ay mates lelkins here
i couldn't post this thing i actually planned for a long time due to irl stuff. also new computer and i had to bring files over and it took a while for that to finish. this one is a little ambitious cause i tried getting gifs for this bloody post! i hope you all understand the hiatus. sorry everyone.
also, this one is a little ambitious cause i tried getting gifs for this bloody post! might've been better to use webms, but feel free to tell me cause i do not know how computer works properly.
i apologise for increasing this post's loading times for you all
so here's a foss game some don't know. we all clearly know xonotic, sauerbraten and openarena... and another one i'd mention on the next installment (someone here actually introduced me to it! i will make a post about that game when i feel like it), those are pretty good quality games. openarena is just quake, xonotic is like unreal tournament (even if it just uses quake technically) and sauerbraten is a quake-like with singleplayer campaigns, under an engine that can show some cool graphics on lower end hardware (and with some sick tunes!).
alright, onto the main subject. what if sauerbraten... but more like a deathmatch counterstrike-like game? here's assaultcube, a game that uses the cube engine. not cube 2 like sauerbraten, but cube 1. older. can work on older machines too.
wait, actually... scratch that. assaultcube is already a bit well known, it was in some foss games lists a couple of times. but there's a different assaultcube that is so lesser known that basically nobody plays it.
thought this was just about assaultcube? yea, that game is good, but this fork is very special. we are talking about
assaultcube reloaded, yeaaaaaa!
alrighty! now we're talking! assaultcube reloaded is a fork made in god knows when by some guy named victor. same engine btw. also the oldest version i can find (2.6.1 aka 2.7 beta 1) was made in 2014-08-24, while the official website dates back in 2010 (archive.org has the 2012 version of the site) so you know it's an old project. but is it good?
fuck yes. i will just talk about the gameplay and shit
differences
original assaultcube (ac) is obviously older and more played than this version, that i confirm. but the gunplay is drastically different.
-ac feels a bit more archaic shooting-wise, but still fun, while assaultcube reloaded (will call it acr from here on out) feels more polished and has the typical tactical shooter features. also acr doesn't stutter on wayland in my case with the new machine.
headshots feel more accurate on acr as the hitboxes feel larger, i can't get even one in ac sadly :(
-both have grenades that you can cook up, but acr has a timer and everything.
here is me doing some shenanigans with this feature in acr. this can also be done in ac!
-acr has aim-down sights (some don't like those i think) and recoil that is similar to other tactical shooters, while ac only has a scope feature for the sniper and nothing else.
-ac has no classes, instead it has weapons you can choose, as every player gets a pistol and a knife in their arsenal, along with their weapon of choice.
notice there's a carbine. acr does not have that weapon. to be honest, it's more like a sniper without a scope, feels powerful but almost sluggish. it's not much of a loss.
-you can throw your knife in acr, and there are also special throwing knives for your custom loadouts. also almost all classes in acr have 1 grenade by default
actual stuff in acr
alright, now time for me to show my shoddily made gifs from a month ago :D :D :D
i will show each class
as i said before, acr uses a loadout system compared to the "change your main weapon" system that ac has.
- assault
this is your standard assault rifle man. bigger gun, smaller gun, knife. and grenade.
it's your typical assault rifle shtick, crouch, stop moving, aim down and shoot. all cool.
- spec ops
similar to assault, the only difference is that your spec-ops has a submachine gun! be like rambo! gun down at close range!
no gif here as there's a class that shares the same weapon type that i will get to shortly.
- sniper
sniping's a good job, mate. it's challenging work, outta doors. and i guarantee you'll not get bored playing as one!
sure, you can just snipe normally, hide near some wall and catch some unsuspecting foes like here...
but this is acr, we have modern-day shooting! you can do some cool shit with this!
yesss, quickscoping! you can do that! even noscoping from what i tried. it's also a VERY powerful weapon like all sniper rifles should be
- demolition
what makes me a typical demoman? well, if i was quoting tf2 every time i get the chance to do that, i wouldn't be here discussing this, now, would i?
jokes aside, this class is more up close and personal than the spec-ops, because you get to have a shotgun! you kind of have ads like every other weapon, but you instead just get a smaller closeup. not much a sights thing and more of an observe. idfk what i am trying to say.
if blowing heads off into mincemeat is not your thing, you also get to have a tremendously strong rpg as your secondary weapon that funnily enough has the beta minecraft bow sound lmfao, genuinely a great weapon, has very good accuracy, has splash damage, but it's not as viable compared to your main weapon due to the small clip size.
this class is more made for chokepoints, i guess!
