MigBuster 2,884 Posted January 16, 2013 Posted on the BMS forum today: ........ I have always admired those developers, and have always wondered why they would commit so much time to their love of Falcon, despite the community at times, despite the challenges, and despite the overwhelming learning curve. I'm telling you, these guys are good. So, it is with a great sadness, after all these years, that I was informed about the closing of FreeFalcon. I asked Steve if I could write this on behalf of FreeFalcon, and he was happy to let me do this. FreeFalcon will be missed. There will be lots of questions asked, and probably never really answered as good as they could be. Such is the life of a development stream sometimes. However, mark this day on your calendar as one of the low days of Falcon. To FreeFalcon, you guys are remembered, and honored, and welcome to our boards. And I would personally like to Thank You for your service to the promise of a dream. Share this post Link to post Share on other sites
RogerSmith 72 Posted January 16, 2013 (edited) I've played it, I wish I got into it before it went away Edited January 16, 2013 by RogerSmith Share this post Link to post Share on other sites
MigBuster 2,884 Posted January 16, 2013 I've played it, I wish I got into it before it went away Not good news - but I hope that they help BMS out because the only way the goals will be met is if everyone pulls in the same direction. Share this post Link to post Share on other sites
JediMaster 451 Posted January 16, 2013 For some reason I thought FF had merged into BMS. Shows how much attention I pay to it! Share this post Link to post Share on other sites
squid 21 Posted January 16, 2013 Me too, i thought FF was eventually working on BMS basis after the release of 4th gen BMS ... (i guess i wish)... LOT of work has been going on for years in FF ... My first and last so far complete 3D model / skin work was released ages ago in some FF release (KC-135R) i have only good memories from my interaction with the FF team Share this post Link to post Share on other sites
squid 21 Posted January 17, 2013 (edited) And today from the same thread : http://www.benchmarksims.org/forum/showthread.php?13464-FreeFalcon-s-Remarkable-History/page6 Hello Cobracab and Everyone who is interrested in FreeFalcon Fist of all.FreeFalcon is alive and now its OpenSource (under BSD License). All Sourcecodes are now open, nothing is hidden, we share all with the World we have. It was migrated to Visual Studio 2010 C/C++ Compiler, and we have tested it on the Intel V13 Optimizing Compiler. There are a few thing wich not work right now perfectly but i think it was hard job to put all the remaining Fragments together (as i joined the FreeFalcon Dev Team a Year ago, there was no working Codebase, we had to puzzle things together). I was also Informed thadt Steve and Ranger will be out of the Project and i thank both for its courage and Energy, managing FreeFalcon the past Years. You will be allways Welcome at the new FreeFalcon Community wich is just startet. We have decided the Project will go into an another Direction. Fist of all. We have removed anything who is not longer needed. The pure Sourcecode in a Zip File is not bigger the 34 MBytes. Secondly. All blackboxed Thirdparty Libs are removed. (NVidia and Amd Matrix libs. The ATC Chat Synth will replaced by Speechx. If you interested in the ongoging Development Process or want to help FreeFalcon you can contact us on: Forum: http://freefalcon.freeforums.org Follow us on Twitter: https://twitter.com/FreeFalconOSC Developer Mailinglist: http://www.freelists...lcon-developers (subscribe first) http://www.freelists...lcon-developers EMail: freefalconopensource@gmail.com GitHub: https://github.com/FreeFalcon (Version Control where the complete Source code is hosted to the Public) IRC: (You need a Program like Nettalk or Mirc to connect). irc://irc.oftc.net/#FreeFalcon We just starting the new Project but we are now 3 Senior Coredevelopers in C/C++ and one Junior Developer. How you can help: If you are an C/C++ Programmer... then you can checkout the code, fix things and export a Patch. You can export the Patch as Diff File on the DevMailinglist or Enque your Patch on GitHub as Pullrequest. A Dev will review your Code and decide if it can be applyed to the central Codebase or not. If you are an Softwaretester / Engineer in Test... Great! We are using Googles Unittest Tools to test the Code, so this would also be awsome. If you can find a bug... Please use our Issuetracker to file a bug so we can find a Solution for it. There are many more things to come, but for now this should be enought. Peter Edited January 17, 2013 by squid Share this post Link to post Share on other sites
MigBuster 2,884 Posted January 18, 2013 (edited) ok........ For those interested in the spirit of this thread, and for those whose "speculations" have been a little too "out there"... ...here is the OFFICIAL statement from FreeFalcon. There is really not much to add: FreeFalcon Fans, It has been my honor and pleasure to be associated with FreeFalcon these past few years and to serve as head of FreeFalcon. It is with reluctance that I now feel it is time to close the doors to FreeFalcon. Steve "Hustler" Wooters and myself have been in close consultation with each other other the past year and a half and we both feel the time has come where FreeFalcon has nothing more to contribute to the community. The, time, energy, and costs to maintain the website and server no longer serve the communities best interests. Our development process has been active but we have reached a point where we have been unable to move forward in a way that would provide the sort of meaningful advances that we know you want and expect. Theater development while productive also lacks from significant progress because there just aren't enough active contributors to FreeFalcon dedicated theaters. Code development has for all intensive purposes been halted because we lost our current source code and were unable to develop a replacement to allow us to keep our current theaters and to fix existing shortcomings in crucial areas like stability, multiplayer, refueling, and AI. Lastly, the lack contributors to core material like models, skins, flight