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Rationale
PyGame is a Python library which makes game programming really easy, thus there are lots of small, fun, experimental games made with it (somewhat like the multitude of Flash games found online, but with no proprietary lock-in).The pygame website ( http://www.pygame.org ) lists a lot of things made with the library.
I think it would differentiate Ubuntu if a small selection of such games were included in a default installation, since they're generally small. Gaming systems like the Wii have shown that there is a desire for short, experimental games which can be played for a few minutes of enjoyment and closed, as opposed to long, drawn-out games which the player must stick with to ascend levels and such. These are perfect candidates.
Admittedly, the support level for such games might not be fantastic, but they wouldn't have to be included in an LTS release, and particularly buggy ones can be replaced without disrupting the user experience, in fact people may look forward to seeing what interesting games Ubuntu will ship in the next release.
Not everyone enjoys Gnome Robots :P
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I would like to see more games in the repository.
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dino
wrote on the 25 Aug 08 at 19:21
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> Look through PyGame site for small games to include
why dont you look yourself and propose your findings for inclusion
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Warbo
wrote on the 25 Aug 08 at 21:59
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dino: I completely understand, I just didn't want the idea to be voted down based on games X, Y and Z, when such things would only be examples.
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cheesehead
(Brainstorm moderator)
wrote on the 26 Aug 08 at 02:00
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The Gnome games are included with the Gnome desktop.
There must be a compelling reason to change that, particularly when user-installing/uninstalling games is so trivial in Add/Remove and Synaptic.
Perhaps a 'game-of-the-week' spotlight website or feed or (thread, webcast, video, e-mail, telepathic bombardment, etc.) would meet the same intent?
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Warbo
wrote on the 26 Aug 08 at 02:58
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cheesehead: If such a thing were obvious to new users (for instance if if were a feed in Firefox's default "live bookmarks") and included clickable apt URLs then it would fulfill the same purpose.
The idea is that Gnome have to be very conservative in the choices they make, since they will end up packaged for pretty much every distro (and not just Linux ones). Ubuntu can stand out from Fedora, Debian, ForeSight and every other distro which uses a pretty much unchanged default setup (except maybe adding some custom system administration tools). Non-LTS releases are given codenames to embody the spirit they are meant to follow, such as "Gutsy Gibbon", "Feisty Fawn", "Edgy Eft", "Intrepid Ibex", but I see nothing gutsy, feisty, edgy or intrepid about syncing Debian and shipping the next version of Gnome.
Ubuntu is meant to be aimed at non-geeks ("human beings"), thus even though there are a lot of very technical users the distro is not designed for them. What I mean is, Gnome have to worry about massive deployments throughout businesses, schools and governments, hardcore hackers who want to know exactly what is going onto their machine and why, etc. whilst Ubuntu assumes that the user is not particularly well versed in computing, and that any large deployments and things will be handled by someone competant enough to change the packages which get installed. To appeal to those new to computers or Linux one of the most important things is the small touches, something which Apple is endlessley praised for. Unlike the big deployments and the hardcore hackers, the selling point is not the packaging system, the bootup sequence or the mandatory access controls. It is the seamlessness and integration (ie. what works in one place must work in another and not have to be relearned), the ability to do everyday tasks without having to tell the system anything (ie. not be annoying) and the little niceties sprinkled around the system (which are unnoticed until the lack of them is noticed on a different system). Into the latter category I would put games which are fun to play rather than just brain-absorbing time wasters, things which are active, have no arbitrary game-ending goal and where quitting feels the same at all points in time (for instance compare the feeling of quitting a FreeCell game at the beginning, to quitting when most of the deck is sorted, to quitting when there are no more obvious moves). Tetris is one of the few gnome games I would say achieves this, another would be something like this http://pygame.org/project/418/
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cheesehead
(Brainstorm moderator)
wrote on the 27 Aug 08 at 23:21
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Well explained!
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Warbo
wrote on the 28 Aug 08 at 04:39
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cheesehead: I tend to go off on tangents and I'm terrible at being concise. Especially when the alternative is exam revision :P
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