Hugo Hacker News

Spring is a free RTS game engine

dhosek 2021-08-16 20:34:42 +0000 UTC [ - ]

From Wikipedia:

• Spring (application), an E-commerce platform

• Spring (game engine), an open-source RTS engine

• Spring (operating system), an experimental operating system from Sun Microsystems

• SPRING, a GIS and remote-sensing image-processing system with an object-oriented data-model

• Spring Framework, an application-framework for the Java platform

Spring Framework (what I think of when I hear Spring in a computing context) is 5 years older according to Wikipedia.

henearkr 2021-08-16 20:48:02 +0000 UTC [ - ]

Best known for Zero-K, an open-source multi-platform futuristic RTS game that uses Spring as engine.

homarp 2021-08-16 21:10:43 +0000 UTC [ - ]

and Beyond All Reason, https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=28201265

Zero-K is at https://zero-k.info/

szundi 2021-08-16 21:16:15 +0000 UTC [ - ]

Most played by us at the company, regular 6-8 people lan parties. We play BA (a game for the engine) that resembles the Total Annihilation game that this whole stuff is based upon. Best times. Really recommended.

sockgrant 2021-08-16 21:33:13 +0000 UTC [ - ]

Crazy! I was gonna come here to say this reminds me of Total Annihilation.

So it sounds like you recommend it? I'll have to check it out!

azalemeth 2021-08-16 21:39:43 +0000 UTC [ - ]

Is it possible to build this on MacOS? The wiki has some old build guides from about 2011 saying that "the next version will contain a .app package directly", but only binaries for Linux and Windows are provided. I presume this is just a reference to apple's awful opengl support, but I can't really find a conclusive explanation what happened, why, or if the engine will build at all if I try.

Grakel 2021-08-16 21:00:23 +0000 UTC [ - ]

I just can't make time for games that don't look good anymore. They don't have to be cutting edge, but they can't be plain, without lighting or an interesting color palette.

Cyberdogs7 2021-08-16 21:14:33 +0000 UTC [ - ]

This engine is based off a 1990's game called Total Annihilation, Because of this, most of the fans and developers have an affinity towards the more simple graphics that mimic the original game.

Also, there can be thousands of units on the map, and each projectile is physically modeled.

Not to invalidate your stance, just providing background to why it is the way it is.

poisonborz 2021-08-16 21:27:52 +0000 UTC [ - ]

For the record, the engine was written from scratch, and not based, only inspired by TA - to bring its style of RTS to true full 3D. It has compatibility/easy portability of TA maps and units though.

Cyberdogs7 2021-08-16 21:38:23 +0000 UTC [ - ]

That is a very valuable distinction. Because of this, there is a full 3d viewpoint available as well as built in LUA scripting.

Grakel 2021-08-16 21:23:36 +0000 UTC [ - ]

That sounds cool. Sorry to offend.

I just picked up Patron, which reminds me of old Sierra City builders I used to love like Caesar 2, but with quite decent graphics.

Cyberdogs7 2021-08-16 21:39:03 +0000 UTC [ - ]

No offense taken! I am a big fan of both the original and SprintRTS, so I may have had bias in my writing.

andrewmcwatters 2021-08-16 22:33:37 +0000 UTC [ - ]

The market is flooded with good looking games that are not fun.

Consider the fact that big budget games spend a majority of their budget on graphics, and are conservative in gameplay, because it is a risk to do anything else otherwise. See also: the film industry[1].

If you want to play games that are fun, look for games with graphics that are less than AAA quality. Smaller studios focus on what they want to build, at the risk of bankruptcy. This is the exact type of game engine you should be keeping an eye on, because small studios and independent developers don't all pick Unreal. They aren't spending their time building PBR-workflow assets because they take exponentially more time to build than the traditional 3D and 2D art workflows of yesteryear.

It is a project management objective to trade those things off, so one can ship a game.

There's a reason why games like Minecraft and Factorio have overwhelming mass market appeal. And Factorio actually has AAA level 2D graphics, but most kids wouldn't recognize that.

There are more games than ever, and in addition, there are now games that are several years old which never stopped being fun.

[1]: https://www.reddit.com/r/Filmmakers/comments/ozj2ov/matt_dam...

Graffur 2021-08-16 21:19:33 +0000 UTC [ - ]

That's interesting. I find myself the opposite. The games that are improved graphically year on year are normally quite boring or scripted. Fifa and COD series for example.

I can appreciate great graphics like Red Dead 2 but if it could be 10% more fun but look 10% worse I would always pick the more fun option.

poisonborz 2021-08-16 21:38:56 +0000 UTC [ - ]

Exactly. I'm playing Red Dead 2 now and it's mind blowing how slow and limiting the controls are despite the world looking so full and lively. For the sake of realism and movie-like presentation, the player is reduced to A-B button pushing, to not interfere with the nicely laid out scripted scenes.

pythonaut_16 2021-08-16 22:04:23 +0000 UTC [ - ]

One thing I've picked up on that I especially hate is when a cut scene has you press buttons solely for the sake of interactivity, i.e. they don't utilize game mechanics.

"Press X to..." in a situation that you will never encounter again or press X again in. Like the cut scene isn't teaching you a mechanic, it's just making you pay attention.

BlueTemplar 2021-08-18 19:40:28 +0000 UTC [ - ]

But lighting is actually something that Spring does very well ?

docflabby 2021-08-16 21:09:31 +0000 UTC [ - ]

Been playing this for years - it's brilliant

aerovistae 2021-08-16 22:15:20 +0000 UTC [ - ]

There have been three posts to hacker news today of open source RTS games ... what's with that? Is it RTS Day or something?

2021-08-16 22:19:12 +0000 UTC [ - ]

stonecharioteer 2021-08-17 03:17:28 +0000 UTC [ - ]

I was wondering the same thing. What's going on?

BlueTemplar 2021-08-18 19:38:51 +0000 UTC [ - ]

Wait, what's the 3rd one ?

epa 2021-08-16 22:08:24 +0000 UTC [ - ]

Seems like this is based on total annihilation, one of the Best RTS games ever made.

BlueTemplar 2021-08-18 19:39:28 +0000 UTC [ - ]

It started circa 1999 as a 3D viewer for TA replays :

https://www.clan-sy.com/frame.html

aphroz 2021-08-16 23:00:39 +0000 UTC [ - ]

I love this game and I wish there were more people playing it to make it easier to find an online game maybe that will change now thanks to HN

2021-08-16 20:27:26 +0000 UTC [ - ]

Craighead 2021-08-17 03:12:14 +0000 UTC [ - ]

Didnt expect to see total annihilation on hn