LINUXGAMES

Almost 10 months of development led to a huge amount of improvements, check out the changelog for details.

Whats hot:
* New shiny water shader (by jK). It uses bumpmaps, it is both pretty and fast (see pic).
* Improved performance (faster gameplay, more FPS)
* Even more modding capabilities
* Improved autohosting with dedicated server
* As usual, lots of bugfixes

Spring is an open source real-time strategy game inspired by Total Annihilation.
Check the setup guide and Linux forums for installation instructions and troubleshooting.

Screenshots: [ View ] Download: [ clan-sy.com ]

The Blender-derived open-source game project, Yo Frankie!, has posted a video update:

Its close to release and were finalizing the levels, cleaning up the files and removing smaller glitches. however there are some things that we didn’t post about because we were too busy.

Behind the exciting GLSL shaders, along with the funny animations and pretty scenery we did manage to get some gameplay in.

Here’s a video (OGG Theora) of the game Chris and myself recorded, showing some of the gameplay you can expect to see.

• LordHavoc has released a new build of his Quake-derived DarkPlaces engine, which introduces savegame compatibility. DarkPlaces is also utilized by the Nexuiz project.
• The Quake2World engine’s site has a new demo video showcasing the bump and parallax mapping, specular lighting, and new maps the project has added to the Quake 2 engine.

LordsAWar version 0.1.2, a clone of the turn-based strategy game Warlords II, has been released with the following changes:

• new default terrain artwork based on wesnoth artwork.
• added z-axis zooming on the game map.
• improved random map generation.
• improved network play (still buggy)
• fixed some crashing bugs.
• fixed many game behaviour bugs.

The authors also send thanks to Janek Kozicki for converting the hex wesnoth tiles to squares, the Wesnoth Art team, and all of the bug reporters.

Download: [ nongnu.org ]

Teeworlds, an endearing multiplayer 2D shooter (3D-accelerated) with mouse-based aiming, is now at version 0.4.3:

• Auto team balance
• Anti-spam fixes
• Fixed editor crash on windows when saving
• Added clear collision to the editor
• Fixed issue with cursor being hidden on some maps
• New version notifier
• Silent mode for windows
• F10 for screenshots now works in the editor

Screenshots: [ View ] Download: [ teeworlds.com ]

1up.com conducted an interview with id Software’s Tim Willits and Todd Hollenshead about the vaunted first-person shooter developer’s myriad projects in the pipeline:

1UP: What’s going on with Quake Wars? I think you guys are due for an expansion. What do you think?

TW: [Sighs] Well, again, that’s one thing. If the market would support it — we may do it.

Rage, Wolfenstein, and Doom 4 are also discussed.

OpenAnno, an open source real-time economic sim loosely based on the Anno series, has a new release:

Do however note that this is a development release solely to show off what we have done so far. It is intended to be viewed as a technical demo and to get people interested in the project. You can do some basic playing, but nothing great yet.

There’s also a new demo video.

Screenshots: [ View ] Download: [ openanno.org ]

LambdaRogue is a roguelike role-playing game with an emphasis on story:

• graphical SDL mode and text-based console mode
• optional soundtrack
• 3 difficulty levels
• 2 alternate ways to win (with different endings)
• 5 professions to choose from (Constructor, Enchanter, Thief, Ranger, Soldier)
• 5 gods, inspired by greek mythology, to worship (Aphrodite, Apoll, Hermes, Dionysos, Ares)
• 10 skills, abilities and talents to train
• 4 character presets for an easier start for new players
• 20 dungeon levels, most of them randomly generated when entered
• 20+ quests
• 20+ different standard monsters, many of them with special abilities
• 7 unique monsters
• many carefully handcrafted items
• 22 different spells to learn and to train (incl. some not so easy to be obtained)

Download: [ sourceforge.net ]

Hothead Games sent in the following press release to announce that the second episode of Penny Arcade Adventures: On the Rain-Slick Precipice of Darkness has gone gold:

VANCOUVER, British Columbia – Oct. 1, 2008 - Hothead Games is pleased to announce that the anxiously-awaited Episode Two in its well-received Penny Arcade Adventures: On the Rain-Slick Precipice of Darkness game series has reached Gold Master status for the Windows®, Mac® and Linux® versions. In recognition of this momentous milestone, Hothead has further announced that Episode Two will be priced at $14.95 for download this fall via the Greenhouse digital distribution service (www.playgreenhouse.com) and other popular digital distribution systems or 1200 Microsoft points on Xbox LIVE® Arcade. The PLAYSTATION®Network version of Episode Two is also expected for release shortly thereafter with similar pricing. “Episode One was a huge investment for us and established a great base from which we built Episode Two. It allows us to focus even more on the fans in developing future games in the series,” said Hothead’s CEO, Vlad Ceraldi. “Our new game has a lot of great enhancements that were made possible by direct fan interaction and we are extremely excited to get our game into their hands and get their feedback.”

The madcap Penny Arcade experience continues in Episode Two where gamers return to the deranged 1920s universe of New Arcadia and rejoin Gabe and Tycho of the Startling Developments Detective Agency to visit crazy new areas, combat bigger and badder enemies, solve even more wacky puzzles and get ever closer to unraveling the mystery in the sinister heart of New Arcadia.

You can read our review of the first episode here; there’s also a new trailer at Gametrailers.com.