Loki Games Closing?

Color me shocked.... by Anonymous Coward · 2002-01-23 15:59 · Score: 0, Flamebait

Linux guys want all the good games, but won't pay for practically anything. Hmmm.....problem?

Re:Color me shocked.... by Bremen24601 · 2002-01-23 16:06 · Score: 5, Insightful

No, the problem is not that we won't pay, the problem is that most people still have a win9x partition to play games on and we don't want to wait a few months for a linux version.

Also despite great strides in the desktop area I still think of my linux boxen as development platforms or servers, I don't play games on them, I program and do real work. Putting mere games on them would be demeaning to them!

--
Blessed are the young, for they shall inherit the national debt. --Herbert Hoover
Re:Color me shocked.... by baitisj · 2002-01-23 16:16 · Score: 1

Actually, Loki had the Linux version of Tribes 2 out very, very shortly after the Windows version came out.

I still have it, and love it.

Oh well.

--
Learn from your parents' mistakes: use birth control.
Re:Color me shocked.... by nyteroot · 2002-01-23 16:27 · Score: 1

oh shit!
who will port civ3?!
damn damn damn..

--
Ratio of replies to old sig content : replies to actual post content > 0.5. Sig changed.
Re:Color me shocked.... by Anonymous Coward · 2002-01-23 16:35 · Score: 0

We of the Linux clan are leet.
You are right.
We are cheap cunts.
I won't buy condoms when I fuck crackwhores
so I can buy more blank CDs for my leet warez.
Re:Color me shocked.... by Anonymous Coward · 2002-01-23 16:50 · Score: 0

They should just pirate all Loki's games now.

Linux users are the type of people who don't respect copyrights anyway... MP3's, DeCSS, DIVX.. why not steal some games? Just add it to the list of their crimes.

The company (and Linux gaming itself) is dead anyway
Re:Color me shocked.... by SocietyoftheFist · 2002-01-23 16:55 · Score: 1

Interesting theory but I don't buy it. I think the stats of Linux web browsers support Loki closing. Linux has become the low end Unix of choice and with time will probably take the high end too. I don't think that the average person understands the Windows mindshare among people that view a computer as an appliance. Look at you, you run Windows to play games because you don't want to wait? Why should consumers wait for Linux to catch up to Windows on the desktop when they already have Windows, after all you won't. Think about it.
Re:Color me shocked.... by LinuxInDallas · 2002-01-23 16:59 · Score: 1

I just bought Empire Earth, and already they are at version 1.0.4. It's not a big deal these days since a lot of games these days come with update tools that make downloading and installing completely painless. How well has Loki kept up with bug fix releases of their games? Do they even release them?
Re:Color me shocked.... by Bremen24601 · 2002-01-23 17:16 · Score: 1

This goes a bit deeper than just not waiting for titles to appear on linux. I do have two loki games (Quake 3 and Heroes of Might and Magic III) however all the other games I have purchased do not have linux versions. I could undoubtably run some of these games through wine, but this really defeats the purpose if you want games written for linux.

That said, Neverwinter Nights, which I am eagerly awaiting, will have a linux version which I do plan to purchase. Maybe Linux is catching up after all.

--
Blessed are the young, for they shall inherit the national debt. --Herbert Hoover
Re:Color me shocked.... by zenhonky · 2002-01-23 17:35 · Score: 0

yes, they have a nifty utility called loki update. I was very happy with the quality of the products that came from loki.

--
"Be true to yourself and you will never fall" - Beastie Boys http://tjhsst.edu/~crepetsk/lotr/page.php?id=1359
Re:Color me shocked.... by Anonymous Coward · 2002-01-23 20:02 · Score: 0

what kind of color is shocked? is that one of those weird new crayola crayon names? i remember shocking green, but not "shocked". Please list the approximate rgb value of "shocked", or post a link to a photo of someone or something that is colored shocked. would you consider this image to be color shocked?
Re:Color me shocked.... by digitalgiblet · 2002-01-24 01:51 · Score: 1

Bleh! Someone mod this WAY down so no one else accidently sees some guy's hairy butt in the middle of breakfast!
Note, if you don't want to see some guy's hairy butt, then DO NOT click the "this image" link.

It was gonna happen eventually by L-Wave · 2002-01-23 16:00 · Score: 3, Interesting

I go to the local video game store (yes, a franchise) and what do i see? I can get any linux game for 10 bucks or under. If you consider the Windows version costs roughly 30 bucks or more, this is a huge loss to companies. Loki did some really great ports, but i think linux still has yet to prove itself as a gaming platform.

--
I SURVIVED THE GREAT SLASHDOT BLACKOUT OF 2002!

Re:It was gonna happen eventually by yobbo · 2002-01-23 17:40 · Score: 3, Insightful

Yes, but the fact that you could go to your local video game store and find linux games there is a start at least...
Re:It was gonna happen eventually by Anonymous Coward · 2002-01-23 17:50 · Score: 0

I can get any linux game for 10 bucks or under....but i think linux still has yet to prove itself as a gaming platform.

hasn't it already proven itself? i play q3, unreal tournament, urban terror mod!, descent, tribes2... on my linux box. it has potential alright...

imagine... the "average pc video game consumer" finally able to realize that games ported to linux were cheaper... is it possible that more of those people would actually run a linux distro just to be able to inexpensively play awesome bleeding edge video games on their pc? wouldn't you think that more companies would be out there producing games for linux?

damn i would start one if i had capital or mad l33t programming skillz!!

xnesteax
Re:It was gonna happen eventually by lightfoot+jim · 2002-01-23 20:27 · Score: 2, Interesting

Brainiac: Do you really think cheap games is the killer app that will drag down the Windows monopoly and bring users to Linux?

Most home pc owners I know don't ever do word processing. Nearly all own at least a few recent games. Selling ports of games that have already been out for windows for weeks just doesn't make good business sense, but if there were a large number of games that came out for linux first or linux only, I imagine a lot of people would switch.

--
The state is the great fiction by which everyone tries to live at the expense of everybody else. ~F. Bastiat
Re:It was gonna happen eventually by Anonymous Coward · 2002-01-24 01:24 · Score: 0

It had to happen, because free unix users are a bunch of freeloaders; They just want free stuff. They wish the whole world was free software.. not because of any moral ground, but because they want free stuff prue and simple. they do not realize they need to support something, that peopel need to be paid to work. Loki is going under because Linux people wont' put their money where their mouth is.

I am disgusted.
Re:It was gonna happen eventually by morbid · 2002-01-24 02:55 · Score: 0

Unfortunately, they are more likely to just get a cracked version of the Windez game because Linux is still percieved as "too difficult" by those who have heard of it.
It has been said before, but one way may have been to make a Linux boot CD with the game on it, so you could just restart your machine and go straight to the game via a Linux boot.
It would also therefore be much easier to make intel and Mac versions of the game ie a recompile rather than an expensive and tedious port.

--
I'm out of my tree just now but please feel free to leave a banana.

:( by Timbo · 2002-01-23 16:00 · Score: 1, Insightful

...

Re::( by Anonymous Coward · 2002-01-23 16:05 · Score: 0

Me too.
Re: :( by AntipodesTroll · 2002-01-23 16:25 · Score: 1

You got it backwards. I think you meant C:
:^/

--
Anyone who considers arithmetical methods of producing random numbers is, of course, in a state of sin.-John von Neumann

No reason? by madcoder47 · 2002-01-23 16:01 · Score: 1

"After 3 wonderful years, Loki will be indefinitely suspending operations on
January 31."

Do they give any explanation? I was looking forward to new games from Loki!

*sigh* back to TuxRacer i go....

Re:No reason? by NineNine · 2002-01-23 16:30 · Score: 2, Insightful

Well, since you're new to "business", the reason a company usually stops selling a product is because they're not making any profit on that product.

I'm not sad to see them go. by gmhowell · 2002-01-23 16:01 · Score: 1, Troll

They didn't make games I wanted. Didn't seem like they ever would. My job is not to 'support the concept of Linux gaming'. It's to buy games.

--
Jesus was all right but his disciples were thick and ordinary. -John Lennon

Re:I'm not sad to see them go. by JohnG · 2002-01-23 16:04 · Score: 2, Funny

My job is not to 'support the concept of Linux gaming'. It's to buy games.
You get paid to buy games? That's pretty cool! :)
Re:I'm not sad to see them go. by Anonymous Coward · 2002-01-23 16:12 · Score: 0, Flamebait

They didn't make games I wanted. Didn't seem like they ever would. My job is not to 'support the concept of Linux gaming'. It's to buy games.
And that's the problem for Linux game companies - they're selling to a target market of users who wouldn't pay for software if it leapt out of the monitor and blew them.
Re:I'm not sad to see them go. by Anonymous Coward · 2002-01-23 16:31 · Score: 0

Way to completely ignore what he said.
Re:I'm not sad to see them go. by Anonymous Coward · 2002-01-23 17:10 · Score: 0

Hear, hear. Seriously, if you're not interested in any of Loki's games then you don't have much cause to suggest you're interested in games at all.
Re:I'm not sad to see them go. by raistlinne · 2002-01-23 17:32 · Score: 1

I bought tribes2, and I like it a lot. I just didn't find any of their other titles interesting. Well, a while ago I bought railraod tycoon II, but while the graphics are nice that game sucks big time compared to railroad tycoon (original). What idiot thought that the default mode for a game where you build up a railroad empire is to have it last 15-20 years only, and then everything stops? In railroad tycoon I, you got over 100 years to build your railroad empire. That's a heck of a lot more satisfying. Oh well. The real problem, I believe, is the way that most games appeal to a relatively narrow variety of interests. When your population is big enough to only support a few games, not enough people will be interested in them, since you're still probably going to see a relatively similar array of interests in the linux community. It's a pity that there aren't more games with a wide appeal.

--
They laughed at Einstein. They laughed at the Wright Brothers. But they also laughed at Bozo the Clown. -- C. Sagan
Re:I'm not sad to see them go. by Gregg+Alan · 2002-01-23 17:53 · Score: 1

I'm totally with you. I tried to want one of the games they ported (becuase the quality was good and the install of the demos was fine) but I just couldn't pick a game that I wanted to play. I'm not the target market I guess...I probably would have purchased something like Ultima V or a really cool version of nethack or any game along those lines. But Solitaire? Did the original for Windows even sell? (That's not flamebait, btw).

What strikes me is that they ported so many games but still didn't cover all the basics. Perhaps they had trouble getting companies to agree to the deal. No matter what, they really only served a certain portion of the game market...a market that appears to not have been big enough.

--
Here before all but 8486 of you.
Re:I'm not sad to see them go. by aussersterne · 2002-01-23 21:30 · Score: 2

Well, friend, if you don't buy games, there won't be any more games, so you *for sure* won't get any games you were interested in ported to Linux, and you will *continue* to need Windows to play all of your games.

Do you feel smarter now, or do you just feel a little bit lighter in the pocketbook for all the copies of Windows you will continue to buy for the next decade, just to play some games...

Or do you just warez your Windows?

Sometimes I get very disappointed in the Linux "community" who seems to be more bark than bite.

--
STOP . AMERICA . NOW
Re:I'm not sad to see them go. by byran+lei · 2002-01-23 23:49 · Score: 0

>Well, friend, if you don't buy games, there won't be any more games,
>so you *for sure* won't get any games you were interested in ported to
>Linux, and you will *continue* to need Windows to play all of your
>games.
>Do you feel smarter now, or do you just feel a little bit lighter in
>the pocketbook for all the copies of Windows you will continue to buy
>for the next decade, just to play some games...
>Or do you just warez your Windows?
>Sometimes I get very disappointed in the Linux "community" who seems
>to be more bark than bite.
>
>
Get a life asshole. I can't *STAND* the kind of garbage games Loki and the rest of the PC game companies produce these days,which is why I now own a PS2. I will never again buy a game for my PC. I've gotten out of the PC upgrading rat race for good. PC gaming losers like you can bitch and moan all you like, but I am not goint to spend a *SINGLE CENT* of *MY* money on PC games *I DON'T WANT TO OWN OR PLAY* no matter if they run on Windows or Linux. I will be renting and buying games for my PS2 on the other hand. What dipshit like you don't seem to be able to comprend is that there are a huge number of people like myself *WHO CAN'T STAND THE GAMES ON THE PC PLATFORM AND REFUSE TO WASTE OUR MONEY ON THEM.*
Re:I'm not sad to see them go. by gmhowell · 2002-01-24 16:37 · Score: 2

I have windows '98. When that will no longer suffice, I will remove myself from the PC market. At that time, those 'old' PS2's and X-Box's should be available for around $100 on eBay.

Or I'll dump the money into a MAME cab, or pick up a Battlezone, Frogger, or any of a dozen video arcade games I'd like to have.

The most important thing is that relative to the cost of games, the cost of Windows is trivial. I spent around $40 for Roller Coaster Tycoon and Baldur's Gate. More for Red Alert and some other RTS games. I would have bought Deus Ex at full price when it came out, but had other things to do with my time. Now, let's say I spend $20/month on games. Probably close to what I spend. Now let's say I have to upgrade Windows every three years (reasonable, given '95, '98, and the current OSes fighting it out now). Let's further assume that I pay the full $209 cost. That's less than $7 per month. Keeping current hardware costs more than that. ($150 video card every two years, $150+ for processor/mobo a little less often).

It ain't cost. I've got enough money. Trust me. My bike probably costs more than the car of the average /. reader.

If there are no more games... big fucking deal. Way more to do with life than engage in a twitch fest.

--
Jesus was all right but his disciples were thick and ordinary. -John Lennon

Damn! by Anonymous Coward · 2002-01-23 16:01 · Score: 0

Too Bad.

New icon? by DragonPup · 2002-01-23 16:01 · Score: 4, Informative

No more N64 controller...anyways, ya, sucks that Loki isn't doing well, but honestly, the Linux game market isn't nearly as profittable as the Windows one. Maybe it's because a lot of Linux users have a Win partition and rather than wait for 'Awesome Game X' to get ported, they buy the Win version...

-Henry

--
"Useless organic meatbag" -HK-47

Re:New icon? by 1010011010 · 2002-01-23 16:13 · Score: 2

I just bought Alpha Centauri. I have the Windows version (a gift), but hate having to boot back into Windows.

Now I've got RTCW and Alpha Centauri on Linux. If I just had Age of Empires 2 and Half-Life... I'd be set.

--
Napster-to-go says "Fill and refill your compatible MP3 player", which is a lie. It's not MP3. It's WMA with DRM.
Re:New icon? by arsaspe · 2002-01-23 16:17 · Score: 1

Well I don't know about AoE2, but Half-Life runs perfectly under Wine.
Re:New icon? by benb · 2002-01-23 16:17 · Score: 1

> rather than wait for 'Awesome Game X' to get
> ported, they buy the Win version...

I buy both of them.
Re:New icon? by Krach42 · 2002-01-23 16:17 · Score: 1

Well, you can get Half-Life working under WINE (the best alternative some of the times... sadly...)

Honestly, I hate dual booting, it's a pain in the ass to take my computer down and reboot it into Windows, just to have Windows crash on me every two hours. That's damn annoying! Since I have WinXP also, there's also the nice "If you get a blue screen you won't see it" feature, so when the NVidia drivers lock up (due to SMP issues) my computer just *blip!* reboots. That pisses me off! The video driver issues aren't there in linux though, and linux stays stable on me 24-7!

_THAT'S_ WHY I WANT MY LINUX PORTS!

--

I am unamerican, and proud of it!
Re:New icon? by Some+Dumbass... · 2002-01-23 17:16 · Score: 2

Maybe it's because a lot of Linux users have a Win partition and rather than wait for 'Awesome Game X' to get ported, they buy the Win version...

Or they wait until the Linux version comes out, then they realize that they can buy the Windows version for about half the price (and in some cases, they can download a Linux binary!)

There are many reasons why the Linux game market is failing. They fact that it's an afterthought to most people is one of them.
Re:New icon? by Jace+of+Fuse! · 2002-01-23 19:38 · Score: 2, Flamebait

There are many reasons why the Linux game market is failing.

The lack of DirectX is the other big one.

--

"Everything you know is wrong. (And stupid.)"

Moderation Totals: Wrong=2, Stupid=3, Total=5.
Re:New icon? by Lumpy · 2002-01-24 01:11 · Score: 3, Funny

that is an atari 2600 controller. NOT a n64 controller. Please get your retro gaming icon name right. I played the Atari 2600, I loved those oblong big ass pixels...

--
Do not look at laser with remaining good eye.
Re:New icon? by Anonymous Coward · 2002-01-24 01:33 · Score: 0

That's because you're a clueless idiot. Disable reboot on a system panic and the BSOD will be there for you to relish.
Re:New icon? by Anonymous Coward · 2002-01-24 06:47 · Score: 0

FWIW, the old /. "games" icon was a N64 controller. Hence "No more N64 controller".

Looking at your uid, I figure that you know this. This is just in case you are borrowing someone else's account.
Re:New icon? by Karn · 2002-01-24 11:27 · Score: 1

Bullshit.

Go to transgaming, look at the rating on Half-life. It's given, by Transgaming, a 4/5, b/c it is NOT perfect.

I'm really upset that Loki's gone, and I'm really upset that I still play Half-life under Windows.

I subscribed to Transgaming some time ago, I have tried 2 of their releases, and countless other Wine releases, and I have not seen Half-life run decent yet. (And NO it's not running in software. I know for a fact it is not.)

Now, let me define decent. For me to play games on Wine, I would require at LEAST 85% of the speed I get in Windows, otherwise I'll just dual-boot. I see about 60% of the performance under Wine currently, and it just sucks. It's like downgrading to my old video card, on my old CPU.

I still support Transgaming, and I hope that we can actually see some 5/5 games on it (the only one which gets 5/5 is a hacked version of The Sims). I would love to play Counter-strike in Linux, but with current performance, I just can't bring myself to do it.

My system is a Duron 800 with a GF2MX400. I set my maxfps to 60 at 1024x768, and it never wavers. With Wine on Linux, I'm lucky if I can hold 40fps, and even then, it's very eager to drop down to 20, and feels like vsync is always off, with a refresh rate of 40hz. Yeah, sometimes I get 60, when I'm in a tunnel with 8 polygons and i'm not moving.

--

Why do I keep typing pythong?
Re:New icon? by Anonymous Coward · 2002-01-24 12:04 · Score: 0

note it was a joke... please please put on your funy hat...

Looking at your uid I assume you are a troll.
Re:New icon? by arsaspe · 2002-01-24 16:06 · Score: 1

Mine doesn't slow down at all- in fact it seems to run faster. In windows, there seems to be some hard limit locking me at 60fps- it doesnt go any higher. I've fiddled with all the settings like maxfps, but it refuses to go any higher. In Linux, It often sits around 80-100 fps, depending on the scene, and it feels a lot smoother. What drivers are you using for that Geforce2? I use the closed NVidia driver, but I know a lot of people have some issue with them and use the slower open source drivers instead. If so, try the latest NVidia drivers and see if it runs faster
Re:New icon? by Anonymous Coward · 2002-01-24 17:29 · Score: 0

I am currently using the latest Nvidia drivers, I always try the latest hoping to see some improvement.

The max you see on windows is vsync kicking in. I don't know why, but on Win2k, unless you turn off vsync you get no more than 60fps.

I've been running linux a long time, and I know it' not a driver issue, b/c quake 3 runs fine, as do other OpenGL games. I don't now, maybe it is my setup, but if other games run fine then I have no idea what I can do about it.
Re:New icon? by arsaspe · 2002-01-25 17:50 · Score: 1

It's possibly your wine setup. Get the latest version of WineX from transgaming.com, it should run sweet.

Of course, there is only... by Anonymous Coward · 2002-01-23 16:02 · Score: 0

...one real Loki.

Re:first posting is great by MrPerfekt · 2002-01-23 16:03 · Score: 1, Troll

too bad you weren't it!

--
I just wasted your mod points! HA!

Re: Loki by Anonymous Coward · 2002-01-23 16:03 · Score: 0

um, yeah.....(i like the "morrow" part however)

humm, this blows by MaxQuordlepleen · 2002-01-23 16:03 · Score: 3, Insightful

I'm sure it will be said a dozen times again in this thread, but I'm bummed.

I've got five Loki products cramming my hard drive, and even though their products were sometimes indifferently supported and somewhat uneven in quality, I'm really sorry to seem them go as I'll have no reliable source for new products.

I'd imagine the contracts to support UT and QIII were pretty huge for them, it was a bad sign when they went away...

Re:humm, this blows by Anonymous Coward · 2002-01-23 16:19 · Score: 0

Too bad all the products are unpaid for and downloaded from IRC. That is why he said he has them on his hard drive and why he did not say he purchased 5 products. I hope you are happy.
Re:humm, this blows by Krach42 · 2002-01-23 16:29 · Score: 1

You all are idiots... We've not spent $$$ on the OS or anything like that, we can afford to pay for games. And how often have you used a Linux game? huh?! Not that often, because if you had, you'd know that of all the games Loki ported, I only came across Descent3 that requires the CD to play. Yeah, 0 copy-protection, why? Because Linux people don't share their games like Windows folks... it's not in their interest, (more Linux games) so they pay... well, those of us who actually DID buy them... (that or they didn't have them.)

And you want proof? I have friends with >100 burned windows games, and even though they run Linux? they have 0 Linux burns... (and 0 Linux games)

--

I am unamerican, and proud of it!
Re:humm, this blows by garcia · 2002-01-23 16:46 · Score: 3, Insightful

Sorry but the games that they ported were already out for a long ass time, didn't really catch my eye, and I really didn't see a need for them.

As far as the comment in another post about how people wanted the Linux binaries for free: I don't think that users should have demanded it but I also don't believe that they were entirely wrong for asking. I don't want to pay $whatever for an old game and I certainly don't want to pay twice for a game I already own.

I am VERY sad to see a company that worked so hard at doing something that was ignored by the community but I don't see how they could have thought that they would turn a profit anyway.

Linux users are so used to receiving games for free (and other apps) I guess they just believe that all apps should be free (this is IMHO as I pretty much refuse to pay for any software).

Sorry Loki, you had a great idea, it was just too slow and too early.
Re:humm, this blows by Roto-Rooter+Man · 2002-01-23 17:34 · Score: 0

I hope to God you're trolling. Do you think your Windows friends maybe have more Windows CDs because there are WAY MORE WINDOWS GAMES? Why would they buy a Linux game when they downloaded the Windows version six months ago?

As for the zero copy protection, the position Loki's currently in shows how well that idea paid off for them.

--

The goatse guy for president. Win one for the gaper!
Re:humm, this blows by dougmc · 2002-01-23 19:15 · Score: 2

You all are idiots... We've not spent $$$ on the OS or anything like that, we can afford to pay for games.
No, you're the idiot. I have several computers, two of which I use all the time. I've got my `work' computer, which runs Linux, and my game computer, which runs Windows (because that's what the games run under.)
I buy a lot of games. I enjoy them. I probably spend as much on game software as I do on hardware. I spend *much* less on OS's -- Windows 98 was around $100, and I spent that years ago (XP may run some games, but 98 runs all games. If all the computer is for is Windows games, 98 is what you want.)
Just because I didn't spend $200 on Linux, that doesn't magically give me $1000 to spend on games ...
Re:humm, this blows by dougmc · 2002-01-23 19:21 · Score: 3, Insightful

Sorry but the games that they ported were already out for a long ass time, didn't really catch my eye, and I really didn't see a need for them.
And that's why Loki failed. They ported old games.
By the time a Linux port is available, the Windows version has gone up and down the charts. The people who really wanted that game already bought it, finished it, and have moved on to the next game.
Now, if Loki could get Linux ports out the same day as the Windows version was released, things would be different ...
Linux users are so used to receiving games for free (and other apps) I guess they just believe that all apps should be free (this is IMHO as I pretty much refuse to pay for any software).
That might be a small part, but it's a very small part. You can find lots of good free Windows software too if you just look.
Here's the real clincher -- as a Linux user, why would I pay $50 for a Linux version of Quake 3 when 1) the Windows version of Quake 3 is in the bargain bin for $10, and 2) I bought Quake many months ago (for Windows) when it first came out. And I only paid $30 for that!
Re:humm, this blows by Anonymous Coward · 2002-01-24 03:30 · Score: 0

How about we all buy those games we've been thinking about buying for the last month or so. Is the announcement really that final or would the extra cash help?
Re:humm, this blows by Anonymous Coward · 2002-01-24 06:07 · Score: 0

Is the announcement really that final or would the extra cash help

I'm sure alot of extra cash would help

I always got the impression from the loki guys on the loki news server that they like what they were doing. I can't imagine they would leave if the money was there. Now it looks like the news server has just been taken down.

Would be nice to see IBM's billion dollar linux committment stretch over to gaming and the desktop and help them out... One can always dream :(
Re:humm, this blows by Anonymous Coward · 2002-01-24 06:51 · Score: 0

I bought Quake 3 directly from loki (in the nice tin case, to boot), for $30. I think your numbers are just a little skewed, buddy.

Though, you are quite right about buying the same game twice. Also: Q3 was available for all 3 platforms at release. Almost the same ofr UT. Tribes 2 was just a bit (what, like a week and a half?) later than the win version.

Maybe you should wait untill your next game comes out for linux, before buying it for win. But, seeing as how Loki's going asunder, there isn't much of a point.
Re:humm, this blows by dougmc · 2002-01-25 11:18 · Score: 1

Last time I looked, the Loki games were all $50 each, whether you ordered them from Loki or you found then at EB. Maybe this has changed ...

This is what happens.... by Wakko+Warner · 2002-01-23 16:03 · Score: 0, Troll

...when you try to sell games to cheap-ass Linux users. One person bought Loki's games and served the ISOs on IRC.

Sad to see them go? What's sad is how little support they got from the stingy Linux user community.

- A.P.

--
"Remember when the U.S. had a drug problem, and then we declared a War On Drugs, and now you can't buy drugs anymore?"

Re:This is what happens.... by Ramadog · 2002-01-23 16:09 · Score: 1, Redundant

When new games here cost $90 - $100 and I have never seen any titles that I want for linux why buy them? I would not call stingy not wanting to pay good money for unwanted games.
Re:This is what happens.... by Anonymous Coward · 2002-01-23 16:17 · Score: 0

One person bought Loki's games and served the ISOs on IRC.
We all know Windows games never get pirated.
What's sad is how little support they got from the stingy Linux user community.
A lot of people are going to say this, but that's simply not the problem. The problem is that Linux is run by only 0.24 per cent of desktop users. You can't support a proprietary software company with 0.24% of the market.
Re:This is what happens.... by Anonymous Coward · 2002-01-23 16:40 · Score: 0

You must be a Canadian, games don't cost $100. If they did, no one would buy them. Foolio!
Re:This is what happens.... by AHumbleOpinion · 2002-01-23 16:51 · Score: 2, Insightful

...when you try to sell games to cheap-ass Linux users

No, the real problem is that the vast majority of Linux gamers are already customers of the Windows developer/publisher. I.e. they dual boot or use wine.

The perceived Linux game market and the actual Linux game market differ by multiple orders of magnitude. The actual market consists only of those people who will not buy the Windows version of the game or who will buy a second copy to support their preferred platform. There is no large block of new sales waiting to be tapped.
Re:This is what happens.... by Wakko+Warner · 2002-01-23 16:56 · Score: 5, Interesting

We all know Windows games never get pirated.

They get pirated all the time, but what they lose in piracy they make up for in legit sales. Lots and lots of legit sales.

The problem is that Linux is run by only 0.24 per cent [slashdot.org] of desktop users. You can't support a proprietary software company with 0.24% of the market.

