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E3: Linux Still Waiting In The Wings
This year's Electronic Entertainment Expo was a great disappointment. Not just to see the state of the PC gaming industry in the ongoing PC vs. Console war, but to see that Linux was even less prominent at this show than it was at Game Developer Conference just a few months ago. Two things can be garnered from this observation. The first is that, as Linux users know, the power of Linux comes from the people, not from the marketing guy in the corner office. GDC was a show for the programmers, artists, designers and tools manufacturers. E3 on the other hand is a show for the marketing and public-relations representatives to vie with their peers for coveted media attention. The second thing is that Linux gaming has gone nearly as far as it will go without increasing the number of Linux users who will buy Linux games.
This is not meant to be a gloom-and-doom piece, but rather a summary of where Linux gaming is today, and to point out a few of the more interesting Linux gaming products represented at the show. Several important issues still need to be resolved for Linux to be supported by mainstream companies. Today, the biggest obstacle is really threefold: It's to convince marketing people that 1. there is a market of Linux users who use the OS for more than just servers, 2. that the market is large enough to support first rate games, and 3. that the publishers can make money supporting Linux, or their developers can gain great enough non-monetary benefits to justify the expense of developing for and supporting multiple platforms.
While talking with marketing representatives from mainstream companies like Red Storm, Hasbro, and EA, each representative was familiar with what Linux was, but did not expect that they would be supporting the OS in the foreseeable future. However, nearly every developer I talked to was interested in supporting Linux. For the next year, it is important that we as a community not forget that while vast market share has been gained in the server world, the desktop is still an enigma for most marketing people. Many of these marketing people simply don't understand why anyone would use Linux on the desktop instead of Windows. The tend to share the often-correct assumption that "the Linux users all have Windows anyhow."
Only a handful of developers at the show actually promoted the fact that they supported Linux. Of these, none that I saw actually demonstrated their games running on it. However, when asked about their experience developing a game for multiple platforms, all said that it was a very positive experience. In fact, the result according to one was significantly improved code. This may be the way games come to Linux; as the standard Windows-based PC platform slowly erodes because of the ever increasing power of consoles, the Macintosh and Linux platforms have recently gained market share in the PC arena. If game developers begin designing their games for multiple platforms then Linux will be a great beneficiary, as will the quality of the code itself.
The availability of development tools and engines supporting Linux is something that I first noticed at GDC in March, and was well in evidence at E3 as well. Many 3D engines now promote the fact that they support Linux; one that stuck out as special was GameBlender, a 3D game development tool and engine from Netherlands-based Not A Number (NaN). The company is building a large community of developers. GameBlender's user-base is also growing rapidly; currently the number of registered users is upwards of 65,000, with more than 250,000 downloads to date. GameBlender incorporates a complete 3D-creation package with game design and game playback, allowing anyone to author and publish interactive 3D worlds and real-time interactive 3D animations. Unique to GameBlender is support for Linux on PPC, Alpha and x86 among other OS's The GameBlender User Conference recently held in Amsterdam illustrates the company's commitment to the community. For the event, NaN sponsored 24 developers from around the world who gathered to work with GameBlender on new projects. This engine, unlike many others available today, is not first-person-shooter specific, nor is it priced in the hundreds of thousands of dollars. GameBlender is aimed at the end user and games as diverse as mech combat, flight sims and racing games are already in production. A free demo can currently be downloaded from the Blender Web site, and the full version is planned for release at Siggraph 2000 in New Orleans this summer.
Also shown was the much-anticipated X-Box competitor from Indrema. The New York-based company is promising to change the way we think about entertainment on Linux and also to solve of the issues that game developers encounter while trying to support Linux. They plan to provide support for developers as well as a stable target platform for developers. This helps solve the issue of fragmentation that currently exists because there are so many 'standards' without support for things like sound and graphics under Linux. The company appears dedicated to open source and will be supporting OpenAL, Mesa 3D, and OpenStream for video and multimedia control. However the device will not support the standard X Window System. Instead, Indrema has developed Xtrema, a system claimed to be compatible with the X Window system components necessary to support the DRI. Therefore, existing X Window applications will be able to support Xtrema with little or no modification.
