Someone made a Tradewars clone named Black Nova, a PHP script that runs on a web server like Apache with PHP loaded. If you go to http://www.sourceforge.net/ and search for "Tradewars" you will find it. I just found it at http://sourceforge.net/projects/blacknova/

I think an Open Source Tradewars would be nice. The original Tradewars was BASIC based and they gave the source code with it. So I think originally it was Open Sourced and they asked for donations to keep it going.

For more info:
http://www.classic-games.com/tradewars/

Or download the original at:
http://www.classic-games.com/tradewars/download.html

They also have Tradewars The New Era for Windows and Linux.

BASIC won't translate into C++ very well, too many GOTO/GOSUB routines, etc. You'll be better off writing it from scratch and look at the original Tradewars 2 BASIC code for examples when you get stuck.

The EIS Tradewars is better than the rest because of all the scripts and support built for it. If you write a new Tradewars, you'll have to write your own scripts for it, and provide your own support for it. Either that or give someone else the info to do it for you.

Good luck to the both of you.

Question i have heard people talking about Tradewars: The New Era... But no real detail on it can someone explain to me what it is all about and if people even play it like they do this one...
Strider

I haven't played it, but I heard about it. It is a sectorless system, no warps, I guess you just move on the grid. I haven't found any servers running it. You can download a copy of it at http://www.classic-games.com/tradewars/download.html if you want to look at it.

It comes with its own client, you move north, south, east, west on it. I did try it out on a NT 4.0 Server with a 200Mhz Processor and 64M of RAM, and it ran slow. Nothing to compete with TWGS or TW2002 yet.

You've got questions, we've got answers (tm)

Q. Who'd be interested in a *nix port of TW2002.
A. Please! Yesyesyesyesyes! Give it to me in any x86 flavor of *nix you want but with a high priority on Linux.

Q. What about Kylix?
A. There was a post here not too awful long ago (my sense of time is defective; it could have been quite some time ago) about how Kylix was not able to deliver on its promises of compatibility with Delphi. A straight Linux port was not possible. Pascal in general is not exactly the way to go if you're wanting to support multiple platforms anyway. Along those same lines I have a REXX version of Trade Wars 2 laying around that was written for Amiga REXX (not by me). I kinda half-heartedly looked into porting it over to Regina REXX but the amount of work that it would take really gets into the 'why bother' category.

Q. The original Trade Wars was open source?!?
A. Well, not really but it did include the source code for the first 6 major versions or so. It died out at version 11.20, written in C++ with DOS and OS/2 versions. On a side note, you will not find a better behaving DOS door for multi-node use than Trade Wars 2 11.20.

Q. Trade Wars: The New Era?
A. An utterly ignorable game. I mean seriously, it has problems with basic math and it takes very little to bring the server component down when it's on a separate machine. The client is.. beta. Negotiation through the universe is with NSEW controls and look at the funny numbers that you get when you trade!

How about a Java port? That's an idea I've thrown around in my head for some time -- on the most recent recall of the idea I actually started looking around and discovered that TradeWars is still alive and well (didn't realize that before).

I found one port that, if I remember correctly, what using Java for the client and C for the server. I've pondered the idea of putting together a fully Java client/server to port the concept of TradeWars. I also keep thinking about that, if done correctly, the program could be a game "framework" rather then the game itself -- allowing for very easy expansion.

It could run on Windows, Linux, Mac, or any other *NIX type system. A little tweaking would probably be needed, since "write once, run anywhere" hasn't exactly come true yet, but I think it would be an interesting project to undertake. TradeWars is certainly simple enough that Java's issues with speed would be less then a concern.

Probably a little overkill in the end... but if anyone wants to help beat the dead horse into the ground, feel free to help me get the ball rolling.

I really should get here more often...

This will be a very disjointed message - my apologies.

1) There are only two real options for a "portable" version of TWGS, C and C++. While C++ has some nice features, it also tends to run slower then C. I don't know if this would be a problem. Oh, and dump the Borland extensions. TW isn't a door anymore <GRIN>.

2) To whomever mentioned GOTO - in regards to using GOTO and GOSUB in Basic programs - only an idiot would do that, or someone working with an antique version of Basic (GWBasic for instance), at least if they want maintainable code. There is a goto equivalent in C as well - again, don't use it unless you are feeling suicidal. The only common structured language is Pascal. However you can write structured programs in C and Basic quite easily.

3) I like Java, but... It's not quite ready for prime time. Not yet. Give it a few years.

4) Chris Sherrick and John Morris included the source code to their version of TW because recompiling it was the only way to get it running on some systems, not because it was open source.

5) Trade Wars - The New Era is a bad joke.

6) Anyone who uses Internet Explorer/Outlook Express and knows anything about computers, clearly has suicidal tendencies, and should seek psychiatric assistance.

7) As to which Nix, either FreeBSD or Linux. The proprietary Nix's are too expensive for hobbyists to use.

I mentioned to JP a while back that it would be nice to add "hooks" to TWGS so that third party apps could be added in. I'm thinking along lines of a chat room, a theater (where you could watch games in progress), etc.

I tried your Nix version of 2002B5. Not bad. How about ressurecting the V1.03D code, compiling it, and getting it up and running as well? I still think that 1.03D was one of the best versions (even if it didn't support multiplayer action).

Maybe us people still using Internet Exploder and No Outlook In Sight Express are either not wanting to go back to the stone age, not wanting to run an OS that comparitively nothing is written for, or just a misplaced feeling of "some day Microsuck may actually get the Darn thing right and it will work like its supposed to."

There are alternatives to IE and Outlook. Mozilla is one of them and while it lacks ActiveX and VBScript, it is a good web browser. It also supports Internet mail via its Thunderbird mail client. http://www.mozilla.org/ for more info. You also need the Sun Java JRE from http://www.java.com/ for the Java plug-in.

Sadly I still use IE and Outlook (Not Outlook Express, Outlook 2000) and I've wanted to go off of them, but my Timex Datalink watch can use the Contacts and Calendar of Outlook to synch up, and some sites I visit still need IE to work.

Mozilla exists for almost every platform out there, unlike IE.

Yeah, Internet Exploder, a fine example of the programmer's art. Think I'll stick with Mozilla. I like using a browser that doesn't have an exploit announced against it every month.

I'll also stick with Win98 for my desktop - it's safer - no one is writing worms/virii to attack it anymore. Of course the hardware firewall helps.

Yeah, I have XP and Office at work. Quite frankly they are NOT worth what we paid for them. Neither adds any value to our business. Autocad, Maximizer, and Quickbooks do add value to our business. As far as the operating system is concerned we could be running Netware, Nix, or DOS. What matters is the apps you are using.

I'd be willing to pay any upgrade fee or even new license fee for a linux version.

Deuce,
A native linux port would be nice, distrobution independant would be nice just a nice tar.gz or tar.bz2 with an install script. RPMs and DEBs are more of a pain than they are worth.

Also you might want to look into using GMP, then you aren't limited to any particular bit length / word size for the data types. You'll just need to be careful about the license. GMP can be found at http://www.swox.com/gmp/