The problem is that nobody bought their games; doesn't matter how many Linux users there are. Loki sold their games in stores nationwide and on their website. They're there for the purchasing. Unfortunately, they're also there for the taking elsewhere on the Internet. If everyone who stole their copy of "Railroad Tycoon 2" or "Sim City 3000" or "Postal" had supported Loki and paid for it instead, we wouldn't be commenting on this story right now.

- A.P.

--
"Remember when the U.S. had a drug problem, and then we declared a War On Drugs, and now you can't buy drugs anymore?"
Re:This is what happens.... by mystran · 2002-01-23 17:28 · Score: 1

Now everyone with Loki's games, quickly send them the price you would have paid for it, and they even might reconsider :)

--
Software should be free as in speech, but if we also get some free beer, all the better.
Re:This is what happens.... by SirGeek · 2002-01-23 18:09 · Score: 3, Informative

Nationwide ? I NEVER was able to find any Loki Games (which I would have purchased on Principle).. I mean , Yes.. I can download ISO Images for FreeBSD but I STILL buy the 4 disk set each revision just to help support the project.

--
UPS Sucks
Re:This is what happens.... by abdulla · 2002-01-23 20:05 · Score: 2, Insightful

i think the real problem was there business model, to pay the developers to have the right to convert there games, shouldn't it be more that the developers should pay them to covert the games and then the developers boxed it in with the windows copies or put an alternate linux binary on the website for use, that would have been a smarter way to do things, they earn money from the developers paying them for linux compliance and sdl would thrive. they got greedy, they believed they could become fat cats off there alternate busniess model, but it was the cause of there doom
Re:This is what happens.... by Goldberg's+Pants · 2002-01-23 21:27 · Score: 1

I didn't steal my copy of "Railroad Tycoon 2". No, I recently purchased the Platinum Edition, which is the original, the Second Century expansion, and a whole host of other goodies, but way less than half what the bollockheads at Loki are flogging their version for.

As for Postal, dear god. I just picked up the Windows version for $3! Yeah, Loki, great idea, port a game from the last century!

With a business model like this, how could they POSSIBLY fail. Particularly given the "glowing" reviews Postal received *cough*.

The IQ's of the people who run the company can be measured on one hand.
Re:This is what happens.... by RickHunter · 2002-01-24 01:25 · Score: 3, Interesting

What universe are you living in? I've never once seen a Loki game in stores. If I had, I would've snapped it up immidiately. Unfortunately, I don't order games online much, if at all. I buy games that look interesting in the store, when I have some free money and free time. Since I can't predict either ahead of time, having to wait weeks for a game to arrive just doesn't work.

That said, that wasn't Loki's fault. Most gaming stores believe that all gamers run Windows (or, even worse recently, that all gamers use consoles), and thus don't want to stock Linux games because there's no market for them. Which becomes a self-fulfilling prophecy. No desktop success because no games -> no market for games -> no games stocked -> back to square one.
Re:This is what happens.... by Mozai · 2002-01-24 02:56 · Score: 1

Sold in stores nationwide?

I used to go into computer shops and ask if they had any Linux games, just to watch 'em squirm ("duuh, leenucks?"). If I get a condescending look, I'll ask about Macintosh games, and then I'm asked to leave.

I know of one place that had Loki Games on their shelves; this was before I made the switch from Win32. That place was on Yonge Street, Toronto, and it turned into a shoe store over one weekend with no warning.

I've been looking for a copy of Quake3 for Linux -- I can't get it from iD software, and the only place I've seen it for sale via web is canux.com, but they (he?) hasn't responded to any questions about buying or pointing out that the 'purchase' button in his catalogs doesn't actually link to anything.
Re:This is what happens.... by Demonbird · 2002-01-24 03:29 · Score: 1

Yep, I'm sure that games for 0.24% of the market have an ABSOLUTELY huge standing in the warez scene.
Re:This is what happens.... by theoddone33 · 2002-01-24 03:44 · Score: 1

They get pirated all the time, but what they lose in piracy they make up for in legit sales. Lots and lots of legit sales.

They raise prices in the Windows market to counteract the effects of warez. It's not so much the legit sales that keeps PC gaming alive, it's more the insane prices. We just don't notice because we're used to paying far too much for our games.
Re:This is what happens.... by Adhoc · 2002-01-24 08:36 · Score: 1

I live in Rochester, NY and I bought about 6 loki titles at EB. Funny, I never realized how 'out of this universe' Rochester is.
Re:This is what happens.... by RickHunter · 2002-01-24 09:03 · Score: 1

Ah, that would be the problem. Yes, that's a common difficulty with New York residents. You don't seem to realize that your city is in on a different plane of existance. Probably a lower one. ;)
Re:This is what happens.... by Anonymous Coward · 2002-01-24 12:58 · Score: 0

Yeah, I wondered what they were smoking when they said they were porting Postal... Perhaps that was all they could afford a licence for?

As a great fan of driving simulators (especially the Need for Speed series) it was a great disappointment that to my knowledge *no-one* has thought of porting one to Linux. I have licensed Linux ports of all the Quake series and the binaries for UT, and intend to buy RTCW when the Linux port comes out commercially, but not being into RTS games it appears I can only play FPS...
Re:This is what happens.... by Adhoc · 2002-01-25 06:14 · Score: 1

If Rochester is hell, then hell just froze over. :) Our neighbors in Buffalo recently got 7 feet of snow in a week.
Re:This is what happens.... by Anonymous Coward · 2002-01-28 17:31 · Score: 0

Matt Soffen is that you ... or em I dreaming ?

Very Sad by Anonymous Coward · 2002-01-23 16:03 · Score: 0

It is very sad to see them go i wish that could stay and make more ports :(

What's the big deal... by Mapultoid · 2002-01-23 16:03 · Score: 2, Insightful

... with running a dual-boot system? I understand the desire to get Linux on every desktop that some people have, but it seems to me that Linux ahs strengths and weaknesses. Frivolous wasting of time, such as videogaming (ignoring /., of course) is not it's strong suit. Windows is great if you want waste your time. Why not let Linux do what it does best, be productive, and get better at those things, and let Windows be the big time waster? Is it really so difficult for a person who really wants to play games to get a copy of Windows and slap it on their machine for playing games? Let Linux do what it does best and don't waste money on projects that in the end may not help the system continue to build its reputation.

--
Ben Garrison, a mindless idiot who will be the first against the wall when the revolution comes.

Re:What's the big deal... by Mapultoid · 2002-01-23 16:05 · Score: 0

The fate of the non-previewer: please excuse my use of "it's" where "its" is quite sufficient. Thanks.

--
Ben Garrison, a mindless idiot who will be the first against the wall when the revolution comes.
Re:What's the big deal... by npietraniec · 2002-01-23 16:32 · Score: 1

Is it really so difficult for a person who really wants to play games to get a copy of Windows and slap it on their machine for playing games?

Are you suggesting piracy or purchasing an OS just for an occasional game? Either solution seems like a dumb idea...
Re:What's the big deal... by entrigant · 2002-01-23 18:38 · Score: 1, Interesting

What's the big deal with running a dual boot
system? I'd be happy to tell you. For an
admittedly small few of us windows isn't just
a pile of bugs... it doesn't work at all. I
have tried every version of windows that has
support for all of my hardware, and not a
single one even boots once I install all my
drivers and apply patches to fix known bugs.
Linux however supports all my hardware as
well, and it not only boots.. it runs fast
and reliable for as long as I need it to. It's
people in similar situations that dual booting
is utterly useless.
Re:What's the big deal... by Sloppy · 2002-01-23 18:54 · Score: 2, Insightful

There are several reasons for not wanting to do that. Some are lame, and some aren't.

The most obvious one, I think, is that rebooting is a pain in the ass and counter-productive. Just a couple of hours ago, I was playing the "download a tarball, configure, find out I'm missing a library, go find it, download, repeat" game. While waiting for libxml2 to download, I fired up Heavy Gear 2 and spent a few minutes LAACing and VHACing some enemy gears. Reboot? Uh, I'm downloading. I don't want to reboot when my computer is in the middle of something, that's just silly.

Another thing.. I don't have Windows. Yeah, I guess I could trivially pirate a copy from work if I wanted to, so that's not a big deal. But it's something. I'de probably have to juggle partitions too, just to get it to boot. I also remember how hostile I've seen Windows act when you try to install it on a machine that already has other OSes on it. Adios, boot sector and boot manager. That's a lot of hassle to go through just to play games, compared to how easy it has been to enter my credit card number on a web form.

I don't trust Windows. If I were to install it on a machine, it would have write access to the hard disk and access to my network inside the firewall. That's just reckless.

The final reason: Windows is disgusting. I hate the sight of it and I don't want it anywhere near me and I'm sure not going to let it into my house. Bitterness and anger aren't what I want to feel while I'm trying to relax. When I'm at home, I want things to be pleasant. Windows has too much baggage -- emotional, aesthetic, and idealogical -- for that ever to be possible.

--
As copyright owner of this comment, I authorize everyone to defeat any technological measure which limits access to it.
Re:What's the big deal... by Anonymous Coward · 2002-01-23 19:15 · Score: 0

This guy Mapultoid has strong ties to microsoft.
Look at his @ddress for Gods sake!

BTW i don't have room for windows.
HA!
Re:What's the big deal... by Anonymous Coward · 2002-01-23 20:15 · Score: 0

Wow, if should do that, then my games would really
be expensive!, since I do not own any windows versions at all, and to pay 200$ + the price of
the game would really be overkill just to be playing games. And furthermore to even install windows on my computer just to play a game seems a little overkill to me. Since firstly, i have not used windows in about 2 years, second, waste partitions and storage on a product I do not see fit my needs feels just stupid. Why use windows when linux and solaris does my work perfect, both in entertainement (Mplayer really rocks) and working.
Re:What's the big deal... by mr.e · 2002-01-24 03:33 · Score: 1

I don't give a shit what your opinion on games for linux is, the real question we should be asking is what will happen to sdl (used by most linux media players as well as games) and openal if loki does finally collapse.
If these two libraries die linux loses a lot more than a few games
Re:What's the big deal... by lazarius · 2002-01-24 04:47 · Score: 1

Are you suggesting piracy or purchasing an OS just for an occasional game? Either solution seems like a dumb idea...

I think he's suggesting that students (like me ... nearly out of High School...) need to work full time to afford to be able to have recreational activities (such as PC gaming).

Not that I blame him, tho... every company seems to expect the same out of us... I have had one real paying job (not weekend things, or shovelling snow etc) and I don't have enough left to buy WinXP Home, if I wanted ... but I'm perfectly happy with my linux box (RH 7.2) thank you...

I think that it's cool when my brother and I are playing Unreal Tournament on different machines... his PIII chokes at the flak gun while my Celeron 366 doesn't...

I want my linux native ports (I just don't have the hardware power to run Windoze!) ... and I did pay for 5 Loki ports (mostly cheap at the Electronics Boutique... who have not had any more shipments and who are the only store in Ottawa that I know of that ever stocked Loki ports...).

MIKE

--
Beware the JabberOrk.
Re:What's the big deal... by Anonymous Coward · 2002-01-24 07:24 · Score: 0

Windows is great if you want waste your time.
No shit. But for anyone who wants to actually play games instead of reboot every ten minutes...

Too bad. by Maul · 2002-01-23 16:04 · Score: 1, Insightful

Loki made some excellent ports, including ports of games that were originally written with Direct X in mind. I was very pleased to be able to buy a Linux
version of Quake 3 Arena from them.

Truly this is a shame.

--

"You spoony bard!" -Tellah

Re:Too bad. by rekoil · 2002-01-23 17:22 · Score: 2, Insightful

IN the case of Q3A, all Loki handled was distribution. Id did the Linux port themselves.
Re:Too bad. by Anonymous Coward · 2002-01-23 18:28 · Score: 0

Not totall true. Loki was also responsible for doing the initial port of the Q3SDK to Linux. (At least the editor part anyway...)

Hopefully by T3kno · 2002-01-23 16:06 · Score: 2, Interesting

They'll open source everything that they can. That would at least be a silver lining.

--
(B) + (D) + (B) + (D) = (K) + (&)

Re:Hopefully by Krach42 · 2002-01-23 16:13 · Score: 2, Insightful

They already have released everything open-source that they could. The companies that they did the ports for required that the source remain closed.

--

I am unamerican, and proud of it!
Re:Hopefully by Anonymous Coward · 2002-01-23 16:14 · Score: 0

No, due to licensing agreements between Loki and the companies paying them to port the games, I would think it is very unlikely that they would be allowed to open source the software they've released.
Re:Hopefully by Anonymous Coward · 2002-01-23 16:32 · Score: 0

hmmmm, yet i have the q3a source. interesting.
Re:Hopefully by mabinogi · 2002-01-23 16:35 · Score: 1

That's got nothing to do with Loki.

ID did the port for Q3A, Loki just distributed it.

So if you have the source, it came from ID.

--
Advanced users are users too!

Re:first posting is great by wrinkledshirt · 2002-01-23 16:06 · Score: 0, Offtopic

Trolling by Haiku?

Haven't seen that one yet. Good stuff.

--

--------
Bleah! Heh heh heh... BLEAH BLEAH!!! Ha ha ha ha...

I paid! by Krach42 · 2002-01-23 16:07 · Score: 2, Insightful

Damn, I bought a second copy of Descent3 because I wanted the Linux version! I still want my Deus Ex!!! NO!!!! I owned all the games I was willing to buy, and _REGISTERED_ each one! I don't want to see them go!

--

I am unamerican, and proud of it!

Re:I paid! by Cainam · 2002-01-23 16:55 · Score: 2, Insightful

Yeah...I was going to buy SC3K Unlimited and maybe Civ... :(
However, this isn't the end of the linux gaming world. When Linux has more desktop market share among the masses (note when, not if), someone else will come along and be the next Loki. Maybe even some of the same folks! Wouldn't that be cool?
Don't despair.
Re:I paid! by kurowski · 2002-01-23 18:23 · Score: 1

you were going to? what's stopping you? now is your last chance!

i just put in my order for sc3k (and tribes2, and fakk2) (already have five other loki games). after all, it's not like the games magically stop working as soon as loki shuts their doors...
Re:I paid! by Cainam · 2002-01-23 19:01 · Score: 1

Lack of money. I'm a poor college student. :-(
Re:I paid! by kurowski · 2002-01-23 19:54 · Score: 1

ah yes, i remember those times well. on the bright side, it's probably better for your grades this way.
Re:I paid! by Anonymous Coward · 2002-01-24 06:20 · Score: 0

>When Linux has more desktop market share among the masses (note when, not if)

Note that you saying this doens't mean anything.
Re:I paid! by Cainam · 2002-01-24 09:00 · Score: 1

Of course it means something. It means that I believe that Linux will at some point in the future have more desktop market share among the masses.
Did you have a point?

This sucks so hard. by ACK!! · 2002-01-23 16:07 · Score: 2

Listen I own two of their games.

Alpha Centauri (the full pack with the regular game and Alien Crossfire)
and
Myth II

I was hoping to get Heavy Gear II or Rune next.

Damn this bites so hard because of not only the great games but the progress in terms of ideas for developing games while living with an open-source community without pissing them off.

I was actually hoping the company would cut staff and such and go the mail-order/web sales route.

Some Mac Game porting companies lived that for awhile. This makes me so fucking sad.

________________________________________________ _

--
ACK /ak/ interj. 2. [from the comic strip "Bloom County"] An exclamation of surprised disgust, esp. i

Re:This sucks so hard. by Anonymous Coward · 2002-01-23 16:34 · Score: 0

I own quake3, ut, heavy gear2, railroad tycoon, simcity, heroes 3 heretic2, trbies 2, myth2, descent3, alpha centari w/ expansion pack, soldier of fortune, rune and rune expanion pack, all bought legit. Guess One person can't support a whole company :) (I've never played sim city, i bought it cause it was $10 bucks and i found out loki was going under, so i ran out and bought it :) ) Good thing is companies have realized linux has a chance. Return to Castle Wolfenstein has been ported, Never winter nights will be ported without loki, so it looks like they at least made an impact on the gaming world that linux CAN be a gaming platform

Man this sucks.... by reaper20 · 2002-01-23 16:09 · Score: 2

I own quite a few Loki titles myself. This sucks. At least the open source SDL will live on in someway, so all their effort will not be totally wasted.

At the same time, I wish they would have diversified some of the titles that they offered. One can only play so many Quake knockoffs ....

Re:Man this sucks.... by BigJimSlade · 2002-01-23 16:44 · Score: 1

At least the open source SDL will live on in someway, so all their effort will not be totally wasted.

Even better, Sam Lantinga (sp?) works for Blizzard now and is the creator/maintainer of SDL. SDL is alive and kicking. And it is good.

Old news? by Anonymous Coward · 2002-01-23 16:09 · Score: 0

I thought I read about this a long time ago? I actually remember telling people of this closure some 3 months ago?

Re:Old news? by Mr_Bunnies · 2002-01-23 16:24 · Score: 1

i seem to remember this too, maybe they were just announcing staff cuts or something back then?
Re:Old news? by treke · 2002-01-23 17:01 · Score: 3, Informative

they announched Chapter 11 a few months ago. That was pretty clear that the end was near, but not certain. Now they are saying the doors close at the end of the month.

Use operating systems for what they're good for by xg0blin · 2002-01-23 16:11 · Score: 0, Troll

If you want to play games, use windows, if you want to program, or run an apache server or whatever, go ahead and use linux. Is it really that hard to use windows? Even when linux sucks for something, you don't wnat to use windows, when it happens to be good about the operation in question?

Re:Use operating systems for what they're good for by scorcherer · 2002-01-23 16:20 · Score: 2

If you want to play games, use windows, if you want to program [...] go ahead and use linux.
Someone has to program the games, too.
I agree that right now LoseDoze is much better in terms of available games. Still I can't help thinking .. what if the power of Linux, proven superior in many other fields, could be harnessed to make da ultimate gaming machine.. :-] For instance, watching DivX and MPEG movies on my crap 400MHz box is much smoother under Linux, but that hardly stops people like you from whining.

--
--
The Cap is nigh. Time to get a fresh new account.
Re:Use operating systems for what they're good for by Anonymous Coward · 2002-01-23 16:21 · Score: 0

I think it's more about convenience. Linux is fully capable of playing games up to par with its competition. If there exists a perfectly capable platform for playing games that is also a great development platform, why not exploit this feature?
Re:Use operating systems for what they're good for by Krach42 · 2002-01-23 16:24 · Score: 1

Linux Quake is getting better performance than Windows at 640x480, and at 800x600... you call that BAD at it? Not to mention that it only lacks a few frames per second at 1024x768, and 1600x1280 (most recent benchmarks I've seen) That means that the majority of resolutions that it runs at, it runs better than Windows! Personally, I don't think Windows does a better job of playing my games... Playing Diablo II, I can either play it in WINE, where occationally it locks WINE up, and I have to kill WINE and restart, that or I run it in WinXP (the new "stable" windows) and it randomly reboots on me... screw that!

--

I am unamerican, and proud of it!
Re:Use operating systems for what they're good for by Colin+Bayer · 2002-01-23 16:25 · Score: 1

Is it really that hard to use windows?

Uhh, yes. I have one copy of Windows (98) that I borrowed from a friend. I put up with it crashing and doing incredibly stupid things for 3 months. It was awful. I have another copy of Windows (Me) that acts the same as Win98, but makes my hard drive produce an unsettling noise every few seconds (a loud click; no, it's not my hard drive, as it's been running just fine for over a year) and shuts off many of the good features that remained in Windows. I don't have a Windows partition and I don't plan to add one soon.

Even when linux sucks for something, you don't wnat to use windows, when it happens to be good about the operation in question?

This statement shows that you've never played one of Loki's ports. At the very worst, I've seen Loki ports keep all of the flaws and quirks of the Windows versions. In many cases (*cough*Alpha Centauri*/cough*), they actually removed bugs.

Loki's ports were great (I own 3: MindRover, SimCity 3000, Tribes2) and I'm sad to see them go. :(

--
Want Linux games? HERE.
Re:Use operating systems for what they're good for by Robotech_Master · 2002-01-23 16:34 · Score: 1

What do you use to watch divx movies? I can't seem to get much to work very well on my Linux box.

--
Editor Emeritus and Senior Writer, TeleRead.org
Re:Use operating systems for what they're good for by johnnyb · 2002-01-23 16:34 · Score: 2

My Linux OS plays TuxRacer quite nicely ;)

--
Engineering and the Ultimate
Re:Use operating systems for what they're good for by NineNine · 2002-01-23 16:35 · Score: 1

Sure. Exploit the feature. YOU write brand new games for free, then! It's obvious that money can't be made porting games for free. No business will sell something that they can't make a profit from. That's the definition of business.
Re:Use operating systems for what they're good for by garett_spencley · 2002-01-23 16:41 · Score: 4, Funny

I always laugh when I hear someone say that Linux was not designed to play games (or that Linux is not a gaming/desktop OS or whatever.....)

Here's the thing:

Linux was created to be a UNIX-like OS on a 386 when the only option at the time was minix which was very sub-par.

UNIX was created by Ken Thompson to play games on his PDP-7

Therefore I would argue that Linux was, in fact, designed to play games. Just on a 386 not a PDP-7 :O)

--
Garett
Re:Use operating systems for what they're good for by xg0blin · 2002-01-23 16:43 · Score: 1

I never said that Linux was "BAD" at running video games, and I never quoted any benchmarks claiming windows was faster. You just add what you want to conversations I guess. Anyways, what I said was "Use operating systems for what they're good for". Linux has like Quake 3 and tux racer..wow, big line up. One company has died and you guys are crying. One windows company dies and no one gives a fuck. See my point? There are a ton of video games, and support for games on windows and that is not true on linux. BTW, I have XP as well, and it's never crashed on me, even while playing Diablo II.
Re:Use operating systems for what they're good for by xg0blin · 2002-01-23 16:46 · Score: 1

Then explain the huge lack of games for it.
Maybe it was designed to play games, I don't know, but the point is there are barely any on it.
Re:Use operating systems for what they're good for by Cainam · 2002-01-23 16:58 · Score: 1

I have excellent luck using xine. It's being actively developed and each version has bugfixes/features/performance improvements. It's a really good piece of software.
Re:Use operating systems for what they're good for by HanzoSan · 2002-01-23 17:27 · Score: 2

Or you can try WineX, never crashed on me

--
If you use Linux, please help development of Autopac
Re:Use operating systems for what they're good for by HanzoSan · 2002-01-23 17:29 · Score: 1, Redundant

Actually, PCs werent designed for games so lets all head back to the consoles

--
If you use Linux, please help development of Autopac
Re:Use operating systems for what they're good for by Anonymous Coward · 2002-01-23 17:33 · Score: 0

How do you do it?

divx/mpeg/avi are very slow on my 366MHz box...

Kubus
Re:Use operating systems for what they're good for by Xoro · 2002-01-23 17:33 · Score: 1

I just use AVIPlay. The shocking thing was that the performance was much better under linux than using Windows Media Player under Win2k. Certain high-quality divxs on win would choke my machine, causing stuttering, dropped frames and poorly-synched sound. They play perfectly at full screen under linux. I was prepared to make a lot of compromises when switching to the linux desktop and was pleasantly surprised to find divx playback on the plus side of the equation.

--
Kill, Tux, kill!
Re:Use operating systems for what they're good for by Anonymous Coward · 2002-01-23 17:45 · Score: 0

Hearing linux users brag about TuxRacer is as pathetic of the Mac users bragging about Marathon so long ago. "See, we have a game!"
Re:Use operating systems for what they're good for by Doomdark · 2002-01-23 17:49 · Score: 2

Is it really that hard to use windows
Perhaps you are glad to pay 50 - 200$ for the bootloader for games. That's what Windows would amount to me. I don't mind paying for games (I have bought enough, including couple of Loki titles... alas I don't care too much about 1st person shoot-em-ups), but I don't want to waste money on OS _just_ to get chance to buy games.
It's not that Windows is that especially for games. Various libs (directX) are ok but similar ones exist on linux (and usually same libs on various other platforms too). It _is_ convenient for developers, due to monopoly position and _good enough_ support for game writing.

--
I like paying taxes. With them I buy civilization -- Oliver Wendell Holmes
Re:Use operating systems for what they're good for by Anonymous Coward · 2002-01-23 17:53 · Score: 0

For what, the PDP-7? There were like two games total back then (Spacewar and adventure, right?), and they all ran on the PDP-7!
Re:Use operating systems for what they're good for by Anonymous Coward · 2002-01-23 18:32 · Score: 0

I tried WineX a few weeks ago, to see if it could install Aliens vs. Predator. Nope, sorry, too bad. (And no, it does not use SafeDisk).
Re:Use operating systems for what they're good for by Goldberg's+Pants · 2002-01-23 21:34 · Score: 1

I agree that right now LoseDoze

Hehehe... LoseDoze. That's so funny, 'cos you took the "win" part and changed it to "lose" and the "dows" part and changed it to "doze". Man, that's so original... Honestly... God you're talented... You make Ralph Wiggum look like fucking Einstein...
Re:Use operating systems for what they're good for by Goldberg's+Pants · 2002-01-23 21:37 · Score: 1

Xine is a piece of shit. Even with the D4D support to play DVD's, it sucks ass since you can't actually utilize the full functionality. It's DIVX playback is woefully poor, and the interface is shit.

And the pathetic thing is, it's the best Linux has to offer...
Re:Use operating systems for what they're good for by aussersterne · 2002-01-23 21:38 · Score: 2

I don't want to pay $300 for Windows. I'll buy a PS2 before I'll shell out $300 for Windows.

Why are some people so against the concept of playing games under Linux? It seems only natural: if you prefer Linux, use Linux all the time, then why wouldn't you want to play your games in Linux, if Linux is capable.

And Loki has certainly proved that Linux is capable.

Yet some people in the Linux community have this angst about games showing up for Linux, like it will ruin Linux... Sort of like the Palm users feeling terribly threatened by color displays and fast CPUs.

It makes no sense. Games for Linux can only be a good thing. The Linux world is *smaller* and will grow *more slowly* because of Loki's death.

--
STOP . AMERICA . NOW
Re:Use operating systems for what they're good for by Cainam · 2002-01-23 21:46 · Score: 1

While I don't have a DVD drive, and so can't speak as to xine's ability to play DVDs, I have had few problems with xine and almost none with recently updated versions...
I remain a happy xine user and wonder what exactly you have to back up your claim that xine is "a piece of shit". The interface, while incomplete, is usable and relatively intuitive. Do you have anything constructive to say on the subject, or are you just another mindless troll? Unfortunately, I suspect the latter.
Re:Use operating systems for what they're good for by Anonymous Coward · 2002-01-23 22:05 · Score: 0

oh dear...
xine skins can be rewritten to suit any users needs, not that there aren't dozens to be downloaded around the web already, but I digress...
If you do not find xine to be your cup of tea, ogle, videolan and cvs snapshots of mplayer all work great with the formats they are good at. I personally have mplayer's newest release along with ogle for my wife's linux box. She seems to have no problems using the gui interfaces for video playback. When asked if they needed to be improved upon in any way, there wasn't anything she found unsatisfactory. xine is not Open Source's best offering for divx playback, neither is mplayer the best thing to happen to dvds since DeCSS. However you are perfectly entitled to express your own opinion as long as you can tell the coders what's wrong with their product. Simply stating it sucks hardly amounts to anything now does it ?
Re:Use operating systems for what they're good for by rseuhs · 2002-01-23 22:13 · Score: 2

And the pathetic thing is, it's the best Linux has to offer...
No, there are aviplay and mplayer.
aviplay has great functionality and good usability while mplayer is uncrashable and plays adequate even on slooooowww machines.
WMP has bad functionality and uses a lot of resources.
Re:Use operating systems for what they're good for by rseuhs · 2002-01-23 22:17 · Score: 2

I never said that Linux was "BAD" at running video games, and I never quoted any benchmarks claiming windows was faster.
You said that you shouldn't run games on Linux which sounds pretty dumb for me.
It all boils down to the usual: If the app is available on Linux (natively or via Wine, doesn't matter), use Linux, if not, reboot to Windows.
Linux certainly is able to run games and I don't see a reason why I should not use Linux to run games.
Re:Use operating systems for what they're good for by Explo · 2002-01-23 22:46 · Score: 1

If you want to play games, use windows, if you want to program, or run an apache server or whatever, go ahead and use linux. Is it really that hard to use windows? Even when linux sucks for something, you don't wnat to use windows, when it happens to be good about the operation in question?

