actively adding user content (stories, outfits, ships, races, etc) and has the only actually functional launcher I've ever seen (like if you want to play a stable release, or play in your own sandbox development area, etc). It's really great community of folks.

[–] Quik@infosec.pub 2 points 1 year ago

Really nice recommendation, thank you!

[–] poVoq@slrpnk.net 13 points 1 year ago (1 children)
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[–] ArtikBanana 11 points 1 year ago (3 children)

Thrive

tl;dr: a better Spore

From the site:

Thrive is a free, open-source game about the evolution of life.

From the lowly tidepools of your home planet, you will rise to cosmic dominance. At every step, powerful creation tools and deep simulation mechanics will aid your species’ development. Revolutionary Games is the open-source team of dedicated volunteers aiming to make Thrive a reality.

Our team seeks to accomplish two major goals: create engaging, compelling gameplay that respects our players’ intelligence, and remain as accurate as possible in our depiction of known scientific theory without compromising the former.

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[–] CrypticCoffee@lemmy.ml 11 points 1 year ago

MineClone2 is addictive. All that Minecraft style fun, but free and open source. It's pretty comprehensive and solid for the most part.

[–] ChaoticEntropy@feddit.uk 10 points 1 year ago (2 children)

Warzone 2100, from the community project website and not Steam. Some douche just took the code and uploaded it to Steam themself and does a poor job maintaining it.

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[–] ChairmanMeow@programming.dev 9 points 1 year ago

OpenTTD, OpenRCT and OpenRA are all great!

[–] craigevil@lemmy.ml 9 points 1 year ago
[–] gibson@sopuli.xyz 7 points 1 year ago

One Hour One Life is open source, it is a 2D hand drawn survival game where you have 1 real life houre to live from a baby to an elder and contribute to the player-made society in your life as best you can.

You have to pay for an account on the official servers, but i recommend you do to support the development.

Not sure if the dev accepts community patches or not, but the game is public domain license.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/One_Hour_One_Life

[–] karlexceed@midwest.social 7 points 1 year ago

Minetest and several others that I play regularly have already been mentioned, so I wanted to shout out a game I've been following and playing for years, waiting for their 1.0 release: FreeOrion

https://www.freeorion.org/

It's essentially a clone of the Master of Orion series, which are classics in the 4X world.

[–] poVoq@slrpnk.net 7 points 1 year ago* (last edited 1 year ago) (1 children)
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[–] tegimaster@lemm.ee 7 points 1 year ago

My PC always has 3 games installed, and depending on the distro I'm currently on they may have come directly from the default repos:

  • Battle for Wesnoth
  • Warzone 2100
  • OpenRCT2

I have lost count of how hours I have in all 3.

[–] banazir@lemmy.ml 6 points 1 year ago
[–] bzxt@lemmy.ml 6 points 1 year ago

Xonotic, if you like very fast paced shooters.

[–] TheImpressiveX@lemmy.ml 6 points 1 year ago
[–] bionicjoey@lemmy.ca 5 points 1 year ago (1 children)

OpenRCT (not totally free but a damn impressive project nonetheless)

[–] DaveedMee 2 points 1 year ago

OpenRCT is free iirc! You can just get the RCT2 demo for the assets OpenRCT needs

[–] citytree@lemmy.ml 5 points 1 year ago* (last edited 1 year ago) (2 children)

People like giving recommendations like Super Tux Kart that haven’t aged well and don’t play well.

What's the issue with SuperTuxKart? I thought that it was great fun when I played it.

[–] popcar2@programming.dev 4 points 1 year ago

It's just not very good compared to any other kart game. Aside from the fact that it's very dated, the driving is slow, the levels are wide and uninspired, the racing itself is very simple. SRB2Kart is another open source karting game and it's sooooo much better.

[–] SSUPII@sopuli.xyz 2 points 1 year ago

For a game currently still maintained, it seriously didn't age well in all departments especially animations, sound design and character models.

[–] homoludens@feddit.de 5 points 1 year ago

Teeworlds is a good game. Unfortunately the player base got very small, even though it's on Steam.

[–] glasgitarrewelt@feddit.de 5 points 1 year ago (1 children)

I had fun playing Dink Smallwood (I think the Dink Smallwood HD Version on Android). You run around, solve tasks, and work your way through the story.

It is, as you described, not actually great, but great in a sense that you can have much fun with it. I especially liked the humor.

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[–] patchwork@lemmy.dbzer0.com 5 points 1 year ago* (last edited 1 year ago) (1 children)
[–] ExLisper@linux.community 3 points 1 year ago (3 children)

How do you run OpenRA? I've tried both flatpak and snap and it didn't work. It gets stuck on the first screen asking about downloading content but I cannot click anything.

[–] ccdfa@lemm.ee 4 points 1 year ago (1 children)

Just don't use flatpak or snap. I'll bet anything that switching off flatpak/snap will solve all your issues. Just check the downloads page on the OpenRA site and find whatever works on your system.

[–] ExLisper@linux.community 3 points 1 year ago

The thing is it requires some c# runtime? I hoped I wouldn't have to install it system wide.

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[–] potato_lemon@feddit.nl 4 points 1 year ago

Space Station 13 is great

[–] Redo11@szmer.info 4 points 1 year ago

Barotrauma is source available (no commercial, public use, restricted for game modding and contributions) Librerama is dumbways to die style minigames

[–] ExLisper@linux.community 3 points 1 year ago
[–] Wijnie@feddit.nl 3 points 1 year ago (1 children)

When I played open source games around 15 years ago, these were all the same games mentioned. There doesn't seem to be a lot of progress

[–] snek_boi@lemmy.ml 6 points 1 year ago

Veloren is written in Rust and is inspired by Zelda Breath of The Wild. Both of those are relatively recent.

[–] wiki_me@lemmy.ml 3 points 1 year ago

My favorite: cataclysm dda, flare rpg, oolite.

[–] Die4Ever@programming.dev 3 points 1 year ago

ScummVM supports many many games. Some people might think it's an emulator, but it's actually a collection of reverse engineered game engines.

eDuke32 and other Build Engine source ports

[–] Spider89@lemm.ee 3 points 1 year ago (1 children)

SuperTuxKart Xonotic Openarena

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[–] Comment105@lemm.ee 2 points 1 year ago

I'm not giving any of these a chance.

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