Ace of spades, Minecraft like FPS

Ace of spades, Minecraft like FPS (rockpapershotgun.com)

118 points by netcrash 15 years ago | 37 comments

ugh 15 years ago |

Nice to see that Minecraft has seemingly created a new genre of first person world building games.

Deestan 15 years ago | |

It's not correct to attribute the voxel game genre to Minecraft. It's just the first game of the genre to reach a considerable level of success.

Minecraft is just one of many games that were directly inspired by the underground hit Infiniminer.

microtonal 15 years ago | | |

I fondly remember NovaLogic's Comanche series. While it isn't of the 'world building' genre, its voxel engine was very impressive for its time:

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Comanche_series

Also interesting (historically) is 'Rescue on Fractalus'. Not just for its cheesy name, but also due to its reliance on fractals to draw 3D mountain sceneries:

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Rescue_on_Fractalus!

Edit: videos of both games:

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Usj17cxSCKs

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=FbZ-chrOgGg&feature=playe...

blhack 15 years ago | | |

Infiniminer may have been Notch's inspiration, but Minecraft is what created the genre. People making minecraft-like games right now aren't copying Infiniminer, they're copying minecraft.

The iPhone wasn't the first smart-phone, it wasn't even the first touch-screen smart phone, but most people (correctly) give it credit for popularizing the style, and creating a new "genre" for smartphones.

ugh 15 years ago | | |

Why not? If it’s the one that made it popular then it’s the one that created the genre.

Edit: Well, ok, I don't want to put it in such absolute terms. But I do think that Minecraft deserves quite a large chunk of attribution for the genre.

swombat 15 years ago | | |

Is Minecraft Voxel? I thought it was real (if blocky) 3D?

petewailes 15 years ago | |

Indeed. I can't wait to see someone building an RTS using this. Imagine how awesome TA would be if you could alter terrain on the fly!

JanezStupar 15 years ago | | |

Then you should go and check TA Spring. It has all the good stuff from TA + modern graphics engine + terrain changing mechanics.

I remember this epic duel I played vs 2 other guys (yes my teammate quit) in a castle type map. Since I turtled too heavily for them to break through, eventually they just drowned me by blasting me with arty long enough for map's floor to erode beyond water level.

thenduks 15 years ago |

FYI: Windows only.

CWIZO 15 years ago |

Is this a completely new thing or is it based on Minecraft's engine?

Deestan 15 years ago | |

Not based on the Minecraft engine. The Minecraft engine is proprietary and closed-source. Also, it is (according to the developers) a bit of a runny mess, so licensing doesn't make sense either.

CWIZO 15 years ago | | |

That's a shame. I guess this game would progress more quickly if it could leverage Minecraft's engine, since it looks the concept is nearly the same.

kpeel 15 years ago | |

According to the readme, it's based on an open source engine called Voxlap, created by Ken Silverman (the guy that wrote the Duke3d engine). Here's a link:

http://www.advsys.net/ken/voxlap.htm

jonursenbach 15 years ago | |

Given that Minecraft isn't open source, this is a new thing.

fredoliveira 15 years ago | | |

You're right in that this is a new engine, but the fact that minecraft's engine isn't open source doesn't necessarily come into play here. There's closed-source engine licensing happening everywhere.

rsbrown 15 years ago |

Jut DL'ed and played for a few minutes. I really like it, but there were issues with lag and general UI responsiveness.

Though very rough, I'm excited about the potential for this one.

beza1e1 15 years ago |

So, where is the code?

nopassrecover 15 years ago | |

Actually if you read http://www.rockpapershotgun.com/2011/01/20/proto-minecraft-a... apparently releasing code (unintentionally) is what destroyed Minecraft's inspiration Infiniminer.

euccastro 15 years ago | |

Why has this been downvoted? The game is free software, yet the (temporary) homepage has no link to the sources.

This is a most relevant question in a "Hacker News" site.

etcet 15 years ago | | |

I haven't heard any mention of this game being free or open source. The software it uses (Voxlap & GenLand) both have permissive non-commercial licenses w/ attribution but are not viral like the GPL.

dylanrw 15 years ago |

It's a shame it has no Mac client. :/

olsonjeffery 15 years ago | |

I actually play AoS on Snow Leopard using a Wineskin wrapper + ie7 (gross, I know.. but all AoS games are launched from the browser and FF didn't work right for me..)

If you're familiar with wineskin, the process was something like:

1. create new wrapper 2. in advanced settings, launch winetricks and install ie7 (ie8 is always weird/crippled for me) 3. set homepage to http://ace-spades.com 4. in OSX, download the AoS installer MSI 5. Install the MSI from your Wineskin wrapper 6. Set the ie7 bin to be the "start program" for your wrapper 7. Launch the wrapper 8. Click game 9. Profit!