No demonstration model or screenshots of the interface were available at the show however, and no specifics available on what developers would be supporting the platform. The product is exciting nonetheless, and I look forward to a Linux-based console. They promise to unveil the first generation product in the July or August but not necessarily at Linux World Expo. The L600 will contain a PIII-600, 64 megs of RAM, a hard drive, and an upgradeable, next-generation GPU developed by nVidia. At launch, Indrema expects to have web browsing, e-mail, mp3 and DVD playback as well as at least one game title included and ready to go out of the box. The output from the device is for HDTV and standard TVs but no monitor out is planned. This is an entertainment console, not a PC. At an expected $299 MSRP, this may be the gift of choice for the geek on your holiday shopping list. I can't think of anyone who doesn't need a mp3, DVD player, and console so they can play their favorite Linux games.
Over the past year Linux has come a great distance, but it has long way to go before first-tier developers and publishers support it. Neverwinter Nights, a tremendous title that was demonstrated at the show, may be the first AAA game to support Linux out of the box. It was shown in a private booth in the back of the basement of the main hall but I am convinced it was just because they wanted to keep the secret to themselves. This title promises to take the world of the Dungeons and Dragons universe and allow gamers to develop their own adventures and share them with other gamers online. While the title is still at least a year from release, this product is amazing and deserves an entire article to itself. The developer, BioWare, is supporting several platforms with the product, including Windows. Not only is the game going to have a significant online potential, but also the developers are promising a well developed single-player game as well. Everything from the beautiful game engine to the attitude of the developers and their track record of having developed such complex titles as Baldur's Gate promotes optimism about it.
Overall, E3 this year was disappointing for Linux gamers. The enthusiasm so evident at Linux Expos, at user groups and among developers has not trickled up to the marketing people. Until it does, it doubtful that Linux will have a steady stream of first-class games like Windows does. Linux as a platform has reached the threshold where any developer who wishes to support Linux can do so fairly easily; now it is a matter of us developing the user base so that marketing people can be convinced to develop more games for us. I don't fault the evil marketing people for not supporting Linux today. In fact I am excited to hear mainstream developers remark to me, 'Wow, a lot of people are asking me about Linux,' as several did when I asked them about their plans for the platform. Over the next year, as more new developers such as Vicarious Visions and Bioware, join Loki in developing for the Linux platform, we need to remember to support them, so that they continue to make that decision for future products.
The future is still bright for Linux gaming, though. Linux is an operating system that has only recently come into the radar screen of mainstream companies. As such, there is a significant deficit of proven marketing statistics and developers with proven track records. To a great extent, it is up to us as Linux gamers to vote with our dollars, pounds, pesos, francs and deutsche marks and buy the Linux games that are available. At the same time, we must strive to increase the sheer number of Linux users in the desktop arena. Until publishers feel there is a market for Linux games then most likely there will continue to be a deficit of high quality Linux game titles.
Many Linux users use linux not only because its stable and fast, but because of their own OS/FS political agenda. Many will not accept any software that is not Open Source. This is a big problem for games since writing OS games is very difficult.
First of all, game development is not a service model industry. Its a manufacturing model. OS does not work anywhere near as well under the manufacturing model because its not as "itch" driven like a service model is.
Writing an OS game is difficult in most cases. Why? Because writing a trusted game client using OS is nearly impossible. (Remember what happened with Quake.) There is too much incentive to cheat and few ways to prevent it (since these ways would be included in the source too).
Untrusted clients mean that lots of simple work-arounds can't be used (like the quake lag issue). This also means that the server has to do a lot more work. Worldforge has untrusted OS clients, but they're having trouble running more than a couple clients and their server AI before the load kills it. More server load means more expensive servers. This means the game will not be able to stay free as in beer and even more people will be angry.
