I've found this project couple of days ago. It's a remake of classic game called Frontier: Elite 2.
If you don't know this game - it's space trading computer game, with open ended gameplay. There isn't any plot, you can do whatever you want - be a pirate, fight pirates, be merchant etc.
You can find more information here:
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Frontier:_Elite_II
And now some screenshots from remake:
Here is website of this project:
http://pioneerspacesim.net/
And here is forum about it:
http://www.spacesimcentral.com/pioneer-f35/
Those guys are looking for help with art (3d models, personnel faces, icons, music, sound) and code (c++ / SDL / OpenGL).