EDIT: Damnit...
After over 5 years of working on this project, I am afraid things have gotten to the point where I can no longer balance a support and passion against the community and where it sees efforts best spent. It has become increasingly clear to me that people in the doom multiplayer community would much rather stick with their tried and true, yet broken or fascist port of choice rather than participating in an effort for a truly community-driven, open project.
It is no secret that we have been and still are looking for someone to take the reins from denis after his departure, and we have not had much luck. Granted, we have picked up some wonderful folks like Hyper Eye and Ladna. These guys show a twinkle of what could have been possible. Unfortunately, we are still grappling with problems that have existed since day 1, and we still to this day do not have a cohesive community-driven discussion and participation on any but the most basic level.
This is not my only frustration. There are certain areas in which I have asked for support beyond programming, and it is hard to come by. While I mentioned we've picked up some developers with chops, progress has not been made at the speed that I would like, and as I have no repercussions to implement, it's hard to command such things get done. Being at the whim of others who come and go is not going to work for this project.
To be clear, this is not about getting or not getting "credit" or lack thereof for anything. Far better programmers than I have implemented a majority of what Odamex is. I do not feel that I am being forced out, "overworked" or anything like that. In fact, it is the lack of such progress that plays a role, albeit a small one.
Perhaps at this point in Doom's life, there is not enough room for 3 port choices that are all based on the same seeds. I am not entirely sure at this point. I suppose it will remain to be seen. My departure does not signal the end of Odamex. Since it's an open source project it will continue, though what "continue" means is up in the air. Without a lead developer, things will continue to stagnate. Without serious effort, information is stale and interest is lost. If there is someone in the shadows waiting that suddenly has an interest in providing real coding leadership and direction, you're more than welcome to join #odamex-dev on irc.oftc.net.
So long, and thanks for all the fish.