By following this logic, there wouldn't have ever been many games for Windows; initially it sucked quite much as a gaming platform compared to even DOS, which sucked initially compared to something like Amiga, which sucked initially compared to... All in all, I'd say that you're looking at it in quite black/white way. I don't play games much, so I'm quite contend with a few games per year that don't even have to be brand-new. In similar, many people with Windows can probably quite happily try Apache - there's no point of installing Linux just for that. What you're saying applies only to the hardcore gamers, not to someone who plays something a few times per month or so.

--
Everyone who makes generalizations should be shot.
Re:Use operating systems for what they're good for by Anonymous Coward · 2002-01-23 23:46 · Score: 0

First and foremost, windows users seldom conglomerate themselves like linux ones do. You see geeks car pooling to head to lug meetings, you don't see anything like that in comparasion to the much greater crowd of windows users. Part of the reason is probably that geeks appreciate the sweat and toil of other geeks. Each and every programmer has had to sweat through manuals, try something anew, go back to the manuals until they get it right. A windows user will just throw up his hands and call tech support. To provide means of effective relaxation and recreation to the linux user is a task of monumental difficulty, one that a run of the mill linux user can appreciate. It generates a loyal fan base, something that windows companies seldom have. But I digress...

The fact of the matter is, linux although comprising a much smaller userbase than even mac at the desktop, has an unfaltering line of people who are quite literally willing to support the products for their platform despite the fact that their taste obviously points somewhere else. My lug has had members buying loki and tribsoft products, even though their favorite non-technical pastime on a computer is xboard and crafty. The fact that windows users do not garner this type of support from its userbase is suggestive of the difference in backgrounds of its users, and how, more importantly, that loki despite its commercial shortcomings, was a good company to its customers and tried as hard as possible to stick to the original mission of which the company was founded upon.

The fact that loki is closing means that one of the biggest pushers of not just linux gaming, but the overall multimedia experience, (i.e. openal, sdl, smpeg) these projects will all have to be maintained by other people. Linux users should mourn the passing of this company, because not only did they contribute a great deal to the linux envirnoment as a whole, but for a long time they were the only company of its kind. The fact is linux has the potenial to be as good as a gaming platform as windows, and should be a tournament os of choice if you want to compete in a stable envirnoment. The closing of loki makes this potenial all the more harder to be realised. Once you realise how much gaming is to home computing, you realise that home computing is as much about productivity as it is about entertainment. The ramifications of my statements, applied to set top boxes and dedicated home devices not withstanding, it's difficult to see a good company go. It is even more difficult to see a company that was attempting to leverage slowly a playing field that Microsoft dominates, but failed in the end anyway.
Re:Use operating systems for what they're good for by damiam · 2002-01-23 23:53 · Score: 1

I use mplayer.

--
It's hard to be religious when certain people are never incinerated by bolts of lightning.
Re:Use operating systems for what they're good for by Anonymous Coward · 2002-01-24 01:45 · Score: 0

It suycks to have to boot into an other OS that costs to much mony, why pay the same amount of money for second OS, when i could have bought a geforce 3 ti 500 for the same cash?
Why use windows, when my games run faster on linux and don't make me reboot when on of them crashes..
Re:Use operating systems for what they're good for by garett_spencley · 2002-01-24 06:44 · Score: 2

No one gets my humour. Oh well. I was hoping it would be modded as funny. Not interesting.

--
Garett

So, will they open all their source? by Anonymous Coward · 2002-01-23 16:11 · Score: 0

If ever there was a company that should free all its products upon closing, this is the one.

Re:So, will they open all their source? by Anonymous Coward · 2002-01-23 16:42 · Score: 0

Yeah right. They don't own the source since they were a porting company.
Re:So, will they open all their source? by Anonymous Coward · 2002-01-23 17:00 · Score: 0

Vulture.

Back to Nethack by eGabriel · 2002-01-23 16:12 · Score: 1

It was nice having a few decent games for Linux. I've really enjoyed Tribes2 the past several months. I suppose the patches will stop, the servers will disappear... time to get back to trying to ascend my Monk character.

I have felt a bit hypocritical anyway, having these proprietary binaries on my machine when there is plenty of entertainment to be found in all of the free software available for my operating system.

Re:Back to Nethack by MrResistor · 2002-01-23 16:32 · Score: 3, Interesting

I've really enjoyed Tribes2 the past several months. I suppose the patches will stop, the servers will disappear...
Well, at least that's one Linux port that's keeping pace with the windows version. Too bad it's headed the wrong direction...
Everythign about Tribes2 makes me really sad. I bought the windows version when it first came out. It was unstable, but not too bad. I've definitely seen worse. There were a lot of patches that came out in quick succession, but the patches were done very poorly. A patch couldn't be applied to an install with a previous patch, and you couldn't back out of the patches. You had to uninstall it and reinstall it, with all the required reboots, everytime a new patch was released, which in that first month was about every other day. That was the only reason I stopped playing it.
I was planning to buy the Linux port aafter they'd settled down with the patches for a bit, but there's no way I'll have the money by the end of the month. It seems like they could have sold a lot of stuff if they'd given a little more notice.

--
Under capitalism man exploits man. Under communism it's the other way around.
Re:Back to Nethack by TheOnlyCoolTim · 2002-01-23 17:11 · Score: 1

Uhm... you probably have longer than until the end of the month. Just because the company is going out of business doesn't mean that your local Software Etc. is going to immediately toss all their Linux game ports out in the trash.

--
Omnia vestra castrorum habetur nobis.
Re:Back to Nethack by MrResistor · 2002-01-24 08:04 · Score: 2

That's true, I'm sure I'll be able to pick up unopened boxes on ebay a year from now, but my intention was to buy them direct from Loki. The reasoning being that Loki would get the full benefit from the purchase and I would be furthering my own desires by supporting those who provide what I want, now and in the future (like a copy of Deus Ex that is actually playable because it doesn't hard-lock my machine every 20 minutes).
Along those lines, I've made a personal commitment not to pirate Linux software. Sure, I try Free alternatives first, if available, and if they don't cut it I pay for the non-Free package that does. Again, it comes down to supporting those who produce what I want in the hope that they will continue producing.
The real problem, though, is that I have a very hard time shelling out cash for software that's totally unsupported, as all those boxes at Software, Etc will be next month. What's more, purchasing those boxes will help support only the middlemen, not the actual producers, and unfortunately for them the RIAA has made that an issue for me. The only remaining reason for me to purchase a copy of one of Loki's games is to get a legitimate CD-Key so I can play online (which isn't an issue for some games, UT and Q3 come to mind).
It's more of a moral issue for me than an availability issue. When it get's down to it I can get any software I want. As long as I'm willing to use a pirated copy, someone will be willing to provide it.

--
Under capitalism man exploits man. Under communism it's the other way around.

Retrospective by Anonymous Coward · 2002-01-23 16:12 · Score: 1, Interesting

The main Linux gaming site, LinuxGames, has a retrospective article posted talking about Loki and what they did for Linux gaming and what they contributed to open source.

Looks like they (LG) were too optimistic about Loki pulling out of the bankruptcy nosedive in that article.

One has to wonder: where does this leave the support for the games that are already out there? What happens when a new glibc causes old games to fail to start? What happens when an incompatibility with SDL or XFree86/OpenGL or anything else crops up? Do those games just die?

And what does this mean for future games, like those whose engines are already ported to Linux (like Unreal/Unreal Tournament and Quake 3)?

Red Hat should buy them. by grub · 2002-01-23 16:14 · Score: 5, Interesting

Root^H^H^Hed Hat should buy Loki's assets and licenses. They have a somewhat successful business already, a gaming division for "their" OS would be a nice feather in their cap (cap.. heh, no pun intended)

--
Trolling is a art,

Re:Red Hat should buy them. by AntipodesTroll · 2002-01-23 16:23 · Score: 1

Yeah, Red Hat are making too much of a profit, so they should buy Loki and emulate them so they start bleeding red ink again.

Tell me, why should any other company have any intrinsic advantage over Loki themselves?

--
Anyone who considers arithmetical methods of producing random numbers is, of course, in a state of sin.-John von Neumann
Re:Red Hat should buy them. by Anonymous Coward · 2002-01-23 16:31 · Score: 2, Interesting

red hat is moving towards the server side.
if any linux company were to buy loki, it would be Mandrake. they have a gamers edition, which includes the SIMs, and fresh cash from their recent IPO
Re:Red Hat should buy them. by Anonymous Coward · 2002-01-23 17:02 · Score: 0

ROOFLE 0wned SCRUB. I 0wnz0r ur p4th3tic Bulgarian shoe-shining, cock-licking, monkewy-knob-polishing, salad-tossing, Nigerian-deep-throating, b1tch 4ss.

J00 R n0t l33t. f4g.
Re:Red Hat should buy them. by linzeal · 2002-01-23 17:24 · Score: 1

Mandrake should buy them or transgaming. What about Mandrake Gaming Editon with some native games?

--
An Education is the Font of All Liberty
Re:Red Hat should buy them. by Anonymous Coward · 2002-01-23 17:25 · Score: 1

Umm why would redhat buy an unprofitable business? So they could lose money?

I don't think so, since loki proved once and for all there is NO linux desktop market.
Re:Red Hat should buy them. by Fizzlewhiff · 2002-01-23 18:14 · Score: 1

I seem to remember a stink a while back about Red Hat not wanting to distribute Quake II for Linux. If they didn't want to distribute a game then its probably safe to assume they don't want to deal with the licensing and porting aspect of it either.

--

'Same speed C but faster'
Re:Red Hat should buy them. by madrouter · 2002-01-23 18:38 · Score: 0

for the gamers edition mandrake entered an agreement with TRANSGAMING, who makes windows games run under wine.

But, It would be a good idea. Any company picking up loki would probably be beneficial.

I wonder if they'll have a sale before the end of the month...I'd love to buy the rest of the games I don't already have...but I'm dead broke.
Re:Red Hat should buy them. by xtremex · 2002-01-23 19:29 · Score: 1

Umm..no..it proves there is no Linux GAMING market. When the PC first game out, Commodore rules the roost in the game division. One of the main reasons Commodore went under..it was just a toy, merely a GAME machine

--
If you're not a Liberal in your 20's, then you have no heart.If you're still a Liberal in your 30's you have no brain.
Re:Red Hat should buy them. by Rogerborg · 2002-01-24 01:16 · Score: 2

Heck, if AOL/TW are actually interested in shipping a Linux OS at some point, they should buy them and make it a viable alternative to Windoze for Joe AOLuser.

--
If you were blocking sigs, you wouldn't have to read this.
Re:Red Hat should buy them. by the+cleaner · 2002-01-24 01:25 · Score: 1

Well as I am livong on the other side of the atlantic, I dont consider this to be a very great idea.

RedHats actions in the past (gcc, glibc...) give me the impression, that the games wold rely on RedHat insted of vanilla-Linux to be run.

Just my 0.02

--
Could be worse. Could be raining.
Re:Red Hat should buy them. by egon · 2002-01-24 04:50 · Score: 1

Actually, it just shows that there is CURRENTLY not a big enough Linux gaming market. Give it a couple more years - when linux has made more progress on the desktop, I think we'll see a new loki style company come along and make some bucks...

--
Give a man a match, you keep him warm for an evening.
Light him on fire, he's warm for the rest of his life
Re:Red Hat should buy them. by HiThere · 2002-01-24 05:11 · Score: 2

No. Red Hat shouldn't buy them. They properly concentrate on system software. (Licensing rights from someone else is another matter.)

None of the distributions should buy them, though backing a company that bought them might be reasonable.

Loki is good for Linux, but most Linux users aren't really gamers. So Loki's business can't expect to be really profitable. So it needs to be supported by someone who derives an ancillary benefit. The arguments in favor of Mandrake are a bit reasonable, but Mandrake software tends to be specialized to the Mandrake distribution. So this isn't too good an idea.

If AOL is serious about moving into the Linux market, then they could be a reasonable purchaser. But I'm not sure.

Unfortunately, every plausible purchaser that I can think of would limit the market for the games further than it has been. At one point I could have seen Corel as a ventor. Unfortunately, it supported it's own distribution (which was a "broken Debian" [probably a timing problem here, glibc was changing just then]), and that drained their funds.

--

I think we've pushed this "anyone can grow up to be president" thing too far.
Re:Red Hat should buy them. by Anonymous Coward · 2002-01-24 09:33 · Score: 0

So do people over there have some sort of mental problem, maybe you are extreamly sheepish, or lack any technical knowledge, but are willing to comment on it with absolutly no proof, or even reason.

What has redhat done to libc, or gcc. They used a beta g++, but a huge deal was made of it, but really what can you expect when gcc goes through a binary incompatible change. All redhat wanted was a better c++ compiler.
I can only assume with libc your refering to the glibc switch, which redhat handled as well as anyone else.

And while i'm sure they would be tailored to redhat linux, theres nothing stopping something from working on another distribution. And considering the cost of porting, they would be stupid not to try and reach the largest market.
Re:Red Hat should buy them. by Anonymous Coward · 2002-01-24 10:35 · Score: 0

Do you know how many years I have been hearing that for?
The linux desktop market has peaked and the vendors that are onboard are here. The mythical upswing in linux desktop use is not coming ever!

Do yourself a favor and enjoey your desktop, but realize that as good as linux is on servers, it has no future as a desktop except for the few hobbyists that run it as such. Am I one of those, yes, am I also realistic YES!
Re:Red Hat should buy them. by Trogre · 2002-01-24 12:21 · Score: 1

I second that.

I reckon it would be a great idea, RH certainly has the capital, and there is the demand, just not much in the way of interested game companies or a distribution system.

We must still be cautious. In giving big players like Red Hat more market, we would run the risk of going back to the days of monolothic corporations, a la microsoft.
.
.
.

--
"Nine times out of ten, starting a fire is not the best way to solve the problem." - my wife
Re:Red Hat should buy them. by Anonymous Coward · 2002-01-25 21:13 · Score: 0

So do people over there have some sort of mental problem, maybe you are extreamly sheepish, or lack any technical knowledge
As one of the other people living on the eastern side of the Atlantic, I can assure you that "the cleaner" match the second or third case above. People in general have a clue, unlike "the cleaner".

Entertainment and limited leisure time. by Bigger+R · 2002-01-23 16:14 · Score: 3, Informative

The point of games is entertainment. We've all got limited leisure time. You have to WORK to get a linux box tuned for games. Even then the return on your investment has a smaller pay-off than the windows-environment hassles, because there are fewer choices.

I have a couple of boxen, both W2K and *nix. I really wanted to make it happen, but I just found that I enjoyed playing more than configuring.

I'm just sorry the chickens and eggs did get sorted out(if the "leak" is indeed real).

--
Beta only seems to work for Google. Such a shame.

Re:Entertainment and limited leisure time. by krogoth · 2002-01-23 16:54 · Score: 2

Oh, it was just so much work for me. First I had to download the nVidia drivers (gasp!) and (because I chose the SRPMS) rebuild and install them - that was 4 commands! 4 commands I'll never get back! After that, I downloaded the wolfenstein demo, and when I ran the installer I had to choose a directory to install to (~/wolftest2) AND a binary directory (~/bin)! And, to top it all off, the game doesn't automatically start when I want to play! (I know wolf isn't a Loki game, but it's the same installer)

--

They that quote Benjamin Franklin on liberty and safety deserve neither.
Re:Entertainment and limited leisure time. by Anonymous Coward · 2002-01-23 17:02 · Score: 0

Huh? That looks like gibberish to me. Can you repeat that in English?
Re:Entertainment and limited leisure time. by Time+Doctor · 2002-01-23 18:42 · Score: 2, Interesting

Honestly, the nvidia drivers are so easy to get set up as long as you already have a reasonably current version of X4.

--
Check out ioquake3.org for a great, free, First-Person Shooter engine!
Re:Entertainment and limited leisure time. by Parein · 2002-01-23 20:18 · Score: 1

You have to WORK to get a linux box tuned for games.

Hm, perhaps you have different Linux than I do, but I have had much more problems configuring Windows for gaming than Linux.

Loki port of Railroad Tycoon II worked straight out of the box. It is my only Loki game for Linux, but I have never had problems with other games in Linux.

Windows, on the other hand, has been a problem with all the drivers, lock-ups and stuff.

Still, Loki could have tried to port newer games.
Hm, how could we make companies do the games for both (or even all) platforms at the same time...

On a related note, is there a good pinball for Linux? Currently I use my A500 to play Pinball Dreams... B-)

(I have some thoughts about making a pinball game. Might get to it some time after my diploma thesis.)

--

Pare
Re:Entertainment and limited leisure time. by aussersterne · 2002-01-23 22:02 · Score: 2

Gaming on Linux: Install Red Hat 7.2, go to NVidia site to download drivers, rpm -i drivers, run Loki installer.

Gaming on Windows: Install Windows 2000, go to NVidia site to download drivers, double-click on drivers, run Windows game installer.

How is that hard? Or are you one of those have-cake-and-eat-it-too idiots who won't use NVidia with Linux because they won't open-source their drivers, and then has the nerve to complain that all of those non-vendor drivers for the other cards are hard to use?

Honestly...

--
STOP . AMERICA . NOW

what happened to press releases by ab0mb88 · 2002-01-23 16:14 · Score: 2, Funny

Does anyone actually put out press releases any more, or does every company just leak an internal email when they have news?

Re:what happened to press releases by Anonymous Coward · 2002-01-23 22:06 · Score: 0

It wasn't an internal email!

Read it - To RETAILERS!

David

Sad news by Anonymous Coward · 2002-01-23 16:15 · Score: 0, Funny

I just heard some sad news on talk radio - game porting company Loki Software was found dead in it's Tuskin home this morning. There weren't any more details. I'm sure everyone in the Slashdot community will miss them - even if you didn't buy their games (and not many people did), there's no denying their contributions to the Linux community. Truly an American icon.

I'm not really surprised by An+Ominous+Cow+Erred · 2002-01-23 16:15 · Score: 5, Insightful

At Hyperion, an alternative platform game software porting company I work for, we've produced titles for Linux as well as MacOS and AmigaOS. The Linux versions simply bombed, with the Amiga versions outselling them by a good margin. The *AMIGA* versions! The Amiga market, by a good estimate, is around 100 times smaller than the Linux community.

What we got from Linux users were not sales, but tons of email demanding that we put up the binary executeables on an ftp site for free so they could download them and use them with their Windows version of the game. For some reason they just couldn't grasp that it cost us money to both license and port the software, and that we didn't see a red cent for the Windows version they bought. It didn't matter, all they wanted was free beer.

As a Linux enthusiast myself (active in my LUG, promoting Linux wherever I can) it really saddens me that so many users will clamor for Linux games but won't actually pony up the money when they become available. It's very, very depressing.

::goes to cry in his non-free beer::

James Sellman -- Hyperion Entertainment -- http://www.hyperion-entertainment.com/

Re:I'm not really surprised by Anonymous Coward · 2002-01-23 16:41 · Score: 0

The lack of response to your post shows that Linux users have nothing to say to this sad state of affairs - nobody denies it. It's amazing that Amiga users - a group well known to be prone to copying rather than buying - are actually more prepared to support your business than Linux users. Could it be that there are actually about the same, or even fewer Linux users as Amiga users? Or is it just that Linux users simply will not pay for anything? I would have wondered if your software was crap, but if some users are buying it and not the others...
Re:I'm not really surprised by Anonymous Coward · 2002-01-23 16:53 · Score: 0

The lack of response to your post shows that Linux users have nothing to say to this sad state of affairs - nobody denies it.
The lack of response to his post shows that people generally don't respond to trolls. "The Amiga market, by a good estimate, is around 100 times smaller than the Linux community"? Do you notice that he gave no source for this statistic? That's because he just made it up.
Re:I'm not really surprised by Anonymous Coward · 2002-01-23 17:31 · Score: 1, Informative

Has anyone at Hyperion actually looked at their linux releases? I tried desperately to like Shogun M.A.D., which looked to be an arcade-ized Heavy Gear. In some dark corner of the Hyperion website, there was a demo, that claimed (iirc) to be a proof of concept test. It looked like crap, but moved along fairly well. It moved right up to your first enemy encounter, where the enemies AI would crash, leaving them motionless, and you without a mission objective.
After the retail release, I never saw any release of an updated demo, leading me to wonder if the engine has improved at all. Their website showed no intention of supporting or promoting their product. If Shogun were 1/10 as fun or complete as Tux:AQFH, I would have bought it. Shogun looked like a strawman project, with such a halfass effort, they can say "see, linux doesn't work, let's get back to Amiga!".
Being a happy owner of all of Loki's bearable titles, and Rune, I am saddened to see them go.
Re:I'm not really surprised by captaineo · 2002-01-23 17:37 · Score: 5, Insightful

Hi James,
What we got from Linux users were not sales, but tons of email demanding that we put up the binary executeables on an ftp site for free so they could download them and use them with their Windows version of the game.
Maybe this is a clue towards a better marketing angle for your services? Linux customers are in this strange situation where the majority of them also run (and buy games for) Windows. So naturally they see a Linux binary as an incremental "nice-to-have" add-on, whereas they won't look twice at a standalone full-price Linux product.
Have you considered giving these people exactly what they ask (for a small fee of course)? I mean, don't produce or ship a full boxed product, just sell downloadable Linux binaries for say 20% the purchase price of the full game (and maybe charge a bit extra for optional tech support hand-holding). This way you get less revenue per sale, but you might make a lot more sales. Of course the economics of this business model might not work out; I just hope it's something you've considered.
Re:I'm not really surprised by Some+Dumbass... · 2002-01-23 17:53 · Score: 5, Insightful

What we got from Linux users were not sales, but tons of email demanding that we put up the binary executeables on an ftp site for free so they could download them and use them with their Windows version of the game.

This goes back to the dual-booting problem. Linux and Windows both run on x86 hardware, while MacOS and AmigaOS do not (I assume most gamers are using x86 CPUs, not SPARCs :). Thus dual-booting to play games is an option for the Linux crowd only. Then there's Wine and (especially!) WineX, the latter being x86-Linux-only right now. My point being, most Linux users have the option to run Windows games somehow, awkward and unpleasant though it may be.

Meanwhile, Linux gamers had to wait an awfully long time for most games to come out after the Windows version was released. When they did, they cost twice as much as the Windows game because the Linux game was "new". If they already bought the Windows (or Mac) version, tough, they get to pay again. Given all this, I'm not surprised that the Linux game market didn't work out. There were some pretty strange economic models involved. Linux gamers have options that users of other OSes don't have. Yet they were being asked to put up with long delays and higher prices just so that they could have The Linux Version of a game. Of course it didn't work. If Linux users had no options, maybe they'd put up with this stuff. But alas, we do, and thus we tend to demand our games more-or-less on time and more-or-less reasonably priced. If they're not, we buy the Windows version. (In general... I personally own 6 Loki games, plus UT bought from TuxGames).

So now, let's look at those complaints from the perspective of someone who can dual-boot or use WineX. You got complaints from people who already had the Windows version. That is, they already paid for the game once. (I assume they could pirate the Linux version just as easily as the Windows one, so let's assume they have legit copies) There's a good chance they could get that game running on dual-booted Windows, or barring that, Wine/WineX. Isn't it obvious why they don't want to have to buy the game again? "Free beer"? Not from their point of view! They figure that they paid once already, so why pay again ("I'll just dual-boot instead until I can get WineX working...")? Obviously, this doesn't work for Hyperion :) But you see my point, right? The Linux market just wasn't going to work as well as other non-Windows markets, because we tend to have access to Windows. Yes, this may be terrible for Linux; but as far as the mob is concerned, second-class treatment just won't cut it.

I do want to thank you and Hyperion for porting some commercial games to Linux. Thanks for helping us out, especially given that it didn't work out financially for you. (Hindsight is 20-20 and all...) Good luck with the MacOS and AmigaOS markets.
Re:I'm not really surprised by iie1195 · 2002-01-23 18:05 · Score: 1

Actually, might there be a better, viable solution to port games to Linux as a service for the actual [Windoze] developer / publisher getting paid by them to provide the Linux port + support? I need help to see why this couldn't be a more viable business solution than porting + publishing Linux specific shrink-wrap software... Alltho, I have to admint, seeing the little Tux on the cover of Loki's ports always makes me smile... :-)
Re:I'm not really surprised by Time+Doctor · 2002-01-23 18:27 · Score: 2, Interesting

This is perhaps the most true comment I've seen.
It is almost always free binaries which people want. Not just demanding them, but _Expecting_ them. Perhaps in the end, this kind of attitude from the large majourity of gamers is what killed Loki.

--
Check out ioquake3.org for a great, free, First-Person Shooter engine!
Re:I'm not really surprised by An+Ominous+Cow+Erred · 2002-01-23 18:38 · Score: 5, Interesting

We actually considered this, unfortunately most major publishers specifically prohibit making their products downloadable -- even after credit card verification. It opens up a big can of worms like credit card fraud and the like so they generally prevent us from doing such things in the license agreement.
In the future as we move more towards distribution of stuff over the 'net, perhaps these attitudes might change, but as it is this is simply not possible. The companies like having that physical box, that keeps the product "real" and makes it harder for numbers to be fudged about the number of copies produced, etc. I do understand this perspective and agree with it somewhat, but the obvious advantages of digital distribution I think will in the end override these concerns. These same issues affect the movie and music industries as well, and they are only just now sticking their toes into the digital content distribution market (after thoroughly sueing a lot of people I might add. :-( ).
We'll see what tomorrow brings.
James Sellman - Hyperion Entertainment - http://www.hyperion-entertainment.com/
Re:I'm not really surprised by TheQuantumShift · 2002-01-23 19:21 · Score: 1

I'm not suprised either. I personally, wouldn't buy some linux port of a win game, mainly because I own a playstation, and am much more satisfied with it, than the constant disappointments of PC games (win or linux). I'd rather see psx/dc emulation under linux than some port of a two or three year old game I don't want. But linux ports of win games do deserve money from those that want to play those games. But most gamers still have a win partition anyway... The problem is, a lot of linux users run around pissing on anything that they can't get for free. These are the same people that wanted to keep KDE out of Debian, and keep P2P piracy alive. They think they have "values" or "scruples", and ignorantly think that just because it runs under linux, it had better be completely open source and free for the taking. Funny, I don't remember hearing much about how Netscape was so evil since it wasn't completely free and open source, everybody used it, because there was no alternative. Of course it is now, and as a result, nobody uses it. They all use Mozilla. Basically, my point is that people will first find a way to get things free. Legally or illegally. Then they will consider buying. It's american nature, and thank god we've managed to spread it around the world. God bless the USA.

--

Shift happens. Fire it up.
Re:I'm not really surprised by Anonymous Coward · 2002-01-23 20:41 · Score: 0

The standard way to determine the size of a userbase is to count Usenet posts over a given period and correlate that with a known number, such as the sales of OpenBSD CDs. To this date, nobody on Slashdot has proposed a better mechanism.

