The source code to yet another classic video game has just been released online, thanks to a combined effort between 3DO fans and the original developers.
This time, the game in question is Krisalis Software's 1995 3DO port of Star Fighter — a 3D shoot-em-up that was originally released for the Acorn Archimedes in 1994. This is a game that saw players take control of a futuristic fighter ship to complete various objective-based missions and remarkably featured the ability to fly outside of a planet's atmosphere into space as well as terraform the environment by firing repeatedly at the same area of land.
Despite some of the game's impressive technical achievements, it received a somewhat mixed response following its launch, with the UK magazine Maximum calling it "another wasted opportunity for the 3DO", while Next Generation, on the other hand, called it "addictive as hell" and Electronic Gaming Monthly labelled it "one of the most impressive games yet for the 3DO".
The release of the game's source code was announced on Twitter yesterday by the 3DO homebrew developer Trapexit, who claimed that it was thanks to the RISC OS developer Nathan Atkinson, members of the 3DO community, as well as the game's original designers/programmers Andrew Hutchings and Tim Parry.
As Trapexit stated on GitHub, the code pretty much seems to be complete, with "most if not all media assets in their final processed forms". Several utilities are also present, but given the game was ported from the Acorn Archimedes the tools for original media creation and level design are not available here.
As they go on to state, the plans for this source code are now to port it over to hopefully "build against the 3do-devkit project". This will potentially allow for new development.
You can take a look at the GitHub page here.