Great Games To Put On a Free PC? 634
Lumpy writes "I am giving several new PC's to a local charity that will be giving them to needy kids this Xmas. They are not powerful, basically baseline Dells that have Intel graphics and Celeron, but more than enough to do homework and other studies on. They are going out with XP on them, an Ubuntu CD, and a bunch of OSS software like OO.o and the others. I would like to include some games for the kids. Strategy, fun, etc. Great freeware games that are fun to play. What would be the best games that a 13-16 year old will like to play that are free and legal to give away, and will run on this lower-end hardware?"
Battle for Wesnoth (Score:5, Informative)
http://www.wesnoth.org/ [wesnoth.org]
FreeCiv (Score:5, Informative)
Scorched earth (Score:5, Informative)
Frozen Bubble (Score:5, Informative)
Great for all ages and skill level
Freeciv (Score:5, Informative)
FreeCiv is a freeware version of Civilization that I still play. They have linux and windows releases.
http://freeciv.wikia.com/wiki/Download#Windows_Packages [wikia.com]
Re:Battle for Wesnoth (Score:4, Informative)
Yep - great game in a format a lot of teen gamers will already know. I love playing it and the ability to download new scenarios and make your own is pretty cool. It is very well done - and a lot of fun.
Here's a link.. (Score:3, Informative)
Take a look at the Platform and First Person Shooter games.
Couple ideas... (Score:5, Informative)
Ur-Quan Masters [sourceforge.net] (Star Control II, but free)
Wolfenstein: Enemy Territory [wikipedia.org] (great role-based strategic shooter, inexplicably free)
Re:Armagetron (Score:3, Informative)
Please elaborate (Score:3, Informative)
If you know the kids, you can tailor the games to their interests... I'm not sure how much mileage you'll get out of installing nethack when the recipient of the PC is a typical 14-yo girl.
If they have a good internet connection, all they need are links to decent flash games sites. I'm fond of recommending Kongregate, since they also have great tools and tutorials for creating your own games, and I've yet to see malware there. (Doesn't mean it doesn't exist).
Oolite (Score:2, Informative)
Urquan Masters/Star Control 2 (Score:4, Informative)
Very worthwhile, for both the strategy and melee modes.
google is your friend (Score:1, Informative)
http://apcmag.com/top_5_best_free_open_source_games.htm
Urban Terror (Score:3, Informative)
Cave Story (Score:5, Informative)
Re:Battle for Wesnoth (Score:5, Informative)
Might also look into Teeworlds [teeworlds.com], World of Padman [worldofpadman.com] TORCS [sourceforge.net], Neverball [icculus.org] and OpenArena [openarena.ws].
Plenty of older games have been release as freewar (Score:3, Informative)
I seem to remember there being quite a number of older titles released as freeware. Older iD titles, some of the earlier GTA titles, Tribes 1/2. With the number of mods available just for Quake 3, there will be tons of playtime just in one title. Red Alert was also released free, if you want to include some variety (as opposed to endless FPS games).
There are also current (ish) titles that might run on them. IIRC, Enemy Territory has a Linux port as does America's Army.
There's also the free games usually available for Linux that have Windows ports, such as FreeCiv.
Re:Nintendo Emulator (Score:5, Informative)
Java Risk (Score:3, Informative)
I've wasted more than enough time with this recently: Java risk: http://domination.sf.net [sf.net]. The implementation seems to be pretty good, it has some basic AI players, and can be played over a network. Good, classic strategy game, without the overhead of sorting out all the little army pieces. -- Paul
Re:Please elaborate (Score:3, Informative)
X-Moto (Score:3, Informative)
I vote for X-Moto [tuxfamily.org]. It's a 2-D motocross simulator game. Lots of fun and challenge from easy to nigh-on impossible, and very addictive.
There is also a simplified version more suited to kids.
quake engine games... (Score:2, Informative)
C&C Red Alert (Score:2, Informative)
Re:public domain (Score:4, Informative)
and then...
You are dreaming right? None of those are in public domain, not with copyright laws 90 years after death of the creator. They're abandonware at best, and that most certainly isn't legal.
I though of fl0w [usc.edu] and Plasma Pong. However Plasma Pong seems to be down :-(
Re:Nintendo Emulator (Score:4, Informative)
Never mind willing to buy, no one is selling.
Comment removed (Score:4, Informative)
Angband (Score:4, Informative)
TripleA, Axis and Allies simulator (Score:3, Informative)
TripleA is free. The older kids may appreciate having a more complicated board game like A&A on there. It even goes beyond the classic maps
And bookmark a few good flash gaming sites while you're at it. Some of the best games are online
A Few of my Favorites (Score:5, Informative)
FreeCiv, a freeware implementation of the Civ and Civ II rules - http://freeciv.wikia.com/wiki/Main_Page
Dwarf Fortress is a fantastically complex game, like a cross between SimCity, NetHack, and Oregon Trail - http://www.dwarffortresswiki.net/index.php/Main_Page
NetHack is a classic dungeon crawler with ASCII graphics - http://www.nethack.org/
Command & Conquer is an old but awesome RTS, now available for free from EA - http://www.commandandconquer.com/intel/default.aspx?id=62#NewsMain
Abandonware is murky but you can find install files for many abandonware titles online as well.