Until this guy's post, I had no idea that there still was a commercial software market for the Amiga at all, outside of the toaster vertical. But, maybe IHBT.
Re:I'm not really surprised by An+Ominous+Cow+Erred · 2002-01-23 20:50 · Score: 1

The lack of response to his post shows that people generally don't respond to trolls. "The Amiga market, by a good estimate, is around 100 times smaller than the Linux community"? Do you notice that he gave no source for this statistic? That's because he just made it up.
Well, maybe I wasn't being humble enough when I called it a "good" estimate, since it really was my own. However it is just that -- an estimate -- one that is based on personal experience. There are a LOT more Linux users than Amiga users. My best GUESS, if you'd rather I phrase it that way, is that there are about 100 Linux users for every Amiga user. It's not based on hard research, just on impressions. Again, I only said it was an estimate. If you have hard figures from a reliably study, then that takes precedence. I would bet an Andy Jackson that my estimate is within an order of magnitude of the exact number.
James Sellman - Hyperion Entertainment - http://www.hyperion-entertainment.com/
Re:I'm not really surprised by bogado · 2002-01-23 23:07 · Score: 2

That is the problem with the llinux game industry, the games are always released after, some times very after, the windows games. People that use linux commonly have a windows partition to play games. What happens people buy the game for windows, and then they simply would not buy the linux version and pay for the same thing twice. If the games were to be released at the same time this problem would be solved.

In fact, in my opinion this porters should work for the game company, and all the versions should come in one CD. The executable part of the game is almost zero if you compare with the rest of the data. And I do think people that use linux would prefer to buy a game that has a little seal with a penguim saing "works with linux".

--
[]'s Victor Bogado da Silva Lins
^[:wq
Re:I'm not really surprised by weinford · 2002-01-24 00:00 · Score: 1

Actually, for me it was the other way round. I bought the Linux Version of Q3, which came in a beautiful metal box. Unfortunetaly I didn't get it working with my soundcard at that time, so I installed from Linux, downloaded the Windows patch and played on Windows. I'd really rather buy the Linux version of any software, although due to EverQuest I mainly use Windows now.

--

This sig is stolen from someone who had a much better idea than I had.
Re:I'm not really surprised by iainl · 2002-01-24 00:01 · Score: 1

Here's another suggestion then- how about something like a Bleemcast! equivalent then; charge less for your port, but require the data files off the 'original' version. I know that Bleem! is dead though, so this obviously doesn't work _that_ well.

Its just that what killed UT and Q3A on Linux was that it was cheaper to buy the discounted Windows version and get the free binaries than it was to buy the Linux-specific one, and people do balk at paying £35 twice for the privilege of getting it running on both platforms. Mind you, they seem to be ok at paying the same price for DVDs even if they bought the VHS release, so maybe its a mindset thing after all.

--
"I Know You Are But What Am I?"
Re:I'm not really surprised by Motor · 2002-01-24 00:24 · Score: 1

What we got from Linux users were not sales, but tons of email demanding that we put up the binary executeables on an ftp site for free so they could download them and use them with their Windows version of the game. For some reason they just couldn't grasp that it cost us money to both license and port the software, and that we didn't see a red cent for the Windows version they bought. It didn't matter, all they wanted was free beer.
I think you are being a bit harsh here. Disclaimer: I hardly ever buy games. I'm just not that interested in them - the last one I bought was Quake 3 (the Linux version). I've no Free/Non-Free objections or anything against people making money from games etc.. etc..
I run Linux almost exclusively - I do have Win98 on my system, but it's rarely been booted. If, when I was getting started with Linux, I wanted to buy a game I would get the Windows version... no question. Why? It's because I know it would likely work (no jokes about BSODs or patches), and I wouldn't have to go through the hassle of getting a refund. Linux - love it though I do - was just too flakely for graphics and sound. Getting a Linux version along with it (or available for download) is a huge bonus since I could try it... and if it didn't work, well, I could always fall back on the Windows version. However it turned out, I'd at least get to play it.
I suppose what I'm trying to say is that those people emailing, cluess though they may be, are probably in that situation. They want to run it under Linux, but don't want to take the risk of paying for it and not working. Not much comfort for Loki or you, I suppose, but at least it shows there is an interest.

--
We all know that crap is king
Give us dirty laundry!
Re:I'm not really surprised by Anonymous Coward · 2002-01-24 00:38 · Score: 0

Your port of Shogo was great! I downloaded the demo and loved it. I still haven't bought, it but that comes down to one thing: the price.
You can get a double pack of Shogo and Septerra Core for Windows for $9.99, where Shogo for Linux costs $20 by itself.
I would love to buy this game for Linux, but right now I can't convince myself that it makes sense to spend twice the money for half what I'd get otherwise.
Re:I'm not really surprised by carleton · 2002-01-24 01:12 · Score: 1

Heh... maybe it's because the Amiga page is the only one of the three (MAc, Linux, and Amiga) pages on your website. I know I for one only knew about your Shogo port, which frankly I couldn't care less about. Any pointers to reviews of the Worms port, as well as where I can buy it?
Re:I'm not really surprised by mshiltonj · 2002-01-24 01:20 · Score: 1

What we got from Linux users were not sales, but tons of email demanding that we put up the binary executeables on an ftp site for free so they could download them and use them with their Windows version of the game.

Hypothetical:
I bought a VHS copy of, say, the Mystery Men movie because it was my favorite movie in recent years.

I have a VCR and a DVD, but for some legal or licensing reason, the DVD release was delayed by six months.

I watch Mystery Men on VHS many many times over that six month period.

When the DVD is finally released, I realize that it is only the movie itself. No director's commentary, no deleted scenes -- just the movie.

Sure, it'd be nice to have Mystery Men on DVD, but I already *have* it on VHS, and the DVD offers no compelling reason to buy a second copy.

Why would I buy a second copy of the same movie for the same (or more) amount of money? The only difference is the format of the medium, but the benefits are only marginal, and questionally marginal at that if I only have a 19" TV with no surround sound.

To add another wrinkle: Licensing usually says you don' *own* your copy Mystery Men, or Tribes. You merely bought the right to view or play it. If I bought/own a license to view Mystery Men, why can't I exercise that use on both VHS and DVD without having the buy two separate licenses?

The analogy is not complete. But the argument remains...

The truth behind the story is that I bought MM on VHS way before I got a DVD. Eventually, I got a DVD, but could not bring myself to by another copy of MM in that format, even with all the extra added features. Luckily, I recieved it as a gift.

We're not cheap bastards, we just want real value for our money.

--
Software Wars
Re:I'm not really surprised by An+Ominous+Cow+Erred · 2002-01-24 01:46 · Score: 1

Heh... maybe it's because the Amiga page is the only one of the three
(MAc, Linux, and Amiga) pages on your website.

That is an issue. The page has been like that for some time, I actually asked that it be fixed up as it's been "under construction" for far too long. There were, however real pages for the Mac and Linux stuff before that, then our site went into redesign and they never got added back. You might be able to find the old pages in Google's cache or something. We *DID* have active pages for Linux at the time our games were released though, so this argument isn't strictly correct. I can understand, however, how one could imagine the situation based on the current status of the website.

James Sellman - Hyperion Entertainment - http://www.hyperion-entertainment.com/
Re:I'm not really surprised by An+Ominous+Cow+Erred · 2002-01-24 01:58 · Score: 2, Informative

Here's another suggestion then- how about something like a Bleemcast!
equivalent then; charge less for your port, but require the data files
off the 'original' version. I know that Bleem! is dead though, so this
obviously doesn't work _that_ well.

You're missing something here -- we don't make a cent on sales of the original. Our cost in terms of pay to our coders to do the port, and the cost per copy of royalties, and the up-front advance payments all stay the same. If we have to pay $5-$10 a copy (royalties vary depending on the agreement) we can't very well sell your Bleemcast-equivalent for cheap and expect to make anything. Bleem! is a totally different scenario. They didn't have to pay a cent in licensing fees/royalties. They just wrote an emulator. Not only that, but the bulk of the work was done after the emulator was written, it just needed tweaking to run a different game. The cost and effort involved per-title is minimal in comparison to what we do. We have to pay to port each game (although if we do multiple Quake engine or multiple Lithtech engine games the ports are a little easier). We have to pay our coders to port it. We have to pay our royalties/up-front license costs. We have to pay these things that Bleem! did not.

James Sellman - Hyperion Entertainment - http://www.hyperion-entertainment.com/
Re:I'm not really surprised by roryh · 2002-01-24 02:11 · Score: 1

Would it be possible to include the Windows and Linux binaries in the box set then, making the data files available to both, but in one package? That way, no distribution channnels would need to change, and Linux users could buy games in their local games store.
Re:I'm not really surprised by mpe · 2002-01-24 02:30 · Score: 2

To add another wrinkle: Licensing usually says you don' *own* your copy Mystery Men, or Tribes. You merely bought the right to view or play it. If I bought/own a license to view Mystery Men, why can't I exercise that use on both VHS and DVD without having the buy two separate licenses?

Customers see this (as with issues surrounding replacement of damaged media) as attempts to rip them off. If the major cost of buying the film is the licence then changing or replacing the media should be a marginal cost. (Since magazines can give away DVD's the media coat self evidently isn't that high.
Re:I'm not really surprised by An+Ominous+Cow+Erred · 2002-01-24 02:58 · Score: 2, Informative

Would it be possible to include the Windows and Linux binaries in the box set then, making the data files available to both, but in one package? That way, no distribution channnels would need to change, and Linux users could buy games in their local games store.
Certainly it's POSSIBLE, it's just that the major publishers don't consider Linux to be worth their time -- period. They won't do it.
Unless you're suggesting that we do the port and somehow magically make it appear on all the Windows version discs. You don't understand, we buy a license for the Linux version. We don't make any money off the sales of the Windows version. Even if we somehow did the port before they were done with the Windows version (how can we port something that isn't done?) and convinced them to put our binary on the disc, we would not make a cent because THEY are selling the Windows version, not us. And if you're about to suggest that they would pay us royalties for the privilige of including our port on their Windows version disc, think again! If they really thought it was worth their money and time to include a Linux version on their Windows install discs, we wouldn't have to license it from them!
For some reason people can't seem to fathom that the people who do the ports have to PAY for the rights, because the original publishers JUST DON'T CARE about Linux. *THEY REALLY DON'T GIVE A DAMN*. They are not about to take the risk of investing in something that they don't care about, so we take the risk by making the investment ourselves (by buying the license and funding the port). If the port sells well, we make money from sales (and they make money from royalties, maybe in the process convincing them that Linux is worthwhile). It's as simple as that.
It really frustrates me that time and time again people keep suggesting the same "solutions" which just aren't possible. The only way to get free downloadable Linux binaries, Linux binaries included with Windows version, or even inexpensive binary-only packages that you combine with the Windows version, is if THE ORIGINAL PUBLISHER is the one doing it. Loki, Hyperion, etc. can't. We can only buy the rights and then sell our own version.
James Sellman - Hyperion Entertainment - http://www.hyperion-entertainment.com/
Re:I'm not really surprised by weinerdog · 2002-01-24 03:28 · Score: 1

As a Linux enthusiast myself (active in my LUG, promoting Linux wherever I can) it really saddens me that so many users will clamor for Linux games but won't actually pony up the money when they become available. It's very, very depressing.

But users are asking for more than simply "Linux games." For many, being able to play games under Linux, rather than having to maintain a separate Windows machine or partition for their gaming, is an idea that appeals to them, but that doesn't mean that getting rid of that Windows partition is the overriding concern.

Do Linux users hate the idea of using Windows or supporting Microsoft so much that they are willing to wait an extra 6 months and pay an extra $30 or more for what may well be a not-so-great port of a Windows game? Some are, but others may reason that they play games for enjoyment, and playing a game becomes less enjoyable when one has to fight an uphill battle to find, pay for, install, and run the game.

I've bought a few commercial Linux games. Some, like CIV:CTP, weren't that great as games to begin with, but my overall feeling is that the Linux ports of Windows games cost more and are somewhat less fun to play than the Windows versions. Personally, I would prefer to give my gaming money to a Linux developer than to a Windows developer, and I would even pay a modest premium to play a game on Linux rather than Windows, but I want a certain standard of quality. I want a game that works well with and is fun to play under Linux.

I think that there is a reason that Nethack is still quite popular; it certainly doesn't win any awards for sound and graphics (not even xnethack), but it is a fun game that is well-designed, and rather than behaving like a fish out of water, it works well in its environment. The fact that its open source is also great, but am more than willing to pay real money for proprietary Linux games, if they are fun.

--
There's no such thing as Scotchtoberfest!
Re:I'm not really surprised by Anonymous Coward · 2002-01-24 05:29 · Score: 0

What we need then, is a closed community that develops the Linux port in parallel with the game itself, then the original game maker will toss it on the disc. Why the hell wouldn't they? It's literally no-risk. And then we'll take polls and stuff to help convince them that Linux is profitable.

Of course, we need to convince them to let that closed community get their hands on the source.
Re:I'm not really surprised by ArsonSmith · 2002-01-24 06:41 · Score: 1

Sorry I know this is hashed to death but has this been tried (I'm sure it has)

negotiate a smaller license price for distributing a cheap Linux update to the windows version. This way you would make the $5-10 on each update and the original distributor would still make there money because you would have to buy both in order for it all to work. You pay far less up front you could have a small cd envelope and not need a full boxed version to ship. You could distribute in magazines etc with a cd key for unlocking the binarys.

I am sure there is a flaw somewhere but it seems it would work.

--
Paying taxes to buy civilization is like paying a hooker to buy love.
Re:I'm not really surprised by jungd · 2002-01-24 07:29 · Score: 1

I, for one, would happily pay 150%, perhaps even 200% for a Linux version of a new game, but NOT if it were released a week after the Windows version. I will not wait that long. I think this is a common attitude.

--
/..sig file not found - permission denied.
Re:I'm not really surprised by Anonymous Coward · 2002-01-24 07:54 · Score: 0

Hyperion ported games to Linux?!?!? Woot... Er wait, the page has been under construction for 6 months. I can see level of support here. (Sorry, I just call it as I see it.) If I could see what products you had maybe there would be a better chance of selling product.

I currently own 12 game titles for Linux. My main complaint has been with having to wait sometimes years to get same game at a premium price to the windows version. My best gaming experiences where for games released at the same time as the windows version. Given that choice, I will ALWAYS buy the Linux version.
Re:I'm not really surprised by JosefK · 2002-01-24 08:04 · Score: 1

The problem with that attitude is that most publishers won't give a porting house the code until *after* the Windows version is finished. The publisher has its own timetable, and could really care less about when a version they're not making comes out. It's no money out of their pocket when the Linux versions don't sell. In fact, they're making money even when the Linux versions don't sell. And after all, what do you think they would prefer: a bunch of Linux gamers who get tired of waiting for the port and buy the Windows version (money directly in the publishers pocket), while also making money selling the porting rights to some foolhardy porting house that won't sell any copies because everyone already bought the Windows version; or to finance cross-platform development up front and pay to publish a Linux version concurrently with the Windows version, when the return for the Linux version is arguably likely to be a miniscule fraction of the return on the Windows game?

There are some developers who've gotten the cross-platform bug, but they are few and far between, and the experience of porting houses like Loki and Hyperion doesn't seem to show the publishers changing their tune any time in the near future. And it's the publishers who call the shots, not the porting houses.
Re:I'm not really surprised by enol · 2002-01-24 17:14 · Score: 1

As long as people think of linux as a "hobbists'" OS, Linux game ports will fail. Why do linux users, simply because it mostly runs open source programs, demand proprietory ones to be given away as well?

If I owned a Windows version of CivIII, that does not in any way give me the right to call Sid Meier and demand to have the MacOS version for free because I *own* the game already. No one has a problem with this, why is it that when it comes to Linux, everything must be "free" or nil? This mentality is really disturbing. People must realize that Linux is a powerful OS of its own, capable of being productive, and a LEGITIMATE OS of its own, not something that sits on a partition on the side next to Winodws which you can run back to if you "really" want to have work done. If the only OS you had was Linux, and you wanted to play games, you would pay for games.
Re:I'm not really surprised by Anonymous Coward · 2002-01-24 17:29 · Score: 0

Thanks for your comments.

To me there are two main problems with the Linux gaming scene:

1. Major game titles didn't get ported

We got Sin ported to Linux, when the whole market went to Half-Life. How many copies of Half-Life would you have sold if you'd put the same effort into that? Yes the licence would have cost more but you'd have sold far more copies and it would have given your company a higher profile and also significantly raised the credibility of Linux as a gaming platform.

How many Linux users kept dual-booting Windoze just to play Counterstrike?

Another example of a legend that was never ported (albeit a bit older) was Duke Nukem 3D.

2. the example of ID

The *REALLY* big games that did make it to Linux (the Quake series) all had Linux binaries supplied by ID for free download. (Note that I did purchase the boxed versions of all versions of Linux Quake.)

When Unreal did the same thing with UT I think people came to expect it: buy the Windows version and download the Linux binaries for free.

It's not my expectation (I'm waiting for the boxed Linux version of RTCW to come out before buying that game) but I think that's the expectation of a lot of Linux users; they've already bought the game licence as they see it by buying the Windoze version.

I think the only way out of this is for Linux binaries to be produced *by the original developer* and included with the package the way Mac binaries are with some games. But that doesn't help Hyperion unless you could persuade them to pay you to help with the porting.

You want a market niche to try for? Try finding a Linux simulator (other than Flightgear). I'd be happy to buy IL-2 and Need for Speed 4 or Porsche Unlimited or the equivalents. Think about it.

PS - what's the best way to get a copy of Sin for Linux in Australia? Is there any way of getting Wages of Sin to run with the Linux Sin binary?
Re:I'm not really surprised by iainl · 2002-01-24 21:19 · Score: 1

aah, I see. I was hoping that the publisher you bought the rights off might be of the mindset to take a smaller cut on the title where it entailed purchase of the original release. i.e. regard a Linux/Amiga port as like an expansion disc rather than a sequel.

Mind you, I didn't get a discount from Universal when I bought Lost World (I think its fun, ok?) on DVD, despite already having the laserdisc and VHS releases, which is the nearest equivalent I can think of.

--
"I Know You Are But What Am I?"
Re:I'm not really surprised by Anonymous Coward · 2002-01-25 10:27 · Score: 0

The number of Amiga's ever made by Commodore and ESCOM in 1985-1996 is commonly agreed to be five million, although the CEO of Amiga Inc., the current mother company of Amiga, did say on a CNN Digital Jam interview in 2000 that the installed base was seven million (this is most likely in error, recordings of this interview can be found via Google). No new Amiga's (with the exception of one or two specialized models and some prototypes) have been built since 1996.

A partner and an executive of Amiga Inc., Fleecy Moss was quoted saying "Estimates vary from 50,000 to 500,000," on the size of the Amiga community also back in 2000 (read the story in http://www.eetimes.com/story/OEG20000113S0030). Of the above-mentioned five million, only some of the machines are capable of running current software (e.g. an A500, which covers much of that number, could ever dream to do that only with the most extreme of expansions if at all).

The PowerPC accelerators, recommended for these games, number most likely in thousands - as do the 3D accelerators. Sales figures of these have been floating around in the Internet, but I was unable to locate them at this time and of course one can question their validity. But it would be quite silly to expect them to be more than in five figures considering they came out years after the last "normal" Amiga was built (which has clearly resulted in decreasing market).

How many Linux users are out there? You tell me, you are the experts on that subject. One estimate (http://counter.li.org/estimates.php) put it up to 18 million, not sure how old that is. Another in 1998 (http://www.of.org/rhaptel/proposal/faq/base.html) at 7,5 million - should be considerably more by now. One site (http://www.metasystema.org/welcome.mhtml) talks about 30 million "by now" but I'm not sure when "now" was.

But if we take James Sellman's comment of "100 Linux users for each Amiga user" and take it as it was meant to be, a ball-park figure, and use Fleecy Moss' estimates as a guide 50 000 Amiga users would require 5 million Linux users in the world for the 100-rule to be accurate, 500 000 Amiga users on the other hand would require 50 million. Personally, having been active in the Amiga community and user group activities for years, would estimate the size of the Amiga community to be closer to 50 000 than 500 000 thousand - and the size is even less for those who have adequately specced machines for the games in subject.

The 100-rule would sound pretty reasonable, if not in any way scientific (I'm sure it was not meant to be that either).

Death of Gaming on Linux by indaba · 2002-01-23 16:16 · Score: 1, Insightful

Well, that's it guys, you've just read the obituary of commercial gaming on linux.

Go and buy a X-Box, PS2 or N-Cube, 'cos that's the only place that the majors will pour dev money into in the future, esp as these games get more and more complex, ie approaching Hollywood $$ levels of investment to deliver.

Why ? It wouldn't surprise me if M$oft stop developing DirectX etc on the Windoze PC platform and only dev/push it on the X-Box in order to drive sales towards the X-Box.

From the end user POV, with gaming on PC's - why should I spend 2x or 3x as much for a souped up games PC that can play modern games.

I did that analysis , then went out and bought a PS2 with GT3 - works for me :- )

Darren Kruse CCNP CCDP
WAN/LAN Networking Consultant
mailto://darren_kruse@hotmail.com
www.geocities.com/darren_kruse

Re:Death of Gaming on Linux by indaba · 2002-01-23 19:01 · Score: 1

thanks - I didn't think it was flamebait either !
got modded back up by some more "Insightful" soul ;-)
Re:Death of Gaming on Linux by xtremex · 2002-01-23 19:50 · Score: 1

I personally think the X-box is a piece of crap. I am not a gamer, but when I do have this strong desire to pplay a game, I go to blockbuster and rent a PS2. So, the other week, my buddy who is lawyer (it's funny seeing a 45 yr old man playing Halo!), bought himself an Xbox. Not being one to allow only HIM to play the cool games, I rented one from Blockbuster, out of the titles they had, 90% already existed on the PS2, then we had Halo. So I got Halo. it looked very pretty. Sound was fantastic (gotta love Bose!), but that was about it. I got bored after about 20 minutes. So i booted up my old crusty WInlaptop (it exists solely for the sims) and played that instead. Xbox is like WIndows. Pure vanity. It's like a beautiful chick, who is as dumb as a stump. Can't even boil water w/o screwing it up. You stay with her HOPING she might be the one. Then you just stay because "she looks darn purty. I'll boil my own water"

--
If you're not a Liberal in your 20's, then you have no heart.If you're still a Liberal in your 30's you have no brain.
Re:Death of Gaming on Linux by Anonymous Coward · 2002-01-23 21:09 · Score: 0

Just a hint - there's no reason to type up your /. messages in Word. Use the spel chucker in Outlook Express if need be. If you want curly quotes, use the proper Unicode entity references (http://www.pemberley.com/janeinfo/latin1.utf8)
Re:Death of Gaming on Linux by byran+lei · 2002-01-24 01:17 · Score: 0

>Well, thats it guys, youve just read the obituary of commercial gaming
>on linux.
>
>
>
No,this pretty much spells the death of the PC as a platform for gaming. Just look at the reaction to the annoucement. PC gamer are acting like Linux users were supposed to run out and buy ports of PC games they didn't want or had no interest in,and now are getting bent out of shape over the fact. The real story here that nobody want to talk about is that the Linux userbase is made up of a large number of people who either have absolutely no interest in PC gaming or have totally abandoned the PC as a gaming platform (PS1/PS2/GameCube owners for instance). Just take a look the XMAS of the PS2 for instance. It's been stated that Sony sold over *5 MILLION* PS2's over XMAS world-wide. No wonder the PC gaming community is shitting in their pants over the lack of interest in PC games they see in the Linux community.

One size... by AntipodesTroll · 2002-01-23 16:17 · Score: 4, Redundant

Dosent fit all. Wholly open source and popular-commercial-gaming just dont seem to go together.

Carmack is right, Linux gaming isnt a viable market. As asthetically displeasing as it is to the faithfull crowd, Windows holds the market on the gaming market. Hopefully this will accelerate the development going on in WINE and other API abstraction layers out there, so one day we can run most any Windows game reliably on Linux. That will be better IMO than Loki (or another company) scrabbling to port a subset of Win games to Linux, after the fact.

It is just plain more efficient for all involved, after all.

--
Anyone who considers arithmetical methods of producing random numbers is, of course, in a state of sin.-John von Neumann

Re:One size... by Yohahn · 2002-01-23 16:28 · Score: 1

As a paying user of winex, I'd have to disagree.
Loki's games are so much better/easier than having to "kludge" it with winex.

I can only hope that someday there will be enough of a DESKTOP usage of Linux that games will be viable. I was hoping that this would happen before loki had to fold.

Goodbye Loki, we'll miss you.
Re:One size... by PlaysWithMatches · 2002-01-23 16:44 · Score: 1

That's very true. One reason I signed up for TransGaming some months ago was that very reason. Namely, while Loki ported some awesome games (Tribes 2, yeah baby), they couldn't bring me some things I wanted. Diablo II, Half-Life, and others.

They're "too old" or the developers wouldn't allow them to port the games. But with WineX, I can run them. I have my issues with their licensing policy, but honestly I can get past those for now. Yes, it'd be great if the code was fully open, but it allows me to play my games, and I'm happy with the product. That's all that matters to me at the moment. Anyway, off I go to slay some more demons in the depths of Hell. ;)

--

Mozilla's a nice operating system, but it needs a better browser.
Re:One size... by linzeal · 2002-01-23 16:55 · Score: 1

Its not going to be a desktop but a console market that will bring unix gaming to the masses or make it viable. Since netbsd runs on damn near everything maybe that would be a better platform. The consoles could be cheap ~50 play simple 2-D and 3-D games and with an expansion play more advanced 3-D games. Since desktop machines would be far more powerful an emulator would be reasonable.

--
An Education is the Font of All Liberty
Re:One size... by Anonymous Coward · 2002-01-23 17:05 · Score: 0

That's a losing battle dude.
Re:One size... by Yohahn · 2002-01-23 17:15 · Score: 1

I really don't think so.

I really think the free software movement is glacial.

It was started in the 80's nobody'd even heard of it till the mid 90's really.

These things all move gradually.

pessimism dosen't help
Re:One size... by Ami+Ganguli · 2002-01-23 17:18 · Score: 2

There's nothing fundamental about free software that makes gaming impractical, it just comes down to market share. The Linux desktop just doesn't have the market share yet. It'll be a few more years. Loki is a victim of poor timing.

My worry is that other desktop oriented companies - for example Mandrake, Suse, and Ximian - will have the same problem. Too high of a burn rate to hold out for three more years. The only ones left might well be Red Flag Linux. I bet that would make Americans really happy :-).

--
It is tempting, if the only tool you have is a hammer, to treat everything as if it were a nail. - Abraham Maslow
Re:One size... by Anonymous Coward · 2002-01-23 18:31 · Score: 0

Ironic that you quote Maslow in your posting... It reminds me of Linux zealots thinking everything and anything should run on Linux. Linux seems like the best tool for every job when it's the only tool you've got or recognize.
Re:One size... by Afrosheen · 2002-01-23 19:25 · Score: 2

Keep in mind Transgaming's goal in life. Once they recoup X amount of dollars to recover development costs, their code is going to be merged into the public wine tree and open sourced. So everyone that 'subscribes' contributes to the software being free eventually. Sounds like a good business plan to me, everyone gets what they want.
Re:One size... by Ami+Ganguli · 2002-01-23 19:25 · Score: 2

So are you arguing that general-purpose operating systems like Linux and Windows shouldn't be used for games? Not everybody has or wants a dedicated game machine.

--
It is tempting, if the only tool you have is a hammer, to treat everything as if it were a nail. - Abraham Maslow
Re:One size... by aussersterne · 2002-01-23 21:44 · Score: 2

Wine is crap so far. And it's been crap for years now.

There seem to be all of these Wine fans crawling around saying "Wine is great" and "Wine is beautiful" and "Wine is not an emulator" and "Wine will save Linux and make Loki obsolete because someday we will all run Windows apps under Linux!"

