[Kde-games-devel] Proposal for GSoC

[Ian Wadham]

On 26/03/2012, at 4:39 AM, Wolfgang Rohdewald wrote:

> Am Sonntag, 25. März 2012, 03:58:32 schrieb Arjun Basu:
>> My Project mainly aims at developing the board game “Monopoly” using QML
>>   /Qt Quick
> 
> can you re-use parts of atlantik?

You should tread very carefully here, Arjun.

Firstly, the original author of Atlantik spent years working on it and never really finished.
It was eventually dropped from KDE Games because nobody was able/willing/had-time
to convert it to KDE 4 from KDE 3 and the original author, Rob Kaper, had long since
departed from KDE Games.  I know QML/Qt Quick is supposed to reduce the time
taken to program, but will it reduce years to months?  In other words, is the project
just too big for GSoC?  And is QML/Qt Quick a miracle cure for the need to program?
I have seen many such packages come and go in the course of a long career, yet
here I am --- still coding away … :-)  There have been many improvements in
programming tools and practice, but no revolutions.

Secondly, Rob Kaper was always worried about infringing copyrights and trademarks
when he was working on Atlantik, which was based on Monopoly.  I think Hasbro and/or
Parker Brothers hold the copyright on Monopoly.  You really must use another name.
Also you should try and set up a completely different scenario/artwork/currency etc.
How about basing it on ancient Indian legends and folklore?  I dare say Hasbro have
already done versions of Monopoly based on modern Indian cities.  For further ideas
see the KDE Games thread beginning and ending at:
    http://lists.kde.org/?l=kde-games-devel&m=107401555517073&w=2
    http://lists.kde.org/?l=kde-games-devel&m=107478674402761&w=2
Unfortunately Rob Kaper's web page on this topic seems to have disappeared.

All in all, I think it would be safer if you choose an existing KDE Game to rewrite
in QML/Qt Quick.  I think you would have a greater chance of success within the
time-frame available and you would satisfy our objective of learning more about
the strengths and weaknesses of QML/Qt Quick.

Just my 2 cents worth.

All the best, Ian W.