NovaTux is the first open source video game to be released by Cuba’s vibrant free software community. The work was done by students of UCI, one of the most important computer science universities in Cuba, which also launched Nova, the first GNU/Linux distribution from the country.

The video game was developed using only Blender and GIMP and is designed for kids between the ages of 9 and 14 years. NovaTux is a phase game, where each player passes through different worlds after completing specific objectives, all of which are designed to teach the main concepts of free software as well as how to use the Nova GNU/Linux distribution. So, while Cuban teens and pre-teens are learning how to use Unix with a fun and visually-compelling video game, US teens and pre-teens are dodging diet pill pop-up ads on their school’s website and squandering their limited technology resources on software licenses.

Cuban programmers have been contributing for a while already to the Blender free software project, a 3D animation and content creation application suite with incredible functionality and possibilities. Cuban programmer Raul Fernandez Hernandez (Farsthary) works on true volumetrics for Blender. He keeps a blog with updates on his project but he also supports the Cuban Blender community and writes about his visits to the UCI Campus and their community-building efforts.