Freeciv is non-intuitive. Here are some others. (Score:5, Informative)
As much as I love playing Freeciv, I worry that it's not quite ready for people who have never played either it or some other version of Civilization. It is not at all intuitive, and it's not engaging to somebody who isn't already a known quantity at the whole getting sucked into the game thing.
How about OpenArena [openarena.ws] (a.k.a. Quake III) or Extreme Tux Racer [extremetuxracer.com]? TetriNET/Blocktrix [blocktrix.org], a good multi-player Tetris game, is also a winner. Finally, there's a really good list of "open source" games [wikipedia.org] over on Wikipedia.
ScummVM + Free games (Score:2, Informative)
Sauerbraten (Score:1, Informative)
http://sauerbraten.org/
Free FPS that is easy to create maps for.
Re:Scorched earth (Score:5, Informative)
warzone 2100 wz2100.net (Score:2, Informative)
in Ubuntu as deb but oldish website has rc2 - quite fun.
Open Transport Tycoon Deluxe (Score:1, Informative)
openttd.com is fantastic. You need some of the original game files but they can be found legitimately (google for 'transport tycoon clive owen'). Suitable for all ages and it's really fun.
Re:Battle for Wesnoth (Score:5, Informative)
BZFlag (Score:2, Informative)
Re:Battle for Wesnoth (Score:5, Informative)
Re:Cave Story (Score:2, Informative)
Mod parent up. Amazing game!
Here's a download site for the game + the English translation patch: http://www.cavestory.org/downloads_1.php [cavestory.org]
You could also throw in GTA(2), which are now freely available as Rockstar Classics: http://www.rockstargames.com/classics/ [rockstargames.com]
Re:Frozen Bubble (Score:5, Informative)
I'll put this here, since these are kind of arcadey games.
ABA games [asahi-net.or.jp] has a number of free arcade shooters that are tons of fun to play. Most of them are available in Debian's repository, so they should be available on Ubuntu too. You can get windows binaries at that link. In particular, check out rRootage, Torus Trooper, and Tumiki Fighters. But they're all excellent games.
Xmoto (Score:2, Informative)
Xmoto is great, available from Ubuntu repositories, and non-violent. Apart from when the bike falls on top of the character that is! hehe
You should check out Edubuntu, it was designed the sort of thing you want to do in mind.
Re:Battle for Wesnoth (Score:5, Informative)
Free games (Score:3, Informative)
Star Control: The Ur-Quan Masters. One of the absolute best games I've EVER played for ANY platform - ported from the 1990's as free software.
Seiklus. One of my all-time favorite action/adventures: simple, colorful, evocative.
Within a Deep Forest. Really fun and neat game where you play a bouncing ball.
Spheres of Chaos. INCREDIBLE trippy Asteroids clone with lots of power-ups.
flOw. Of course.
Overgod. Very fun 2D arena shooter with upgradable ships.
ROM CHECK FAIL. Old-school craziness. =)
Cave Story. Metroid-style old-school side-scroller.
- David Stein
Re:Scorched earth (Score:3, Informative)
Re:Classic console emulators: (Score:3, Informative)
To be pedantic, the emulators are perfectly legal; the pirated ROMs are not (although there are a few good original distributed-as-free-software ROMs.)
Depends. Some of them require an illegal copy of the bios.
Look for Linux games (Score:2, Informative)
Take a look for "Linux Game" sites and follow the links to the homepage of the games. Most times the Windows ports will be included. Here's a few good examples:
At getdeb.net [getdeb.net] you can get Super Methane Brothers [getdeb.net]. If you go to the homepage of Super Methane Brothers [sourceforge.net] you find a Windows Exe.
You can take a look at LinuxGames, playubuntu.com and probably find more via Google.
Games that I would recommend specifically:
Tux Math Command [sourceforge.net]
gridwars 2 [marune.de]
OpenAlchemist [openalchemist.com]
Hedgewars [hedgewars.org]
Game Maker [averagesoftware.org]
Frets on Fire [sourceforge.net]
Secret Maryo Chronicles [secretmaryo.org]
Re:Wing Commander (Score:2, Informative)
Wing Commander isn't free though, so I doubt it could be packaged with these computers. Maybe Vegastrike [sourceforge.net] or one of it's mods would be a better option.
