Title | Original release | Source code found or leaked | Genre | Original developer | Additional information |
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360: Three Sixty | 1999 | 2020 | Racing | Smart Dog | The PlayStation source code can be found in a dummy file on the disc.[72] |
Actua Soccer 96 | 1996 | 1996 | sports game | Gremlin Interactive | A demo CD that shipped with a game magazine accidentally contained the C++ source code of the game.[73][74] |
Adventure in Time | 1981 | 2016 | Adventure game | Phoenix Software | In November 2016 the source code for the Atari 8-bit and Apple II versions of Adventure in Time and Birth of the Phoenix were released by Kevin Savetz, along with partial code of Queen of Phobos for Apple II.[75] |
Airforce Delta | 2000 | 2020 | Flight simulator | Climax Studios | Source code of the Game Boy Color version was leaked on 4chan in May 2020.[76] |
Aliens versus Predator 2 | 2001 | 2002 | FPS | Monolith Productions | Source code released on the Monolith Productions FTP server in 2002, then quickly taken down.[77] |
Asteroids | 1979 | 1996 | Arcade | Atari | Source code of Asteroids in the Atari 7800 version was released in physical form by AtariSunnyvale on their closure 1996. Together with Ms. Pac-Man, Dig Dug, Robotron: 2084 and eight further games reconstructed by the Atari-Museum and published later.[78][79] Ports for modern FPGAs were made later.[80] |
Art of Fighting | 1992 | 2014 | Fighting game | SNK | The source code was found on an NEC PC-9821 used for developing Neo Geo titles in 2014.[81][82] |
Aztec | 1982 | 2019 | Action-adventure | Datamost | In January 2019 Jason Scott uploaded the source code of this game to the Internet Archive.[83] |
Battle Konchuuden | 1999 | 2019 | Battle RPG | Jaleco Entertainment | A zip file was found within the retail games dummy data, which included the full PlayStation 1 source code to the game.[84] |
Beatmania 5th Mix | 1999 | 2000 | Music video game | Konami | With the 2000 Japanese PSX game Beatmania Best Hits there was mistakenly included the source code for the 1999 game Beatmania 5th Mix.[85] |
The Bilestoad | 1982 | 2019 | Action-adventure | Datamost | In January 2019 Jason Scott uploaded the source code of this game to the Internet Archive.[83][86] |
Blood | 1997 | 2000/2010 | FPS | Monolith Productions | In 2000, partial source code of an alpha version was leaked. In 2010, the complete alpha source code was leaked.[87] Using the code as reference, a reverse engineered build of the final version was created by Alexander Makarov for source ports around 2017.[88] |
B.O.B. / Space Funky B.O.B. | 1993 | 2008 | Side-scrolling game | Electronic Arts | On September 12, 2008 the source code of the SNES version became available as it was found on an eBay-bought hard drive.[89] |
Buck Rogers: Planet of Zoom | 1983 | 2018 | Rail shooter | Sega | On May 17, 2018 Kevin Savetz uploaded scans of the complete source code of the Atari 8-bit conversion of Buck Rogers: Planet of Zoom donated by Charlie Kulas.[90] |
California Watersports | 2001 | 2020 | Sports | Theyer GFX | The PlayStation source code was released in 2020 with the permission of developer Mark Theyer.[91] |
Captain Comic | 1988 | 2012 | Platformer | Michael Denio | In September 2012 the source code of the NES version was offered on eBay for $439.[92][93] |
Chicken Run | 2000 | 2011 | Stealth game | Blitz Games | In May 2011 the Sega Dreamcast source code became available, found by a collector on a Dreamcast Dev Kit's harddrive.[94][95] |
Chill | 1998 | 2020 | sports game | Silicon Dreams | A zip file was found within the retail game's dummy data, which included the full PlayStation 1 source code to the game. |
Counter-Strike: Global Offensive | 2012 | 2020 | first-person shooter | Valve | A 2017 version of the game's source code was leaked on 4chan in 2020.[96] |
Dark Engine (Thief, Thief II, System Shock 2) | 1993 | 2009/2010 | Stealth game | Looking Glass Studios | In 2009, a complete copy of the Dark Engine source code was discovered in the possession of an ex-Looking Glass Studios employee who was at the time continuing his work for Eidos Interactive.[97] In late April 2010, a user on the Dreamcast Talk forum disassembled the contents of a Dreamcast development kit he had purchased.[98] Later, significant updates for the Dark Engine-based games were published.[99][100][101] |