Well right now, the emperor has no clothes. NONE of the major Wine trees right now runs anything terribly well. Wine may not be an emulator, but it certainly sucks memory, processor time, and stability like one.

I for one prefer native software, thanks. Oh yeah, I knew you were going to say that: "Wine IS native software! Wine is an API, not an emulator, duh!"

Fine. Let me make it simple... I for one prefer non-Wine software!

As in "software that works."

Like Loki's.

*sigh*

--
STOP . AMERICA . NOW
Re:One size... by dzym · 2002-01-24 00:07 · Score: 1

Sounds like extortion to me.

Pay us X amount of dollars and we'll give you the source.

Oh wait ...
Re:One size... by mpe · 2002-01-24 02:33 · Score: 2

Carmack is right, Linux gaming isnt a viable market.

Actually what this proves is that it isn't a viable market to have games written for Windows, then ported to Linux some time afterwards.
It says nothing about what might happen were games to be released at the same tiem for different platforms or for Linux before Windows. Or even a multiplatform version on one box.

Why is this *news*? by Anonymous Coward · 2002-01-23 16:17 · Score: 0

Linux companies going under -- that's like saying the Earth spins around once each day!

The worst part by xwred1 · 2002-01-23 16:18 · Score: 2, Insightful

The worst part of this is that trying to be a Linux gamer will be alot harder, since there's almost nothing coming down the pipeline anymore. I really don't want to use Wine or WineX if I can avoid it. In my experience, Loki's ports have been superior to, if not equal to, the Win32 port's quality.

Maybe I will just because a bitter ex-gamer, and only play Doom 3 (which will by then, probably be the only newish commercial Linux game). Serious Sam will be nice too, but by the time its done, it probably won't be big in the lanning scene, which is where I do most of my gaming.

Re:The worst part by Time+Doctor · 2002-01-23 18:25 · Score: 1

Well, no. The Serious Sam port most likely will not just be the first encounter. Besides that you have some okay points there :)

--
Check out ioquake3.org for a great, free, First-Person Shooter engine!

opensourcing everything by antistuff · 2002-01-23 16:19 · Score: 5, Informative

It looks like a lot of people are saying that loki should make everything opensource. Rather than respond to each thread, ill just post the general response here. They cant. They dont actualy make games, they port them, and the orriginal maker still has the copyright for it. Loki isnt allowed to just release the source to it. Rather than release the source, I hope they sell all their games for like $10 or somthing in a going out of buissness thing. I only bought three of thier games and there are a couple more I would like.

--
Mess Stuff Up

Re:opensourcing everything by Anonymous Coward · 2002-01-23 16:22 · Score: 0

One word:

Abandonware
Re:opensourcing everything by alsta · 2002-01-23 16:36 · Score: 1, Redundant

They won't. The reason they won't is because they don't own the rights to the games which they have ported. It's not their source code to do with as they please.

Microsoft releases source code to select customers which it deems may need it. But just because you have somebody else's source code doesn't mean it's open source.

Sorry.

--
Wealth is the product of man's capacity to think. -Ayn Rand
Re:opensourcing everything by Anonymous Coward · 2002-01-23 17:43 · Score: 0

They are talking about the TOOLS and code Loki used to port games not the games themselves fool!
Re:opensourcing everything by wilhelm · 2002-01-23 17:52 · Score: 1

They may be doing this already. I was in Microcenter the other day, and picked up 4 Loki titles for $5 apiece (Myth II, Railroad Tycoon II, Heroes of Might & Magic 3, Eric's Ultimate Solitaire). There were another couple (Heretic II, Descent III) which were $10, but I didn't have the 3D accelerator they required, so I didn't get them. Though that could have just been the store trying to get rid of them... dunno.
Re:opensourcing everything by lemox · 2002-01-23 18:05 · Score: 1

Too much caffeine? Did you even read the parent post or just look at the subject and shoot off a reply?

--
"We obviously need a new moderation category: (-1, Woo-fucking-hoo)" --Mr. AC
Re:opensourcing everything by antistuff · 2002-01-23 18:21 · Score: 1

The tools and code they used to port them are already open fool. www.libsdl.org

--
Mess Stuff Up
Re:opensourcing everything by Anonymous Coward · 2002-01-23 20:44 · Score: 0

I was in Microcenter the other day, and picked up 4 Loki titles for $5 apiece (Myth II, Railroad Tycoon II, Heroes of Might & Magic 3, Eric's Ultimate Solitaire). There were another couple (Heretic II, Descent III) which were $10, but I didn't have the 3D accelerator they required, so I didn't get them. Though that could have just been the store trying to get rid of them... dunno.

Gee, you think? I thought ALL games retailed for $5-10!!!!

Take this as further proof that not only is there no Linux gaming market, but that the Linux community didn't stand behind their pledges to actually buy some Linux games.
Re:opensourcing everything by dzym · 2002-01-24 00:10 · Score: 1

Great!

Instead of getting them the money they need to survive, let's all wait for them to shut down and buy everything from the bargain bin!

What a wonderful way to support such an excellent company, don't you think?

No wonder they're talking about shutting down.
Re:opensourcing everything by antistuff · 2002-01-24 01:43 · Score: 1

I paid for three of thier games, how many did you buy?

--
Mess Stuff Up

Good idea, bad business by Ryan+Amos · 2002-01-23 16:21 · Score: 1, Informative

Loki did a great service for the Linux community.

I'm surprised they survived as long as they did.

As far as I know, they didn't really sell anything, they just ported the executables of Windows games to Linux. Without selling anything, you bleed cash. The ironic thing is, games are probably the ONLY thing you can really sell on Linux. Most everything (web servers, office software, etc) has a Free alternative, but games are unique. The sad thing is, they just released the executables, so people bought the windows game and downloaded the binary and libraries and just copied the maps/textures.

The question is now, with Loki gone, will the commercial Linux game market disappear? id was gung-ho about it with Q3, but after abyssmal Linux boxed sales, decided it wasn't such a smart idea. Most other game companies don't have plans to port things to Linux, and Loki was usually the company that did all the work. Now that they're gone, do Linux game addicts have to break down and install Windows?

Or will the Linux gaming community shift its focus towards emulation, with projects such as Lindows and WINE? These projects are becoming quite mature, and can already run complex games like Half-Life. It's an interesting situation, and I'll be watching how it unfolds over the next few months.

Re:Good idea, bad business by Anonymous Coward · 2002-01-23 16:48 · Score: 0

and I'll be watching how it unfolds over the next few months.

Me too! Right from this trusty chair...
Re:Good idea, bad business by Fizgig · 2002-01-23 17:02 · Score: 1

As far as I know, they didn't really sell anything, they just ported the executables of Windows games to Linux.

No, they sold boxed versions of the games with the Linux executables. You couldn't download those separately. The only exception (that I know of) was Quake III, which Loki didn't port (id did). They just distributed it and so it was up to id to release binaries for free or not.
Re:Good idea, bad business by Anonymous Coward · 2002-01-23 17:15 · Score: 0

Huh? This karmawhore gets a 4, Informative for a moderator friendly piece that has more holes than the Titanic? Loki never released binaries. They SOLD games, which completely blows this schmuck's ludicrous theory right out the window. They never allowed people to just download executables and use their Windows equivalent. id software is the one who pioneered that idea and one of the few that continues to do it. Jackass.
Re:Good idea, bad business by Anonymous Coward · 2002-01-23 18:31 · Score: 0

Now that they're gone, do Linux game addicts have to break down and install Windows?
Linux game addicts don't have to break down and do anything, they already have Windows installed.

OH WELL by rice_burners_suck · 2002-01-23 16:21 · Score: 2

Perhaps Loki Games will somehow find a buyer, and they'll continue to operate under a different name. Like AOL/Loki.

OH WELL.

Re:OH WELL by mgkimsal2 · 2002-01-23 16:28 · Score: 2

It would probably be AOLoki (or maybe that's too obvious?) :)

--
creation science book
Re:OH WELL by Colin+Bayer · 2002-01-23 16:35 · Score: 1

[warning: Kohan reference below]

"With new AOL 7.0, get 70 kajillion free hours... FOR THE DARK MASTER!"

--
Want Linux games? HERE.

who will take over distribution? by neowintermute · 2002-01-23 16:21 · Score: 1

Who's going to take over for them? I'm sure there are still people buying Q3A and lots of other games.

I wonder what they'll do to make sure these apps don't just disappear from the landscape.

--

hyperpoem.net

Re:who will take over distribution? by npietraniec · 2002-01-23 16:37 · Score: 1

I just bought Quake for Linux a few weeks ago. The metal box was only 10 bucks. I doubt they're making much of a profit on that

There's obviously not too much of a demand.
Re:who will take over distribution? by Anonymous Coward · 2002-01-23 17:35 · Score: 0

They will disappear, probably. Unless someone buys the rights that Loki purchased with blood, sweat, tears, and a shoestring (borrowed).

At least one other company is still in active development (Linux Game Publishing, doing Majesty and packaging Creatures), but that won't completely make up for the gaping hole in the landscape that this leaves behind.

Sad to see them go by Evanrude · 2002-01-23 16:22 · Score: 3, Informative

I try and purchase any Linux games I see on store shelves. I was surprised to see Railroad Tycoon II in my local Best Buy a few weeks ago.

I thought that *maybe* Linux gaming was starting to become more main stream. Truly a sad day for Linux gaming

--

~.Evanrude

Every Amiga is 'game ready' by mgkimsal2 · 2002-01-23 16:23 · Score: 2

Every Amiga comes with minimal standard gaming hardware (video chips/sound/etc). MANY "Linux" boxes are just boxes - servers, etc. - without video or sound (or at least video/sound usable for a game). True, there is a great number of Linux machines out there - I'd hazard a guess to say most aren't configured for gaming, and configuring it isn't a piece of cake...

--
creation science book

Re:Every Amiga is 'game ready' by Banjonardo · 2002-01-23 16:55 · Score: 1

Configuring it isn't a piece of cake..."
Agreed. I just installed Mandrake 8.1 , cause I've never used Linux before. While I've managed to mess a whole lot of stuff up, I still am using it (right now, in fact) and liking a lot. But the problem with gaming on Linux is the LIBRARIES.
I wanna play tuxracer, but I simply cannot. The driver on my NVIDIA card messes up the SDLlib and this and that.....it's a pain!
Libraries are kind of a pain for a first time user.

--
-----
Score 3? For what? Being wrong, at length? - smirkleton
Re:Every Amiga is 'game ready' by Anonymous Coward · 2002-01-23 16:59 · Score: 1, Interesting

In the case of Hyperions titles, that's not necessarily true. Most or if not all of their titles require PPC and 3D support. Now the Amiga community is small at best, but the number of people that have machine with (expensive) PPC cards and a 3D video cards is a miniscule part of that small community. Given how the Amiga titles have outsold the Linux versions, this makes the situation all the more disappointing.
Re:Every Amiga is 'game ready' by Anonymous Coward · 2002-01-23 18:22 · Score: 0

You may wanna fix the link in your sig. Fuck, as if putting advertising links in sigs wasn't bad enough...
Re:Every Amiga is 'game ready' by God_Retired · 2002-01-23 18:27 · Score: 1

Right on. Let me say first off that I'm not a gamer. But I figured with all the talk I should see what it's all about. So I bought a joystick. Spent a couple hours and couldn't get it to work. I've been using Linux since '96 so I can usually get things installed, configured and working. I just figured, hey, this isn't that big of a deal to me, and I suppose I can boot into M$ if I really want to play a game. If it still boots, it's been months since I rebooted.
Re:Every Amiga is 'game ready' by Longstaff · 2002-01-23 20:03 · Score: 1

What kind of joystick?

I didn't have any problem whatsoever taking an hour to install the joy-console drivers and *build* a box to plug my original SNES controllers into via the parallel port. They work like a dream :-)
Re:Every Amiga is 'game ready' by Anonymous Coward · 2002-01-23 21:53 · Score: 0

Would you rather each software install silently trashed any previous version of shared libraries, like on windows? That way, your latest install always works, but anything previously installed might break...

I HATE that "feature" of windows.
Re:Every Amiga is 'game ready' by God_Retired · 2002-01-25 14:16 · Score: 1

Ahh, don't know if you are going to read this. It was a super cheap Fry's dual joystick, kind of playstation type thing. But it did say "Linux Compatable" on the box. One of these days I'll read up on it all again and try it.

Quake3 for 10 bucks by bryanbrunton · 2002-01-23 16:24 · Score: 1

You can still get their port of Quake3 (which comes in the nice tine box) from www.ebgames.com for only 10 bucks. Go to ebgames.com and do a search for Linux.

You can even easily convert it to the Win32 version (not sure why you would want to).

Score 2....come on! by gnarled · 2002-01-23 16:24 · Score: 0, Offtopic

People get modded down all the time for off topic posts, and somehow this gets a score 2 for just using an emoticon. Seems like you get modded down for disagreeing with the prevailing opinion and up for agreeing no matter how weak, or unexistent your comment is.

I guess this was off-topic.

--
I'm a firm believer in the philosophy of a ruling class. Especially since I rule. -Randal, Clerks

Delay between Windows and Linux port did them in? by Masem · 2002-01-23 16:26 · Score: 5, Insightful

Most of Loki's port came out 6 to 12 months after the Windows version was released. Now, maybe 5-6 years ago, this would be reasonable, but in today's age, the average lifecycle for a game with a multiplayer element is at most 3 months, with only a few notable exceptions (Half-Life Counterstrike, for example). After that initial 3 months, while people will still be playing these games, there's definitely a lack of servers for that game. While single-player elements can be used 'indefinitely', the lack of a usable multiplayer element when the port is released is a bad selling point.

Understandably, Loki's method couldn't allow them to start the port much earlier, as it seems they waited until a 'popular' game emerged from new releases. The same thing appears to be happening with the Mac market, but maybe not as apparent as a Mac owner doesn't have the same dual-booting option that many Linux users have. A better method, as demonstrated by id, is to work on the port at the same time, either in house or with outside help, such that the binaries for all systems of interest can be released near-simulateously.

--
"Pinky, you've left the lens cap of your mind on again." - P&TB
"I can see my house from here!" - ST:

bloody vanity sites.... by Anonymous Coward · 2002-01-23 16:28 · Score: 0

I thought only gothettes have photos of themselves on their homepage.

Lucius Sour

Re:bloody vanity sites.... by Anonymous Coward · 2002-01-23 16:31 · Score: 0

I thought gothettes only posted pictures of their skinnier friends.

I think this could be a good thing... by Anonymous Coward · 2002-01-23 16:29 · Score: 0

This means plenty of free games for Linux people.

Simply because with Loki dead and those games going out of print, they're abandonware.

So spread the word, and most importantly, those of you who bought games off Loki, SPREAD THE GAMES.

Hopefully all the free games being distributed by the people, for the people spark some life into Linux gaming.

Re:I think this could be a good thing... by Anonymous Coward · 2002-01-23 17:11 · Score: 0

No, you will just make the developers very angry. Disenfranchised and bitter, they will turn to profitable gaming companies that use closed, proprietary hardware and copy protection.

"whining"? by xg0blin · 2002-01-23 16:29 · Score: 1

Do you have any idea what you're talking about? You agreed that windows "currently" is a better gaming platform. Ok, agreed. Next, I never said you shouldn't use linux, I have a dual-boot computer, I use Linux, just not for gaming. Like I said, if windows is better for something use windows, if linux is better at something use linux. This is the kind of blind fanatacism I'm talking about. Someone has to program the games too? Umm....people that use windows can't program? Jesus man, look past the end of your nose. You are one of the blind followers of Linux, that don't even know why you use it. You just accept it at face value that it's better because some other fanatic told you so. I love linux too, but you're the kind of fanatic that makes linux users look bad. Windows has a half a billion games, and linux has tux-racer and q3. Hate to break it to you, but most of the programs you use on linux are CLONES of programs already available on windows. When they are on an even keel, i'll take dual boot off my computer as well, but not until then

Re:"whining"? by Anonymous Coward · 2002-01-23 17:00 · Score: 0

He meant by "someone has to program the games" that many game programmers probably use linux as a dev environment which is probably true. There is hope that some of these developers will evangelise porting their games to linux like ID software does.
Re:"whining"? by Anonymous Coward · 2002-01-23 17:15 · Score: 0

Um, like ID software did. Past tense.
Re:"whining"? by Anonymous Coward · 2002-01-23 17:59 · Score: 0

Graeme Devine is coding DOOM 3 in Mac OS X. The Q3A master and authentication servers are also OS X. Linux is third place at id (if you don't count consoles), and that's about as high as they're getting at any gaming company.
Re:"whining"? by Anonymous Coward · 2002-01-24 01:59 · Score: 0

blabla...

The fact that Linux can keep up with windows, when windows is optimzied for gaming and linux not says enough about linux potential as a gaming platform, I do see blind fanaticsm with linux users, but even more the other way around, most windows users don get the fact that their use of the windows platform eleiminates future choiche, not only for them but also for me, the fact that most games come out for windows doesn't say that the platform is better, so suggesting that its a bad sign that most of the linux games are clones/ports of native windows games is not that smart, windows got it's support from the beginning (from IBM), Linux has to compete with a corrupt monopolist (backed up by morons such as bush) to get more support, the fact that Linux has come as far as this clearly prooves that it's a better platform than windows will ever be..

You want no choice, no competition and thus no innovation...talking about being blind

Red Hat already owns them by Anonymous Coward · 2002-01-23 16:30 · Score: 0

Red Hat owns a significant portion of Loki, so they will probably get most of the assets.

LOKI? WTF was Loki? by Anonymous Coward · 2002-01-23 16:30 · Score: 0

I love video games but who the fuck are they?

How this impacts *my* company by b.foster · 2002-01-23 16:32 · Score: 5, Insightful

I work for a small, moderately successful custom software company. We've got 95 employees and serve mostly medium size businesses in the U.S. that need us to engineer supply chain and inventory management software.

You may wonder why a bombshell in the Linux games market impacts us. Well, I did as well, until I started hanging out with my boss and understanding the way the marketing department works. And now I know that Loki's death is yet another nail in the coffin of the concept of ever using Linux on a client site again.

The problem here stems from the fact that customers purchase buzzwords from us, not solutions. Our software is simple - it can be implemeted in FORTRAN and run on VMS, for all we care. In the late 1990s, we began a massive shift from NT to Linux because, well, our clients asked us for a massive shift from NT to Linux. They didn't care that it was free (they still paid us for our "official" copy of Redhat which we made with our CD copies). They wanted it because it was fashionable. And that is why the tide has turned on us Linux fans now. Linux is out; it is not a hot topic anymore. Companies are asking for what they believe to be the "tried and true" solutions, and most of those come from Redmond and from Big Blue (and we aren't talking OS/2 here). If we stuck to our guns and sold Linux products, we would lose a lot of business and wind up in va's situation - barely alive. It's sad but that's the way it is. I want nothing to do with Windows but if I don't learn it, I will inevitably cost my company money and lose my job as a result.

What can we do to turn the tide in our favor again? Learn to write. Offer to write a computer advice column in your local/school newspaper and encourage users to pursue Free solutions. When somebody writes in with an Outlook problem, steer them toward Pine or Mutt. Take the time to teach people how to use Linux - if you let them sink or swim, they will take the path of least resistance and make billg richer. Nobody said it would be easy, but the only way our grass roots movement can succeed is by pursuading users to switch, one at a time.

Bill

Re:How this impacts *my* company by npietraniec · 2002-01-23 16:47 · Score: 1

When somebody writes in with an Outlook problem, steer them toward Pine or Mutt.

I use pine, but... Steer a clueless user with an Outlook problem to pine or mutt? I could see evolution or Kmail maybe, but pine??? There's a small minority of people who could prefer pine to outlook if they didn't have to use any of Outlook hundreds of other features... I mean, we've come a looooong way since ASCII terminals.
Re:How this impacts *my* company by Anonymous Coward · 2002-01-23 17:15 · Score: 1, Funny

You wimp. If someone comes in with an Outlook problem, steer them toward a manual typewriter.
Re:How this impacts *my* company by Anonymous Coward · 2002-01-23 17:21 · Score: 0

Been there done that...you know the rest.

The biggest interest I ever saw in linux was when the redhat ipo took place.BTW thanks for the IPO shares redhat you bought me a car!!! Anyway after that I could not talk to a client without hearing about Redhat. Of course it did not matter that redhat made linux, only that their name was "hot" and they made something that was new and revolutionary. So I did a lot of redhat installs and was happy to spread the love.

So flash forward to now and linux is not the panacea it once seemed and personally I just don't see the level of interest that was once there. I still manage my current linux clients, but it feels like most companies are not will to "risk" going opensource now. I try to explain that going MS is even worse in certain situation, but MS is what people know and feel comfortable with. And right now I don't think there has ever been a time when people want or need to feel more comfortable.
Re:How this impacts *my* company by linzeal · 2002-01-23 17:30 · Score: 1

I use outlook for friends, family and such but plain old communication pine is still superior. Especially after you have mastered enough of the keyboard shortcuts to make it second nature.

--
An Education is the Font of All Liberty
Re:How this impacts *my* company by Anonymous Coward · 2002-01-23 17:39 · Score: 0

ok very informative post but... teaching people Linux/Unix is not the hard part. The hard part is getting them to understand why it's better, and why they should bother to learn it.
Re:How this impacts *my* company by Polyzinha · 2002-01-23 18:04 · Score: 2, Informative

Please, please don't steer them toward Pine or Mutt. If pine had been my first linux experience,
I would have run away screaming. I mean, even techmail was more fun to use than pine. Meanwhile, Eudora (and presumably outlook, kmail, and evolution) will let you sort messages and
even view more than one email at a time. It's really hard to give that up once you're
used to it.

Seriously, you shouldn't be pushing free solutions that are less useful than the windows
or mac equivalents or of course people will conclude that free software is inferior, and
they may never try it again. Concentrate on the linux applications that actually do what they do better than the non-free competition. They're out there.
Re:How this impacts *my* company by Anonymous Coward · 2002-01-23 18:34 · Score: 0

No, if someone has a problem with Outlook, you fix it for them. You don't replace their entire computing experience because of a typo in the password field.
Re:How this impacts *my* company by Anonymous Coward · 2002-01-23 18:35 · Score: 0

do u have a nail in coffin fetish, becuz u post other messages with that too hahahahahahahhahaahahahah
Re:How this impacts *my* company by dimator · 2002-01-23 19:12 · Score: 2

When somebody writes in with an Outlook problem, steer them toward Pine or Mutt.

"Outlook problem, huh? Here, try this, it's called Pine. No, there's no shiny buttons. A help menu? No, you won't need that. You like stuff that has more than 2 colors? You'll get over it. By the way, the '^' in '^X' means the CTRL button. Have fun now, off you go!"

In related news, people who come to me with a problem with their 2001 Corvettes will be redirected to an '85 Plymouth Reliant.

--
python -c "x='python -c %sx=%s; print x%%(chr(34),repr(x),chr(34))%s'; print x%(chr(34),repr(x),chr(34))"
Re:How this impacts *my* company by Alex+Belits · 2002-01-23 19:24 · Score: 2

I can use pine (and only pine!) for my mailbox _precisely_ because it can't sort messages -- mutt can, and this is why I can't use it. My mailbox is currently >200000 messages long, and nothing, absolutely nothing, can read it remotely except a combination of cyrus on the server and pine at the client. Pine happily reads it at usable speed with no significant delays over everything from 100Mbps Ethernet to 14.4Kbps cellular phone, and selections/zooming/coloring functions allow me to handle my email easily and efficiently.

--
Contrary to the popular belief, there indeed is no God.
Re:How this impacts *my* company by AussiePenguin · 2002-01-23 19:29 · Score: 1

How could you trust Outlook for friends and family? Make them use Eudora. Only problem is that Eudora's interface has become cluttered and clumbsy as of lately.

--
Jeremy
Melbourne, Australia
Jabber Australia
Re:How this impacts *my* company by xtremex · 2002-01-23 20:00 · Score: 2, Funny

Why would you use Outlook with friends? and Pine for everything else? WHy the hell should THEY care what you use!!?? It's like saying "I use the blue phone when I call friends, but when I make a business call. the blue phone will NEVER do. I use the RED phone"

--
If you're not a Liberal in your 20's, then you have no heart.If you're still a Liberal in your 30's you have no brain.
Re:How this impacts *my* company by Anonymous Coward · 2002-01-23 20:50 · Score: 0

If pine had been my first linux experience,
I would have run away screaming.

Har - the funny thing is that Pine is a luser program designed so that state school fratboys could actually get their mail from an early-90s Unix system. (I was a mac lab slave back then, and the average drooling Mac moron had no problem using Pine once they figured out that ^ meant hold-down-control.)

The real Unix gods didn't use something as wussy and un-elite as Pine - they used mail(1) and grep and ed or whatever.
Re:How this impacts *my* company by _Sprocket_ · 2002-01-24 01:44 · Score: 2

...even view more than one email at a time.

Actually... there is a way in Pine to jump between two messages. Can't remember it off the top of my head. But I do remember going "wow, didn't know you could do that" while we were sifting through my mail one day. I felt smug. Although tempered by the fact that I hadn't known you could do it for years myself.

Having said that... if someone wants/needs a GUI laden environment like Outlook, mutt or pine is NOT the right direction. There are numerous GUI mail clients for Linux that should surfice (although Outlook is more than email). So yea - I can agree on that point (although there ARE times when a good consol mail reader is nice).
Re:How this impacts *my* company by praxim · 2002-01-24 03:08 · Score: 1

When somebody writes in with an Outlook problem, steer them toward Pine or Mutt.

"Pat, help me, I can't get my e-mail!"

"Oh, well, Susan, just reformat your hard drive, install Linux, configure Pine or Mutt (and Fetchmail if you'd like), and I'll help you from there."

"Thanks, Pat! You're my hero!"
Re:How this impacts *my* company by morris57 · 2002-01-24 04:51 · Score: 2

Use $ to sort the index for the current folder that you are viewing in pine. You can sort by subject, arrival, from, to, Date, size, thread, and a few others.

Good luck!
Re:How this impacts *my* company by linzeal · 2002-01-24 05:56 · Score: 1

How else am I supposed to see the various pictures. formatting, and such? Sometimes I'm supposed to comment on something that may use activex or take me to a site that needs macromedia shockwave. Everything else I can use pine for because they are seperate email addresses and everything else is in plaintext from various discussion lists. When you need to see the crap that people are sending you only the blue phone is the only way unfortunately.

--
An Education is the Font of All Liberty
Re:How this impacts *my* company by jamwt · 2002-01-24 09:46 · Score: 1

Seriously, you shouldn't be pushing free solutions that are less useful than the windows or mac equivalents

Be careful using terms like "less useful"... Eudora may be easier to learn, and Eudora may certain have advantages compared to CLI MUAs; but you run serious risk of being trampled by devotee Unixites if you say that any MUA is more useful than mutt.

Do some reading: http://www.mutt.org . (It might take you awhile.) Then I'd be interested in your feature-to-feature comparison to mutt.

Is Eudora easy to learn? Yes. It is useful? Pine and mutt are proven CLI MUAs that are many times more useful than current GUI ones--for those who deem it worthwhile to get the most out of their mailer w/out the cruft.

problem by Anonymous Coward · 2002-01-23 16:32 · Score: 0

maybe if they had ported some halfway decent games they wouldn't be in this situation. Where is CounterStrike or Starcraft?

Re:problem by AntipodesTroll · 2002-01-23 16:41 · Score: 1

Serious Sam would have been really nice.

The other busines issue Loki had were those Linux users like me that dont actually mind dual-booting to play Windows games. I got the OS with my laptop, I dont mind using it for games, that Linux truly and honestly dosent give any advantage for playing over Windows. (Unless you cant get a decent stable install of Windows happening on your system. Which a lot of people can manage, believe it or not.)