So far I've gotten all my Karma from telling people they are wrong... :)
I'm not a forefront gamer, actually something of a trailing edge-type. I paid $5.00 for Quake in the bargain bin, shortly before the LinuxQuake boxes started showing up at something like full price.
I've heard the argument that we might have to pay a bit to bootstrap the Linux gaming market. But somehow I don't think Linux gaming is going to be bootstrapped by a few fanatics paying an nX premium just to get Linux ports of old games.
We need the Linux game in the same box as the Windows game, on the same announce day. We need the Linux box on the registration card. Unfortunately, we can't do this on our own with mainstream games. The publishers have something to say about it.
But then again, ID Software built a distribution channel with the shareware release of Wolfenstein 3D, and moved themselves into the big leagues with Doom.
There are a bunch of home-grown Linux games out there. There are even Linux gaming sites. Maybe what we need are decent reviews and links. (Maybe we have them already, and I just need to look a bit harder.) Maybe we need to be prepared to port one of these games to Windows, so it can hit the mainstream, too. Supposedly we're all getting more net-savvy. Why can't we find a way to use the net to bootstrap our way into the retail stores.
On a related note, ID has been giving away the code a year or two later, but maintaining copyright on the artwork. This is reasonable considering that ESR's position that 95% of software work isn't making software for sale. But artwork shares many characteristics of software, except that the percentage-for-sale thing is probably reversed.
This is the kernel of the problems with the MPAA and RIAA. We don't know how to pay artists. Now it becomes a problem with Linux game development, as well.
The living have better things to do than to continue hating the dead.
1. The LINUX desktop market is still fairly small. It may have overtaken SCO, FreeBSD, and maybe even MacOS (I haven't seen the numbers lately), but we are still talking about a platform with no more than about a tenth of the number of Micros~1 machines out there.
2. It is well known that many LINUX users (not all) dual boot their systems, or have a separate Micros~1 box set up for games. I have to count myself among this number... In addition to my various LINUX and MacOS systems, I a tricked-out Micron in the den, with Win95 on it, strictly for use as a game console.
3. Porting games after the development phase is over is usually cheaper than multi-platform development. This may be counter-intuitive, but when you consider that over the time-span of a game's development from concept to release, there are going to be several OS patches and new drivers released. Keeping up with the changes on more than one platform means juggling more balls than most game companies want to do.
4. Most game companies (not all) are small mom-and-pop organizations. They often extend themselves to the limit just to get a release out the door for one platform. The only way they can afford to do the ports is to wait for the profits from the initial release to roll in.
A good example of this is Starship Titanic. You will never meet a bigger Mac zealot than Douglas Adams, but when developing the game it became obvious that a MacOS-first or simultanious release was beyond the resources available to him. Titanic was released as a windows-only game (even though D.A. did not even own a PC to run his own game on!), and was ported to the Mac using money from the sales of the Windows product.
Bottom line: Game developers will care about LINUX if and when they must write for LINUX to be profitable.
For now, the best hope for Tux fans is the development of open-source projects like WorldForge.
Who knows? Maybe some GPL game, designed by some free-beer advocate, might come along and prove to be the killer app that gets all hard-core gamers to put a permanent LINUX partition on their PC's. Until then, get used to sounding like Rodney Dangerfield when the subject of games comes up.
Information wants to be anthropomorphized.
This idea just won't work. It's just too much like the current PC market.
Game consoles are meant to be SIMPLE. Consumer buys console. Consumer buys game, puts CD in, and plays. Done.
PCs, on the other hand, are far from simple. You have to deal issues like: Is my CPU fast enough? Do I have enough RAM? Do I have enough hard drive space? Is my 3D Card fast enough? Is my sound card supported? Is my version of my operating system supported?
