Alien Arena

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We usually play CTF on the AAOCS server between 19:00 UTC and 23:00 UTC

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News

There were crash issues in single player mode. This has been fixed in the windows binary (link below), itch, Alien Arena Installer, Steam on Windows, and on Flathub so please update if you have this issue.

New release 7.71.7

  • Automatic and ultra-fast installation of map packs before loading a map (by default enabled)
  • Fixed bug that could cause crashes in single player mode
  • Added Discord button in the main menu to easily join the Discord server
  • Fixed a map difference error bug after reinstalling a map
  • Added option to override the sky from the fog script (only relevant to mappers)
  • Removed the sponsor banner
  • Increased default time that messages appear in the screen to 6 seconds and can be changed and remembered now

Steam

Alien Arena 7.71.7 for Windows has been released on Steam! For Linux, see Known issues on Steam and alternative methods in How to install.

Flathub

Alien Arena has been installed more than 15K times from Flathub! The latest release on Flathub is 7.71.7.

Alien Arena Installer

For Windows, there is a new installer to install the latest release directly from the source: Alien Arena Installer. This installer keeps the game up-to-date and can be used for launching the game as well.

Also the installer needs to be installed. When installing it, you might get warnings from Windows Defender that Windows protected your pc. In that case, click on "More info" and choose "Run anyway".

New release 7.71.6

  • The server list has a filter now to show active servers only
  • It's easier to see the number of real players in the server list
  • The server list sorts on player count + ping by default
  • The antilag code got some optimizations
  • The player setup pops-up at more places
  • The newsfeed can show colors now apart from just yellow and white

New release 7.71.5

  • The player setup will handle classic player models better.
  • There is a new command to install classic player models: installmodel.

Classic player models and custom skins

Four classic player models with all their custom skins are available again: slashbot-classic, martiancyborg-classic, martianenforcer-classic and martianwarrior-classic. From release 7.71.5, you can install them with the console command installmodel. If you have 7.71.4, you can use installmap for that.

It's recommended to install all of them because you don't know which ones other players are using. Use installmodel classicmodelpack for that.

Itch.io

Alien Arena is now on itch.io!

New release 7.71.4

  • Release 7.71.4 has most game operations running on alienarena.org.
  • Automatic downloading of maps is using the http protocol again.
  • The old obsolete stats have been removed.
  • A new console command has been added to easily download and install new maps and/or map packs: installmap.

Debian and Ubuntu

Alien Arena 7.71.3 has been released on Debian 12 - Bookworm and Ubuntu 23.04 - Lunar Lobster.

New IRC server

For IRC, use irc.alienarena.org. The port should be 6697 for secure connections, otherwise 6667. With the latest game clients the IRC server will be changed automatically.


How to install

Windows:

  • Install using the new Alien Arena Installer.
  • Install from svn (icculus) or GitHub. You'll have the latest code (see below).
  • Install from Steam.

Linux:

  • Install from Flathub.
  • Ubuntu 23.04 - Lunar Lobster or Debian 12 - Bookworm: 7.71.3 is available in the package repository.
  • Install from svn (icculus) or GitHub. You'll have the latest code (see below).
  • Install from Steam, but for Linux it is outdated (see Known issues on Steam how to fix that).
Latest version number:

Known issues on Steam for linux

The Steam client on Linux currently has the following issues:

  • Automatic downloading of maps uses the (slow) udp protocol.
  • The newsfeed is not working.

Above issues can for the moment be fixed by manually replacing the game client / executable. Rename the original one first to something else to have a backup.

Linux steam client 7.71.6: alienarena.x86_64
Warning: this Linux steam client doesn't work on all distributions.

SVN (icculus) and GitHub

The repository is located at: svn://svn.icculus.org/alienarena/trunk and https://github.com/alienarena/alienarena.
On Windows, if you want to download from svn on icculus, you can install TortoiseSVN and download the source code. The alienarena.exe is already there.
On Linux, install subversion. Then you need to build the application yourself.

For building on Linux, you need to install the following libraries first:

Execute the following command to download the source code from SVN on icculus into folder alienarena:

Execute the following command to download the source code from github into folder alienarena:

Then execute the following commands to build the executable:

If you have already done this before, use svn update or git pull to download the latest sources.
For windows, download the latest game client here.
To compile faster, you can specify the number of threads it uses: make -j 4.

Other configure options that are useful:
Dedicated server: ./configure --disable-client
With debug symbols: ./configure --enable-debug


Links

Help / Tools

Support

  • Discord
  • Matrix

  • IRC:
  • irc.alienarena.org:6697
  • irc.alienarena.org:6667

Classic models and skins

Easy installation with the console command installmodel.
Instructions for installing manually.

Install all: classicmodelpack.zip | installmodel classicmodelpack
slashbot
martiancyborg
martianenforcer
martianwarrior

Map packs and 3rd party maps

Easy installation with the console command installmap.
Instructions for installing manually.
Map pack 1
Map pack 2
Map pack 3
Map pack 4
Map pack 5
Map pack 6
Map pack 7
Map pack 8
Mega map pack (1-8)
ctf-titan
ctf-terminal-classic2
ctf-brownfield
ctf-curvy
ctf-exobiology
ctf-spacejam-classic
ctf-office
ctf-ahtcity
ctf-blockbattle
ctf-mines-of-hell
ctf-thepit
ctf-tribute
ctf-bsfortress
ctf-anxiety
ctf-facingworlds
ctf-radia
dm-badabum
dm-defence
dm-inferno
dm-leviathan-classic
dm-mothership
dm-nkitrn1
dm-tourney0
dm-undergroundlabs
dm-cavern
ctf-rockwar
ctf-eizo
ctf-rampage
ctf-atrix
ctf-oblivion
ctf-greeno
ctf-acchupta