- medic
so spec-ops isn't your thing? you want to help people? this is one of the two classes that has a special secondary, everyone else (but demolition) has a measly pistol. sure, you have a sub machine gun, but look, you have a magic wand! what does that do, you ask? since you are a medic, it actually heals your allies in the battlefield!
here, let me demonstrate in the spawn point on a bot in my team. i forgot to mention that all the players here are bots, i cannot play multiplayer due to how empty the servers always are. i tried playing with a friend and it works really well. we enjoyed this game a lot tbh
we all know the "crap, i slipped into a gunfight and remained the victor, but i ended up being severely damaged! and there are no health pickups around!" ordeal. but as a medic, you can heal yourself if you are in a tight situation! just point your magic wand at yourself (hold right click) and administer yourself some zaps.
you also get points doing these, too.
- custom loadout
you might be asking "hey lelkins, what about custom loadout 1 through 10"? they're just loadouts you can customize. you can use a sniper rifle and a magic wand. you can use an rpg and an ak47. you also get perks! here's all of them (perk 1, perk 2 and "combined perks" which i don't understand much. think of them as a mega perk that will disable your main two perks, i guess!)
i forgot to mention the one powerup that replaces your weapon with a funny one. the akimbo uzi. you dual wield a very fast full-auto rifle, what's not to love?
ooh ooh! you asking me "how is this counter strike? where is bomb? terrorist moment? well, lemme tell you about th-
gamemodes
there are multiple gamemodes. i should've called this "we have call of duty and battlefield at home and it's one game with some random stuff strapped onto it" but that's not a fun title, ain't it?
your typical deathmatch, team deathmatch, capture the flag, but also "bomber" and zombie. and other stuff
bomber is like capture the flag but you are bringing your flag to the enemy's base, blowing yourself up.
zombie is a wave-based coop thing where you fight bot-controlled "zombies" that inflict a bleeding effect and your job is to kill them all and survive as long as possible, or until you get bored lol
"secure the flag". i never played cod but apparently it's like domination? you stay near the flag to gain points and protect it. acts almost like tf2's capture the point gamemode but there are so many flags to slowly capture, it's kinda chaotic
"keep the flag" is "get a flag from the enemy team and survive, this is team-deathmatch btw"
"hunt the flag" is "shoot the player that has a flag and keep the flag to yourself for points, difference is that there's one flag and it's deathmatch"
and "overload". wow. overload is kinda weird to explain. so flags can be damaged. you go to the enemy team, fight the flag, fight the enemies and hopefully destroy their flag to score
just like sauerbraten, you can edit maps! yes, you can make your own stuff here. i didn't try that tbh, i just wanna go guns blazing
conclusion? nah, rambling
now that i am done talking about the game and its range of classes and stuff, you may ask "why is this not the more played one?"
to be honest, i ask myself the same thing. why is this abandoned?
the original assaultcube community kind of hates this fork as its main creator, victor, has his ips banned? the website has a "promotion client" that not only advertises this fork every 16 seconds, but has like two actual cheats (explosive ammo and a radar, both are off by default)
i am not going to talk about the slander in the forums btw. it's a mess and i don't understand it instead, have a comment used to slander this specific fork from a post about the 2012 aurora, colorado movie theater shooting in the assaultcube forums
cw: mention of the shooting, the entire post is that
https://forum.cubers.net/post-103789.html#pid103789
like seriously what the fuck
also this fork uses (or used to use? i don't know much) "copyrighted assets" from original ac, but the stuff is licensed under the cube license which is pretty permissive but technically not fully libre.
as i mentioned in the first UNNAMED FOSS GAME THING post, i consider games that have copyrighted material a la srb2 or foss games that require paid assets a la doom, quake and openmw. i am not the kind of person who would sell games in a pack or something. i am just here to talk about games that i like
so am i actually promoting something bad? the game is pretty good in terms of gameplay, but these actions kinda suck and i do not know if victor changed his ways or anything. promote the game, not the person i guess????
this is all a mess, and these are just past posts from the forums. nowadays if you mention acr, nothing seems to happen. it used to be a sign to ridicule the person, similar to a "kick me" flyer taped to someone's back. just ignore this shit and move on, cause the game's pretty fun
actual conclusion
game's good. the other game's good. try both ac and acr out, they're both good in their own way. shame that acr had some incidents to be fair.
acr's multiplayer is pretty much a barren wasteland, but a couple of friends can fill it up for a good computer-based time. ac is still active multiplayer-wise, even if it was last updated in 2022. i played a couple of multiplayer matches and it was pretty fun!
both are on flathub if you all use flatpaks, both are on the aur if you all use arch. both of them are easily playable. windows users may have trouble due to false positives but these games are foss and can be compiled so do not worry about that
i am sorry i made this post so fucking long and so rambly, i just wanted to post gifs of me shooting in a cool way :((((
anyhow, thank you all for reading this shit i wrote in 1 hour. see you all some day with a different game.
foss sweep.
links
assaultcube reloaded source code
assaultcube reloaded official website!
assaultcube reloaded weapons list and other stuff (breezewiki link)
fanmade assaultcube trailer as a little treat for the curious folks that look at the links :D
again, thank you all for reading!
i thought it was polish for some reason