Free SimCity? Free Civilization?

The best SimCity knock-off is LinCity-NG. It has a tendency to crash in Linux, but it runs fairly smooth in WinXP. It's free and open source. The project is abandoned, though.

I'm not sure if C-evo is open source, but it's the best freeware alternative to Civilization for Windows. It's free, it looks great, and it has a map editor! It even has an extremely low filesize of 2.4mb! What more do you need?

I'm keeping a look out for better sandbox games. There's a decent Portal clone in development, but it doesn't seem to be worth posting about yet. I'll keep you in the loop.

Graal is back again!?

For those of you who never became associated with the awesomeness that was Graal Online, it was a late '90s MMORPG, in which you and the other players controlled the game content. In essence, it was Second Life but two-dimensional. Those interested in making world were able; those only wanting to play were given all the opportunities to do so.

The community was stabbed in the back when the game became pay-to-play. Over time, those still devoted to the game kept it alive in the form of private servers, and I know of only one place left to relive the glory days, and that's here: http://www.graal2001.org

BlockCAD: Lego Buildings

I found this very interesting program called BlockCAD. I haven't tried it out, and I don't plan to, but it'll be great for anyone who likes Lego.

I found it while I was browsing a list of 3D modeling tools.

More Kid Friendly Games

I found a really awesome racing game for kids. It has the simplest of controls, just the arrow keys. There isn't a lot to it, either. You start the race, zoom past the other racers and try to collect little crystals to gain max speed. The game's called LudoRace, and you can download it from Graphit-X.

I also found a nice sandbox game (well, sort of) for the younger crowds. The game's called Freeride Earth, and, as the the name suggests, you ride all over the world in a sort of free-roaming environment. Really, you're on a hoverboard in a snowy area, and that's all there is to it. Even though the game is insanely simple, I enjoy its endless environment, and I suspect a young child would stay interested longer than I. The latest version can be found here.

If you have a fairly powerful video card, you could also try "That Cloud Game," an insanely popular internet phenomenon which allows you to fly through the air, collecting healthy clouds to dispatch them near unhealthy coulds to make more healthy clouds and collect those. The point of the game is to clear the sky of clouds, but I just have fun zooming through the sky as I listen to the beautiful soundtrack.

If you're feeling adventurous, you could also try out some of the nice-looking RPGs at Tomoshibi, but it's a Korean site, so you may have trouble finding your way around.