Has anyone talked to MS about open sourcing PS?

[LadylexUK]

I am trying to get in contact with someone at Microsoft to discuss the future for kode and the possibility of the community developing an open source Project Spark 2 game engine using kode as the programming language for people to develop games. I am not interested in the PS assets with their asymmetrical and swirly nonsense, so MS can keep them, all I think we would need would be a licence to use the tiles and the kode method of programming. Assets would then be simple forms and textures so you could develop your own props, music could be developed in the community, as could UI elements. I think there are many talented people that loved Project Spark and would be keen to be involved in developing its future incarnation.


So far I have been redirected to the wrong people or totally ignored. Has anyone else tried to contact Microsoft about the future for kode? Do you think it would be possible to crowdfund the project, and get developers interested enough to work on it? Would you be interested in such a project and program? Do you think Microsoft would rather keep the rights to themselves and do nothing with it rather than let the community run with it?

[Psychokiller1888]

That idea has been around since already before PS totally stopped. To be honest, I did not even try to start anything. I have tried to make some tile programing languages, it's doable, hard but doable.

Kode or not Kode, just find another name and MS isn't involved anymore, they can't copyright a tile based programing language.

[LucidStew]

Recreating PS presents a lot of challenges. I've been reading about the method that TD likely used to make the k-code system and to encode the UGC. It sounds like a lot of work. It sounds easy to infest with bugs(which we experienced). To get it to work REALLY well, the complexity ramps up significantly, which means way more coding time on the back end. And that's just to get the tiles to compile into something. Then you have to do an entire 3D environment engine, then you need to license or code a physics engine, make a framework to hold it all, and all the networking coding to pass everything back and forth. And that's just the coding. Then there's all the artwork, all the modeling, all the animation, all the rigging. There's a reason it took 20-30 of them 3 years to produce what they did. Might be a fun thing to work on if you didn't might releasing it in 10-20 years.

Number one problem with getting to MS to open source Project Spark is that the physics engine was licensed, so basically they can't since the physics engine is integral to the game engine. From my understanding they also used proprietary tech for integrating their model, rigging, and animation in some fashion. They likely would not open source that.

That said, Kodu Game Lab, upon which PS is partially based IS open source, so if you wanted to do basically what TD did, you're technically free to do so. That would probably eliminate a lot of work in coding the k-code system, but you'd still be missing ALL of the art assets, and all of the refinement in other parts of the program, which is not something that could be recreated overnight.

[LucidStew]

Actually, sorry, looks like Kodu ISNT open source. I could swear I found the source code at one point a couple years back, but MS has either rolled that back or I just remember wrong. Anyway, at best it's open sourced to academia for academic purposes only. I'm guessing MS doesn't want anyone taking their source code and creating a competitor.

[LadylexUK]

So a non-starter then.
I could not even get a department name out of Microsoft to even begin to discuss anything. You end up talking to Indian Call Centres who have not got the faintest idea what I am saying or what I am asking for. Frustrating. I feel sorry for the schools that trusted Microsoft and invested in the game only to have it removed within a year - which was hardly enough time to plan a curriculum around it. So much talk about wanting to get girls into computer programming, and they have the solution right in front of them. So sad.

[LucidStew]

They already have an educational solution with Kodu Game Lab. Project Spark was a little more advanced, so would have been something your transitioned into from Kodu, but I don't know how beneficial or necessary it was. The leap from PS to pro tools is still pretty big.

Getting a hold of PS is probably not going to happen. Making a replacement is not impossible. But it would require a fairly dedicated team and time. As far as the former community that has the skills to pull that off, we're pretty coding heavy, so coding it wouldn't be much of a problem, given sufficient time. But, being that there are several people who could conceivably code such a thing, someone with coding knowledge would have to act as lead, and maybe do nothing but lead. I wouldn't mind working on it. A lot of time when I sit down and think about what kinds of games I really WANT to make, PS is one of the answers. But its a big project, so to get it off the ground would either take someone who has a decent idea of what's involved or lots of time to figure it out.

[LadylexUK]

The other option is to see if it would be possible for the Microsoft server address for the community levels to be pointed to a community owned server. At 10MB maximum per level - a 500GB server costs $200 per month and would house 50,000 levels. If we got 1,000 players interested they would only need to pay 20c a month. But the point is, it could be crowdfunded. But would Microsoft let us do this? And how the hell do you get hold of them to even ask? I was given the runaround the other day, and could not get past anyone who wasnt xbox support and worked in a call centre.

[Psychokiller1888]

I have tried to emulate a PS server, and I still have all the original packets dumped in a file. Thing is, MS cannot distribute PS anymore due to the proprietary parts that are not paid anymore such as the terrain generation tool if I remember correctly, so the answer is simply gonna be no. Plus, but that's more a personal feeling, MS wants PS buried away for some reason, it's the only explanation on how they killed it. Decompiling the appx and remove the authentification parts is a way to go, but it's an investment in time I'm not ready to take for a couple of 100 potential users. We stopped dev'ing Lineage 2 when the community was still tenth of thousand big....
Don't forget that without the source code, there's no fixing the client, and over time, the app becomes completly deprecated and bugged with no other mean than just let it go

[packers]

thanks for this information.

[fredlafitte]

I have tried to emulate a PS server, and I still have all the original packets dumped in a file. Thing is, MS cannot distribute PS anymore due to the proprietary parts that are not paid anymore such as the terrain generation tool if I remember correctly, so the answer is simply gonna be no. Plus, but that's more a personal feeling, MS wants PS buried away for some reason, it's the only explanation on how they killed it. Decompiling the appx and remove the authentification parts is a way to go, but it's an investment in time I'm not ready to take for a couple of 100 potential users. We stopped dev'ing Lineage 2 when the community was still tenth of thousand big....
Don't forget that without the source code, there's no fixing the client, and over time, the app becomes completly deprecated and bugged with no other mean than just let it go

If 100 potential users will donate $100 for you to "Decompiling the appx and remove the authentification parts" would you be interested? Even if it take a year to do it, many users will be interested including many schools around the world. Atmosphir was resurrected that way. One more thought, do you know any Xbox emulator for PC....I was thinking to use Project Spark DVD in XBox One emulator for pc to play offline. Thanks