So far I have only been adding fully opensource games to the list, games where you can not only get the assets but the sourcecode as well. People have been posting a load of great non open source games however, and it seems a waste to ignore them. I should create a separate section for closed source games. If people could post a game, plus a single sentence describing the game, it would be a lot easier to copy paste it to the front of the thread. Single line isn't much, but it is by far better then a title alone. Some like OpenTTD are extremely cryptic and don't really encourage people to check it out. :)

In my opinion, open source seldom matters much with games! The game creators mostly want to work on their own projects, so when a game is OS, the source code just lies there on its lonesome. Most games are played once and forgotten, and this limited life span don't really inspires coders to try and evolve what is now an outdated cultural product.

While it is good to have the freedom to tinker with a programs source code, a game is different thing. With a game, I expect its creator to have the final word. Even if I dislike elements of a game, I respect that this was the game he wanted to make. Likewise, when I read a book, I don't try to edit it. The author is the author of the book, not me.

But okay, then there's stuff like Battle for Wesnoth where the open source concept fits perfectly.

S.W.I.N.E. but I have no idea where can u find it....

I don't think we would be playing and extending Doom today if it weren't for the advanced features added in source ports.

Definitely not natively on my OS.

And what about all the fan made patches? They exist, but they would be so much more abundant if we had the source to most games. How about patches to add widescreen support or fix issues on newer PCs?

How about UI improvements? Old games in particular have their warts. Adding support for newer gamepads or custom keybindings?

What about removing DRM? Fixing multiplayer for games whose greedy developers restricted your ability to make unarbitrated connections and later took down their servers, effectively removing the multiplayer capability entirely?

I can read a book from the 1800s with no issue today, but trying to play a 20-year-old game, I'm likely to run into all sorts of technical issues that could be improved. I don't think the game designers 20 years ago wanted us to suffer these technical limitations today.

There are lots of good reasons for wanting the source code. Unfortunately most developers are too stubborn and basically don't give a shit about you (the player). And most players are too dumb to realize what they're missing out on.

Thank-you for mentioning OpenRA! I had another look at it, and boy they have come a long way since i last saw them. As someone who went through all the fan patches trying to get the old games to run well on my Mac under wine, this is totally awesome. And it looks like they will soon have Tiberian Sun working as well!

UFO: Alien Invasion

Pioneer

I warmly recommend the Ben Jordan series of "paranormal investigator" AGS point & click.

http://www.grundislavgames.com/benjordan/

Glad to have helped :-)

You can download it from several sites like these two:

http://www.chip.de/downloads/Vollversion-S.W.I.N.E_18067304.html

http://www.gamershell.com/download_11942.shtml

Didn't that get a commercial release too? I had it a while back...

Hidden & Dangerous Deluxe (base game + expansion) is free. You can download it here.

Hydorah is a really fun Gradius type shooter, and just as difficult. Took me forever before I finally beat it

yeah, i have a boxed copy somewhere too

I've hoped for updates of the OP. The tread is only semi-useful without.

I guess, I'm simply spoiled by the commitment of certain very dedicated Goglodytes ;-)