When comparing 0 A.D. vs Cube 2: Sauerbraten, the Slant community recommends 0 A.D. for most people. In the question“What are the best open-source games?” 0 A.D. is ranked 6th while Cube 2: Sauerbraten is ranked 42nd. The most important reason people chose 0 A.D. is:
Still currently in development, 0 A.D. is currently in Alpha stages and completely free. For those willing to wade through the multiple bugs, essentially testing the title, this game will scratch the itch of any RTS fan on a shoestring budget.
Specs
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Pros
Pro Free, Real-Time Strategy title actively being developed
Still currently in development, 0 A.D. is currently in Alpha stages and completely free. For those willing to wade through the multiple bugs, essentially testing the title, this game will scratch the itch of any RTS fan on a shoestring budget.
Pro Multi-platform support
The game will run on any Operating System, whether it be Linux, OSX, or Windows, which is great for people who dual-boot or use multiple OS's across their devices. No matter the OS used, one can install and play this game.
Pro Addictive Age of Empires style gameplay
This game can be seen as a spiritual successor to Age of Empires, thus it will provide similar gameplay to those who are familiar with the AoE series.
Pro Straightforward RTS gameplay
0 A.D. brings recognizable, straightforward, Real-Time Strategy gameplay to the players. With a mini-map in the bottom corner, resources shown in a bar at the bottom, and unit selection through double clicking, all of the major elements found in most RTS games is here, making for a very familiar game for those that are used to the genre.
Pro Code is open-source
Even if the current developer team chooses to no longer work on the game, others can keep contributing to the source code and modify it.
Pro Active development
By being in active development the game allows for frequent bug fixes as well as frequent new content. While it is still in alpha, the state of the game playability is pretty good with new features being added all the time.
Pro Simple gameplay
There are no skills beyond those common to all AFPS games: very basic movement, aim, weapon switching, item timing, map knowledge. There is less to learn so newbies can become proficient more quickly, but there is still the ability to hone those basic skills to a very high level, as evidenced by regular community tournaments.
Pro Fast movement
Movement is very simple but acceleration is very fast, so hitting an opponent good at dodging is more difficult than perhaps any other AFPS.
Pro Cross platform
Available for Windows, MacOS and Linux.
Pro Free, open-source
Pro Low hardware requirements
If you can run the original Quake 3 you can probably run this (with the advanced graphics features disabled).
Pro Easy map editing
Getting into map editing is very easy, which has resulted in a large number of user-created maps with a wide variety, from massive sky castles where you have to hunt down your opponent from far away, to large CTF maps, to competitive, claustrophobic 1v1 arenas with teleports.
Pro Many gametypes and gametype combinations
Free-For-All (everyone for themselves, all weapons allowed), Capture (where teams fight for control of points on the map), Capture the Flag (two teams fight to capture the other's flag and return it to their base), Teamplay (defeat the other team's players to score points for your team), Tactics (FFA, no weapon pickups, players spawn with random equipment), Efficiency (FFA, no weapon pickups, players spawn with all equipment) InstaHold, where two teams have to possess a single flag for a minimum of 20 seconds to score points; Collect (kill enemy players and collect their skulls, which then have to be returned to the home base), and Protect (teams try to touch each other's flag). Instagib, regenerative weapons ("regen") and Teamplay versions of most of the game modes are available, as well as online cooperative map editing—one of Cube 2's most interesting and popular features.
Pro Has a Doom-like singleplayer campaign
Cons
Con Currently in alpha
0 A.D. is an ongoing open source project that is as of yet feature complete.
Con Slow development
0 A.D. is an ongoing open source project that is as of yet feature incomplete. This game is still in Alpha version 23 Ken Wood as of September 2020.
Con Simple graphics
For the most part it looks like a game from the early 2000s. There are advanced options that use a lot more GPU power, but inefficiently compared to modern games, and many competitive players turn these off in favour of visual clarity and a really high framerate.
Con Simple gameplay
The gameplay is more basic than almost all other AFPS games. Movement doesn't get any more advanced than recoil/rocket jumping, without even crouching or bunnyhopping. This is great for newbies and for becoming competent quickly but for experienced AFPS players getting around the map is less interesting and there are less skills to work on - just the basics of aiming, weapon selection, item timing, and map knowledge.