''Pioneer'' is a free and open source

space trading and combat simulator A space flight simulation is a genre of flight simulator video games that lets players experience space flight to varying degrees of realism. Common mechanics include space exploration, space trade and space combat. Overview Some games in the ...

video game inspired by the commercial proprietary '' Frontier: Elite 2''. It is available for

Linux Linux ( or ) is a family of open-source Unix-like operating systems based on the Linux kernel, an operating system kernel first released on September 17, 1991, by Linus Torvalds. Linux is typically packaged as a Linux distribution, which ...

, and

Microsoft Windows Windows is a group of several proprietary graphical operating system families developed and marketed by Microsoft. Each family caters to a certain sector of the computing industry. For example, Windows NT for consumers, Windows Server for serv ...

Setting

''Pioneer'' is set at the start of the 33rd century. The player may choose from one of three starting locations: Mars, New Hope or a space station around

Barnard's Star Barnard's Star is a red dwarf about six light-years from Earth in the constellation of Ophiuchus. It is the fourth-nearest-known individual star to the Sun after the three components of the Alpha Centauri system, and the closest star in t ...

Gameplay

The game has no set objective, and the player is free to explore the galaxy and accrue money by performing tasks like trading, piracy or combat missions, allowing them to achieve a higher rank, buy better ships and equipment and hire more crew. It has a realistic flight and orbital model based on

Newtonian physics Classical mechanics is a physical theory describing the motion of macroscopic objects, from projectiles to parts of machinery, and astronomical objects, such as spacecraft, planets, stars, and galaxies. For objects governed by classical mec ...

and a rudimentary atmospheric model with drag and heat build-up.

Development

Development was started in 2008 by Tom Morton, also known for his work on GLFrontier, as a remake and homage to Frontier: Elite 2. The game is written in

C++ C++ (pronounced "C plus plus") is a high-level general-purpose programming language created by Danish computer scientist Bjarne Stroustrup as an extension of the C programming language, or "C with Classes". The language has expanded significan ...

and uses OpenGL for graphical rendering. It uses

Lua Lua or LUA may refer to: Science and technology * Lua (programming language) * Latvia University of Agriculture * Last universal ancestor, in evolution Ethnicity and language * Lua people, of Laos * Lawa people, of Thailand sometimes referred t ...

for scripting support. The development migrated in 2011 to a

SourceForge.net SourceForge is a web service that offers software consumers a centralized online location to control and manage open-source software projects and research business software. It provides source code repository hosting, bug tracking, mirroring ...

repository, and some years later to

GitHub GitHub, Inc. () is an Internet hosting service for software development and version control using Git. It provides the distributed version control of Git plus access control, bug tracking, software feature requests, task management, continuous ...

(downloads are still distributed from Sourceforge). The project had at times up to 50 developers

Reception and impact

''Pioneer'' was selected in March 2013 as "HotPick" by

Linux Format ''Linux Format'' is the UK's first Linux-specific magazine, and as of 2013 was the best-selling Linux title in the UK. It is also exported to many countries worldwide. It is published by Future plc (which produces a number of other computer magazi ...

. ''Pioneer'' was used in a physical spaceship

flight simulator A flight simulator is a device that artificially re-creates aircraft flight and the environment in which it flies, for pilot training, design, or other purposes. It includes replicating the equations that govern how aircraft fly, how they rea ...

project in 2013. In 2014 ''Pioneer'' was described by '' PCGamer'' as "incredibly slick" and named among the "Ten top fan remade classics you can play for free right now". In 2015 a ''

Der Standard ''Der Standard'' is an Austrian daily newspaper published in Vienna. History and profile ''Der Standard'' was founded by Oscar Bronner as a financial newspaper and published its first edition on 19 October 1988. German media company Axel Sprin ...

'' article noted the enormous work the fans have achieved with ''Pioneer'' as ''Elite'' remake and continuation. ''Pioneer'' became a quite popular open source

freeware Freeware is software, most often proprietary, that is distributed at no monetary cost to the end user. There is no agreed-upon set of rights, license, or EULA that defines ''freeware'' unambiguously; every publisher defines its own rules for t ...

title; between 2011 and May 2017, the game was downloaded via

over 260,000 times.Download Statistics: All Files6
on

sourceforge.net SourceForge is a web service that offers software consumers a centralized online location to control and manage open-source software projects and research business software. It provides source code repository hosting, bug tracking, mirroring ...

(October 2019)

References

External links