Reviews and Ratings

Interesting piece of software  
4.0
   
written over 16 years ago

Although installation is all-but-simple (even in Debian), the feeling of having your own Sourceforge cannot be replaced by anything else. Worth a shot.

3 out of 3 users found the following review helpful.
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OpenTibia Server - well written MMO...  
4.0
   
written over 16 years ago

OpenTibia Server is a replacement server for MMORPG called Tibia, developed by a German company from Regensburg, Cipsoft GmbH. OpenTibia now contains most of the features of original Tibia server, and it is in fact amazing that the developers are continuing progress. Several updates are being prepared that should greatly optimize the performance of the software when large numbers of players are connected (in hundreds), mostly by replacing the "one-thread-per-player" model. That is the so-called "revnetsys" branch in the repository.

OpenTibia uses numerous standard methods in its development and free libraries for leveraging them, such as XML for most of the static storage (monster attribute specifications, spell attributes, and it is one of the formats for storing maps), LUA as the runtime scripting language (for NPCs, for spells, and so on). It unfortunately uses Boost library as well, which is the reason I am giving it a 4 instead of 5 -- my personal opinion is that Boost is bloated. It might make things easier, but not for me. Let's just say that Boost's Regex library is (in Debian) dependant on an internationalization library which is 18MB in size.

A large community exists, which develops maps, scripts, and even server distributions composing of the above. There are many "closed" servers (meaning those who do not release neither source nor binaries) -- GPLv2 allows people to do this, which has allowed for a great community of people looking for fame (by improving OT and hosting their improvements) to arise.

Overall, OpenTibia is an exemplary MMORPG emulator. Although it does not justify its existence financially (the original game is free to play), it does justify it by providing players features not present in the original game (such as very fast player-versus-player action which some servers implement). It's also fully legal, since Tibia has not forbidden the reverse engineering or use of their client "in the real world" by their license agreement; their service rules, however, forbid this. It is probable that, thus, this rule applies only inside their game, and is punishable only there.

There are some clients in development as well, which will make OpenTibia a complete and free alternative to Tibia.

2 out of 2 users found the following review helpful.
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Untapped potential  
2.0
   
written over 16 years ago

Crossfire exists for quite long, and obviously has a large developer base. Unfortunately, I believe that it will stay largely that -- a developer's toy. Large maps may be available, certain amount of graphics may be there, the server and the client may be open-source; however, the movement isn't smooth, the UI is cluttered and it's hard to find the way around it, and I can't say there is a central point of referral for discussion with other players, or similar. At least I haven't found something similar during my playing around with Crossfire.

I believe that Crossfire would, with proper guidance, be able to become something like a closed source game Tibia. If Crossfire developers are reading this, I'd suggest them to try Tibia out. I am not suggesting removal of options, reduction of world size or something similar; I am merely suggesting less cluttered and nicer interface, animated characters, scrolling movement.

I'm giving this project 2 stars instead of 1 because of respect I have for the work and time the developers placed in Crossfire.

2 out of 2 users found the following review helpful.
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@welloiledpc: gfdl violation?  
4.0
   
written over 14 years ago

Just noting that PDF produced by WellOiledPC is possibly a GFDL violation:

https://www.ohloh.net/topics/3602?page=1#post_10844

Also, non-downloadable _work in progress_ version of the manual is free:

http://docs.gimp.org/2.6/en/

Older (2.2 and 2.4) manuals are also downloadable PDFs.

--------------
In other news, GIMP is an excellent piece of software, especially for software developers or for-computer artists. From what I hear from for-print artists, it's not suitable for finalizing for print.

But when you take its price into account, as well as its excellent suitability for any advanced for-computer image manipulation, then you see you can't go better than this. After all:
benefit / price = benefit / 0 = +infinity

2 out of 2 users found the following review helpful.
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Simple and efficient  
4.0
   
written about 16 years ago

Misfit Model 3D is not a tool packed with options, and that's probably one of the things I love about it. Simplicity of use greatly reminds me of 3D Studio Max. There aren't too many complicated keyboard shortcuts to learn like in some other software ("to move, press and hold ctrl + left mouse; to rotate, press and hold alt+ctrl+right mouse; to scale the model up, press and hold shift+alt+ctrl+f1+middle mouse, don't forget to release the 'super' key").

