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curvedinfinity
August 8th, 2008, 11:03 PM
Hey everyone! I've been working on a project in my spare time for the past two years, and its finally complete. It's called MirthKit, and its basically a free all-encompassing system for making and publishing games. You can optionally sell games through it (there's no cost for this). The reason why we're different is that we require all games, even the ones that are sold commercially, to be distributed in source format. That seems like a contradiction, but we've made it work.

This is technically a commercial project, but I hope the mods can appreciate the open source ideals that we are shooting for.

You can download it at http://www.mirthkit.com

On another note, I wrote a bit about my personal reasoning for making MirthKit on our own forum. I hope you as part of the OSS dev crowd can appreciate my purpose...

From http://forum.mirthkit.com/viewtopic.php?pid=4#p4


Hey all,
MirthKit was envisioned as my personal answer to the question, "why aren't games easier to give to the world?" I spent a lot of time researching whether there was an answer to that question, but there simply weren't any ways to quickly do everything that is involved with making a living making games.

I was just completely frustrated that there were all these huge companies out there, and all this money floating around being wasted away on the same damn game over and over, yet something so simple had been overlooked. Ug. All I wanted was some way to just sit down and start making a game one day. Then when I'm done making the game a few weeks later, put it in a zip file and get it out to the world while scrounging up just enough income so I can rinse and repeat.

That didn't exist! To get to the point you can do all of that, you have to know all this stupid superfluous crap -- which libraries do I use? How do I use all of these libraries? How do I publish my game? Do I pitch to a publisher? Do I go out on my own? Do I try to make it work with ads? Do I try to flat out sell it myself? Do I use an existing marketplace? How does credit card processing work?

I practically tore my hair out, because something like MirthKit isn't that complicated -- just no one had thought it was a good idea or something. Well damn, I was so frustrated, I just went and did it because people deserve better.

I specifically designed MirthKit so there is as little lock-in as possible, while still being able to have a unified system. I specifically designed MirthKit so the publishing terms are extremely flexible, and the monetary deal for developers is far and beyond the best deal anywhere.

We do all these things because we know something that big CEOs do not. With software, it costs us nothing to be nice, so why shouldn't we be nice? It will probably help us more in the end, anyway, compared to arranging all these complex methods of "getting" people. Its easy to see a heartless business from a mile away, so why does anyone consciously chose to be the bad guy, anyway?

Regardless, we want to be nice because making money is not our goal. Our goal is for there to be more fun games in the world, because we personally would like to play them. We were forced to involve money in the equation because money is required so that developers can live (for a year I tried my hardest to make non-commercial game development work).

So, there you have it. MirthKit is an honest-to-goodness better way of doing things, because me and my buddies want to play your games. I hope you enjoy our effort and can get to know us a little better while this community develops! :)

Thanks,
Chase Adams

starcannon
August 8th, 2008, 11:07 PM
Very cool, I'm reading through your site now, and was lucky enough to get to be first on stumbling it as well.

Keep up the great work, and thanks!

curvedinfinity
August 8th, 2008, 11:34 PM
Thanks starcannon! -- I forgot to mention, if you have any trouble getting it to work, just drop a reply.

ZylGadis
August 9th, 2008, 01:52 AM
Is MirthKit open-source?

MirthKit’s arcade and all of MirthKit’s games, including games you buy, are open source. Free games are covered under the X11 license. The source is also available for any games you purchase, but you are only allowed to redistribute changes to that source through MirthKit’s publishing process. MirthKit’s binary executable (the main part of MirthKit that is installed on your system) is closed source.

This is called vendor lock-in. No, thanks. There is also a play on the words "open source," which is intended to fool people who don't know better.

I urge the admin team for a rule here (if one does not exist already) against blatant advertisements made for financial gain. They are annoying for experienced developers, and outright dangerous for inexperienced ones.

Phenax
August 9th, 2008, 02:33 AM
Thanks, seems very interesting! Finity Flight is a pretty good game, too.

mssever
August 9th, 2008, 03:05 AM
Is MirthKit open-source?
MirthKit’s arcade and all of MirthKit’s games, including games you buy, are open source. Free games are covered under the X11 license. The source is also available for any games you purchase, but you are only allowed to redistribute changes to that source through MirthKit’s publishing process.
Following on to what ZylGadis said earlier, this is a contradiction. It is not possible to prohibit independent redistribution of games covered under the X11 license. Furthermore, the site claims that all games are open source, while simultaneously claiming that redistribution outside the site is prohibited. This is a violation of the Open Source Definition (http://opensource.org/docs/osd), which means that the site's claim of open source is deceptive.

Shame you, curvedinfinity, for producing a deceptive product and promoting it here.[-X

curvedinfinity
August 9th, 2008, 03:46 AM
This is called vendor lock-in. No, thanks. There is also a play on the words "open source," which is intended to fool people who don't know better.

I urge the admin team for a rule here (if one does not exist already) against blatant advertisements made for financial gain. They are annoying for experienced developers, and outright dangerous for inexperienced ones.