--
Anyone who considers arithmetical methods of producing random numbers is, of course, in a state of sin.-John von Neumann
Re:problem by Cef · 2002-01-23 16:47 · Score: 2

maybe if they had ported some halfway decent games they wouldn't be in this situation. Where is CounterStrike or Starcraft?
I'd ask this question of Valve & Sierra (re: Half-Life/CounterStrike) and of Blizzard (re: StarCraft). Loki only ported games, and unless they got the code and the permission to port the game from the authors, then they couldn't do it.

I'm really somewhat surprised that Sierra/Valve dissed the idea of a Linux client port. They had OpenGL code already, and they had a Linux server port. The audio shouldn't have proved that much of a problem, and I'm pretty sure it would have done QUITE well with Linux gamers. Almost all of Blizzard's stuff was Direct3D only, which does make it harder to port.

I'll miss 'em. I own Q3A (metal box), Unreal Tournament, Tribes2, Soldier of Fortune, Rune, and Kohan. I paid for every damn one of them, and I'm glad I did.
Re:problem by NotoriousQ · 2002-01-23 16:47 · Score: 1

Why port the games that run at 99% speed through wine. (given that opengl works fast, not rage 128 pro 1 year ago, which did not accelerate anything)

--
badness 10000
Re:problem by npietraniec · 2002-01-23 16:50 · Score: 1

I think that the people at Blizzard are real assholes when it comes to Linux... And that really gets to me, because I definately would have bought a Starcraft port.
Re:problem by treke · 2002-01-23 16:55 · Score: 2

Serious Sam is being ported by http://icculus.org
Re:problem by Cef · 2002-01-23 17:15 · Score: 2

I think that the people at Blizzard are real assholes when it comes to Linux... And that really gets to me, because I definately would have bought a Starcraft port.
Same, and I know a lot of people who currently dual-boot to play games like StarCraft who have said they would happily buy such a port.

I don't have Windows installed on my machine at home (thankfully!) and I've only used Wine to run the installer for Return To Castle Wolfenstein. Every install of Windows I've had has had 'issues' (particularly video and motherboard drivers), which I am glad to say I have not had under Linux. And since I didn't have to pay for Windows (since I don't use it), I got to spend just that little extra on my machine so I could buy decent, quality components - makes all the difference for stability, no matter what OS you run.
Re:problem by Anonymous Coward · 2002-01-23 17:27 · Score: 0

Think? They are, or at least they were and may still be. Go WAY back in the archives of Slashdot to 1998 or so. You'll find a story or two about how all these people mailed them asking for Linux support for some game (Starcraft?) and they essentially pissed on the entire community.

After that and the whole "phone home with a copy of the registry" I decided Blizzard was not worthy of any more hard drive space. WC2 is great, thanks.
Re:problem by Gehenna_Gehenna · 2002-01-24 01:40 · Score: 2

I shall miss them as well. I Happily own Quake 3, Soldier of Fortune, Descent 3, Heroes of Might and Magic, and Unreal Tournement.

Unfortunatly their business model just didn't make a whole lot of sense. Whay pay more for a port of (what was often an older) game that runs fast and cheaper in windows. I understand, not all Linux users dual boot, so not all have the oppertunity to run games in windows...

In the meantime, I'd suggest sending some money to the good folks at Transgaming. It's essentialy Wine with special consideration for direct x, and runs many games spledidly. I've had a good deal of success wih it.

--

Re:Hard times at the Bank of America by Anonymous Coward · 2002-01-23 16:34 · Score: 0

BoA dropped their support for Mac Quicken today. Surely this is part of Project Faustus. When will the insanity end?

I had hope for Loki Games.. by X-Dopple · 2002-01-23 16:35 · Score: 3, Insightful

..but after spending hours trying to get Quake 3 Arena and Unreal Tournament to work, I had little hope for their future. I checked their support newsgroups some time back; Unreal Tournament support was active with about 4000 posts. Let me detail my experiences with Unreal Tournament:

- Downloaded and installed it with Windows CD.
- ./UnrealTournament. Takes an eternity to load, but I blame that on my slow hard drive and K6/2 500.
- Crashes: Cannot find Glide drivers, even though Glide v3 was installed (Voodoo Banshee, by the way), and libglide.so was sitting plainly in one of the main /lib directories, I forget which.
- To cut a long story short, I was sent on a wild goose chase, trying hack after hack after hack (DRI, Utah-GLX, recompile OpenGL^HMesa, recompile kernel) until I finally decided that I will never try one of Loki's games again unless they can successfully make Unreal Tournament work on a Banshee. Mandrake 7.2, BTW.

Asking on IRC was futile, as my problem was unique.

This experience isn't new for me. LinuxGames.com's instructions on emulating UltraHLE in WINE must involve some sort of magic, as I have never been able to get that working. Quake 3 Arena's demo segfaulted on startup.

Sorry to see you go, Loki.

Re:I had hope for Loki Games.. by Colin+Bayer · 2002-01-23 16:38 · Score: 1

- Crashes: Cannot find Glide drivers, even though Glide v3 was installed (Voodoo Banshee, by the way), and libglide.so was sitting plainly in one of the main /lib directories, I forget which.

Uhh, that's your problem. To use the Glide drivers for Unreal Tournament requires that you have Glide version 2 installed. If you have Glide 3, you need to use the SDLGLDrv (IIRC).

--
Want Linux games? HERE.
Re:I had hope for Loki Games.. by Anonymous Coward · 2002-01-23 17:16 · Score: 0

Duh!
Re:I had hope for Loki Games.. by Anonymous Coward · 2002-01-23 17:36 · Score: 0

Having hope for Loki games is like having hope that by storing your severed head in a jar after death, one day you may be revived.
Re:I had hope for Loki Games.. by Time+Doctor · 2002-01-23 18:05 · Score: 1

Uh, driver problems are most definately your problem. You can blame Loki, but it is purely silly to. In any case the voodoo banshee is/was terribly old and wouldn't have good performance anyway. Besides that, it sounds to me like you kept trying all the wrong things. "Glide v3" sounds distinctly like glide for the voodoo 3. Or, if it was really Glide3x that you were using (which it may be), you should know that it is Glide2x which UT requires. Also, DRI doesn't support Glide2x (on any voodoo hardware), and I don't even know if they have, or ever will, support the banshee at all.

--
Check out ioquake3.org for a great, free, First-Person Shooter engine!
Re:I had hope for Loki Games.. by Lemmy+Caution · 2002-01-23 18:50 · Score: 3, Insightful

This entire conversation - or rather, the reality that it represents - is one of the reason why linux gaming is so handicapped. SDL, Glide2, Glide3, Mesa, DRI, DRM, nvidia drivers, ggi - the web of interdependcies, conflicts, workarounds, kernel patching, and other nonsense you have to go through to get games (and only games - Linux is substantially easier to work with in just about every other domain) working is enough to drive one bald.
Re:I had hope for Loki Games.. by Time+Doctor · 2002-01-23 19:12 · Score: 2, Interesting

You mention a number of Libraries and I don't believe they are really that hard to get working. With one exception, MESA/DRI for X4 is extremely frustrating. Nvidia drivers however are cake to install. Most of the commercial games for Linux (http://www.icculus.org/~zakk/gamelist.php?license =commercial)
came with all the required libraries besides GL, which is up to the user or the user's distro to get working.

--
Check out ioquake3.org for a great, free, First-Person Shooter engine!
Re:I had hope for Loki Games.. by Afrosheen · 2002-01-23 19:32 · Score: 2

Just as an offtopic aside, the Banshee is/was well supported in XFree4. I used to talk to Darryl Strauss almost daily when he was hacking together drivers for this card and I can say that Quake3 ran fairly nicely on it. UT ran fine also. This is just a config issue.
Re:I had hope for Loki Games.. by bzzzt · 2002-01-23 21:51 · Score: 1

MESA/DRI are installed with X4 by default. Most distributions enable 3d by default on the DRI supported cards. What's your problem?
Re:I had hope for Loki Games.. by ShavenGoat · 2002-01-24 08:57 · Score: 1

I had the same problem installing Unreal as you did, the difference being that I was running FreeBSD. In the end I just gave up.

However, I downloaded their demos and the installer they give you rocks. I had zero problems installing and running their 2D games. The 3D games didn't work at all, but then again I had a Nvidia TNT at the time which doesn't work well at all with 3D in FreeBSD/XFree4.1.

I was so impressed with their demo package, that I ended up buying SimCity3000 and Railroad Tycoon 2. (both work great)

Loki did a good job, it is just that their earlier products (Unreal) did suck.

?? Selling software to linux users ??? by ezfur · 2002-01-23 16:36 · Score: 1

I'm not supprised this happened. Why market software to a segment of the OS community who's main goal is to support free software? I'm not saying that all linux user are this way but I would wonder how much money free OS supportes spend on retail application versus the comercial OS user.

Re:?? Selling software to linux users ??? by Anonymous Coward · 2002-01-24 09:06 · Score: 0

> but I would wonder how much money free OS supportes spend on retail application versus the comercial OS user. I wonder how many commercial OS supporters copy their retail applications from their waRez-buddy versus the free OS user...

Well, at least I bought one of your games... by Svartalf · 2002-01-23 16:36 · Score: 2

SiN didn't play any better on my machine than it did under Windows so I didn't buy it. Shogo, on the other hand, was pretty good- I bought that.

--
I am not merely a "consumer" or a "taxpayer". I am a Citizen of the State of Texas

Re:Well, at least I bought one of your games... by An+Ominous+Cow+Erred · 2002-01-23 16:45 · Score: 1

Thanks for buying Shogo! That was actually our very first project and our guys got to know the code very well for that one. In fact, we later went on with a project to write parts of the second version of the Lithtech engine (so you'll see the result of some Hyperion code in any Lithtech V2 game like Aliens vs Predator 2, Sanity, No One Lives Forever, etc.)
Unfortunately the problem with SiN was that the CPU was mostly spent on the AI code, which we really couldn't do much to rewrite without making it a MAJOR project... So even though our guys did a phenomenal job with the 3D stuff your speed is still usually limited by the AI (unless you have a very fast machine).
Shogo is still my personal favorite of our games though. :-)
James Sellman - Hyperion Entertainment - http://www.hyperion-entertainment.com/
Re:Well, at least I bought one of your games... by FatRatBastard · 2002-01-23 17:20 · Score: 1

(Offtopic)

Were you the guys that did AvP for the old Atari Jaguar? That was one of the few games that scared the living crap out of me when I first played it.
Re:Well, at least I bought one of your games... by An+Ominous+Cow+Erred · 2002-01-23 17:33 · Score: 1

Heh, I wish that was us. :-) That was Rebellion, who certainly did a great job on atmosphere. :-) The game had some serious gameplay issues (not really their fault, nobody had really figured out how to do a good FPS from a console controller back then) it was still a great game. Yes I have it and I thoroughly enjoyed playing it (I beat all three modes :-). It was one of the few good games the Jaguar had.
Incidentally, if you like "Aliens"-type atmosphere, the game that really captured it the best I think was Pandora's "Xenomorph", a Dungeon Master clone that was released for a variety of platforms. It's very, very primitive by today's standards but it really kicks ass. You should check out some abandonware sites and try it out. It was released for the C-64, Amiga, Atari ST, MS-DOS, and Archimedes. I have the C-64, Amiga and MS-DOS versions, and I have played the Atari-ST version though I still need a copy of it. In terms of features the C-64 version is actually the most advanced (the character selection was implemented in it, while it was never finished for the other versions), but in terms of graphical atmosphere and general playability the Amiga version is probably the best. BTW, if anyone reading this has either the Atari ST or Archimedes version of this game I would really like a copy! ;->
James Sellman - Hyperion Entertainment - http://www.hyperion-entertainment.com/

I am going to bookmark this post. by schwap · 2002-01-23 16:38 · Score: 2, Insightful

When someone asks me why there are no linux games (my little brother does), I can refer to this. I hear a lot of people complain that software costs too much or that they didnt get this thing or that thing for free. I sometimes wonder if these people can balance their checkbooks.

Holy shit! by Anonymous Coward · 2002-01-23 16:39 · Score: 0

A new gaming topic icon! Its much better than that shitty old n64 controller, but still not as good as an x-box controller or a ps/2 controller would look, seeking that the gamecube's controller sucks. Loki? what the fuck is loki?

Playing vs. Configuring - DOS Days? by Sean+Clifford · 2002-01-23 16:39 · Score: 2, Informative

Remember the DOS days when you had to hack up your autoexec.bat file to get enough free memory to run cool games, configure your sound card, and otherwise hack at your box to make stuff work? Yeah, playing can be more fun than configuring but if I didn't want to configure, I'd buy a console instead of a PC.

Re:Playing vs. Configuring - DOS Days? by Anonymous Coward · 2002-01-23 17:28 · Score: 0

Yep used to run memmaker and pray.
Anyway you don't need a console, get Windows XP. Download one video card driver double click mouse and boom done. No more fussing with Wine or hounding vendors to provide linux ports. Best of all for the first time no crashing. Yea I know you don't believe me, well take it from a long time desktop linux user(since redhat 5.0)XP is the stable desktop you have been waiting for.
Re:Playing vs. Configuring - DOS Days? by Sean+Clifford · 2002-01-23 17:41 · Score: 1

It's even easier with a console:
1. Insert disc.
2. Play.

Yeah, I've played with XP and it's pretty damned stable but I find Windows 2000 just as stable for the PC games I play. I won't go into the litany of reasons why I reject XP except to say that stability isn't one of them.
Unlike Enron, the news about Loki is sad and all. Like many Linux users, I never bought (or played) any of their ported games, so I'm not put out. Good luck to all concerned - and thanks for the work on WINE!

question by Anonymous Coward · 2002-01-23 16:40 · Score: 0

Since they are going bankrupt anyway, can they offer their games (binary only of course) hugely discounted? I know I would be willing to buy some games for $5 that I would not even look at otherwise.

Of course, if the money would only go to pay creditors and not Loki staff I would probably not even bother to spring for a $5 game, as I've bought all the ones I have time to play...

I bought everything they ported by Wee · 2002-01-23 16:42 · Score: 2

Well, nearly everything. I still have to get MindRover. TuxGames sells it (and they should be able to get some copies, since that letter Draeker sent out was an invite to buy up the balance of Loki's stock.

Loki will be sorely missed.

-B

--

Ash and Hickory, straight-grained and true, make excellent bludgeons, dandy for the cudgeling of vegetarians.

Anyone going to sell a "loki_update" CD? by Anonymous Coward · 2002-01-23 16:43 · Score: 0

It would be nice if someone (maybe Loki?) sold an inexpensive mirror of their public ftp site on CD and modify loki_update to patch games from the CD. I wish they had done something like this long ago. Not only was the $50 price for direct access to the majority of games discouraging, it was an even bigger let down to have to download for half an hour before the new game would run on a glibc v2.2 distribution. I would have been happy to have payed $25-30 for an years subscription of quarterly update CDs instead of having to download each time.

No! by Blymie · 2002-01-23 16:44 · Score: 5, Informative

Loki is _not_ dead because they entered a market that couldn't support them. Scott has mentioned several times that he had no intention of showing a profit for a few more years, at least. Loki's intention was to become the defacto standard for porting games to linux, and to capitalize on that ability in a year or two more down the road, when Linux sales _really_ started to generate revenue. At that point in time, they would have developed all the tools necessary to port games to Linux (like an installer, SDL, and so on), and have shown that they have the skill to do it quickly and professionally when they were handed the ball.

The problem for Loki came when all the venture capital dried up. It shouldn't for them, their plan was always sound, and based on profit in a year or two more. Their problems started when the market crashed, and with how quickly all the VC dried up.

Some very short sighted people pulled their money out of Loki, and they ... well, they suck ;) Don't invest in a five year plan, and then pull out 1/2 way through just because the market crashes.

Loki, a victim of circumstances, and a lack of investment fortitude. The sad part is that if Loki could have lasted until the summer, I'm sure that VC would have returned. :/

Re:No! by AntipodesTroll · 2002-01-23 17:00 · Score: 1

Well maybe this says more about the bogus nature of investment and venture capital, than it does about commercial gaming on Linux.

VC is nice if you can get it, but IMO you shouldnt *rely* on it. Nothing beats a nice solid business plan that can make a profit.

--
Anyone who considers arithmetical methods of producing random numbers is, of course, in a state of sin.-John von Neumann
Re:No! by Anonymous Coward · 2002-01-23 17:11 · Score: 1, Insightful

You can say many things about the "VC people", but it's rather silly to call them "short sighted". "...how quickly the VC dried up"? "...a lack of investment fortitude"? Give me a break. The NASDAQ hemorrhaged about 4 trillion dollars over the course of a year or so, most of it wasted on companies that never produced anything the slightest bit economically useful for society, and only then did the VC's finally get the good sense to pull their feet out of the fire.
Re:No! by bitflip · 2002-01-23 18:56 · Score: 1

Uuuhhhh, wasn't that what _all_ the dead dot coms were saying? Not that Loki's nearly as bad as some were, but their story doesn't seem all that different.

If its a truly viable business plan, it'll pop back up later, perhaps when profitablity isn't "in a year or two more".
Re:No! by AbsoluteRelativity · 2002-01-23 20:03 · Score: 1

That would have been a good plan, and from the sounds of it Loki knew what they were doing. From a gamers perspective I dont think the hardware drivers are there quite yet for gaming, some games I have played in Linux were stuck in some software mode, or the drivers were not using hardware or something was going on that was out of my reach to fix. I think given time hardware driver developement would progress much better under linux and linux and X windows programmers/hackers, could work to improve this.

--
disclaimer : My views do not represent those of every one else in slashdot.
Re:No! by xtremex · 2002-01-23 20:09 · Score: 1

Have you ever GOTTEN VC money? Do you understand the concept of paying 100 people to develop? WHo's paying for it? The bank loan? Max out all your credit cards? Steal your kid's college money? Sometimes you NEED VC's,. and they KNOW this. They will own you, they now dictate what happens. "Do it this way". "NO". "Then we're pulling our money."
The most solid business plan in the world wont make a hell of a diff if you dont have the capital to support that business plan. It's a catch-22. You want to stay independant, yet they are your pimps.

--
If you're not a Liberal in your 20's, then you have no heart.If you're still a Liberal in your 30's you have no brain.
Re:No! by AbsoluteRelativity · 2002-01-24 16:57 · Score: 1

I dont know about some dot coms but I know Amazon was saying that, and as I heard in the news they are doing much better.

--
disclaimer : My views do not represent those of every one else in slashdot.

Re:'Free' software claims more victims by Anonymous Coward · 2002-01-23 16:48 · Score: 0

As soon as Eric S. Raymond stops sucking cock for a hobby and has to start charging to make ends meet?

huh? I already got free. by Erris · 2002-01-23 16:50 · Score: 2, Troll

At Hyperion, an alternative platform game software porting company I work for, we've produced titles for Linux ... For some reason they just couldn't grasp that it cost us money to both license and port the software, and that we didn't see a red cent for the Windows version they bought.

I'm having trouble grasping the concept myself. You might try explaining it a little better. Do those compaines pay you to port those games, or do they just give you the source and then give you a chunck of the revenue when you are done? You're not doing for fun are you?

I'm also having trouble imagining the demanding weenies you describe. The Baton Rouge LUG is small, but most of the people there were NOT like this. Me and the people I know don't do Linux for games. I do it for scientific computing, and I'm just resigned to the idea that I can't make a sound card work. My wife's Red Hat machine has bunches of games that I've never bothered to play, at least one of my Debian machines has Quake that I never play. Having not bothered with all of that, I'm not going to bother to harrass your sales clerks. I don't know anyone else who would either. Perhapse the folks at X-Box have strange ways of ammusing themselves.

All that being said, I've got plenty of money that I have not spent on M$ crap that could be spent on games, especially some of the more interesting social interaction games you mention in another post.

The problem you have is threefold. Teaching me how to build a machine that works. Telling me about your game. Finding the time for me to follow your instructions, get your game and actually play it. Oh wait, most of those problems are mine. Oh well.

Games and PC's multimedia that don't really work right are the smallest social cost of the M$ monopoly.

--
DMCA, Hollings, Palladium. What might have sounded like paranoia is now common sense.

When Indrema died so did loki by linzeal · 2002-01-23 16:50 · Score: 1, Interesting

Linux gaming isn't going anywhere without a console to take it there. "The Dream Lives On"

--
An Education is the Font of All Liberty

They did it to themselves by Guppy06 · 2002-01-23 16:53 · Score: 2

From what I understand, Loki wasn't exactly kind to its employees. The management wanted as many games as possible translated for as little money as possible (which got reflected in their payroll and hiring practices), and they had a rather vigorous turn-over rate.

At any rate, I liked the N64 controller as a logo better than the 2600, but I'm probably biased anyhow. :)

You bought them? by Anonymous Coward · 2002-01-23 16:55 · Score: 0

You know how Linux users are < 1% of the market? Well, you are like < 1% of the Linux market.

Games news icon by cecil36 · 2002-01-23 16:55 · Score: 2, Funny

Now we're talking a real icon for gaming. Screw that new technology. Give me vector graphics!

Way to go! by seebs · 2002-01-23 16:56 · Score: 5, Insightful

And a hearty round of thanks to all the Warez dudes out there. Remember, piracy is a purely victimless crime; anyone actually put out of work when a product doesn't sell is obviously making stuff up, we all know programmers drive Ferarris and do lots of coke.

*sigh*.

--
My blog: http://www.seebs.net/log/ --- My iPhone/iPad app: http://www.seebs.net/seebsfrac/

Re:Way to go! by Anonymous Coward · 2002-01-23 17:11 · Score: 1, Insightful

For warez to have done damage to them, lots of people would have had to have been doing it.

Even pirates are smart enough to know you don't play games on Linux.
Re:Way to go! by Anonymous Coward · 2002-01-23 17:33 · Score: 0

What does warez have to do with this?
You think the majority of linux users who were the potential market used warez instead of buyig from loki?
Please. Loki failed because their is no linux desktop market period.

How many companies have to fail before you realize this?
Re:Way to go! by Pope · 2002-01-23 18:23 · Score: 3, Funny

we all know programmers drive Ferarris and do lots of coke
Well, it certainly explains Daikatana...

--
It doesn't mean much now, it's built for the future.
Re:Way to go! by magi · 2002-01-23 19:50 · Score: 2

And a hearty round of thanks to all the Warez dudes out there.

The warez community might not be as strong in Linux games as in Wincrap. Warez needs networks of people, but if you don't have enough nodes, their connections won't reach the critical threshold to "crystallize" to form a network. (Everything is explainable with NK nets...)

On the other hand, Loki games didn't (don't...) have much if any copy protection, except in the multi-play mode of some games. This was a very user-friendly feature, as it made it easier to handle the game (no need to carry the cds around all the time), and I thank Loki for it.

Unlike with Windows games, I haven't a genuine illegal copy of any Linux game. (I have 9 Loki games, and you bet I'll be ordering a few more today if they still have them at the retailer.) And Linux games cost about 30% more here than their old Wincrap version, that is, about $60 for new Linux titles.

But yeah, this is a really sad day for me I and believe for much of the Linux community. Loki was very important for Linux.
Re:Way to go! by VAXGeek · 2002-01-24 01:16 · Score: 1

What is this Wincrap you speak of?

--
this sig limit is too small to put anything good h
Re:Way to go! by dinivin · 2002-01-24 03:10 · Score: 2

Even pirates are smart enough to know you don't play games on Linux.

Wrong... Pirates are just too stupid to figure out how. Believe it or not, Linux makes a perfectly wonderful gaming platform. It does not take a genius to set up and run games under Linux.

Dinivin
Re:Way to go! by Anonymous Coward · 2002-01-24 04:35 · Score: 0

Posting to slashdot? I didn't know you could run lynx on a teletype!
Re:Way to go! by Anonymous Coward · 2002-01-24 09:12 · Score: 0

Wincrap = Microsoft Windows
Re:Way to go! by willum448 · 2002-01-24 10:46 · Score: 1

Actually, at my library, there are a lot of vt-400(i think), an they have lynx installed on the server, so if i want to read /. at the library, and all the "real" pc's are in use, I just use the terminal, and text on a T1 FLY's!
Re:Way to go! by LadyLucky · 2002-01-24 22:56 · Score: 1

You rock.

--
dominionrd.blogspot.com - Restaurants on

Will they Open Source their work? by Self-Important · 2002-01-23 16:57 · Score: 1

Is there a prohibitive NDA or two keeping them from *really* contributing to the community?

Re:Will they Open Source their work? by Anonymous Coward · 2002-01-23 17:20 · Score: 0

They do not own the original code. They licensed it from the original copyright holders in order to port it, under very specific terms.

No open source for you. If you want a fucking game engine or a game, write your own, or use one of the free engines -- don't go around expecting everyone to give theirs away for free. Some of us game programmers have to have some way of feeding ourselves and our families.
Re:Will they Open Source their work? by An+Onerous+Coward · 2002-01-23 17:55 · Score: 1

My guess is that the only thing they could legitimately open source (verb) is the Loki Installer. Maybe there are a few other auxillary bits (porting tools and whatnot) that they would be able to release. The games are still owned by the original publishers.

--
You want the truthiness? You can't handle the truthiness!

SiN didn't work... by Wee · 2002-01-23 16:58 · Score: 3, Informative

...with NVidia cards. Well, at least not with my Geforce2. The game simply would not work for a great majority of linux gamers. Word of that got out (too late for me, but others must have heard about about the video issues). Combine that with the fact that it was something like 3 years old when the port was completed and you have a darn good reason why the game didn't sell. I don't think some abnormality endemic to Linux gamers was the cause.

Even if you were simultaneously porting an upcoming Win32 title, you'd still face the "why can't I get a binary free?" issue. Loki had that in spades with Tribes2, but it sold pretty well. (Most people wanted to binary for servers anyway -- id ruined people on that count, IMO.)

I wouldn't use SiN's sales figures as anything but an anecdotal tale.

-B

--

Ash and Hickory, straight-grained and true, make excellent bludgeons, dandy for the cudgeling of vegetarians.

Re:SiN didn't work... by An+Ominous+Cow+Erred · 2002-01-23 17:22 · Score: 5, Interesting

Yes, we're aware of the problem. Something changed in nVidia's drivers after we finalized the game that broke it. I personally led a beta testing group and SiN did indeed run just fine on the GeForce line of cards. After the problem occured we tried to figure out what was changed that was causing it to fail but because of nVidia's complete lack of interest in working with other developers we weren't able to easily identify it. We considered spending more time working on it but by that time the sales were so disappointing we put a freeze on all Linux projects (this freeze is not permanent hopefully but it's understandable why we have it.)
Actually, a bunch of us at Hyperion really, REALLY hate nVidia. They are the prima donnas of the graphics card manufacturing community. We repeatedly asked them for information concerning the functioning of their cards and for the large part they refused our pleas. Their attitude is that everything has to be done internally and they refuse to cooperate with others. Companies like ATI and Matrox have been very cooperative with us, giving us the information we need to make sure our stuff works properly with their hardware. 3DFX, while they still existed, were also somewhat helpful in providing information (though not as good as ATI). There was a problem with the Voodoo GL drivers that actually caused the game to crash when we had glowing objects onscreen in Shogo, but fortunately due easy-to-access information we were able to include a workaround.
I wholeheartedly encourage everyone to NOT use nVidia hardware until they open up a bit with the information so that people can actually SUPPORT their cards. There are many other great companies that make great cards you can buy from. My personal favorite is the ATI Radeon series but there are other worthy contenders as well.
And yes, I know Loki games don't have problems with the new nVidia drivers. And no I don't know why. :-( Loki, to their credit, were more devoted to Linux and certainly did work harder to fix incompatibilities. If someone who's reading this knows what's causing the crash, please let us know. I wish we could afford the time to root out the problem but unfortunately we need to spend it on other projects so we don't wind up like Loki. :-(
James Sellman - Hyperion Entertainment - http://www.hyperion-entertainment.com/
Re:SiN didn't work... by dieman · 2002-01-23 17:44 · Score: 2, Insightful

Once I talked to Nick Triantos in passing at LWCE 2000 he was *very* interested in knowing about bugs in the driver and/or in the opengl implementation. I really doubt that you were either talking to the right people or you were asking the wrong questions. Trying to force a company to 'opensource' a driver isn't going to get you any help.

