DECK - Doom Engine Creator's Kit

"DECK will be a public domain collection of game assets that will, combined with the modernized GZDoom version of the Doom engine and a resource and level editing program such as SLADE3, allow you to create 3D games using one of the most proven game engines of the past 20 years. The project will also provide documentation to help newcomers learn the basics."

Sounds really cool and they need visual and audio artists to make it happen. What do you think guys?

http://vectorpoem.com/deck/

Neat idea in theory, but I can't help but think it's a bit redundant. There's also the mountain of legal problems that comes with packaging Z/GZDoom with anything -- assuming they're intending to package GZDoom with their kit, that is. They also haven't specified whether or not content made with their kit can be sold commercially -- that in itself is totally fine, but unless someone is making an "asset pack", the above legal problems become an issue.

BlueFeena said:

They also haven't specified whether or not content made with their kit can be sold commercially

Your work will be placed in the public domain via the CC0 license, able to be reused by anyone for all time with zero legal restrictions. We will proudly thank you in the credits file in any form under our control in which DECK is distributed. The nature of public domain is such that artists can remix your work and even remove this attribution from it, but in practice the latter is somewhat unlikely.

That makes perfect sense, although it doesn't address the issue of packaging GZDoom in with content derived from Deck, commercial or otherwise.

There's a nice thread about it here:
http://makega.me/t/the-doom-engine-creators-kit/143/13

JP LeBreton (the guy leading this) does mention that they're looking at replacing the non-GPL dependencies (mainly FMOD) to make an open-source release.

It's also exciting to read that thread and see the new content that is already being made for it. Even if you don't care about that project at all, it means more resources for the Doom community to use in their own stuff.

Really cool overall IMHO.

plums said:

JP LeBreton (the guy leading this) does mention that they're looking at replacing the non-GPL dependencies (mainly FMOD) to make an open-source release.

Let's hope they find someone who can sort it out.

I do not have much hopes for the software renderer which is infested by BUILD code. Not sure if all of this can be tracked down and replaced.

But for GZDoom, aside from FMOD, the only other non-GPL compatible dependency is one of the OPL players, but since there's more than one it could be easily removed.

The MUSLIB license is annoying too. I'm not even sure it's still possible to contact Vladimir Arnost.

That's the one I mean. But that code can be removed without sacrificing too much.

MUSLIB is used as an interface between the OPL emulators and the OPL music players. There is also the MAME OPL emulator that would have to go (not a big loss to be honest).

Gez said:

The MUSLIB license is annoying too. I'm not even sure it's still possible to contact Vladimir Arnost.

This is definitely his profile and it shows activity beyond the year he left the Brno University of Technology and stopped making many traces on the Internet.

Seeing as the goal of DECK is not to play Doom at all, but to use the engine to make new games, I wouldn't be surprised if they took out OPL emulation entirely. Same goes for the software renderer, even. The intended audience for this kind of thing might not even know what Doom is, and they shouldn't have to really.

Cool that JPL is working on Doomish stuff again, but I'm hoping for more limit-removing maps one day.

Yeah I was super excited when I found out this was being made, I've always thought the Doom engine could be used for some really interesting stuff outside of Doom style games, and a lack of accessible resources seems to be one of the major hold-ups for it.