Look bud. Did you not catch the part that I have contributed and founded open source projects in the past?

I made these four games two years ago:
http://ff2.curvedinfinity.com/

They are open source, and I even contributed the C++ library, and several art tutorials to the community.

... and I've also contributed minor changes to a number of projects other than my own.

Stop being maniacally against commercialism. Its a fact with media industries, and I'm trying to make a huge step forward with games by producing a place where commercial games can also be open source.

curvedinfinity
August 9th, 2008, 03:52 AM
Following on to what ZylGadis said earlier, this is a contradiction. It is not possible to prohibit independent redistribution of games covered under the X11 license. Furthermore, the site claims that all games are open source, while simultaneously claiming that redistribution outside the site is prohibited. This is a violation of the Open Source Definition (http://opensource.org/docs/osd), which means that the site's claim of open source is deceptive.

Shame you, curvedinfinity, for producing a deceptive product and promoting it here.[-X

The X11 license actually is compatible with commercialism, but as a matter of fact, MirthKit's commercial games don't use it, only the free games do. I'm sorry that I must have worded that confusingly.

Our Q&A: http://www.mirthkit.com/?page_id=4

It says "Free games are covered under the X11 license. The source is also available for any games you purchase, but you are only allowed to redistribute changes to that source through MirthKit’s publishing process."

X11/MIT license on wikipedia:
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/MIT_License

Basically, the X11 license is the closest thing you can get to releasing to the public domain while still retaining copyrights. If you so please, you can go right now and take whatever you want from the MirthKit Arcade (including Finity Flight) and even go as far as reselling it. Our work is your work. -- The open-ness does stop at our executable, but thats so we can have at least some measure of attribution with commercial games.

Our end user (not developer) policy for commercial games is designed to encourage reuse of existing games, but also to make sure a games's original creator gets attribution for any sourced works. -- We also have a term that allows an original creator to chose to allow people to modify their work without attribution.

-- I just wanted to add that we specifically have measures to counter the vendor lock-in that can happen from a closed-source interpreter. We are cross platform, we use an open source language (Squirrel), and our developer terms require that developers keep the rights to their games. We also have no terms to force developers to use our arcade or executable for their MirthKit-language games. We will also be _extremely_ open to letting open source projects use our executable without our arcade.

I don't see anyone complaining about Java, Flash, or XNA. These all have much less free terms, conditions, and requirements.

ZylGadis
August 9th, 2008, 04:12 AM
Your most significant fault here, which you can't wriggle out of, is providing deceptive information. Some people call that aggressive marketing, I call it outright lying. Your thing is not open source because it does not allow unrestricted distribution, as per the OSI definition. Any claims to the contrary are blatant lies.

Watering down the argument with unrelated information won't help you, either.

Edit: by "vendor lock-in" I meant that software is locked in to your, the vendor's, distribution channels. That might have been unclear, hopefully it is clear now.

curvedinfinity
August 9th, 2008, 04:23 AM
This is called vendor lock-in. No, thanks. There is also a play on the words "open source," which is intended to fool people who don't know better.

I urge the admin team for a rule here (if one does not exist already) against blatant advertisements made for financial gain. They are annoying for experienced developers, and outright dangerous for inexperienced ones.

Would the following wording be more acceptable?

"MirthKit’s arcade and all of MirthKit’s games, including games you buy, are source-available. Free games and MirthKit's Arcade are covered under the X11 license, meaning they are completely open source. For commercial games, the source is also available, but to protect attribution of content's original creators, you are only allowed to redistribute changes to that source through MirthKit’s publishing process. MirthKit’s binary executable (the main part of MirthKit that is installed on your system) is closed source."

You need to stop approaching me like I'm the enemy. I'm trying to bring more games to Linux. This is the best way I could figure out to do that.

curvedinfinity
August 9th, 2008, 04:40 AM
Your most significant fault here, which you can't wriggle out of, is providing deceptive information. Some people call that aggressive marketing, I call it outright lying. Your thing is not open source because it does not allow unrestricted distribution, as per the OSI definition. Any claims to the contrary are blatant lies.

Watering down the argument with unrelated information won't help you, either.

Edit: by "vendor lock-in" I meant that software is locked in to your, the vendor's, distribution channels. That might have been unclear, hopefully it is clear now.

So you know, the only thing that would potentially be keeping a developer locked in is our API for Squirrel. There is nothing stopping anyone from rewriting it. The language is open, so someone just needs to take all the libraries we use, and redo all of our work. -- Its not a huge amount of work either. If someone were to, developers who made games that were already published with us would be free to use the completely open interpreter -- we have no exclusivity terms.

mssever
August 9th, 2008, 04:46 AM
Would the following wording be more acceptable?
Source-available is fine. I believe vBulletin uses the term visible source, which I think is better still. Personally, I'm not against your model, per se, just the fact that the term open source has a specific meaning, which is contrary to your FAQ as I quoted it.