It does not try to be smart about whether you're trying to select or move an item (like 3DS). Some might find it irritating (I find it so sometimes, too) but on the other hand, it won't do something accidentally. Many things about MM3D force you to be concentrated on what you're doing -- and that's not a bad thing. In fact, it makes it easier to get things done quickly.

Texturing projection is also nicely done. You pick faces (triangles), group them into groups, assign material to group, and then choose Edit Texture Coordinates. Then you first reset the coordinates according to Front, Back, etc. view, then drag the points that represent vertices. Extremely simple!

MM3D has some small flaws. And I repeat, very small flaws. A game programmer, not a graphics artists, who needs to get some models quickly done, won't care too much.

For example, it's only suitable for simple modelling; if you're developing an amateur game, you can get good, but very simple things done with it. Don't count on models with thousands of triangles; it's simply not going to happen. (Besides, if you're developing THAT kind of a game, go hire a professional artist.)

It's also completely unsuitable for rendering tasks; best you can do is press printscreen. Professional tools still do a bit better job than real time rendering (with OpenGL).

A flaw you may more seriously feel is the projection texture coordinate mapping. It's hard to pinpoint, but it's a bit clumsy to use. Not to say other tools are better at it, but let's hope that this part improves.

I can't judge skeletal animation stuff since I didn't use it; but it looks nice enough to do its job.

All in all, MM3D is excellent if you need simple models and if you don't need 3DSM-style modifiers. Personally, I find it 90% suiting my developer needs (and I mean that as a programmer). I've tested about a dozen free modelling tools, some texturing tools, and MM3D combines simplicity with just enough power to do its job.

I can do some things with it that I judge nice, and I'm not a skilled artist, and I'm generally trying to be critical of my work. GIMP and MM3D should be the indie and free software 3D developer's holy grail!

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Disappointing coding style, too com...  
2.0
   
written over 13 years ago

While libjingle solves quite real problems and will certainly help me do NAT traversal or maybe even VOIP, its coding style is "let's throw this together, it's an internal project" and "who needs good docs?"

Having been spoiled by Apple's docs and coding style, I find it hard to read the way the Google::FunctionNaming_() was done. It's also inconsistent; see for example function names in http://code.google.com/apis/talk/libjingle/reference/port.html

Developers also seem to have a strange need to fit everything into 80 characters, oblivious to the fact that modern text editors won't have problems with those lines that need to be wrapped in multiple lines.

Number of comments is appallingly low, and the comments do nothing to describe the functionality of individual functions. Purpose of each class is left to the reader to decide.

Example code presumes I want to use libjingle's XMPP implementation, and it presumes I don't want to do anything except VOIP/VVOIP.

While documentation is available on the web, why is it not available in downloadable form? Why do the authors use dozens of templates, concepts such as signals, etc, without inline comments describing everything?

Interface exposed to the end programmer should not require one to understand all the internals. It should be powerful, it should be simple, and libjingle should allow someone with an existing XMPP client to add tunneling within ten minutes or so, VOIP in twenty-thirty.

As I write these lines, I spent only about 30-60min studying libjingle, and primarily digging the code (not reading online docs); I am sadly disappointed by the internals and by the exposed interface of something that works so well.

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Are all those features needed?  
3.0
   
written about 16 years ago

While Amarok may currently be looking up to products such as Windows Media Player or Winamp 3, that is precisely what is taking me away from it. Simplest solutions are usually the best ones, such as XMMS / Winamp2.

Personally, I don't need a wealth of options regarding a media library; I can use another piece of software if I need that. In a media player, I'm looking for a fast startup time, and quick playing of a song, a bit of playlist management and that's it.

I don't need album covers. I can use a search engine for that.
I don't need "organized" storage of 1001 playlist. I know very well how to store playlist files in folders.

On the other hand, thumbs up to the development team for producing such a quality software. But, WMP and WA3 are both quality software, but still filled with unneeded things. WA5 isn't far away. Amarok has sadly stepped where WMP has gone.

0 out of 5 users found the following review helpful.
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