models, terrain tiles, campaigns, and data besides make for a very slow process. On the bright side, FreeFalcon can lay claim to be one of the oldest and longest active development teams in Falcon history and took Falcon to new heights that perhaps the creators would have been proud of. Many people have contributed to FreeFalcon over the years I would be remiss if I didn't name and compliment at least a few of the truly bright stars; perhaps first and foremost among the group are Steve "Hustler" Wooters, Dr. Fred "Baldeagle" Balding, and Ron "Red1" Nair. Founders of FreeFalcon who started with a dream and made all of us dream even bigger. There have been a large number of contributors that sit on that next tier of stardom; "CCC", Tom "Saint" Launder, Jim "JimG" Garwood, Tom "T-Rex" Perkins, Michael "Speaker" Bradley, Clayton "Aragorn" Noel, Alex "Red" Vallone, Stefan "Biker" Biker, Matheus "Seifer" Ribiero, Robert "Pumpyhead" Lozada, Jon "Nightfalcon" Xedis, Benny "BenBen" Wegmann, Jay "Bird" Ricardelli, Jean-Marie "Topolo" Langeron, Dave "Dewdog2" Wagner, Dave "WaveyDave" Cuthbert, Stefano "Qawa", Bob "Welshmadman" Owens, Brian "Ram22" Thomas, Dave "Demer928" Emerson, Balazs "Molnibalage" Molnar, Tadeusz "Polak" Zukowski, Carlo "Khronik" Lafontaine, Rufus "RP" Parsons, Thomas "Lee" Lee, Hannes "Noname" Wagner, Eyran "Peled" Millis, Winston "RadicalDude" Young, Ataberk "Hailstorm" Portakal, Mike "Toonces" Loomis, Cemil "Eagle611" Ozturk, Stephan "Derstef" Willmes, and of course the "Snakeman" who paved the way for theater development for all forms of Falcon. It would also be unfair to overlook the contributions of our many beta testers, with whom I have worked with only a handful and can only provide a short list of those capable souls who flew many an hour in the pursuit of excellence; Dave "Dewdog2" Wagner, Patrick "cptmtge" Harkins, Frits "Snail" Vanvorst, Stale "TheNorwegian" Almenningen, Jojo57, Thorston "Tom" Buss, Roberto "Ipergallo" Bagnasco, Balazs "Molnibalage" Balazs. My apologies to the many others whom have been omitted because of my short tenure in a long lived organization. What can I can say? It had to end sometime. We had a very good run, had a lot of fun, and made a some good friends along they way. I hope FreeFalcon was able to provide you with something to enjoy, something to dream about, and something that engaged you for at least a short time and in doing so made your life just a little bit better. What does the future hold for free and open development of Falcon as it heads into its 2nd decade? Put your eyes on BMS, once and perhaps for all, development rests with this very talented, smart, and energetic group of people who have made it their mission to continue seeking excellence and I hope you all will support them as they take the Falcon community to the future. Best Wishes, Anthony "Ranger822" Thomas Hope this puts everything into perspective, and - thanks to Ranger822. It was a s**t-load of fun working together. Aragorn. Edited January 18, 2013 by MigBuster Share this post Link to post Share on other sites
MigBuster 2,884 Posted January 18, 2013 And today from the same thread : http://www.benchmark...e-History/page6 One of the Free Falcon Guys has posted there telling them to take the site down.... Share this post Link to post Share on other sites
squid 21 Posted January 18, 2013 Thats one tiring thing about the Falcon history (in past at least) ..... so much and complicated backstage all the way ... still trolling lol Share this post Link to post Share on other sites
JediMaster 451 Posted January 19, 2013 So the team called it quits and some other people are trying to take over their name and continue on with the same line of development without asking? Why not come up with a new name, or better yet try and join BMS? Share this post Link to post Share on other sites
FastCargo 412 Posted January 19, 2013 I guess I'm missing something...the original Falcon 4.0 source code was never legally released, correct? (Other than to Lead Pursuit for F4:AF) And everything since then is based off that non-legal code? Doesn't that mean that nobody really owns the rights (other than Lead Pursuit) and can't compel anyone to do anything? FC Share this post Link to post Share on other sites
MigBuster 2,884 Posted January 19, 2013 (edited) I guess I'm missing something...the original Falcon 4.0 source code was never legally released, correct? (Other than to Lead Pursuit for F4:AF) And everything since then is based off that non-legal code? Doesn't that mean that nobody really owns the rights (other than Lead Pursuit) and can't compel anyone to do anything? FC Correct AFAIK - Free Falcon may have had some arrangement going but that's only hearsay. Whatever it is now they have posted some source code up and have already moved to their second forum. The code was posted up under some kind of free licence - so I expect they may claim that most of the original code has been changed - bit dubious really. There is clearly been a split between the Free falcon team - because these other guys claim to be the "other" developers that were working on it. Edited January 19, 2013 by MigBuster Share this post Link to post Share on other sites
pmvstrm 0 Posted January 20, 2013 Hi to all. I am one of the Coders of the new Team. FreeFalcon is gone, but The FreeFalcon Open Source Project (short FreeFalconOSC) is now lining up for fresh start. First of all. We are working only on C/C++ Sourcecode and delivering no Content, like Theaters, Databases, Terrains, Data, Pits or Aircrafts, We focused on developing the Engine Code itself and working on Crossplatform avaiability. We are behind the official FreeFalcon 6.0 Release, because on of the former Coders at the old FreeFalcon Project only deployed the FFViper.exe without providing the Code wich is was build from. So we had a haevy start at the old community and was forced to puzzle single fragments together. Hustler was running out of Money and Ranger was not willing to manage it alone. We coders where also surprised by the shutdown of the freefalcon.com website, but we decided to move on. You can reach us in our Forum, irc or on Twitter, https://twitter.com/FreeFalconOSC All the best, Peter Share this post Link to post Share on other sites