Re:I made a few... (Score:3, Informative)
Chips Challenge (Score:2, Informative)
Savage (Score:2, Informative)
No one has mentioned "Savage, Battle for Newerth [newerth.com]". Has windows, Linux, and MAC downloadable binaries.
GameTap (Score:4, Informative)
Tomb Raider Legend
Metal Slug 2
Bubble Bobble
Sensible Soccer 2006
King of Fighters '96
Robotron 2084
Elevator Action
Burger Time
Commandos 3
Warlords Battlecry III
Cannon Fodder
Hitman
More...
While the pay part of the service is worth the money, the free part has a suprisingly high number and quality of available games.
Re:Couple ideas... (Score:3, Informative)
Another free game with good production values is Allegiance [freeallegiance.org]. It's a multiplayer space simulation with quite deep gameplay and focused on teamplay.
From Wikipedia [wikipedia.org]:
Re:Battle for Wesnoth (Score:1, Informative)
Not only Slashdotted, but also a new version was released today, and that always slows the server down.
BZFlag - Multiplayer Tank Game (Score:2, Informative)
BZFlag is a fun multiplayer tank game that you can jump right into and have fun but also has a lot of potential for skill growth. It works well on even crappy video cards.
Re:Battle for Wesnoth (Score:5, Informative)
On the subject of freeware, open source and Free games, I wonder why no one checks Wikipedia:
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_freeware_games [wikipedia.org]
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Alphabetical_list_of_open_source_games [wikipedia.org]
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_commercial_games_released_as_freeware [wikipedia.org]
Re:Battle for Wesnoth (Score:3, Informative)
singularity [emhsoft.com] is also good
and freedriodrpg [sourceforge.net] can be played on intel (i think)
widelands (may not be playable), adonttell & Einstein [flowix.com] are also worth a shot
Hell the kids/games metapackage for kubuntu kept me amused for a while.
Re:Battle for Wesnoth (Score:3, Informative)
funny doesn't count for karma anyway.
Re:Battle for Wesnoth (Score:3, Informative)
You think that's bad.
Crack attack...http://aluminumangel.org/attack/
You start playing and then next thing you know..
What? It's tuesday??? It was just saturday!!!!?!
Although thanks for reminding me about frozen bubble. With the posts here I already have enough games on it that will keep the kids happy for at least a year.
Re:Why noone mentioned some of the classical games (Score:4, Informative)
For fans of the board game Settlers of Catan, there is a similar online version which is quite nice:
Sea3D [s3dconnector.net] (here are some screenshots [s3dconnector.net])
That one is a bit old, but stable (it is similar to Settlers plus the seafarer expansion), and the S3D Connector [s3dconnector.net] website can match up players.
The newer version in devel is Cities Online [settlersonline.net] (similar to cities and knights expansion).
Those are pretty good board games.
Simon Tatham's Puzzle Pack (Score:3, Informative)
http://www.chiark.greenend.org.uk/~sgtatham/puzzles/ [greenend.org.uk]
'Net' is my favorite puzzle in the set, but there are 27 different puzzle games total including Mastermind, Minesweeper, a number sliding puzzle, and Sudoku.
Available for PC, Mac, Linux, and Palm.
Re:Why noone mentioned some of the classical games (Score:4, Informative)
Micropolis is the official SimCity for Linux I do believe, but Lincity-NG is an even better clone more akin to SimCity 2000.
Re:A Few of my Favorites (Score:3, Informative)
Dwarf Fortress is a bit easier to get into with a good tileset like DFG [staszic.waw.pl].
Comment removed (Score:4, Informative)
Re:Battle for Wesnoth (Score:3, Informative)
Chuzzle [popcap.com] stole my life away. Much more addictive than Frozen Bubbble especially when you get a high score of 190,000 on the first game. Then there is TAGAP [tagap.net], but that's too hard, even for a 15yr old.
Re:FP? (Score:2, Informative)
http://www.download.com/DX-Ball/3000-2099_4-10155579.html [download.com]
Also, NoNags has a lot of games, all free. I would think anything saying it is Win9x and XP compatable would not be too demanding. At Nonags you want the 6/6 rated software, though some of the 5/6 stuff is OK too.
http://www.nonags.com/ [nonags.com]
Re:Why noone mentioned some of the classical games (Score:1, Informative)
Also Pioneers [sourceforge.net].
It's in the Debian and Ubuntu repos.
Re:FreeCiv (Score:3, Informative)
With the upcoming SDL user interface of FreeCiv it even looks like a modern game (was unfinished when i checked a couple of months ago).
http://freeciv.wikia.com/wiki/Screenshots [wikia.com]
Some freeCiv players also like freecol, a similar game written in java. I never got into it so I can't say much about it.
If you think Frozen Bubble is bad.. (Score:3, Informative)
..don't go for Crack Attack or Tetrinet.