That's much too complicatd for consumers to deal with. Having an "open standard" and having multiple implementations of it isn't going to fly in this case; there's simply too much to gain in adding in your own proprietary extensions to differentiate your system from everyone else's. Afterall, why SHOULD the consumer choose me over my competitor, if we are both the same? It just doesn't make sense.
The biggest challenge might be that distributors do know something about Linux: namely, that the most visible aspects of the community seem to be comprised of people who don't want to pay for closed-source software.
This is a potentially serious dilemma. There aren't any open source business models that allow for making money on software whose only value is the software itself--that is, you're not going to be selling subscriptions, service contracts, commercial OEM support, and the like.
Now, you might be saying "that's irrelevant--the games don't have to be open source." Well, theoretically, you're absolutely right. But are you going to devote significant resources to developing for a platform whose proponents are nearly always focused on free software? You may be more interested in the free speech part of it, but if your definition of "free speech" includes "you can't restrict my right to give the software you wrote away," the distinction is irrelevant to an accountant.
I'm sure people will think I'm being facetious or flippant, but I'm not. Right now, showing companies that you can make money doing Linux games means showing companies that Linux users are willing to pay for old-fashioned, closed source commercial software.
Oh bullshit. I'm tired of this ... just because a few (and it is a few) dickheads get upset over small things does not mean all, or even most, Linux users are zealots. ... All this "zealot" business is self-fulfilling ... you bang on about it until lots of people start to believe it. Shut up
To quote the original poster of this thread: "everybody has noticed this except you"
Until you admit the truth that this is a problem, you're destined to suffer the same fates. No, not everyone is a zealot. But the point is that there is a critical mass of zealotry that turns off a lot of people.
--
Sometimes it's best to just let stupid people be stupid.
| Consumers are stupid. Linux has an air about it
| that makes the lay people stay away.
| (lay people == the majority of console game
| players)
Is this because of stupidity, though, or the fact that it can be a royal pain in the ass to play games on a PC, Windows OR Linux?
Call me lazy, but it's nice to pop a CD or cartridge ito a console, turn it on, pick up a controller, and just play the game - on the big screen TV with the surround sound system in the living room.
However, if some interesting (read, not YAFPS) games come out for Linux, I'll probably buy them. The heck with the Windows versions - I don't even have a system that boots Windows at home anymore.
-- Rick
DRI and SDL are only now becoming viable. I know practically nothing about OGL and DX, but if the rumours and supposition on slashdot is right, OpenGL is losing ground to DX. ... Developing for multiple platforms at the same time is overhead. This might not be a good idea unless the game is a guaranteed success - or your market is large enough that N idiots will buy it.
I haven't used SDL but I know a lot of people are using it to make games including Loki which is actually producing full commercial games. From what I understand, it is fairly low level and is pretty good for porting existing games from Windows to Linux.
For a while I have been programming on an API called ClanLib. It is higher level than SDL and is more like a Game SDK. I like the fact that as long as you go through ClanLib (and/or any other cross platform system calls) you can recompile the same program and it will run on top of Direct[Draw,Input,Sound,etc.] in Windows, or several possible targets on Linux (including X of course).
Linux gamers need to butch up and stop using Windows for games. I was at the Loki Hack contest with 20 other Linux hackers / gamers... I asked how many had Windows, nearly 100% replied, "Yes, but just to run games." We're never going to get good games on Linux if we keep buying them for Windows.
I know many Linux users are willing to boycott productivity tools like MS Office, but they're afraid to do the same thing for games. Step up to the plate, boys!
A common refrain in these discussions is that Linux users should buy Linux games that are out so that vendors know there's a market.
I don't really like FPSs. I don't really like sims. What's left?
Should I buy these games anyway, knowing I'm not going to play them? That could get very expensive very quickly, and I have other things to spend my money on.
Now, if Monkey Island or Wing Commander came out for Linux, for instance, I'd buy in a second.
