Glass Station Release

[wallyweb]

On tt-forums one is never old unless one has two zeros between the first and last digits of one's "joined" date. Is there nothing beyond "tycoon"?

please can we just let things go

said DaVinci about all the fawning over Mona Lisa.
Perhaps JustMoreMemes could be invited to take on the task of his/her suggestion?

[Quast65]

I totally agree that nothing (or noone ) on this forum is too old

And I also agree that the climate-availability was a bit annoying.
I also really like the look of this station (I use it a lot for small metro-stations)
For my personal games, I simply decoded the GRF, removed the Action-07 referring to that and recoded again.

Code: Select all

// Only enable if it's the temperate
    7 * 6	 07 83 01 
                  # Must Not Match
		  03 
		  # Temperate Climate
		  00 
		  # Skip the whole file
		  00

As (AFAIK) there has no license been set, I recommend that you do the same for your personal games only.

[krtaylor]

It's sad that one of the original sins of this forum wasn't to plainly state, "Anything posted here automatically becomes open-source and can be used by anybody so long as credit is given." Instead, we get into these pointless arguments over "There's no license! So something cool has to just vanish into the aether and can't ever be used by anybody else ever again, even though no money was ever involved!"

You'd think that the fact that Transport Tycoon itself is abandonware, would support this view. But I guess too many people would rather argue over irrelevancies than keep all the various fun plugins to this very old game alive.

[Argus]

Unfortunately, it is. And not everyone has enough knowledge to properly compile the edited source

[kamnet]

As (AFAIK) there has no license been set, I recommend that you do the same for your personal games only.

Purno says, "All my graphics are licensed under GPL."

Whip out some NML and just get this done.

[skc]

It's sad that one of the original sins of this forum wasn't to plainly state, "Anything posted here automatically becomes open-source and can be used by anybody so long as credit is given." Instead, we get into these pointless arguments over "There's no license! So something cool has to just vanish into the aether and can't ever be used by anybody else ever again, even though no money was ever involved!"

You'd think that the fact that Transport Tycoon itself is abandonware, would support this view. But I guess too many people would rather argue over irrelevancies than keep all the various fun plugins to this very old game alive.

Unfortunately, this isn't how copyright law works.
A book that's 'out of print' is equivalent to software that's deemed 'abandonware', but copyright law prevails and says you can't use your copy of the book to make your own version and re-release it as your own work (even if you acknowledge the original author).
Also, the precise wording of copyright law DOES vary from country to country, so it MIGHT be legal in one country to do exactly what you're suggesting, but others might explicitly prohibit it, and others still might leave it in a grey area (in other words, not actually state which side of the legal/illegal fence this use would fall on).

In this particular case, as kamnet has pointed out, the original author has released the graphics under the GPL license. This means you can use them to create your own, updated NewGRF. The code in the original GRF might not be able to be re-purposed, depending on the exact wording of the license statement, but if the graphics are GPL'd there is NOTHING stopping you re-using them and writing your own NML to make a NewGRF (or re-using it in an entirely new way completely unconnected to OpenTTD!)

[krtaylor]

Thank you for making my point. WTH do you think the odds are of anyone being sued? HTH would you even figure out who to sue, and where they live? And exactly what damages would you imagine you to be entitled to?

Madness.

[kamnet]

In this particular case, as kamnet has pointed out, the original author has released the graphics under the GPL license. This means you can use them to create your own, updated NewGRF. The code in the original GRF might not be able to be re-purposed, depending on the exact wording of the license statement, but if the graphics are GPL'd there is NOTHING stopping you re-using them and writing your own NML to make a NewGRF (or re-using it in an entirely new way completely unconnected to OpenTTD!)

I'll go one further - I don't believe NFO is copyrightable. Especially if it's reverse-engineered NFO that came out of a decompiled NewGRF, stripped of everything except technical info.

[JustMoreMemes]

This is very old now but I would love it if it could be updated to support all climates! The artwork is so cool!

it's been SEVENTEEN YEARS please can we just let things go

No I don't think we should. OpenTTD itself is old too and the base game is even more ancient and you are arguing that we should let things be forgotten and left behind. This is a great NewGRF with an annoying limitation that from my understanding is easier to solve today than it was back then, it might not get updated but that doesn't mean it's not worth asking.

[JustMoreMemes]

I totally agree that nothing (or noone ) on this forum is too old

And I also agree that the climate-availability was a bit annoying.
I also really like the look of this station (I use it a lot for small metro-stations)
For my personal games, I simply decoded the GRF, removed the Action-07 referring to that and recoded again.

Code: Select all

// Only enable if it's the temperate
    7 * 6	 07 83 01 
                  # Must Not Match
		  03 
		  # Temperate Climate
		  00 
		  # Skip the whole file
		  00

As (AFAIK) there has no license been set, I recommend that you do the same for your personal games only.

How would I go about reprogramming it? I tried to get into NewGRFs but couldn't find anything useful aside from conflicting documentation and numerous ancient programs that don't work properly half the time. I don't really even understand the language. It would be amazing to see a proper rerelease or reupload with change though.

[Quast65]

How would I go about reprogramming it? I tried to get into NewGRFs but couldn't find anything useful aside from conflicting documentation and numerous ancient programs that don't work properly half the time. I don't really even understand the language. It would be amazing to see a proper rerelease or reupload with change though.

1. Decode the GRF using GRFcodec
2. Delete codeline 7
3. Change the GRF-id (BAGS, codeline 8 )
4. Change the name (for example, add "All Climates") (also codeline 8 )
5. Renumber by using NFOrenum
6. Recode the GRF using GRFcodec

As (AFAIK) there has no license been set, I recommend that you do the same for your personal games only.

Purno says, "All my graphics are licensed under GPL."

Well, in that case...

glassstationw.grf

(12.48 KiB) Downloaded 48 times

glassstation all climates SOURCES.rar

(11.04 KiB) Downloaded 40 times

[wallyweb]

I'll go one further - I don't believe NFO is copyrightable. Especially if it's reverse-engineered NFO that came out of a decompiled NewGRF, stripped of everything except technical info.

The NewGRF Specs page is a reference to the NFO that is used in NewGRFs. Every GRF that works as intended is built on code from that page, so reverse engineer to your heart's content.

[JustMoreMemes]

How would I go about reprogramming it? I tried to get into NewGRFs but couldn't find anything useful aside from conflicting documentation and numerous ancient programs that don't work properly half the time. I don't really even understand the language. It would be amazing to see a proper rerelease or reupload with change though.

1. Decode the GRF using GRFcodec
2. Delete codeline 7
3. Change the GRF-id (BAGS, codeline 8 )
4. Change the name (for example, add "All Climates") (also codeline 8 )
5. Renumber by using NFOrenum
6. Recode the GRF using GRFcodec

As (AFAIK) there has no license been set, I recommend that you do the same for your personal games only.

Purno says, "All my graphics are licensed under GPL."

Well, in that case...
glassstationw.grf
glassstation all climates SOURCES.rar

Thank you! I'm working on my own NewGRF right now by reverse engineering an existing one and your instructions helped with that.

[wallyweb]

Thank you! I'm working on my own NewGRF right now by reverse engineering an existing one and your instructions helped with that.

Another route is to start a topic for your project in Graphics Development. That way you'll have all your thoughts and discussion in one convenient location.