A Free Software project is never really dead. As long as the source is around there's always a remote possibility someone will come and pick it up at some point and continue development. There's been such projects in the past, with no updates for nearly 10 years and then suddenly new development pickup up.
Haha, I fondly remember this game. If I recall correctly, this was (is?) in the Debian repos about 4 or so years ago. Shame to hear it's been abandoned these days!