I posted a message on the wesnoth forums today advertising for a new lead programmer. They seemed to be really keen on all those libraries that, for the most part, make the game difficult to compile. Even when you do manage to compile and run it, it is not easy for the newbies.
The current lead programmer and I discussed this matter. Even though he is no longer contributing much to the project, he and I agree that games should not be harder to install than the dos emulator or wine. This is what gives unix and linux gaming such a poor reputation. I truely do not understand the rest of the impractical community. It is bad enough that microsoft windblows dominated the desktop for over a decade. It is much worse that they continue to push out proprietary software and limit what computers can do. In fact, Windows Vista was so bad that many popular computer manufacturers offered a downgrade to XP. We shouldn't give them the gaming advantage, particularly when dealing with games that rely primarly on gameplay, rather than graphics, since we don't have the proprietary video card driver excuse.
Furthermore, I do not feel that a language a programmer would like to learn should determine the game mechanics or the direction that the game should go. It is one thing if the progammer is actually a person who enjoys playing computer games and creates a game that he or she will enjoy playing. It is another to create something that is tedious and boring to play for everyone including the original creator.
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