ArchiveRL

ArchiveRL v1.0

Released 7th December 2018.

ArchiveRL is a project aiming to build an ultimate roguelike archive, with emphasis on preservation, historical accuracy, search for lost games and including not only game files itself but also as much documentation as possible. It was inspired by TOSEC and other retro-gaming archival projects. Version 1.0 is its fifth release: it includes the majority of non-commercial games contained in the International Roguelike Database and also gathered from other sources.

This update (0.8 to 1.0) to ArchiveRL adds a new directory - XDRL. It contains "competition" roguelikes - games written under a time/size constraint or according to some other rules. The majority of games are from the 7DRL challenge but there are also some others.

Due to a huge number of games vs my chronic lack of time, this release is provided "as is" and differs from organised structure of the rest of ArchiveRL. The games have not been repacked, their names were only adjusted so as to allow for searches, there are no tags, there is only one main Doc directory, sources (if available) were packed with the main game. Dealing with these details would delay this release ad infinitum, but it might be corrected in the future updates.

Quite a few of these games started as competition releases but then evolved into long term projects. If a game was updated a year or more after the original compo release, then it's probably included in one of the other ARL directories as well as the XDRL. Games which were updated shortly after the compo finish are packed with the initial release (whenever available) in the XDRL directory. Some games were only playable online as Flash, HTML, Unity or other formats - the links are available in the docs. Any help with archiving those would be appreciated, I don't really know how to "rip" them.

Despite the RL community's help, there are still 96 XDRL games missing. Please see the main MISSING doc and XDRL MISSING docs for a detailed list.

As usual, the main directories have also been updated with some previously missing games, new additions and latest versions of the in-development ones (as of November 2018)

Full changelog: http://www.arkhammanor.com/rpgbase/ARL%20changelog%20v1.0.txt

ArchiveRL stats: 1942 archives - 21.9 Gigabytes - 1520 games - 1473 individual ones - ~500(?) sources

DOWNLOADS

ArchiveRL is hosted at archive.org: https://archive.org/details/ArchiveRL.7z

• there are two files: complete ArchiveRL 1.0 (21GB) and update from 0.8 to 1.0 (9GB)
• torrent file: archive.org bundled both ARL main and the update into one torrent file so make sure to choose which one you want to download in your torrent client dialogue window
• there are also direct downloads as zip files
• you can also download individual files from inside the main archive here on archive.org. Please note that the main DOC directories are at the bottom of the list now.

ABOUT ArchiveRL

• at the moment the collection is only available for DOS/Windows platform (due to the lack of time for building Mac/Linux versions) although it contains the PLATFORM directory with all the games only found on non-Windows systems, plus some gmaex in XDRL directory. Lots of sources can also be compiled on platforms other than Windows. The game version included is almost always the latest available (as of Nov2018 for this edition)

• the collection is organised using directories and tags, with a unified naming system. This is based mostly on IRLDB categories. It allows for easy reshaping, structural control and flexible searches. Presently it includes games classified as ALPHA / BETA+STABLE / VARIANT / MISC / SOURCE / PLATFORM /XDRL

• it contains some games that were never released before, such as MysteryHack and new Halls Of Mist, plus numerous ones that are increasingly hard to locate or were not compiled for Windows before

• historical context and accuracy is a crucial part of this project: every game included was treated as individual case and at least some research conducted. Extra care has been put into obtaining correct files and version numbers. Every individual archive includes a separate DOC directory containing available info regarding the game.

• equally important is the drive to rescue/rediscover some "lost" games: these are covered in the MISSING doc http://arkhammanor.com/rpgbase/ARL%20MISSING.ods

• all main directories have corresponding doc files which are based on IRLDB but do try to correct some of its errors and add updates (fields: name-version-dates-platforms- devs-trad-source-comments and some web links)

For an in-depth description of ArchiveRL, methods and motives behind its structure and decisions taken please read the ARL README doc in the archive or check the website:www.arkhammanor.com/rpgbase/RLdb.html Contact the author: akeley@arkhammanor.com There are also ARL threads on assorted forums (mainly Roguetemple) and Reddit's r/roguelikes.

HOW YOU CAN HELP & CONTRIBUTE

Up till now this project has been mostly an individual effort, only announced on Roguetemple forums and plagued by slow pace due to IRL debuffs. However, it now reached a major completion stage, where it makes sense to publicize it more widely and ask for rogulike community's assistance.

Here's what would be most appreciated:

• simple "bug reporting" - despite thorough examination there are bound to be mistakes: spelling errors, archive/files/directory problems, doc-file mismatches and so on.
• trying to find & rescue games from the MISSING doc (http://arkhammanor.com/rpgbase/ARL%20MISSING.ods)
• testing the games: I've personally tried quite lot of them - but not all, and mostly on x64 Windows
• any historical and informational error corrections and contributions
• adding more games/sources/docs/info
• compiling sources that have no corresponding binaries
• building either Linux or Mac side of this archive.
• providing feedback regarding structure and methodology of this project

Please read the ARL README or check the website for more details regarding this section.

VIRUS/MALWARE: before uploading the files have been scanned with a freshly updated Windows Defender , there were no warnings. I'm fairly certain that all files in this collection are absolutely safe, however I do not take any responsibility if somehow they destroy your computer and/or open a rift to a parallel universe.

COPYRIGHT: to my best knowledge all the files contained in this torrent are publicly available free of charge and fall under assorted licenses that make it possible to release them here. If you have an objection regarding any of the content included here - be it files, docs or anything else - please contact me (akeley@arkhammanor.com) so we can discuss it, any valid claims will be of course respected, content removed and the collection updated accordingly.

THE FUTURE OF ArchiveRL

This version is marked 1.0 since it has finally reached the stage envisioned at the project's inception, back in 2015. It now covers the majority (if not all :) roguelikes contained in International Roguelike Database - plus many more. Of course it still is not a "complete" RL archive and it's highly unlikely it will ever be. I'm quite burned out by this project and would like to concentrate on other stuff now, nonetheless below is a future roadmap of sorts.

• MISSING doc clean up, update and RL recovery drive: coming up soon
• adding a VERSION directory containing some of the older versions of various RLs: quite probable in some sort of 6 months - 1yr timeframe
• scanning itch.io and its myriad RLs - likely, at some point in future
• Mac/Linux versions: rather unlikely, unless somebody else wants to tackle this

Regardless of the above I will also try to update the ARL with new/updated roguelikes every 6 months or so.

THANKS

To everybody who helped out with this project by contributing files and/or comments. And of course to the IRLDB/Roguebasin/Roguetemple/reddit crews, without these resources ARL would not be possible. Check out the Credits section of the main readme for more details