--
-- dieman - Scott Dier
Re:SiN didn't work... by An+Ominous+Cow+Erred · 2002-01-23 18:05 · Score: 2, Interesting

OK, perhaps I was a little harsh. :-/ We did get some feedback from the Linux driver team but the last I heard it didn't result in getting the problem fixed. :-( For the large part though I do stand by the fact that nVidia is next-to-impossible to work with. Other companies provide us with specs, etc.
I could ask our engineers again what finally resulted from talking to nVidia... Unfortunately it's kind of moot now as management is leery about spending time (and thus money) on the Linux market when even the tiny Amiga market is more responsive. :-(
If we have time at some point I can see if we can get the problem fixed, but our guys are super busy at the moment.
Believe me we're not happy that our game crashes on current rev nVidia stuff. It doesn't exactly reflect well on us. :-(
James Sellman - Hyperion Entertainment - http://www.hyperion-entertainment.com/
Re:SiN didn't work... by Arandir · 2002-01-23 19:12 · Score: 5, Insightful

The Linux community needs to stop pushing nVidia. I don't know why they do, but they do. You see the lists and boards choked with newbies trying to get their cards to work, yet the GeForce still seems to be the recommended card fo Linux. Huh?

The "Linux guy" where I bought my Matrox G450 didn't want to sell it to me. He insisted I buy an nVidia instead because it was better supported under Linux. I had to walk away and get another salesperson who would sell me what I asked for. I've had Linux guys tell me I should take back my G450 because nVidia was better. I've seen posts on boards where some guy wants to know what the best card is and gets a dozen replies favoring nVidia.

--
A Government Is a Body of People, Usually Notably Ungoverned
Re:SiN didn't work... by Afrosheen · 2002-01-23 19:21 · Score: 1

Nvidia has good drivers now, starting with the 1541 series and currently with the 2314's. There are snags that newbies hit, but it has more to do with zero experience with linux than anything else.

I have had no trouble with 3d under the new drivers and mandrake 8.1. In fact, I help people daily with getting it setup. It's really not that hard and if I could code worth a shit I'd probably make a decent installer for it.

Matrox and ATI on the other hand, have crap for 3d drivers. The Radeon series is only a wack framebuffer driver that supports no 3d whatsoever. I don't know about the rest of their cards but who cares? Nobody has 3d support and framerates under linux like Nvidia. ATI and Matrox are helpful? Then where are the closed/open source Radeon 3d drivers? They don't exist. At least Nvidia cares enough to *make* drivers.

Next time someone recommends Nvidia, you can nod your head, knowing they're right.
Re:SiN didn't work... by Anonymous Coward · 2002-01-23 19:36 · Score: 0

- I've seen posts on boards where some guy wants to know what the best card is and gets a dozen replies favoring nVidia.

Simple answer: nVidia Cards are good for gaming only: they're fast, but also offer the lowest video quality I've ever seen. You won't notice it when playing a game but, believe me, when doing some productive work on a hires desktop they're -horrible-.
Matrox cards are slower, but they offer the best video quality around and are very well supported under Linux.
I also was impressed by the ATI ones: very good video quality and very good performance, but they're a bit pricey.

The choice will depend on how much time do you spend playing games, and how much fast graphics is needed.
Re:SiN didn't work... by Anonymous Coward · 2002-01-23 19:43 · Score: 0

Interestingly, I bought SiN waybackwhen, and just upgraded my machine. On a Mandrake 8.1 (Gaming Edition) install, with the latest nVidia drivers, I was able to run SiN with the OpenGL drivers without a problem.

I haven't tried Shogo yet, but I've played through a couple levels of SiN, and so far no problems.

I see and understand the business necessity, but I would love to see you guys throw your hats into the ring again at some point. You've got at least one repeat customer (me), who would buy the next thing put out :-)
Re:SiN didn't work... by puetzk · 2002-01-23 19:43 · Score: 4, Informative

excuse me? I have beautiful accelerated 2d AND 3d on my Radeon 7500, using the opensource drivers included in XFree 4.2.

The opensource ATI drivers are IN XFree86! they do very much exist, and they rock it up (about 90 FPS in quake3 at 1024x768, the 'pretties' all on :-). Nothing groundbreaking, but at $99 OEM not shabby. The card even does dualhead (and I'm using that, so it's not wasted).

Plus, I have decent 2d performance, unlike my roomate GeForce3, which could get pasted to the wall by my old mach64 in 2d, much less anything current. The GeForce mad-fast in 3d, I admit; but that's all you get, and it is plenty unstable too :-(

Matrox has weak 3d cards (albiet spectacular 2d), but quit lying about the radeon support. It is right there, in the standard XFree86 and kernel codebases, without needing any extra parts. It could hardly get any simpler :-)

--
The Matrix is going down for reboot now! Stopping reality: OK. The system is halted.
Re:SiN didn't work... by An+Ominous+Cow+Erred · 2002-01-23 19:45 · Score: 1

Umm... I suggest you look at both the XF86 and DRI homepages....

I really don't need to say anything more than that.

James Sellman - Hyperion Entertainment - http://www.hyperion-entertainment.com/
Re:SiN didn't work... by An+Ominous+Cow+Erred · 2002-01-23 19:58 · Score: 1

Interestingly, I bought SiN waybackwhen, and just upgraded my machine. On a Mandrake 8.1 (Gaming Edition) install, with the latest nVidia drivers, I was able to run SiN with the OpenGL drivers without a problem.
I'm glad to hear this! I haven't tested it lately on an nVidia card, so maybe the current drivers have fixed the problem that was breaking the game. If the Linux driver team fixed this because of our input then I will definitely have to soften my stance a bit... ...still you have to understand that it's really frustrating when there's a problem and you don't have the information you need to quickly figure out what is causing it and how to fix it. :-/
James Sellman - Hyperion Entertainment - http://www.hyperion-entertainment.com/
Re:SiN didn't work... by abdulla · 2002-01-23 20:09 · Score: 1

the reason nvidia can't do that is because they are bound by an agreement to sgi, anything they tell you that could be seen as sgi's intellectual property could cause them grief, the main reason why there drivers are closed many a former sgi engineer moved over to nvidia, they brought along the knowledge of sgi's technology with them, thats what caused the problem(s)
Re:SiN didn't work... by SnowZero · 2002-01-24 03:02 · Score: 1

Why did I buy an Nvidia video card? Well, because I actually did research
rather making vague comparisons. As always, a well set up system with the best drivers will beat one where the person didn't even get agp enabled. If not, then explain why I should trust your opinions over a well known review site...

Yes, their lack of source is annoying. But the fact that they care about Linux as a platform (more than any other card manufacturer) means a lot to me. I know there are people at Nvidia paid to write those drivers, and as long as they have the fastest hardware too, they're likely to always be ahead of any other hardware/driver combination in Linux.
Re:SiN didn't work... by Anonymous Coward · 2002-01-24 04:39 · Score: 0

For the record, the machine I referenced is an Athlon 1.3GHz, GeForce 3, Mandrake 8.1 Gaming Edition, XFree86 4.0.3, and the 231[3|4] drivers. I haven't tried it on a TNT, since I no longer have one in an active machine, nor have I tried it with a newer (or older) XFree86.
Re:SiN didn't work... by Vairon · 2002-01-24 04:42 · Score: 1

I'm running a LeadTek Geforce 3 w/64MB ram on a 21" Hitachi monitor with .22 dotpitch. I've never noticed this "low video quality" you speak of. Please elaborate with specifics, I'd really like to know.
Re:SiN didn't work... by Afrosheen · 2002-01-24 06:50 · Score: 2

Don't forget XFree4.2 is bleeding edge. Most linux users out there that have Radeons will be glad to read your post because I'm betting everyone's still running XFree4.10. This is news to me, and brand new news at that. Good to hear though.
Re:SiN didn't work... by Anonymous Coward · 2002-01-24 07:19 · Score: 0

...until next year, when the in crowd decides some other manufacturer is l33t3r.
Re:SiN didn't work... by Arandir · 2002-01-24 07:42 · Score: 2

1) Closed Source and Closed Minds. nVidia is the most secretive video card manufacturer there is. You can't get specs, you can't get help, and you get sued if you reverse engineer. If nVidia decides not to "care" anymore for Linux then you're stuck with XFree86-4.1 for the rest of your card's life.

With a Matrox or ATI card I don't have to worry about what Matrox or ATI does. The drivers are a *part* of XFree86. I don't have to hunt down new drivers everytime I upgrade X. I can use their cards on both Linux or FreeBSD. Of course Matrox and ATI aren't the most open of companies, but compared to nVidia they're radical philanthropists.

2) 2D support needed. I don't know what universe you live in, but the number of Linux programs that need the 3D support that only nVidia can provide can be counted on zero hands. I'm not a game player. I have a life. I use Linux/FreeBSD to get stuff *done*. My OS is a productivity tool. That means I care about 2D graphics. And nVidia can't even come close to Matrox or ATI in terms of 2D.

If all you do is play games, just stick with Windows. I'm serious. Don't give me that crap that you have to have Free Software for your OS. We know better than that. You want Unfree nVidia to run your Unfree games designed for an Unfree platform. So just go Unfree all the way. We'll both be happier.

In the meantime I'm perfectly content with 2D Konqueror, XEmacs, Xmms, Dia, Gimp, KOffice, Staroffice, gcc, Mozilla, Windowmaker, etc. The games I play when I do play games are CivIII, Simcity3k, and MystIII, none of which require or would gain from a 3D video card.

--
A Government Is a Body of People, Usually Notably Ungoverned
Re:SiN didn't work... by dinivin · 2002-01-24 08:19 · Score: 2

Heh... I, too, read that review and bought an nVidia card based on it. And then I got home and suffered with constant lock-ups for three driver releases and then occaisional lock-ups for another release or two. And I'm not alone. So, guess what? I threw my nVidia card out the window and will never go back till they change their attitude about specs and source.

Dinivin
Re:SiN didn't work... by Afrosheen · 2002-01-24 11:20 · Score: 1

Score = -1 Troll, -1 Flamebait.
Re:SiN didn't work... by Anonymous Coward · 2002-01-24 13:58 · Score: 0

I would like to comment here:

When I did Shogo, I too had a problem with a nVidia card, namely the TNT2 ultra. I reported this problem to Nick Triantos at nVidia, and he found the reason. The new driver revision fixed the bug.

I really have to say that I (as head of the Shogo team) never had a problem with nVidia, especially with their Linux team. They did and still do a great job.

Thomas Frieden, Hyperion Entertainment
Re:SiN didn't work... by An+Ominous+Cow+Erred · 2002-01-24 14:48 · Score: 1

When I did Shogo, I too had a problem with a nVidia card, namely the TNT2 ultra. I reported this problem to Nick Triantos at nVidia, and he found the reason. The new driver revision fixed the bug. I really have to say that I (as head of the Shogo team) never had a problem with nVidia, especially with their Linux team. They did and still do a great job.
Thomas Frieden, Hyperion Entertainment
Since Thomas here posted as an AC, I thought I'd reply to it to point it out. I've come to realize that I was overly harsh in my criticism of nVidia as a whole. While I greatly dislike many of their corporate decisions and management, I shouldn't have included their Linux driver team in the rant. My apologies to Nick.
Despite that, I still encourage people to get stuff besides nVidia until nVidia's management change their minds about secrecy.. If it wasn't for that secrecy, it would be easy to fix stuff that broke. :-)
(Someone please mod Thomas's comment up to 1 at least so more people can see his opinion)
James Sellman - Hyperion Entertainment - http://www.hyperion-entertainment.com/

Slashdot, LEARN YOUR LESSON by SuperDuG · 2002-01-23 16:58 · Score: 3

This is not the Nerds Rumor Mill, nor does this matter until it's a real problem. If loki was going to go under dontcha think we would have heard about it a little earlier than a WEEK before the so-planned shutdown?

Here's an idea ... how about you call the company in question for a comment ... you know ... like real reporters do ... before they go an just publish things ...

In the real world we like to call this research, I would have thought you'd learned your lesson from the AOL/RedHat deal ... geeze

--
Ignore the "p2p is theft" trolls, they're just uninformed

Re:Slashdot, LEARN YOUR LESSON by Shiny+Metal+S. · 2002-01-23 17:22 · Score: 1

If loki was going to go under dontcha think we would have heard about it a little earlier than a WEEK before the so-planned shutdown?
Well... We had few signs...

--
~shiny
WILL HACK FOR $$$
Re:Slashdot, LEARN YOUR LESSON by SuperDuG · 2002-01-23 17:37 · Score: 2

Yeah, but has Anyone from LOKI called /. to talk about them closing their doors ...
my 8-ball says that all sources point to no ...

--
Ignore the "p2p is theft" trolls, they're just uninformed
Re:Slashdot, LEARN YOUR LESSON by Anonymous Coward · 2002-01-23 17:44 · Score: 0

You missed a few.

The irony of it all by Anonymous Coward · 2002-01-23 16:59 · Score: 1, Interesting

Just back on October 24th, Draeker was putting down Transgaming/WineX and declairing traditional port to be a better way of supporting Linux. Now, just one day short of 3 months later, Draeker is declairing that his company's traditional ports come without technical support.

I still recall at ALS '97 that Linus declair Wine as one of the most important projects for Linux. As a long term support method, API redirection projects will continue to bring more prioritary apps to Linux than a port here or a port there. And when the Loki ports break down on glibc v3.0 or whatever, the open source WineX API redirection will continue to work. For Loki port, unfortantly, providing just the SDL library layer is not enough for ensuring long term use-ablity.

What About Their Archives? by Lethyos · 2002-01-23 16:59 · Score: 2

What am I going to do next time I install a Loki port of a game with my Windows copy? For example, someone who owns a copy of Unreal Tournament can use the Loki installer to use Linux binaries with datafiles from the Windows copy. Being that I am horrible when it comes to backups, where am I going to get copies of these binaries in the future?

--
Why bother.

Support transgaming. by HanzoSan · 2002-01-23 17:00 · Score: 2

As of right now you officially have no choice. Its transgaming, or no games in linux. Make your time.
Transgaming

--
If you use Linux, please help development of Autopac

Re:Support transgaming. by 303 · 2002-01-23 17:18 · Score: 1

how many times are you going to write this? do you work for them or what?
Re:Support transgaming. by Time+Doctor · 2002-01-23 17:55 · Score: 1

Uh, no.
Loki for instance supported multiple architechtures.
(http://www.icculus.org/lgfaq/lokiarchs.
Wine cannot do this as the binaries are all for x86.

Besides that, there is still LinuxGamePublishing (.com), there are still free ports. There will still be kind companies like id that contract out ports.

--
Check out ioquake3.org for a great, free, First-Person Shooter engine!
Re:Support transgaming. by rseuhs · 2002-01-23 23:18 · Score: 2

AFAIK if you use WineLib you can compile a Windows-program on a non-x86 Linux platform.
Re:Support transgaming. by Elbereth · 2002-01-23 23:55 · Score: 2

That's totally untrue. I don't know about the rest of you, but I still like to play NetHack. Having a native Linux version of Diablo 2 and Civ 3 would be nice, but I'm content to use a second PC for them.

I've even got enough parts to make a third PC: four sticks of 64MB PC133 RAM, an Asus PII/PIII motherboard, a spare 266 MHz Pentium II CPU (used when I need to flash old motherboards to support the Pentium III), two ATX cases, a 15" monitor, two PCI video cards, many 10 and 100Mbit NICs, and various, small EIDE hard drives (not to mention the PCI Ultra SCSI controller and several 4.5GB SCSI drives).

I'm sure I could even scrounge up a floppy drive and a 4X CDROM if I tried hard enough. I've got some old 486 PCs in the closet.

This is the main problem with companies like Loki. I really did expect that I'd be able to download the Linux binary to my favorite games. I already paid once for the license (not the game, mind you -- according to the EULA, all I own is a license), so why should I have to pay for a license again? It's not my fault Loki has to PAY to port these games... that's pretty fucked up. But it's counter-intertuitive.

I don't want a box, documentation, CDROM, etc. I just want a binary. I already have everything else. At most, I'd be willing to pay $20. Not $50. I laugh at $50.

Even if I didn't already have the game, I wouldn't pay $50 for it. I've never paid so much for a game. Back in the 80s, it only cost $20-$30 for a new game, and that's the price point I'm used to. I wait for the new games to come down to $40, then I use a coupon or promo code to get it down to $25 or $30. Staples and Electronics Boutique sell lots of games for under $20 in the "bargain bin". It's easy to get a somewhat new game for $35 or $40 if you shop long enough or wait long enough. Shelf space is limited, so games go on sale eventually...

I can't believe that Loki wanted me to spend $50 on an old Windows game that was selling for $9.99 at EB. Shyeah, right. I'll just buy it from the bargain bin and play it on my second (or third) PC.
Re:Support transgaming. by Anonymous Coward · 2002-01-24 00:23 · Score: 0

There are still companies out there making games for Linux.

Illwinter Game Design (www.illwinter.com) makes strategy games for Windows, Linux and Solaris. Most recent game is Dominions which got 4/5 in Computer Gaming World.

And I'm sure there are many more smaller companies who need the linux platfrom for extra sales and maybe more importantly extra exposure.

/Johan --- Illwinter Game Design
Re:Support transgaming. by Anonymous Coward · 2002-01-24 00:50 · Score: 0

BUT of course, this will not help you, UNLESS you pay the money to license the game's source code. So, what's the point? HanzoDork is talking about buying Windows games and using WhineX ("why doesn't game XY work?! fix it plz!!") to play them under Linux. If you wanted to use WineLib, you would still need access to the source code, and make the game build with the target system's development system (people seem to forget that this task is usually hard enough).
Re:Support transgaming. by rseuhs · 2002-01-24 01:02 · Score: 2

BUT of course, this will not help you, UNLESS you pay the money to license the game's source code.
The company which produced the game in the first place might *gasp* release a Linux-version at virtually no cost.
So, what's the point?
The point is that Wine functions as a bridge to fuel Linux-desktop adoption which is the prerequesite for Linux applications (including games)

I think it stinks by Anonymous Coward · 2002-01-23 17:02 · Score: 1

I also think the writing was on the wall long ago. Time and time again, any company that tries to cater to the linux desktop dies. Look for Ximian here next year or sooner unless sun or redhat bails them out.

I think it sucks, but if one thing has been proven beyond all doubt, its that you cannot make money catering to just the linux desktop market.

Thankfully though the server side is doing well. Linux web server usage is up(of course), and you now have your choice of fully supported DB's as all the major vendors are on board(MS excluded). Of course you can still run your traditional email,dns and f&p servers like always and save a load of cash which makes my clients happy.

Frankly part of me is a slight bit relieved that the "death watch" is over for them. It just killed me every time over the past few years a desktop linux company has died. I had such high hopes for companies like Corel, Eazel, Progeny et al, it was horrible to watch them give up. Especially after I had boasted to so many about how great the linux desktop is. Hell I even got my girlfriend to use it.

Oh well, I'll still use it as a desktop, but my daying of pushing it as such are officially over.

I'm glad they are gone. by HanzoSan · 2002-01-23 17:02 · Score: 1, Troll

Now all these people who refused to sign up to transgaming have no excuse and now its official,.

The only way we will get games working in Linux right now, is to support transgaming.

Loki tried but their idea just wasnt profitable.

Everyone who wants games in linux will sign up to transgaming, everyone who doesnt sign up to transgaming doesnt want games in Linux. Its really that simple.

For all who want to sign up TransGaming

--
If you use Linux, please help development of Autopac

Re:I'm glad they are gone. by Anonymous Coward · 2002-01-23 17:19 · Score: 0

Do you work for Transgaming?
Re:I'm glad they are gone. by Yottabyte84 · 2002-01-23 17:25 · Score: 2

It's only $5 to download it, and vote on what you want worked on. Worth the money IMHO
Re:I'm glad they are gone. by Fizzlewhiff · 2002-01-23 17:43 · Score: 1

What kind of performance hit do you take when you run a graphics intensive game under X? I don't play games on my Linux box but I have noticed certain applications that crawl under Linux but perform very well in Windows or MacOS, even with lesser hardware. Flash and Blender just to name a few. I would think some of these Loki games, Soldier of Fortune for example would be painful to play. (I'm downloading a demo now just to see for myself)

--

'Same speed C but faster'
Re:I'm glad they are gone. by gmhowell · 2002-01-23 17:47 · Score: 2

Hmmm.... NO. Again, if they don't make games I want, I don't buy. That simple.

--
Jesus was all right but his disciples were thick and ordinary. -John Lennon
Re:I'm glad they are gone. by HanzoSan · 2002-01-23 18:03 · Score: 1, Redundant

Well Starcraft is alittle slow right now but they just completed optimization for 2d and it should be 100 percent normal speed in the next release.

Sound is also not 100 percent, it literally was in slow motion.

While games arent optimized, I believe they can get to about 80-90 percent of the Windows version and in some case run better than the windows version.

Right now we need to make a choice, do you want slightly slower but working games in linux, or no games in linux?

--
If you use Linux, please help development of Autopac
Re:I'm glad they are gone. by theoddone33 · 2002-01-23 18:09 · Score: 2, Interesting

I just decided that I'm never, ever, ever signing up for TransGaming simply because you posted this. I might have considered it before, but not any more.

If you think that there are only 2 ways to get games in Linux, the Loki way and the TransGaming way, you are mistaken. Open your mind and you might end up better off in the long run.
Re:I'm glad they are gone. by Alex+Belits · 2002-01-23 18:51 · Score: 3, Insightful

What kind of performance hit do you take when you run a graphics intensive game under X?

Same as under any other platform if you use a hardware-accelerated OpenGL.

I don't play games on my Linux box but I have noticed certain applications that crawl under Linux but perform very well in Windows or MacOS, even with lesser hardware. Flash and Blender just to name a few.

Your card is running as 2d-only because it's either unsupported, or you are too lazy to install an OpenGL driver -- and probably is a piece of junk because everything non-junk has some decent driver already. As for Flash, its Linux port simply sucks because Macromedia knows about Linux as much as I know about the inhabitants' of the Andromeda Nebula taste in paintings.

--
Contrary to the popular belief, there indeed is no God.
Re:I'm glad they are gone. by Sloppy · 2002-01-23 19:23 · Score: 1

What kind of performance hit do you take when you run a graphics intensive game under X?

On hardware from the late 1990s or later? None that any human will ever be able to perceive. I'm sure it's there, but minor overhead costs like this are effortlessly gobbled up by recent processors, and the rest of the work totally overshadows it. i.e. the work involved in shuffling a glx primitive around in memory as it goes through a localhost socket or whatever it does, is totally insignificant compared to what it takes to actually render it.

It's a complete non-issue.

--
As copyright owner of this comment, I authorize everyone to defeat any technological measure which limits access to it.
Re:I'm glad they are gone. by metsfan · 2002-01-23 19:31 · Score: 0

Flash does crawl in linux, but its cause the linux version of it sucks. I use the windows one with the crossover plugin, and its a whole lot faster. So, it doesn't seem to be an X problem, just a program not at all optimized for it, or something.
Re:I'm glad they are gone. by Explo · 2002-01-23 21:18 · Score: 1

The only way we will get games working in Linux right now, is to support transgaming.

I must be imagining things, but I think that there's no mention of either transgaming or Loki software on the Linux version of Jagged Alliance 2 :P But there's a weird word "Tribsoft"...
Its too bad that Loki goes under; I bought both Heroes of Might & Magic III and Alpha Centauri/Alien Crossfire and have liked both, although I have less time for gaming than I'd want to. Now would be a nice time for some overwealthy experimental instance to take a gamble and keep Loki floating a year or two to see how things progress, but I guess it won't happen.

--
Everyone who makes generalizations should be shot.
Re:I'm glad they are gone. by Anonymous Coward · 2002-01-24 05:56 · Score: 0

I really wish IBM had done this.
I know it sounds silly because they are not a video game company, but they poured 1Billion into linux last year, It made a difference on the server and some really nice software came out of it.
A few million from IBM would be a drop in the bucket, and would really help linux on the desktop.
Re:I'm glad they are gone. by LadyLucky · 2002-01-24 23:08 · Score: 1

Your card is running as 2d-only because it's either unsupported, or you are too lazy to install an OpenGL driver -- and probably is a piece of junk because everything non-junk has some decent driver already. As for Flash, its Linux port simply sucks because Macromedia knows about Linux as much as I know about the inhabitants' of the Andromeda Nebula taste in paintings.
Fascinating. Blame it on the user, when none of that suggests it is his fault. Didnt install an openGL driver? eh? Why would i need to do that? That's the computer's job.
Even after all that, it still doesnt address his problem "i installed it and it didnt work right". No 'But', no 'yes of course it didnt because..' or 'stupid luser, doesnt deserver to use our OS'. If ya cant just dubbel klik it and and make it go with flashy bits and stuff, then you just lost 95% of your users.

--
dominionrd.blogspot.com - Restaurants on
Re:I'm glad they are gone. by NewZero · 2002-01-25 04:01 · Score: 1

At this point I'd rather support the wineHQ project than TransGaming. At least those efforts are freely distributable immediately (rather than waiting for that elusive 20,000 subscriber ransom)
My beef with the whole TransGaming model is this:
I'm paying $X dollars a month on the hope that they will address compatability issues with the game I want to play. In the mean time, there isn't a single commercial version of a game that runs completely under TransGamings WineX.
No... the Sims version they include with Mandrake is "optomized" for WineX. TransGaming clearly states the commercial Win version won't work.
Soo.. I want to run the copy of The Sims I already own, I can't. I have to pay another $60 for Mandrake/Sims pack... so where's the advantage?
I would rather use my dollars to "vote" for native Linux versions of commercial apps which will:
a) Truly be "optomized" for the environment on which they run
b) Have significantly less compatability and support issues
c) Go a long way in developing demand for Linux engineering skills
d) Actually be supported by the publisher of the game
Loki had the right idea, but market conditions, timing, and distribution issues held it back.
Also, I would agree with many who say that linux gaming needs a killer app. That one game that forces the Windoze guys to put up that Linux partiton 'cuz it's the only way to get their fix...
Re:I'm glad they are gone. by Alex+Belits · 2002-01-25 19:02 · Score: 2

If ya cant just dubbel klik it and and make it go with flashy bits and stuff, then you just lost 95% of your users.

I don't care about 95% of the users -- Windows, if it was sold in boxes and not preinstalled, would be unavailable for 95% of users, too. The point is, in this case stupid user is at fault, and he should shut up.

--
Contrary to the popular belief, there indeed is no God.
Re:I'm glad they are gone. by LadyLucky · 2002-01-25 22:10 · Score: 1

don't care about 95% of the users -- Windows, if it was sold in boxes and not preinstalled, would be unavailable for 95% of users, too. The point is, in this case stupid user is at fault, and he should shut up.
Hence Linux has sub 1% market share, and windows over 90%. It's those kinds of attitudes that keep it that way too.

--
dominionrd.blogspot.com - Restaurants on
Re:I'm glad they are gone. by Anonymous Coward · 2002-01-28 05:39 · Score: 0

Too bad transgamings Winex is crap. I hope it gets better. It segfaults constantly, but the same apps (Diablo II, especially) run better with the opensource version of wine. Still, I'm always happy to contribute to commercial Linux development that gives back (at least partially) to the open-source development community.

