OpenArena Message Boards

The main reason - TraK's textures.

This post at cgtextures finally seals the deal:
http://old.cgtextures.com/forum/showpost.php?p=1735&postcount=18

Ever wonder why I was so hesitant about his demands of committing 'his' textures? This is the last time i'll ever take weasel words from a crybaby whiner (http://openarena.ws/board/index.php?topic=2117.msg16412#msg16412).

Who knows when the next big fkn release of OA might make it now.

Gone will also be TraK's compiled map files. They won't come back unless someone retextures them.

At least with 0.8.1 we can get it promoted a little better once that's out. 0.8.0 was heavily overlooked

will the base of the game be the same? i mean are there any updates from ioquake3 or something new in the missionpack?

or is it only an update on the content?

It's not an update, it's a "downdate", the 080 is dead, it's nonexistaent now.
I guess we'll have to wait till 081 or whatever comes next...
And to think I hoped to see more players united under the 080 version...

freaking little bastard! Did he give you non GPL textures as if they were GPL?

NOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOO!

I was retexturing lun3dm4 and had it at about 80% done...with mostly Trak textures...

Lets see it from a objective view.
They are not a too big loss, because, beside the license problem they looked cool, but they were freaky fucking small (max 256²).
I first thought, they have too be that small, so I also made some small ones (sorry), but then i wondered, when i saw bigger ones.
(In my favorite textured level, with the server room)

BTW: What is about Slimefac, was it taken out because of his textures?

CU,
Sauer2

nope, slimefac is not out. It's still in the game and playable but just not selectable from skirmish/single player menu. Type in /map slimefac and you're done. Most of it's textures are handdrawn by me and it's kinda low effort due the plain nature of the whole map. ;)

TRaKs textures were awesome. The best thing that happend to OA so far. It's a pity.

Textureresolution doesn't need to be big all the time if the mapper places them in a different way. Go for better brushwork and you're done with 128x128 ;)

fromhell, it is 50% your fault that these textures were submitted, without double-checking the terms. You knew (http://openarena.ws/board/index.php?topic=1901.0) about the textures being cgtextures based. Or did you forget?

Why are you panicking?

They looked cool, but only in 1:1 size.
The problem is, they were looking very crappy and pixel-like if you play in a solution higher than SVGA and come closer to a wall.
I think, this is a problem in many games.
For example Nexuiz, which has a high end engine with HDR and Parallax mapping and...
A part of its graphics looks crappy by size and the effects dont compensate it. (!!)

And you can not tell me, good as the graphics look, the creators of the graphics were not able to create bigger sized ones!
Performance can't be the point. It is a high end engine.
I think it is wrong economizing.
CU,
Sauer2

BTW: Sorry for making this a bit off-topic.

Why would TRaK intentionally lie? This is in no way acceptable.



As a consequence the maps shouldn't be re-implemented (even after re-texturing) since this is the only way not to credit TRaK anymore. A project shouldn't credit someone who obviously tried to sabotage it.

There's the slight chance (http://www.answers.com/devil's%20advocate) that CGTextures changed his mind about licensing after the fact (i.e. a few weeks after TRaK's correspondence and forum post you-know-where), and didn't notify the affected parties.  Same thing happened just last weekend, where someone said "I don't like the looks of this anymore" and just pulled the plug -- funding gone, just like that.

Or, different things may have been said to different people.  If we can assume that the agreement between TRaK and CGTextures was legit, it was stated (two months prior to the texture pack's release) that commercial distribution of textures or texture packs is prohibited (http://old.cgtextures.com/forum/showpost.php?p=1114&postcount=2), while the GPL does not prohibit commercial distribution.

We only have TRaK's one forum post to go on, as far as there being an exception made for this particular set of textures (http://old.cgtextures.com/forum/showpost.php?p=1060&postcount=2) -- no posted e-mail, no word from CGTextures (not that we asked)... so, we don't know if this agreement is even real to begin with.  (But, even if it were, the "no GPL" post (http://old.cgtextures.com/forum/showpost.php?p=1735&postcount=18) probably trumps it anyway (until we find out otherwise).)

Still doesn't mean we can't pull the release or block people.



<sub>I'm not a doctor, but I play one on TV. *opens bottle of cough syrup*

Edit: Nice bold type.  Not a lawyer, either.</sub>

Why do you think that TRaK lied?


Why do you think that he tried to sabotage it?

Welcome to the internets where people do weird things for no reason

Yes, but this is not good enough as the freaking only reason

Check my post again and the cited statements (smaller pt-size) of TRaK and the CGtextures admin. They say exact opposite things about licensing. That is why I think it was intentionally.