Dark Reign 2 | 2000 | 2011 | RTS | Pandemic Studios | Released by a former developer of Pandemic Studios under LGPL to prevent that the game become unsupported Abandonware.[102][103] Legal status unclear. |
Donkey Kong | 1981 | 2008 | Platformer | Nintendo | In August 2008 the source code of Donkey Kong in Atari 8006502 assembly was published at the AtariAge forum by Curt Vendel (the Atari Flashback designer),[104] and was discussed there by the original developer, Landon Dyer.[105] |
Double Dragon II: The Revenge | 1989 | 2013 | Beat em up | Technōs Japan | In 2013 the Internet Archive put the undeletedassemblysources (DRGNSRC.LZH) of the DOS version for download.[106][107] |
Empire | 1977 | 197? | turn-basedwargame | Walter Bright | At some point, someone broke through the security systems at Caltech, and took a copy of the source code for the FORTRAN/PDP-10 version of the game.[108] This code was continually modified, being passed around from person to person and ported to other system e.g. to VAX/VMS OS.[109] |
Eve Online | 2003 | 2011 | Space strategy MMO | CCP Games | On 20 May 2011 someone released the EVE Online source code on a GitHub repository.[110] After the source code was online four days, CCP issued a DMCA take-down request which was followed by GitHub.[111] |
Extreme-G 3 | 2001 | 2015 | Racer game | Acclaim Cheltenham | The source code of the PS2 game came into hands of a community member by unknown means around 2015.[112] |
Falcon 4.0 | 1998 | 2000 | Combat flight simulator | MicroProse | A 2000 source codeleak[113] by a former developer allowed unofficial community development, including upgrades, improved graphics, and bug fixes. In 2013 the source code of one of the community development branches was released to a GitHub repository under a questionable BSD license.[114] |
Fate | 2005 | 2015 | Action RPG | WildTangent | Inadvertently made available when Fate and its sequel Fate: Undiscovered Realms were offered through a May 2015 Humble Bundle. The download link provided to purchasers for the DRM-Free copy lead to an apparently current dump of the source code. This was available for several days before it was corrected.[115] |
FIFA 97 | 1996 | 1996 | sport video game | Electronic Arts | Around 1996 Electronic Arts accidentally put the source code of FIFA 97 on a demo disc.[116][117] |
Forsaken | 1998 | 2007 | 6DOF shooter | Probe Entertainment | In 2007, nine years after the first release, the game itself and its source code were considered abandoned and became available to the public.[118] The game's community took up the game and kept updating and porting the game via a GitHub repository under a GPL license.[119][120] |
GunZ: The Duel | 2005 | 2011 | Third-person shooter | MAIET Entertainment | In 2011 the source code of GunZ 1.5 became available online.[121] |
Half-Life 2 (alpha version only) | 2004 | 2003 | FPS | Valve | An alpha version of Half-Life 2's source code was leaked in 2003, a year before the game's release.[122] |
Harry Potter and the Chamber of Secrets (prototype only) | 2002 | 2020 | Action-adventure | KnowWonder | Source code from a prototype version was leaked in 2020.[123] |
Home Alone 2: Lost in New York | 1992 | 2016 | Action game | Imagineering | Game source released of the NES game in 2016 by Frank Cifaldi after finding it on an old hard drive.[124][125] |
Killer7 | 2005 | 2016 | Action-adventure game | Grasshopper Manufacture | Sources and assets for the GameCube game were found in October 2016 on an open webserver.[126] |
Lineage II | 2003 | 2003 | MMORPG | NCSOFT | In 2003 a Chinese Hacker acquired the Lineage II source code, and sold it to someone who set up alternative servers. Shutdown by FBI in 2007.[127][128] |
Metal Arms: Glitch in the System | 2003 | 2019 | Third-person shooter | Sierra Entertainment | Uploaded to archive.org in 2019.[129] |
Microsoft Entertainment Pack | 1996 | 2004 | Casual game | Microsoft | In the copies of Windows NT 4.0 and Windows 2000 source code which leaked back in 2004, there are 32-bit versions of Cruel, Golf, Pegged, Reversi, Snake (Rattler Race), Taipei and TicTactics.[130] |