As you said, computer games differ from "usual" software. Games are entertainment; they're not mission-critical, they're not really "tools" to do "real work". They're more like movies and music than they are like "usual" software; like movies, many "big title" games are huge endeavours, which take a lot of work and cost a lot of money to get done - and much of that work is not on programming the game logic itself, but on things like sound effects and music, text, artwork, et cetera.
At the same time, a programmer outside the game industry wouldn't gain much from having the source code, specs and APIs to a game - he doesn't lose much from giving away his freedom to freely inspect and modify the code. Correct me if I'm wrong, but I feel that it's competition between game companies in the quest for speed and features which makes it necessary for most of them to keep their source code closed; that's why it was reasonable for iD Software to release the Doom source code, ages after the game's original release.
As Stallman himself said when he came to Rio, copyright remains necessary, at least in some weaker form, for certain kinds of immaterial goods, in order to help ensure the producers' income and thus at least enable them to recover the money they spent on the work. He also pointed out that this kind of copyright should be recognised as a social contract, not as a tacitly accepting the nature of these goods as "intellectual property".
Stallman used movies as an example of immaterial goods which still need to be covered under copyright law, but I think that the same applies to computer games, since they're not "utilitarian" goods (I think that's the term he used; evidently, IANAL), but entertainment goods.
Like it's happening to music right now with Napster/MP3s/etc, things may eventually come to a point where the public no longer finds it reasonable to trade away all their freedom to copy computer games (or full-length movies, for that matter) in order to keep the game industry alive and thus ensure their continued production. When this happens, the social contract implied by copyright law will need to be changed again. Even then, though, the user's freedom to inspect and modify a game's source code will remain unessential enough for most users that "closed source games" will remain a reasonable trade, and thus game companies will remain protected from unfair competition.
In short: I don't feel that proprietary computer games are a problem, even in a platform made up mostly of free software, and even in a world where games are traded freely amongst users on the Internet. That is, as long as the game companies keep in mind what copyright law is really about, and are willing to be reasonable. Luckily, game companies seem to be different from, say, the big music labels and big movie studios which make up the RIAA and the MPAA, respectively, so I think this may actually be feasible.
Yeah, that pretty much sums up what I had to say. Flame away!
To the editors: your English is as bad as your Perl. Please go back to grade school.
My company is developing a few games (some really cool stuff) and focusing on Linux as the primary platform, with the secondary platforms being Windows, MacOS, and BeOS. The Linux gaming market is practically untapped, and we see great potential in this area (as well as BeOS.) By the time the first game (a first-person shooter like no other... think Halo meets Saving Private Ryan, and you have a pretty good idea) is released, OpenGL support on Linux will be up to speed with that of Windows, or at least close.
--
We really need to get a corporate education program going. Somewhere that can help create demos for these shows as well as providing people access to information that they can present to their bosses. Maybe if we could show these companies that you can make money doing Linux games, we'd get more support.
kwsNI
Game blender will be free. It will be compleately free. This message was a bit shady about that.
It is not I repeat not available for download now. It will be released in the end of june. You can now download blender 1.75 wich is not game blender. Game blender is blendder version 2.0. The current blender is freware with added bonus if you buy it. Game blender will contain everything that blender 1.75 does plus tools for making your own games without the nead for programing(its possible to program in python). And Game blender will be compleately free.
Linux offers a unique opportunity to reprogram (for the power user) and optimize for multimedia and gaming performance. Should someone undertake the considerable task of programming a "gaming version" of Linux, we could see an increase in industry attention.
However, I think most people will agree that Linux's main detractor from public consumption is its lack of idiot-proof installation. Although it certainly isn't shy on tech support.
Games like Quake3 and Unreal Tournament have demonstrated that Linux can be used for gaming. However, because most gamers are quick-fix "short attention span" computer users, they don't have the time nor the inclination to learn Linux to the degree that they should. (Please note, I fit myself into that category, it's not intended as flame bait).
