0 A.D. (video game)

Gameplay

0 A.D. features the traditional real-time strategy gameplay components of building a base, developing an economy, training an army, engaging in combat, and researching new technologies. The game includes multiple units and buildings specific to each civilization as well as both land and naval units.

During the game, the player advances from "village phase", to "town phase", to "city phase". The phases represent the sizes of settlements in history, and every phase unlocks new units, buildings, and technologies.

Multiplayer functionality is implemented using peer-to-peer networking, without a central server.

Development

0 A.D. originally began in 2001 as a comprehensive total conversion mod concept for Age of Empires II: The Age of Kings. The development team later decided that making the project as a mod was too limiting to their creative freedom, and elected to move their art and ideas to an in-house engine, making it a standalone game.

The historical accuracy of game elements has been the highest development priority. Unit and building names are shown in the original language of the civilization they belong to, and they are also translated into the language in which the user is playing the game. There is also a strong focus on attempting to provide high visual accuracy of unit armor, weapons, and buildings.

On 10 July 2009, Wildfire Games released the source code for 0 A.D. under the GNU GPLv2 (or later) license, and made the artwork available under the CC BY-SA license.

There were around ten to fifteen people working on 0 A.D. around 23 March 2010; since development started, over 100 people have contributed to the project. On 5 September 2013, a crowdfunding campaign was started on Indiegogo with a goal. They raised a total of to be used to hire a programmer. The majority of the project's finances are managed by the Software in the Public Interest organization. There is no official release date set for the finished version of the game.

The composers of the music in the game are Omri Lahav, Jeff Willet, Mike Skalandunas, and Shlomi Nogay. A 26-track soundtrack was released on 8 June 2018.

Reception

In 2012, 0 A.D. received second place in the IndieDB Player's Choice Upcoming Indie Game of the Year competition. 0 A.D. has been generally well received. It was voted as LinuxQuestions.org "Open Source Game of the Year for 2013". Between 2010 and June 2021, the game was downloaded from SourceForge.net over 1.3 million times.

Notes

References

References

1. (23 December 2012). "IOTY Players Choice Upcoming 2012 feature".
2. "Download Statistics for 0 A.D. from 2010-01-01 to 2021-06-01".
3. "0 A.D. (Original Game Soundtrack)".
4. Yaron, Oded. (8 August 2010). "0AD: לוקחים את ההיסטוריה ברצינות". Ha'aretz.
5. McElroy, Justin. (13 July 2010). "The Joystiq Indie Pitch: 0 A.D.". Joystiq.
6. Tozzi, Christopher. (13 October 2009). "0 A.D. Promises Real Gaming for Ubuntu". The Var Guy.
7. "0 A.D. – PC". IGN.
8. Knight, John. (1 January 2011). "0 A.D.—Stunning Real-Time Strategy Game". Linux Journal.
9. Scipii. (17 December 2009). "Wildfire Games Interview". HeavenGames.
10. Adams, Jason. (14 June 2006). "A First-Look at 0 A.D.". GameDev.net.
11. "The Story of 0 A.D.". play0ad.com.
12. (15 July 2009). "0 A.D. Goes Open Source". Slashdot.
13. (14 July 2009). "Real-time strategy game 0 A.D. goes open source". The H Open Source.
14. Tozzi, Christopher. (23 May 2010). "RTS Game 0 A.D. Needs You!". The Var Guy.
15. Dubowy, Liane M.. (5 September 2013). "Neues Release des Echtzeitstrategiespiels 0 A.D.". [[Heise.de]].
16. Ridgwell, Ian. (20 June 2011). "An interview with Wildfire Games". Geek Haven.
17. Brookes, Tim. (25 October 2010). "8 Awesome Free Open-Source Games You Can Enjoy on Windows, Mac and Linux". Make Use Of.
18. (5 February 2014). "2013 LinuxQuestions.org Members Choice Award Winners".