Aleph One
Updated 2 months ago Released Jan 17, 2000 with a public domain licenceAleph One (formerly known as the Marathon Open Source Project) is a free and open-source first-person shooter engine based on the source code of Bungie...
Bungie began as a company one crisp morning in May of 1991, but that wasn't exactly the beginning. Before it emerged, fully formed as the multinational corporate behemoth that published Operation: Desert Storm (on which they later based a war), "Bungie" released a Pong clone (nearly 20 years after the original, mind you) called Gnop!
That's Pong spelled backwards, and it was that type of brilliant marketing strategy that would catapult Bungie into the gaming stratosphere. Surprisingly, there was a long way to go between Gnop! and Halo 2. To be fair to Gnop! – its price was right. The game was free, although a couple of users did send its creator $15 for the source code.
But Chicago in 1991, when Alexander Seropian set up the company to publish his self-penned Operation: Desert Storm, was a very different world. The country was seeing epic deficits, unemployment was at record levels, Janet Jackson was topping headlines and we had just been involved in a short but messy war in Iraq. Unrepeatable events, for sure.
Back then, the PC was clearly the dominant computing platform, but that didn't stop Seropian and his Artificial Intelligence class compadre Jason Jones from embracing the Macintosh, for reasons of familiarity and ease of use rather than any fundamental business thinking. That and the fact that Jason Jones had a mostly complete build of Minotaur ready when Seropian convinced him to join forces.
"Yeah, I grew up on the Apple II and then the Mac," says Jason, "I wrote all this C code for PCs though, before I even went to school. This was the heyday of PCs, with Wing Commander and stuff. The PC market was really cutthroat, but the Mac market was all friendly and lame. So it was easier to compete."
Jason remembers things weren't all sweetness and light, "I didn't really know [Alex] in the class. I think he actually thought I was a dick because I had a fancy computer. He was looking for another thing to publish after Operation: Desert Storm, so we published Minotaur – and it was after that we set up a partnership. What I liked about him was that he never wasted any money."
There was no money to waste in the early days, when the whole operation (if you can call two guys in a basement an operation) was something like a garage band – and early players of Minotaur (Bungie's second or third release, depending on how you count 'em) might have been shocked to see Jason and Alex sitting cross-legged in Alex's apartment, hand-assembling the Minotaur boxes. And although Operation: Desert Storm had been a minor hit (2500 copies sold!), it was Minotaur that would raise profiles, eyebrows and expectations.
Aleph One (formerly known as the Marathon Open Source Project) is a free and open-source first-person shooter engine based on the source code of Bungie...
HALO is one FPS that really did introduce many new gameplay elements. It offers all that is said below and the modifications already in development look...
Marathon 2: Durandal was the first sequel in the Marathon series of science fiction first-person shooter computer games from Bungie Software. It was released...
Halo: Combat Evolved and its sequel, Halo 2, have achieved phenomenal success on the Xbox video game platform as gamers around the world follow the saga...
Myth II is a real time tactical game based on squad and unit management rather than resource gathering and expansion. Thanks to a realistic physics engine...
Oni is a third person action-adventure game for PC, Mac and PlayStation 2. The game features intense action and furious gunplay.
Only registered members can share their thoughts. So come on! Join the community today (totally free) and do things you never thought possible.
o.0 0.o ....
Wow, and apartment based company made the famous halo. Wow.
Have you any idea how many companies started or with such a small development team? Just take a look at ID Software, and Interplay.
Just a few of the games/franchises started by these humble companies include: like Doom, Quake, Unreal Tournament, Baldur's Gate, Descent, Freespace, etc.
i agree you can't buy that kind of involvement. but on to the more pressing issue i love you guys lol just kidding you should know i've read most of your books and played all of your games cept Halo: Wars cause its not out in Aus yet (but when it is i'll be sleeping on the floor out front of EB games to get a copy) and yeah i can't wait for the movie, if its still going ahead? anywho you guys are the best and i hope you succeed in world domination!! :)
Ah yessss. Oh Bungie, Oh. I have to admit, bungie rocks. I'm an avid Halo fan since before it was released. It's pretty amazing how it all started in a apartment back then.