I also, perhaps naively, consider it a promising sign that gaming platforms (such as Playstation1 and 2) are using Linux-esque Kernels and OSs for their development work.
***JUMP PAD ACTIVATION INITIATION START***
***TRANSPORT WHEN READY***
***JUMP PAD ACTIVATION INITIATION START***
***TRANSPORT WHEN READY***
I dunno, I've never had any problems with games on Linux.
But then, these companies he talks about..Id? Did they port NetHack to Windows or something? And those Epic people..what'd they ever do? (looks at computer) No NetHack derivatives. Can't be that important.
-- Daniel, who has heard rumors that there are games besides NetHack and refuses to believe them.
(it's funny. Laugh)
Hurry up and jump on the individualist bandwagon!
SoftwareETC, I have better luck with. I bought QuakeIII there, and although they have Myth, I didn't get it (I barely played CivCTP, I'm just not a fan of that type game). These days when I ask for HGII the people there can at least locate it in the computer (last checked 5/14, they told me 5/16. I'll have to go back.)
My point is that you can spread the word lots of ways. One is by getting out and talking about Linux and the fact that Hello, I am a potential buyer who will spend money in your store if you have Linux stuff. Sure, these days maybe 9 times out of 10 you'll walk out empty handed...but that doesn't mean you've accomplished nothing. If you do it enough times, and you're not the only one doing it, then some smart manager is going to see Linux scroll by his next "upcoming games" newsletter and think "Hmmm, maybe I should try this out and see if it sells..." and before you know it, we've got another store on our side.
And it's not just about games. Any chance you get, use it. Whenever I'm down BestBuy or CompUSA I always wander through the Linux section to see if there are any potential buyers that I might strike up a conversation with. When my cable company asked me if I wanted internet access, I asked if they supported Linux. When the operator said "What's linux?" I gave her a 15minute rundown of what it was and why it was good. Last week at the car dealer, when speaking of replacing my cd player, I got into a discussion of MP3 players, which got the girl behind the desk asking if I knew how to fix her computer after a bungled Win98 upgrade, which in turn led to me explaining to her about Linux. Will any of these people run out and buy Linux? Likely not. But now they've heard about it once more. And they are more likely to recognize it when they see it in a magazine or on a tv news story. And after they've done that a few times, maybe they'll convert.
www.HearMySoulSpeak.com
Note: I work for a game company.
The bottom line is that most people don't obsess about operating systems. Windows lets people run Word, Excel, use popular email managers, edutainment software, and lots of games. Right now the Linux desktop market consists mostly of people who *do* obsess about operating systems and people with other agendas (e.g. all software should be free; Bill Gates is a fag). This is not generally not a good target market for games.
The other thing, something that I wish weren't true, is that there's a definite attitude among Linux zealots. I don't mean that in a trolling sorta way, just in a "everybody has noticed this except you" way. The Macintosh market is similar in some ways, though not as extreme. If you don't do a Mac port, you get flamed for liking "Windoze." If you do a Mac port, you get flamed for bringing "peecee" software over to a superior machine. From following Slashdot, I can see that companies showing an interest in Linux development walk a thin line. Metrowerks gets slammed for claiming "RedHat only," though most distributions are the same internally. Borland gets trashed with a headline on Slashdot because someone misinterpreted the license agreement. People get annoyed simply because Borland is *giving away* a full fledged C++ compiler and they aren't including the source. There are twisted rants about how Emacs is better than Word and The Gimp smokes Photoshop, which are just plain uninformed. Nobody wants to get involved in such silliness.
Absolutely. People need to recognize that some software is only going to come from companies, in exchange for cold, hard, cash. It's fantastic that we can get a complete operating system for free. But not all software can be developed by hackers across the Internet.