Monopoly | 2000 | 2018 | Board | Artech Studios | The source code for the Microsoft Windows version of the 2000 video game Monopoly was leaked in August 2018.[131][132] |
Mortal Kombat Trilogy | 1996 | 2018 | Fighting | Midway Games | Game source code for the Nintendo 64 version was leaked anonymously on 4chan, alongside the PC, PS1, and Arcade source of Mortal Kombat 3.[133][134] |
Monsters, Inc. | 2001 | 2019 | Platform | Kodiak Interactive | Source code and artwork for the PlayStation 2 version was uploaded to archive.org in 2019.[135] |
Mr Nutz 2 | 1994 | 2008 | Platformer | Ocean Software | Amiga game, source code prototype associated with Peter Thierolf.[136][137] |
Mr. Robot and His Robot Factory | 1983 | 2019 | Platform | Datamost | In January 2019 Jason Scott uploaded the source code of this game to the Internet Archive.[83] |
NBA Jam Extreme | 1996 | 2017 | Sports game | Sculptured Software | In February 2017 the source code was discovered on an archival CD liquidated by Acclaim Entertainment during their bankruptcy sale. It was subsequently sold on eBay for $500. |
Various Nintendo games | 1990-2014 | 2020 | Various | Various | Throughout 2020, the source code for several games by Nintendo (as well as console firmware) was leaked by anonymous users on 4chan. These include Super Mario 64, the first four generations of the Pokémon series, and the firmware for the Nintendo 64, GameCube, and 3DS. For more information, please see 2020 Nintendo data leak. |
Pac-Man | 1982 | 2019 | Maze | Roklan Corp. | In August 2019 the source code for the Atari 8-bit version was released by Kevin Savetz.[138][139] |
Pesterminator: The Western Exterminator | 1990 | 2019 | side-scrolling | Color Dreams | In November 2019 the NES source code was uploaded to the Internet Archive.[140] |
Pole Position | 1983 | 2009 | Racing | General Computer Corporation | On May 20, 2009, Curt Vendel released the source code of the Atari 2600 conversion of Pole Position.[141] |
Postal III | 2011 | 2020 | First person shooter | Running with Scissors | Leaked onto 4chan in June 2020, and contains pre-release Half-Life 2 and Team Fortress 2 content.[142] |
Raid 2020 | 1989 | 2019 | Side-scrolling action game | Color Dreams | Source code was found on a floppy disk and uploaded to archive.org in 2019.[143] |
Re-Volt | 1999 | 200? | Racing game | Acclaim Studios London | Members of the fan-base have acquired the source code of the game around 2004, which was leaked from an anonymous developer who worked on the Xbox Live port.[144][145] The game community works since then on fan patches and source ports to new platforms like Linux, MacOS and OpenPandora.[146][147][148] |
Rolling Thunder | 1987 | 2016 | side-scrolling action game | Tiertex Design Studios | The Amiga version became available on a community forum.[149] |
SpongeBob SquarePants: SuperSponge | 2001 | 2018 | Platformer | Climax Development | The game's development repository was released on GitHub in 2018, converted from an old Microsoft Visual SourceSafe repository. Curiously, it was discovered that the game contained code from the Linux kernel (specifically the vsprintf function, presumably used for debugging), and therefore violates the GNU General Public License. |
S.T.A.L.K.E.R.: Clear Sky (X-Ray Engine 1.5.10) | 2008 | 2014 | FPS | GSC Game World | In August 2014 S.T.A.L.K.E.R.: Clear Sky's X-Ray Engine 1.5.10 source codebecame available on GitHub under a non-open-sourcelicense.[150] The successor's engine, X-ray 1.6.02, became available too.[151][152] As of October 2019 the xray-16 engine community fork, "OpenXRay", achieved compiling state and support for the two games "Call of Pripyat" and "Clear Sky" with build 558.[153] |
Starcraft | 1998 | 2017 | Real-time strategy | Blizzard | In 2017 it was announced that a potentially 1998 stolen/lost[154]STARCRAFT Gold Master source code CD of Starcraft resurfaced in the hand of an enthusiast.[155] After long contemplation, he sent it back to Blizzard.[156] There was some doubt about the authenticity of this CD, as there was no proof provided. It is unclear if, as indicated in the earlier discussion, a copy of the source code was forwarded to Jason Scott of the Internet Archive for preservation purposes. |