The statements of damocles and f0rqu3 may be explanations.

trak got message that his gpling is ok. he now asked if he may post a copy of said message and whether it would be ok for the cgtextures admins to contact fromhell (or vice versa).

Again: Only because they officially do not allow.... blah bleh bluh.

THIS WAS OLD NEWS PROVIDED TO YOU BY PEPSI COKANE

You probably want to go to following ghetto: http://openarena.ws/board/index.php?topic=2307.msg18041#msg18041

I don't know if this is relevant or not, but on his website (http://trak.mercenariesguild.net/node/3) it says:


So can we confirm or deny this?

Side question: If someone made substitute textures and released them under the GPL would this fix the problem?

Side answer: that would not only be a solution (if it finally turns out that there's actually a problem, I have my doubts), but a highly desirable thing under normal circumstances too. There's a lack of good original material on the 2D visual side. The bad news is that not many people have the skills to do a good work in this area, and among those who have there are even less that want to spend their time at it for a project like this. The good news is that with as cheap a tool as a mobile phone camera and a couple of Free programs like The Gimp and Inkscape you can  generate a lot of good looking and useful textures. Even just the pics of interesting stuff like all sorts of materials, terrain, pipes, wires, skies, etc. can be very helpful. Mappers can make the needed modifications as they go...

See my reply in the other forum post about this: http://openarena.ws/board/index.php?topic=2307.msg18041#msg18041

Hopefully this situation can be resolved soon.

From this: http://openarena.ws/board/index.php?topic=2307.msg18041#msg18041 (http://openarena.ws/board/index.php?topic=2307.msg18041#msg18041) I conclude TRaK did not try to sabotage the project (if he is telling the truth) and so replacing of the textures should be the way to go. Still the whole situation is quite unsatisfactory for anybody, including the community.

Why TRaK isn't fixing the map (replacing textures) and getting back involved. For anybody else (including TRaK) this is a lesson to never use third party content if it is not explicitly GPL licensed.

The textures ARE gpl and hence there is no need to replace them.

BrainChemistry, I think you are being harsh and unrealistic. I don't see why Trak should have to go back to work and replace anything at all if he doesn't feel like it. If it turned out that those textures are no longer clean, which doesn't seem to be the case, Trak would be as much a 'victim' as the rest of the OA community. Making some work--and making it _for free_--doesn't convert you in the maintainer of it for the rest of your life. Requiring so, apart from being rude, would effectively kill every existent open source project.

You are right about the need to double check the origin of any material used, and that it applies to _everybody_.

There is still no real proof. I won't believe trak until fromhell gets an email from cgtextures.
Special permission without proof of the permission does not mean anything at all.

I think the whole situation is because nobody really knows what license really applies to the textures (especially the modified ones).


kernel panic, you completly misunderstood me. Actually my hint was meant as a friendly concession since I (as a mapper myself) would be really interested to modify my map a way it can be published (without troubles). TRaK seems to be a mapper which always goes the whole way (from brushwork to texturing) so why should he leave his (indeed nice) work for someone else to finish? Also if you read my post in connection with my first post in this thread you may understand that it was not meant in a harsh but a friendly way. - If TRaK doesn't like the idea though, of course he HAS NOT to do it...


This is true.

Yes, I had completely missunderstood you. :)

People knew that TRaK said that the textures were GPL.

fromhell knew that there might be problems with them, since they are based on cgtexture's license, which obviously is non-free. fromhell knew that TRaK said that he got permission to release his derivates under the GPL. As strange as it sounds.

For some strange reason people (including fromhell) thought that when cgtexture's admins said "our stuff is not GPL-compatible" this meant that there was no way that TRaK really had permission to release his textures under GPL.


Leilol, you will have to inform us of what is happening. (Did you recieve confirmation from cgtextures' admins? Do you accept the textures as being legally gpl'ed now?)

Also you will have to state whether or not you made a mistake by accusing TRaK and if you say that you did, you will have to openly excuse yourself (or do it personally, but then you will have to make an open statement about the fact that you did it).

I'm not dictating to you how to do your job. I just think it's in your best interest to give transparency on this matter.

I'm sorry if I insult you by making these demands, but my expeirence so far was that you are seldomly communicating about topics which are "finished" for you. I want you to know that there is interest about what you think of your own actions.

I just started to play OA, and even got started with making a clan. And I would realy like if you just put it back up again,  or find out if he lied by contacting cgtextures and then put it up again.

Most ppl posting, and many more only reading, would be happy to see how everything gets back normal again.
So we would just be thankful if you would care to get it up again, and tell us whats happening.


And everyone else keep in mind, this reaction was not that  wrong, because releasing licensed stuff under gpl without permission can end up in big problems. So i can understand why to put all content offline.
Just get things right now and id like to see no hate between you for such strange reasons o_O