README

Skyborg

Welcome to Skyborg, a scifi-themed arcade flight sim, made in Pascal. The cheesy title, Skyborg, was a working one, which means nothing but sounded cool. And it was a big improvement over the previous one, Fight. Not by much :)

Developed between late 1995-1997 as a mostly solo project, it was supposed to be my first original (hardcore) game. It features a software rendering 3D engine, the product of experimenting in the demo scene, object oriented architecture, a 2D UI library loosely modeled after Turbo Vision, extended memory manager, and, if I recall correctly, spatial sound.

Artwork was created by Stelian "Steli" Serban (2D), Traian Pop (3D) and myself. After working on it for a while, I realized that trying to cover all code/game design while being full time in university was just not realistic. Last thing I remember working on was refactoring the mission system, which never got finished. This is why the project might not work any more (even if it manages to build) and there will be no release because the only executable built at that time crashes :D

There was no commercial future with it, no publisher contact and nobody in Romania that was interested in investing in game development. Starting the 4th year in university also came with the expectation to find a job in the industry (which I eventually did by getting an internship at a software development company in Timisoara, then developing a product for another one), and it left less and less time for hobby projects. It wasn't until late 1998-1999 that I teamed up with a couple of colleagues to form the first iteration of Piron Games and develop Pure Power

Aside from showing it to a couple of friends and making a presentation at an event at university, this was the only publicity it knew.

Setup&Install&Build (original)

This may only be built using Borland Pascal. It might not run though, as I don't think the sources are stable enough.

License

Code license: https://opensource.org/licenses/MIT

Artwork license: https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-sa/4.0/