Star Wars Galaxies | 2003 | 2014 | MMO | Sony Online Entertainment | In 2013, a former Sony Online Entertainment employee leaked a copy of the 2010 production source code for the Star Wars Galaxies client, server, 3rd party libraries and development tools to a group of former players involved with the "New Game Enhancements" Star Wars Galaxies emulator Project SWG. The code was later leaked beyond its intended recipients and made available online.[157] Live, free to play public servers and public development groups have since come into existence. |
Super 3D Noah's Ark | 1994 | 2018 | FPS | Wisdom Tree | In November 2018 the source code for SNES version was bought on eBay and released to the public.[158] |
Swashbuckler | 1982 | 2019 | Fighting | Datamost | In January 2019 Jason Scott uploaded the source code of this game to the Internet Archive.[83] |
Team Fortress 2 | 2007 | 2020 | first-person shooter | Valve | A 2017 version of the game's source code was leaked on 4chan in 2020.[96] |
Tempest 2000 | 1994 | 2008 | tube shooter | Llamasoft | On 24 August 2008, the source code of Tempest 2000 was released by the defunct Jaguar Sector II website under a CD compilation for PC titled Jaguar Source Code Collection.[159][160] |
Tony Hawk's Underground | 2003 | 2016 | Sports game | Neversoft | The game's C++ source code was leaked in February 2016 to GitHub.[161] |
Turrican III | 1994 | 2008 | Run and gun | Factor 5 | Amiga game, source code prototype associated with Peter Thierolf.[137] |
Turok: Dinosaur Hunter | 1997 | 2017 | First-person shooter | Iguana Entertainment / Acclaim Entertainment | In February 2017 the source code of the N64 version was sold on eBay for $2551.99 on a SGI Silicon GraphicsIndy development machine which came from the Acclaim Entertainment liquidation. This source code was later released August 26, 2018, then reuploaded, non-encrypted to 4chan the following day.[162][163][164] |
Trespasser | 1998 | 200x | Action-adventure, FPS | DreamWorks Interactive | The fan community got the original source code into hand by unknown means[165] and created modifications and unofficial patches with it,[166][167] the latest DirectX 9 port from 2016 and the development ongoing.[168] |
Ultima IX: Ascension | 1999 | 2014 | Role-playing video game | Origin Systems | In November 2014 the Ultima Codex Community was able to acquire the Ultima 9 source code from a former developer for offline archival to prevent permanent loss.[169] |
Ultimate Mortal Kombat 3 | 1994 | 2009 | Beat'em up | Midway Games | The source code and artwork of the PSX version were recovered from floppies in 2009.[170][171] |
Unreal Championship 2 | 2005 | 2020 | First-person shooter | Epic Games | Leaked to 4chan on July 29, 2020. |
Up'n Down | 1984 | 2018 | Racing, maze | Sega | On May 17, 2018 Kevin Savetz uploaded scans of the complete source code of the Atari 8-bit conversion of Up'n Down donated by Charlie Kulas.[172] |
Urban Assault | 1998 | 2016 | Real-time strategy | TerraTools | Found on eBay.[173] |
Warcraft II: The Dark Saga | 1997 | 2020 | Real-time strategy | Blizzard Entertainment | Source code for the PlayStation version was uploaded to archive.org.[174] |
Wing commander series | 1990 | 2011 | Space simulator | Origin Systems | The long lost source code of Wing Commander I was given to the fan-community in August 2011 by a former developer for the purpose of long-time preservation.[175] Later most other parts of the series followed.[176][177] |
Xbox system software | 2001 | 2020 | Video game consoleoperating system | Microsoft | In May 2020, the Xbox operating system source code was leaked. |
Zork and other Infocom games | 1977 | 2008 | Adventure game | Infocom | In 2008 a back-up with the source code of all Infocom's video games appeared from an anonymous Infocom source and was archived by the Internet Archive's Jason Scott.[178][179][180] On May 5, 2020, the Massachusetts Institute of Technology uploaded to GitHub the source code for a 1977 version of Zork.[181] |