Keeping up with KeeperRL: alpha 28 released, improves mod support
| 4:10 AM

By On 4:10 AM


It has been a while since we last spoke of KeeperRL. The hybrid blend of dungeon building sim with roguelike features seems to be doing rather well, with a growing community and regular progress updates. The latest alpha has just been released, and this time it has a flavor for modding.

Aside from the regular bugfixing and gameplay improvements, this build adds upgraded mod support and an in-game downloader for community content. As with most roguelikes, the developers seem to have realized customization is key to maintain community engagement, a very positive assessment in our regard. You can read the full changelog here.

For those who are not reminded, KeeperRL comes in two versions: a gratis package with plain ASCII graphics and no sound, and a commercial package including pixel art graphics and soundtrack, available for 12.99 EUR on a variety of digital stores. The program code is entirely Free Software, licensed under the GPLv3.

Code license: GPLv3
Assets license: Proprietary (commercial version), CC-BY-NC-SA 4.0 (gratis version)

Let's keep an eye out for Cytopia
| 5:18 PM

By On 5:18 PM



With city builder games climbing back into popularity, it was about time for a serious libre project to tackle the genre once again. After many years of abandoned efforts, it is now the turn of Cytopia to try to scratch that itch.

The project had its inception in 2018, when now lead developer JimmySnails announced in a forum post the intention of creating an engine that could replicate most of the functionalities of the classic SimCity 2000, a game still near and dear to many players up to this day. Ever since then, Cytopia evolved into what appears to a fully-fledged independent game-in-progress, with its own graphics, features, and even an editor planned down the line.

Aside from the obvious SimCity 2000 influences, the game also appears to draw inspiration from the recently released TheoTown, with main graphics artist KingTut101 crafting assets in a very similar style.

Whether Cytopia will deliver where others have failed remains to be seen, but as usual we encourage you to download the initial tech demos and show support for the project.

The developers also have an official Patreon to help support hosting expenses.

Code License: GPLv3
Assets License: Unspecified (reverts to same license as the code, by default)

Blackvoxel, an ambitious Minecraft/Factorio mix?
| 6:19 AM

By On 6:19 AM

Check out this interesting (somewhat recently GPLv3 re-licensed) game Blackvoxel:



As you can see it has some interesting mechanic which they call "Molecular Voxel Interaction Engine". As seen in the trailer above, it basically allows you to automate crafting, resulting in interesting "programmable" factory setups.
Of course this might sound a bit too much like actual work and not fun... but given the big fan scene for the closed source game Factorio, I would say it can be more fun that it looks at first ;)

Blackvoxel itself probably needs to be a bit more of a game instead of "just" a sandbox, but there is big promise in the overall concept, so give it a try :)