Team name:
FIFE developing team.

Project name:
FIFE - Flexible Isometric Fallout(-like) Engine.

Brief description:
Just like the name of our project suggests we work on a new open source engine for isometric RPGs. The engine started as a Fallout-only project but we recognized very fast that it offers the potential to be used as a general 2D ISO engine for the development of cross platform RPGs. The engine supports the assets of the original Fallout games but it is also suitable for creating even totally new 2D RPGs. We are focusing on the creation of an engine itself but will bundle it with an example mod; so modders have a starting point to create their own games based on our engine.

Since we do not focus on the creation of a complete game we will be working on comfortable and easy-to-use editing tools. Engine and editor are planned to run on all flavours of Linux, Win32 and MacOSX.

The FIFE project is about 15 months in development now and we have released two public pre-alpha versions of the engine on sourceforge / freshmeat in January & May 2006. The next release is scheduled for the next days; depending on how fast one of our coders brings the planned chunk of code into the SVN repository.

Target aim:
Open source GPL v2.0; non-profit

Compensation:
We are confident that advanced coders will find it quite exciting to work on the creation and the designing of a whole engine with other experienced and passionate open source coders. But as we're a non-profit project the only thing we can provide is the satisfying feeling to work on an ambitious project.

Technology:
Linux, Windows, MacOSX
C++, Boost library
SDL, OpenGL (optional)

Warning:
It seems that we should have stated this earlier as a lot of coders seem to be overstrained with the undertaking of creating a whole engine. That is not meant to sound rude but FIFE is a quite complicated large-scale project that needs a different working approach compared to smaller projects. Please have a look at our code first before you apply for the position. There were several developers who applied for positions in the past who couldn't cope with the task and did leave the team.

As this is neither satisfying for the coders nor for us, the best way to find out if you want to take the challenge, is to have a look at our current code base. You can either get the most recent code from our Subversion repository or download a fresh engine snapshot from our homepage (if you're not familiar with SVN yet or don't have the needed tools installed).

SVN sourcecode checkout:
HTTP sourcecode download:
FIFE 2007.0 r829 src package

Talent needed:
Engine core designer & coder
Advanced C++ skills and engine design knowledge are required for this position as you will need to make design decision about the architecture of the engine. Experience with SDL, OpenGL or QT would be really appreciated but isn't a must. It is far more important that we find someone who can invest a serious amount of time to improve the engine design and give the development a direction.

We're searching for experienced C++ developers which want to take the challenge and work with two highly experienced programmers. A number of developers did silently leave the team in the last months or became inactive. I'm afraid that we didn't make clear enough that the undertaking of creating a complete engine is one of the most complex ones. Please just apply after having a look at the current code base!

Team structure: (only currently active members listed!)
Phoku - engine core designer & coder
Zahlman - engine core designer & coder
mvBarracuda - project manager

My job as project manager is to keep the team together and to ensure that the communication structure inside the team works so everyone enjoys working on the project. Among other things I'm responsible for the news updates @ FIFEngine.de, the project wiki and to provide the official and unofficial win32 packages.

Website:
Homepage
Development wiki
Getting started guide for interested developers
Doxygen code documentation
Design documents
Developer blog

Current release:
FIFE 2007.0 r829 src package

Ways to contact the team:
IRC channel: irc.quakenet.org | #fife
eMail: mvBarracuda@web.de
icq: UIN: 98600423

Important:
You can either use our free XMLmaps with the engine or access the original Fallout maps with it. If you want to use the Fallout maps you will need a legit copy of Fallout 1 or 2. The FO 1/2 maps are far more advanced compared to our own XMLmaps; basically we just set some placeholder textures on them to have something that lets you start the engine without having to own Fallout. So if you want to experience the full beauty: give the Fallout maps a go.

To give you an impression about the status of the project we took sample screenshots of the current release (using the Fallout maps):

Fallout 2 Arroyo map using the new FIFE GUI code.

A very early version of FIFEdit, the editor suite with working zoom feature.

Example screenshot of our WIP GUI.

FIFE can handle different resolutions in spite of the original Fallout engine.

The OpenGL renderer supports alphablending.

Feedback:
Feel free to add whatever feedback you like :-) Critics will help us to improve the project.

Really noone interested in this project?

It would help us to get some feedback how we could enhance our help wanted posting to increase the chances to find an interested developer who's willing to fill a position in the team.

Do you think that the project aim to create a whole engine for isometric games is too ambitious, is the team too small for this undertaking? Didn't you like our code, coding standards, progress rate? Do you think that 2D ISO games are dead anyway and it's not worth working on such a kind of engine anymore? Any kind of feedback from the community would help us to find out where we can do better and bring the project forward.

We started working on FIFE as there was no similar 2D ISO engine that worked on different platforms; so we thought that there would be surely a "target audience" for such a kind of engine :-/

But anyway: here is some new eye candy for the ones who want to have a look at some fancy new pictures. Image #1 shows the new hex grid mode; the NPCs are already scripted and move over the map. Image #2 gives you an impression of our new ingame console; it accepts lua command / scripts and you can already take screenshots and load maps via the interface.

New hex grid mode

New ingame console

To me, the posting is a bit scary. It sounds way too formal for an open source project. As in, it feels more like a transparent Cathedral project than a free Bazaar project. It might have the Ultimate Architecture syndrome, but that generally means the project stuck in analysis and specification, which isn't the case.

I actually like old-school style games the best, so I'm somewhat interested in these kinds of projects. Unfortunately, I'm busy with my own SDL-based gamekit project and SuperTux.

If it is really trying to be an engine more than a Fallout clone, GPL seems a bit restrictive. That means I can't integrate engine code into a commercial game. I might be a little biased as a gamekit writer, which is kind of a different idea than an engine.

The reason for this might be that I simply copied our initial project post for gamedev.net and just slightly modified it for this site. They got a rather strict "help wanted" template there but I feel this helps to not forget about important information that should be featured in every help wanted post.

That's a real pity :-(

There were a number of people who complained about the license. However as we would need to ask every developer who contributed code to FIFE if we would want to change it, it's highly unlikely that a change to a rather less restrictive license will happen.

Stated differently, what's scary about the help wanted is that there are such well-defined "positions". It kind of closes the possiblity of the occasional contributor. Enough about that, though.

Doesn't mean I can't drop by IRC and check things out :-)

Anyway, I have a question about how your architecture. Is there any explicit initialization? For example, in my gamekit, if you create a Bitmap (the wrapper around SDL_Surface) object, it automatically initializes SDL however needed, then calls SDL_Quit at program exit through singleton magic. Pretty much all the other SDL C++ wrappers I've seen have some sdl_runtime object that you create to initialize SDL, or pass-through functions.

I guess we should state that you can take one of the open tickets from trac, fix it and send a DIFF to the mailing list and help out as freelancer this way :-)

List of tickets to fix:
https://mirror1.cvsdude.com/trac/fife/engine/report/3

Now that sounds like a good idea to me :-)

irc.quakenet.org | #fife

Seriously: I've got no clue. You would need to ask one of our coders about this. You can either try to catch one on irc or you ask the question at the mailing list:
http://wiki.fifengine.de/index.php?t...c_mailing_list

Either way it will get answered though IRC should be easier and faster :-)

The src package of our 2007.0 release is finally available for download :-)

Enjoy:
http://downloads.sourceforge.net/fif....0_src.tar.bz2