'Applications' like Office or Quake3 are developed in a very non-hacker way. Anyone who's ever put out a large shrinkwrapped product knows that it's important to have a power structure for decision making. Graphics people need to interact with designers and programmers and technical writers. A game has to have a release date, and there's a finite limit on how long development can take. Games are designed to max out hardware, so Moore's law makes them obsolete within a year.
Developing the kernel is very different. The only real users of the kernel are more hackers--the ones who write programs which run on the kernel--so we don't need marketing, packaging, phone support, or formal documentation. And kernel development time is literally infinite. There are version releases, but there's no need to "get it out the door." The kernel is designed to be as minimal as possible, hardware-wise. Therefore the kernel is much less affected by Moore's law.
There ain't no such thing as a free lunch. Accept the fact that there is some software you MUST PAY FOR. And go pay for it!
It's to convince marketing people that 1. there is a market of Linux users who use the OS for more than just servers, 2. that the market is large enough to support first rate games, and 3. that the publishers can make money supporting Linux
It's difficult to convince people of something when that something isn't true.
One of the reasons console manufacturers are hesitant to use Linux (or any other open OS, for that matter) is because of what happened with the I-Opener fiasco. The business plan for console manufacturers enables them to license developers kits, compilers, and other software to developers--benefiting greatly from a proprietary, closed system. They have to release the system as a loss leader to compete and profit primarily from the proprietary nature of their systems. Unless the embedded Linux used in one of these consoles is created with an API that is SIGNIFICANTLY different from the standard distribution, these revenue streams will be inaccessible and the console prices will increase dramatically.
If a console manufacturer is forced to go out of his way to close an open system to profit, he will be discouraged. Besides, if you need to learn another API to program for their system than who cares whether its Linux powered? We need to see more native Linux 3D desktop games first and improve the performance and driver support for 3D cards under Linux. Then, we can worry about creating embedded Linux distros for consoles.
If you want a Linux gaming machine, install Linux on your desktop.
ByteMyCode.com: A Web 2.0 code sharing community.
Well why don't we distribute full versions (with no restrictions) of all Linux games that currently exist and in the future using Napster.
That would grow the population of people who would play Linux games.
Oh wait, that would mean that the Linux developers wouldn't get any money for it which means they wouldn't develop the software ...
Hang on, how does this compare to the Metallica issue? What is the difference between trading mp3s and Linux games? You're not stealing cos the original copy is still there (just using one of the arguments from previous discussions). Is it okay to trade mp3s on Napster simply because Metallica is rich?
Would anyone disagree that distributing Linux games on Napster severly limit if not kill the Linux game market?
I'm interested to hear other peoples views on this ...
Potential Linux gamers should be wary that companies are supporting Linux out of financial viability rather than PR or code-improvement reasons. We'll start to feel like Mac users if the cross-platform games released on Linux are lacking in features, late, and buggy. A good example is Unreal Tournament
Tim Sweeny, head of the Unreal Tournament (UT) development team, is apparently a big fan of Linux and it seemed like the Linux UT port was going to get a big push, even after it was decided that including the small Linux portion on the CD would imply real tech support. The truth is, it runs on Linux, but not very well. Unlike Quake 3, for which the Linux version is a seperate purchase, UT is a toy for people running both Windows and Linux. There is no support whatsoever, patch releases come long after the Windows patches, the product is buggy, and doesn't demonstrate a good understanding of Linux philosophy (this is evident at the install phase for many reasons: it must be installed and run with the same owner, it uses Windows-style files and directories, etc.).
My point is that we have to demand that games are written (and patched) modularly so that they are equal across platforms.
http:/ /www.indrema.com/servlet/site?page=whats_a_web_con sole_enterprise.html
It seems they're not just targeting this at home users -- they're billing to to corporations as dumb terminals for web-based apps and and as web kiosks and hotel room access. could be interesting, this looks cheap enough to make widespread use actually feasible...
Facts do not cease to exist because they are ignored. - Aldous Huxley