Blockland

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Blockland

Developer(s)	Eric 'Badspot' Hartman, Ben Garney
Publisher(s)	Eric 'Badspot' Hartman
Designer(s)	Eric 'Badspot' Hartman
Engine	Torque Game Engine
Platform(s)	Retail: PC, GNU/Linux (withWine), Macintosh
Release date	February 24, 2007, December 22, 2004 (v0002, beta,)
Genre(s)	Sandbox/freeform
Mode(s)	Singleplayer, LAN Multiplayer, On-line Multiplayer

Blockland, is a semi-noncompetitive multiplayer computer game built on the Torque Game Engine, in which players build with interconnecting LEGO-type blocks in virtual online worlds. Users construct massive buildings and artwork across numerous servers and then have the freedom to roleplay, explore or have a deathmatch within their constructions. The game is neither endorsed by, nor affiliated with, the LEGO brand. It was spotlighted on The Screen Savers^[1] February 11, 2005, drastically increasing the user base overnight. Blockland has also been featured on Shack News^[2] November 1, 2007.

Blockland is available for $19.95 from the main website, a demo is also available for download. The demo restricts access to online play and limits construction to 150 bricks. You do not need to download any other necessities once you have entered a key. The game is currently available on Windows and Macintosh.

1 Features
2 Game Code Modification
3 References
4 External links

[edit] Features

Structures of immense size can be built in a multiplayer setting. Using various tools in the game, a player can add certain effects to bricks such as lighting, specularity, and animated particles, although these are not the only effects available. The game also features a variety of vehicles players can control, weapons, saving and loading of constructions, automated construction through macros, and a mini-game system. The mini-game system enables users to create highly configurable and self-contained game modes through a variety of different options, and then play in the world they create.^[3] One of the strengths of this system is that some players on a server can be in a mini-game while the other players can continue to build, giving the user much more freedom in the way they play the game.

Some of the features for the next update for Blockland (v9) have been announced to the community recently, and one of the most notable additions to the game is an Interactive Brick System (Brick Events) which will allow the user to apply special properties to bricks which allows them to create anything from a simple light switch to a missile launcher^[4] or even a game of Pong^[5].

[edit] Game Code Modification

Blockland features a versatile add-on system to aid users in adding their own content - in this way, users do not need to modify source code for the game. The System searches for script files within a designated Add-Ons folder, and will then allow you to enable or disable this add-on from loading when you start your game. The System will be improved in the next update (v9) to automatically check that an add-on is valid, and instead of extracting zip archives to the Add-On folder - the user simply has to drop the archive into the folder instead.

During its development, a basic open-source alpha version of the game was released under the same name.^[6] This was the only release of its kind and it featured a small number of open maps with basic building functions. This version had several major modifications made for it with the intent of increasing content and improving gameplay, most notably RTB (Return to Blockland), AiO (All-in-One) and TBM (The Better Mod). The RTB team is currently producing a similar modification for the retail version of the game which is to be released alongside the upcoming Blockland V9 update.