Your revised wording makes the matter clearer.

ZylGadis
August 9th, 2008, 04:47 AM
I approach anybody who tries to cheat me as an enemy. Nothing personal. I also applaud your efforts to correct the wording.

I suggest removing "to protect attribution of content's original creators." It is still suspicious, considering that you also intend to earn revenue through distribution, and possibly have other intentions. Either mention no reason at all, or enumerate all reasons completely. Also, you might include "as per the OSI definition" (with a link to it) when you mention open source to make the statement stronger.

curvedinfinity
August 9th, 2008, 04:48 AM
Thanks, seems very interesting! Finity Flight is a pretty good game, too.

Thanks! We actually are working on a patch already that has a couple minor changes, mainly involved with the learning curve. The patch will have some little tidbits of extra gameplay content too, though.

loell
August 9th, 2008, 04:48 AM
hi, i downloaded mirthkit, i seem to remember that finity flight was downloadable with its own binary package, but why the change of strategy now? where the mirthkit executable is the one pulling finity flight from your server?

mssever
August 9th, 2008, 04:51 AM
I don't see anyone complaining about Java, Flash, or XNA. These all have much less free terms, conditions, and requirements.
Apples and oranges. Java is in the process of being open sourced. Flash makes no open source claims. I've never heard of XNA, so I can't comment on it.

curvedinfinity
August 9th, 2008, 04:54 AM
Source-available is fine. I believe vBulletin uses the term visible source, which I think is better still. Personally, I'm not against your model, per se, just the fact that the term open source has a specific meaning, which is contrary to your FAQ as I quoted it.

Your revised wording makes the matter clearer.


I approach anybody who tries to cheat me as an enemy. Nothing personal. I also applaud your efforts to correct the wording.

I suggest removing "to protect attribution of content's original creators." It is still suspicious, considering that you also intend to earn revenue through distribution, and possibly have other intentions. Either mention no reason at all, or enumerate all reasons completely. Also, you might include "as per the OSI definition" (with a link to it) when you mention open source to make the statement stronger.

Please view the updated FAQ to MirthKit's copyrights:
http://www.mirthkit.com/?page_id=4

ZylGadis
August 9th, 2008, 04:58 AM
Wonderful, thank you.

curvedinfinity
August 9th, 2008, 05:07 AM
hi, i downloaded mirthkit, i seem to remember that finity flight was downloadable with its own binary package, but why the change of strategy now? where the mirthkit executable is the one pulling finity flight from your server?

Heya, I remember you. :)

Alright ... its a looong story which involves a ton of decision making.

At the time I was making the FF2 series, I was trying to see whether donations and ads could support me in the most minimal level possible -- meaning absolutely no luxuries in any way -- raman for dinner every night and pretty much no excitement. It still wasn't enough even with the minuscule expenses I ended up with.

EDIT: I have to admit that the main problem with my FF2 strategy was that it needed lots of time to gain popularity, and thus, any sort of income. I didn't have that kind of time, so it didn't work for me. One of the things MK has going for it is that a developer can immediately start getting income, so the transition from a normal job to indy game development is smoother.

I simply wanted to make my own games as my living, and also be socially responsible (read not greedy). That meant working in the game industry was out of the question, since I'd be doing neither. So what I decided to do was get a day job and start working on a way to give game developers, especially the newest ones, the most sustainable situation. Everything spawned from that.

The reason its now an "arcade" is so that it makes all the different games multiply their user awareness. So, if someone learns about X game from a friend, they'll go on, play it, and also see Y game. As it is, the OSS community sort of has the same thing going, but they are in wiki format, and there are more steps involved from going from playing one game to installing and playing the next.

Did that answer your question?

loell
August 9th, 2008, 05:14 AM
Did that answer your question?

yes I fully understand your reasoning and your situation. I would have taken same path if i was in your shoe.

thanks :)

curvedinfinity
August 9th, 2008, 05:36 AM
Wonderful, thank you.

If either of you find anything else that bothers you on our website, please let me know. I don't want there to be any question of misrepresentation.

mssever
August 9th, 2008, 05:41 AM
Please view the updated FAQ to MirthKit's copyrights:
http://www.mirthkit.com/?page_id=4
I'm satisfied. Thanks.

Vadi
August 25th, 2008, 09:47 PM
This looks pretty nice, thanks!

Edit: Can you please provide a 64bit .deb? I'm on 64bit.

Also, you don't have an explicit link to the downloads page on the left sidebar, making it hard to locate it if you're in another part of the website.

curvedinfinity
August 25th, 2008, 11:48 PM
This looks pretty nice, thanks!

Edit: Can you please provide a 64bit .deb? I'm on 64bit.

Also, you don't have an explicit link to the downloads page on the left sidebar, making it hard to locate it if you're in another part of the website.

Hey, and thanks for checking us out! We'll have a 64 bit package as soon as we get a development environment going for it.

Also, just for reference, the downloads section is the "Get Started" link on the sidebar. :)