MacPlay by Johnny+Mnemonic · 2002-01-23 17:04 · Score: 1

The programmers should go to work for MacPlay. MacPlay, a Mac porting house, has committed itself to only bringing games to Mac OS X from here on out, and it would seem to me that the experience that the Loki porters developed bringing DirectX games to Linux would directly translate to bringing DirectX games to Mac OS X. (Somebody please correct me if I'm wrong.)

In fact, it's still a little beyond me why Loki was able to bring some games to Linux but not Mac OS X--once the games were on Linux, I would've thought that the expanded marketshare of the games-hungry Mac market would've been attractive. And Mac users are willing to pay. Personally, I would've given my right nostril to play Tribes2 or Heavy Gear on my Mac. That just seems like an opportunity lost.

In fact, I would still pay to play these games--if Loki needs to divest it's assets, they might consider selling their codebase to MacPlay (naturally, MacPlay would still need to acquire the license for the Mac market.)

The bottom line: Apple is trying to get some gaming cred, MacPlay and others are furiously hard at work bringing PC titles to the Mac, and Mac OS X programmers can be hard to find. I would love to have Loki's talent in the Mac development community.

--

--
$tar -xvf .sig.tar

Re:MacPlay by Anonymous Coward · 2002-01-23 17:28 · Score: 0

mac and linux are very diffrent.
The only thing they have in common, is the are both based on an OS (or oses) based on UNIX.
Re:MacPlay by Anonymous Coward · 2002-01-23 17:50 · Score: 0

"why Loki was able to bring some games to Linux but not Mac OS X"

For that matter, why don't the original developers of games bring their game to other platforms? I realize the Linux and Mac markets for games are significantly smaller than the Windows market, but nevertheless.. It can't be THAT hard to just use standard open libraries (OpenGL, SDL, etc), and write portable code, and then just do a compile for each platform and stick a binary for each platform on the CD (or better yet, just put the source on the CD, but that'll never happen...)
Re:MacPlay by Anonymous Coward · 2002-01-23 17:51 · Score: 0

Couldn't do OSX due to the rights (LINUX) purchased. Sorry.

All the programmers have other jobs now.
Re:MacPlay by Krach42 · 2002-01-23 18:00 · Score: 1

Yeah, you'd figure. I talk to people and they're like "Well, why aren't there Linux only games?" And I respond that there are Terminus, and Parsec (amoung some others) but then I mention that, because Linux programmers write portable code, it turns out that BOTH of these titles are directly available on Mac and Windows both! :P Course the windows world is still in that nice little denial phase where they insist that no one uses anything but Windows, and there's no need to make ANYTHING portable. (Take Roller Coaster Tycoon, which I hear has so much x86 assembly in it that porting to Mac makes it worthless... what a way to write a game... in Assembly...)

--

I am unamerican, and proud of it!
Re:MacPlay by AHumbleOpinion · 2002-01-23 18:00 · Score: 2, Insightful

it's still a little beyond me why Loki was able to bring some games to Linux but not Mac OS X

(1) Competition. Loki would face several more experienced Mac porting houses that have well established track records, excellent contacts and history with the developers/publishers who have an interest in Mac titles.

(2) Experience. IIRC Loki has some former Apple people but this does not necessarily mean they had the experience necessary to port games to the Mac. This manifests in two ways. First, programming knowledge for the platform, Linux is very different from MacOS X (more later). Second, a jealously guarded library that developed over time. A typical Windows to Mac library and tools set (even more later) takes a lot of time, consider it overhead. It only becomes a great asset when you get to the point that it can be largely used as is for a new porting contract. An established porting company can perform a port more quickly and for less money than a new company in part because such libraries and tools are already paid for.

Linux is different: MacOS X may have it's roots in NextStep and FreeBSD but that does not mean that MacOS X programs are Unix apps. The vast majority of MacOS X apps and games are usually using Apple's Carbon API, this lets them either target MacOS 9 and X or reuse much of their existing code (recall libraries and tools mentioned above).

Libraries/Tools: Many developers have no interest in targeting anything except Windows and they code accordingly. Their involvement in ports may only be that they cash the check from whoever is buying a license for MacOS/Linux/etc. A porting house has two options. #ifdef all the Windows specific code or write some code that translates/emulates the Windows calls/data. The latter case is advantageous if you expect to be in the business for a while.
Re:MacPlay by micromuncher · 2002-01-24 08:14 · Score: 1

Ah, a Macophite speaks!

The answer to some of the questions...
1) Why not support MacOS X?
- Because MacOS X has irrelevant market share to support the cost of the port.
- Because companies need to focus their efforts to meet their mandate (i.e. porting brand X to linuX)

2) Why not write games directly for the hungy MacOS/Linux crowd?
- Because an A1 title costs 20 man years at the moment, and that means a cost/revenue balance. MacOS and Linux account for less than 1 percent of the gaming market. Seriously, will a potential revenue of $250k match the $2-5m required to develop the title? Basic math...

Companies that port can only exist if they are one man (or gender confused in the case of WestLake) shops. Look at the history of shops that ported games to MacOS. Lion Entertainment - gone. MacSoft - gone. MacPlay - gone and a bit of a comeback.

Loki could have learned for all the failed MacOS porting shops.

The only star was Bungie, but they hit the 5m cap and sold out to Microsoft for deeper pockets. Cross platforms games are not hard if they are designed as such up front, but again the cost needs to be weighed against the gain for this endeavor.

--
/\/\icro/\/\uncher
Re:MacPlay by Johnny+Mnemonic · 2002-01-24 16:49 · Score: 1
Well, I would like to think that's more Mac-o-phile, but maybe that's just trolling.

In any event, on to your points:
- Mac OS X does not have substantial marketshare, at this point; I'm not kidding myself. However, I might argue that it is on more desktops than Linux, and really, I don't mean to troll. But at least I can quantify how many installs of Mac OS X were made last year (simply by counting how many Macs shipped since OS X came pre-installed), and that is a much trickier thing to do with Linux--especially because it's an easier guess as to how many people can simply reboot to play a Windows game if they are a potential Linux-game customer (many if not most Linux users have a Windows partition; even with VPC that's not really an option for Mac users without a whole 'nother machine.)
- There is no question, even in this Mac-o-phile's mind, that many companies couldn't make a profit making Mac-only, or even Linux-only, games. I don't mean to say that anybody should try. But as to mandates: Loki could have made their mandate "Bringing games to Unix!" and counted both Linux users and Mac OS X users as potential customers. Instead, it was narrowly defined as Linux-only--and see where that got them. Say what you will about MacPlay, but they haven't declared Chap 11.
- And to respond to another poster in this thread--I wouldn't even expect a Linux shop to try to compete with Mac porting shops--however, if they had released Tribes2 for Mac OS X, or Heavy Gear for OS X, they wouldn't have competed with any other Mac porting house--as no other Mac porting house had released those titles. And, unlike any Linux port, a Mac port very likely would have been placed in 27 retail locations throughout the country, with traffic of 800,000 potential game-hungry customers per month, and furthermore, a quality game would be screaming from those shelves--rather unlike the din of competition at Best Buy. Did Loki's site get 800,000 hits/month?
  
  And, btw, MacSoft is still alive and well, but at www.wizworks.com/macsoft, a subsidiary of Infogrames, if my understanding is correct. They have a bunch of stuff coming out even now.
  
  You'll get no argument from me about Bungie. They even said that making cross-plat games was not hard, as they had learned to write disciplined code; well, that couldn't last. And by most accounts, Halo kinda blows. (Which is a troll.)
--

--
$tar -xvf .sig.tar

Re:huh? I already got free. by An+Ominous+Cow+Erred · 2002-01-23 17:04 · Score: 5, Interesting

It actually works totally the other way around. *WE* pay a software company for the right to port the game. We have to pay a big chunk of money up front. These companies do not see fit to make Linux versions of games, so we have to give them money to convince them to do it. While we have also done some contract work (where we were paid to write code) this isn't really how it works for games for any OS besides Windows. Somebody has to pay the original publisher for the rights.

Regarding the number of people who play games under Linux... Well, there certainly has been a clamor for them. While it's true that most installations of Linux are running as servers, there are also many desktop installations. Certainly a larger number than any other alternative OS except perhaps MacOS. We get quite a few requests for ports, and in general there seems to be quite a clamor for Linux games (if you read any website frequented by the Linux community). Loki, as the predominant Linux gaming company, received heaps of praise.

As far as social simulation and other interesting not-common-on-American-PCs genres go... Well, I sure wish we'd release some of those. Unfortunately it is still a niche market, and given that we already cater to a niche market it would be a niche within a niche. :-(

I hope with growing acceptance of Linux there might be a revival of Linux gaming at some point.... But for the time being the attitude seems to be Everything-On-Linux-Must-Be-Free-Beer. People who are willing to buy Windows games are unwilling to buy the Linux version (even though they claim that they want it). Instead they expect it to be supplied for free. I really hope this changes in the future. :-(

James Sellman - Hyperion Entertainment - http://www.hyperion-entertainment.com/

Glad I wasn't hired. by Joz · 2002-01-23 17:05 · Score: 1

I had an interview at Loki for a tech support position late last summer. The place was not what I expected at all. It was an extremely quiet building, especially once inside, there was nobody around. I thought maybe I'd get a little tour or something (which I was looking forward to), but I don't think there was really more than one or two people working there at the time, and this was 2pm on a normal week day. You could hear a pin drop.

Couldn't see any working area either, wasn't the big open rooms geek-house type of atmosphere I expected to see and had seen at other development houses, it was more like a doctor's office, with individual rooms -type of atmosphere.

They weren't the friendly, warm, open-source, eff, gnu, smiling people I expected either. They were quite cut-throat, business-oriented, corporate-core types, rather cold. Although Scott (main guy, one of the two I interviewed with) was actually nice and closer to what I expected. It felt like just another corporation, I've had MUCH warmer experiences at interviews with proprietary software companies. This interview happened just after they filed chapter 11 though, but in that week before anybody knew that they did, so perhaps they were all a bit stressed out.

In the end it turns out they hired some guy a few days before me and were still making sure they had the right person, or something along those lines. I didn't get it. But I guess I'd be out of a job if I did!

Re:Glad I wasn't hired. by Anonymous Coward · 2002-01-23 17:47 · Score: 0

As a person who had left about two weeks earlier: you missed the fun times. The fun ended January 2001, as people started trickling away due to the ongoing problems.
Re:Glad I wasn't hired. by slouken · 2002-01-24 14:57 · Score: 1

Hi Mike! :)

--Sam

Targetting the wrong market by Anonymous Coward · 2002-01-23 17:05 · Score: 1

Loki was doomed because there is no market for what they provided.

A perfect analogy would be between the computer an sex industry.

While Windows gaming would be like porn, Loki provided material to what would be homosexuals who liked dressing up as anime characters and double fisting each other - a tiny fraction of a tiny preference.

Goodbye Loki.

I think Loki did a great job after all. by Shiny+Metal+S. · 2002-01-23 17:06 · Score: 1

Loki proved that Linux really is a great platform for games. The only problems were strictly social and economical, not technical. I know many people who radically changed their opinions about Linux being a poor desktop and gaming platform, after seeing Soldier of Fortune or SimCity 3000 Unlimited.

So yes, they proved that Linux is not only a toy OS for hackers. And this means a lot.

Loki has made Linux better, from technical point of view. We have SDL and OpenAL. We have a great book Programming Linux Games by Loki Software and John R. Hall. For all of these Loki deserves big thanks from all of us. We also owe them apology for not supporting them as we should. It's sad, but their economical failure is mostly our fault. We have to understand that.

Linux community is a pretty strange market. We're used to free speech and free beer. So I guess now we have to wait for WorldForge. I'm not holding my breath for any commercial games for Linux anytime soon...

--

~shiny
WILL HACK FOR $$$

mod parent up by Anonymous Coward · 2002-01-23 17:08 · Score: 0

That is one of the most insightful posts I have read on Slashdot as of late. I know I, personally, whack off to penguins.

Linux Ports != Linux Games by xtal · 2002-01-23 17:09 · Score: 5, Insightful

What I saw of the 'linux gaming' movement, I wasn't too pleased with.. the idea was noble, but in reality, a) computers are cheap, so I have another machine to play games on besides my linux workstation and b) the ports were either a pain in the ass to get running, or my 3D card was a pain in the ass to get running, or xxx yyy was a PITA to get running. Sorry, no sale. It would have been nice to see a killer title emerge on the linux platform - but Tux Racer just isn't going to cut it *grin*. I think that's what linux gaming was going to need to get off the ground. Games rely too heavily on things that are very platform specific - e.g. controllers and game APIs, and 3D accelleration. Linux loses.

I'm not sure this is all Loki's fault though. Has anyone else here been introducted to OS X recently? I got a Ti Powerbook because I needed a machine that would work for 4 hours on a battery charge. No big deal on the OS, as long as it runs vim (and it does, through XDarwin, natively). OS X is flawlessly integrated. It reminds me of what my amiga was back in the day - a great platform, where everything worked. No, it isn't completely open source. But, "It works".

My beef: Aqua and OS X is what Redhat SHOULD have done when they released linux. Take the open source start, hire a team of developers to make everything work flawlessly and consistantly. Glue it together with GREAT developer tools and documentation. Make new hardware work without three kernel recompiles and a prayer to ye gods. Get solid APIs people can build applications from on a bulletproof kernel. Redhat missed out, and I think the failure of gaming to catch on is a symptom of this bigger problem.

There's sure a lot of successful games for OS X. Even native ones.

--
..don't panic

Re:Linux Ports != Linux Games by kurowski · 2002-01-23 18:43 · Score: 1

you got a Ti Book just to get 4 hours of battery life? did you even look at pc laptops? my dell inspiron 8100 gets 4 hours with one battery in. after i replaced the floppy drive with a second battery my battery life is 8 hours. sure, that's when i'm running nothing but vim, konqueror, and xmms, but that's what i do 99% of the time. playing dvd's cuts the battery time in half, but that's still enough to get through two movies, generally.

the point is, i'm guessing that if you're honest with yourself, you bought the Ti Book for it's looks more than anything. i know i almost did.

regarding redhat, what you describe is basically what they're doing now. it installed flawlessly on my laptop- no post-installation configuration necessary. it comes with all the great developer tools and docs that basically every other distro does: gcc+perl+python+autoconf+etc and man+info+/usr/share/doc+etc. the API is solid. it's been solid for years. i didn't even have to compile a custom kernel to get every piece of hardware (sans winmodem) working.

i'll admit that i left linux for openbsd for the last couple of years, but since trying redhat this last month i've been impressed. installed redhat, it works. installed 3d card driver from rpm. it works. installed half a dozen loki games. they all work. wireless ethernet and internal ethernet just plain work. IrDA, USB, and sound all work. everything just works, and it was all painless to install.

so perhaps it's been a while since you've tried linux. but if you put a modern distro on a modern system, i think you'll be amazed at how far it's come in the last few years.
Re:Linux Ports != Linux Games by Anonymous Coward · 2002-01-23 19:12 · Score: 0

TiBook=15.2 monitor which is unheard of for laptops!
Re:Linux Ports != Linux Games by Longstaff · 2002-01-23 19:27 · Score: 1

Make new hardware work without three kernel recompiles and a prayer to ye gods.

Yeah, because there are *so* many different hardware configurations in the Mac world vs. the PC world.

I mean, c'mon - you expect the same results from an obscure company (which RH very much was prior to the whole IPO thing) that you expect from Apple when a) they don't have NEARLY the resources of Apples and b) the job is AT LEAST three orders of magnatude more difficult. How long did Apple work on OS X?? How many years? How many OS and hardware upgrades did they pump out while they were working on it to help with things like...*gasp*...cash flow?

I own an iBook (not the fugly clam shell) and run OS X exclusively on it. It's *very* nice, but I'd still call it pretty far from perfect. I mean, there was a big "ooh-ahh" from my mac friends when 10.1 came out and you could move the dock around - and get it to stay there between logins! Yeah....wow....real customizeable interface...Red Hat ships with how many different desktop environments and window managers?
Re:Linux Ports != Linux Games by xtal · 2002-01-23 19:42 · Score: 3, Interesting

I hope I got people thinking about some possible reasons why Loki had a hard time. You don't learn anything from a failure if you don't know why..
Let me clarify a few points. Yeah, the looks on the Ti Book kick ass. But so does how the OS looks and acts - not to mention the good start projects like fink.sourceforge.net have. XDarwin is great. I needed a machine that'd run for four hours and be thin and light as well. Sony or Apple. Sony's tech support is HORRIBLE (in my opinion). So off to apple I go. I'm really, really glad I chose the Ti book - it introduced me to what some commerical providers can do with the open source communities good starts. Apple brought their best foot forward, and the OS community brought theirs. The results astound me.
But enough about that. I work developing ASICs and embedded systems for a variety of industries in a research lab. I run linux on my primary desktop right now - about as modern a system as you can get, a watercooled athlon, even. Ximian Gnome has come a long way - but it looks like it's going to be woven into the Solaris/SUN fold, and synergies will appear there the way they did with Apple and BSD, I'm sure. FWIW, the design packages I use (Cadence Family) all run on high end Sun workstations. Mentor Graphics has some limited native linux support. Doesn't matter as long as I have a X client.
Redhat does NOT currently offer developers anywhere NEAR the level of support and integration apple does through their developer tool releases and their documentation available through their web site - all gratis. The design of the OS is great, the tools are great, the look and feel is just right - one button be damned.
What Redhat SHOULD have done in my opinion - and to their credit, you're right, they are moving in this direction - is that they should have stepped up to the plate to make sure that common hardware - like, 3D accellerators - are all supported fully by the window manager and display system and are available to games in a user-friendly way. No XF86Config to edit, no nothing. Plug it in and it works. Apple did this with OpenGL. Redhat should have made sure that there is a way for people to watch movies and DVDs without going through 1001 semi-legal hoops, twitches, and jumps for a half working solution. Apple did this with their Quicktime player and iDVD. Apple controls their base motherboards, yes. They work closely with third parties like NVidia and ATI to make sure their cards are supported. Other companies like creative are coming around to provide support, as well - backed by Apple as the provider of corporate sanity and legal guarantees. One thing I'm learning as I get older is the world isn't black and white. Closed source and open source CAN play nice together.
Redhat should have played the role of Apple or Microsoft for the linux world. Yes, they don't control the hardware. They damn well could have worked a lot closer with third party hardware people like NVidia to get their things working right out of the box, so companies like Loki aren't left with 100 line README files on how to make a game work on a given platform. Trying to keep this rant on topic, Loki tried to fit itself in the middle when the installed base wasn't ready and their sales figures reflected that.
What is really troubling to me is that now I can see projects like XDarwin, Fink (fink.sourceforge.net) derailing the effort to get linux on the desktop. Efforts by Sun to intergrate the fruits of open source development - remember, open source users benefit when the installed base goes up - will also further hurt linux on the desktop. Gnome 2.0 with Ximian updates on Solaris is going to make my Sunblade machines a lot more attractive looking!
Apple has a real winner here, and I encourage more people to try OS X. The user experience is something I really missed - reliability and a solid application base.
I really, really, really hope someone at Redhat or any of the major commercial distros looks at what Apple (and Sun, to a lesser degree) are doing and come up with a similar strategy. I don't want there to be any more Loki style failures in the future.
Just my 0.02. cdn, even.

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..don't panic
Re:Linux Ports != Linux Games by Anonymous Coward · 2002-01-23 21:12 · Score: 1, Insightful

Redhat should have played the role of Apple or Microsoft for the linux world

You don't get it. There is not a vast market out there that is unhappy with Windows as a desktop platform.

On the other hand, there is a large market of people that want to replace proprietary UNIX hardware with a commodity solution. This is the market that RedHat focuses on, and ignoring the slashbots and sticking to servers and engineering/development workstations is one big reason that RedHat is profitable and Loki is out of business.
Re:Linux Ports != Linux Games by Anonymous Coward · 2002-01-23 21:34 · Score: 0

Dell Inspiron 8100 = 7.9 lbs loaded
Apple Powerbook G4 = 5.4 lbs.

Comparison invalid.
Re:Linux Ports != Linux Games by Dr_Claw · 2002-01-24 01:49 · Score: 2, Insightful

I agree with most of your points, and what I've seen of OS X looks as fantastic as you say. I could do with a portable computer (mainly as something that takes up very little space in my bedroom) - I sold my old laptop earlier last year - but sadly I can't justify the cost right now. If I could, I'd buy one of Apple's offerings.

Where I disagree though, is that RedHat should do what you suggest. Whilst they are definitely the company in the best position to do so, it's not currently worth their while. IMO some of the other distros make better choices for people coming from windows who want nice looking graphical desktops which are easy to configure their system from. RedHat is keeping up, but it's not advancing on that. The reason for this is because RedHat needs to be profitable, and sales to desktop users aren't currently going to make that happen. Their profit comes from being good for business who will buy their support and advanced packages (remember RedHat doesn't just produce a Linux distribution). Whilst that's the case, they will continue to focus on providing what their paying customers (other companies) need.

Having said that, I would like to see what you suggest happen, and I think it would be a good thing. I just don't think RedHat are going to do it anytime soon. As the Linux desktop market becomes more viable then perhaps we'll see a shift towards this behaviour. I could see closer relationships with more hardware vendors being a logical start (rather than making desktops nicer).
Re:Linux Ports != Linux Games by kurowski · 2002-01-24 03:04 · Score: 1

dell inspiron 8100 = 15 inch screen, which may be a smaller diagonal but because it's the standard aspect ratio (4:3) (1600x1200) instead of a widescreen, i'm guessing it's actually a bit larger in terms of area.
Re:Linux Ports != Linux Games by kurowski · 2002-01-24 03:08 · Score: 1

hey, i'm not trying to say the inspiron is a better laptop than the Ti Book. i love the Ti Book and wish i wasn't wedded to x86 hardware. i was just pointing out that battery life by itself could not justify the purchase of the Ti Book, especially if one isn't a Mac OS user but rather a linux user.
Re:Linux Ports != Linux Games by Anonymous Coward · 2002-01-24 04:45 · Score: 0

i'm not saying either is better, just that an extra pound of Li-Ion makes a difference in battery life.
Re:Linux Ports != Linux Games by crush · 2002-01-24 04:48 · Score: 1

I don't know how much of it is specifically RedHat's fault, but I do agree with you that the central problem with linux gaming is 3D support. Just look at the questions on xf86-newbie (and even on Xpert) and you'll see that a lot of them are "how the hell do I get 3D working" and "what cards are supported for 3D". This is a seriously lagging area for the Linux desktop. I know that Precision Insight (now Tungsten?) have tried to sort things out with adding the DRI, but there is still a huge amount of confusion.

Here's a question for those that are disagreeing with me right now: what card are you using, what version of XF86, do you have 3D acceleration working, do you have OpenGL, what games have you tested this combination with?

I'm running XF864.2 on an ATI 8500 and I only have 2D acceleration
Re:Linux Ports != Linux Games by DunbarTheInept · 2002-01-24 08:32 · Score: 2

I hope I got people thinking about some possible reasons why Loki had a hard time. You don't learn anything from a failure if you don't know why..
There really big reason Loki had a hard time, and it's pretty much the only one that matters, is that their business model was: "Pay full price a second time for a game you already bought a year ago, so that you don't have to reboot." Linux users are in a different sort of situation than Mac users. For Mac users, playing the Windows version (while perhaps grumbling about it) is not even an option. So for them the year-old port they see is the first ever occurance of them getting to buy the game. Not so for Linux users. As long as Loki couldn't get started on their ports until after the Windows version was already out, they were doomed. Look at the one title they *did* do well with - Civ Call to Power. It was very different from the rest in several important ways - for one it had a publisher who put it out on store shelves right next to the Windows game, and in a very timely manner so it was still around while the original game was in its first round of sales.

--
Don't label something "offtopic" unless you know the topic well enough to tell what's on topic.

No variety by dunham · 2002-01-23 17:11 · Score: 1

Sad to see them go, but they never made anything I wanted. Call me weird, but I like RPG/Adventure games, not the simulation games they keep turning out, and I've told them that. Closest I've gotten is "Deus Ex" which has been in development for years, never released. You'd think the baldurs gate series would be a shoe-in, since they've been using the same engine for year after year.

And yes, I would have payed a premium for linux versions of the games I own.

At least we have Ultima VII (a free linux/windows engine for the game data has been written by fans, because the released version of the game doesn't run on any recent OS).

Re:No variety by Anonymous Coward · 2002-01-24 03:59 · Score: 0

Unfortunately, that's the problem I had too. I want to totally get rid of windows, but I can't as long as there's no linux port for the games I play. I play the RPGs such as baldur's gate and the like. I do also play fps games like quake3 and tribes. As a matter of fact, I just purchased tribes 2 and postal (always wanted to see postal just because ppl gripped about it).

What I find staggering is that Linux gaming is far better than the gaming you get on Windows. I get better performance, reliablility, and even speed over the internet.

Not to mention that Linux is picking up the pace. I still say by 2005 you'll see Microsoft loosing it's market share to Mac and Linux. Microsoft is on it's way down, but Loki going away isn't going to help it much. I don't even know of any other game porting companies that you can purchase the game from directly. The reason I say this is simply because most of the retail stores are always "out of stock". Gotta have the games on the shelves too so they can be bought.

Sweet Jesus! by Anonymous Coward · 2002-01-23 17:14 · Score: 0

propz in the name of klerk and all trolls

Want games? Play Gamecube. by HanzoSan · 2002-01-23 17:16 · Score: 2

Right, Thats how you sound.

Go play a Gamecube for your games, a PC wasnt designed for Games.

Stupid little man, Some people want to play Games on their PCs, some people dont want to pay $200 to install an insecure Operating System called Windows just so they can play the occassional Game.

Some people want to play games in Linux.

Some Windows users want to run servers.

Some Console owners want to surf the web.

--
If you use Linux, please help development of Autopac

Re:Want games? Play Gamecube. by Goldberg's+Pants · 2002-01-23 21:44 · Score: 1

You're idea is great, but for 2 flaws.

1) For a Gamecube, you need to shell out $X for the hardware.

2) The markup on console games is insane so the company can make back what they lose on the console.

The fact is, all the fucking zealots need to cut through the bullshit. You're assholes, end of story. Use whichever OS does what you want to do. I want to game, I go to Windows. I want to surf, do my email etc... I use Linux.

Dual boot rules, and is the only way to go. If you choose to just use Linux, well, your fucking loss.

Censorship out of control by Anonymous Coward · 2002-01-23 17:17 · Score: 0

No doubt a Windows using Nazi has mod points right now.

I repeat, how is a person showing his sadness for the demise of an important company a troll?

Re:Censorship out of control by Goldberg's+Pants · 2002-01-23 20:54 · Score: 1

And I repeat, I've had bowel movements more important than Loki.

Open Source projects... by Junta · 2002-01-23 17:19 · Score: 2

What about their open-source projects? Though many didn't acheive anything that impressive, smpeg is an extremely useful library for multimedia. OpenAL sounded nice as well, but I don't know how much that would be missed... Though not directly hosted by lokigames, how would SDL development progress, given that it is maintained by Sam Lantinga, same person chiefly responsible for SMPEG.

Granted, at least in the case of smpeg, there are plenty of alternatives (ffmpeg, mpeglib come to mind), but smpeg is *really* easy to write for. But SDL fills a very important role for multimedia and game development..

--
XML is like violence. If it doesn't solve the problem, use more.

Re:Open Source projects... by Queuetue · 2002-01-24 00:35 · Score: 1

Sam's been working for blizzard since at least August, AFAIK. At least that's what his .sig says.

Re:huh? I already got free. by AHumbleOpinion · 2002-01-23 17:20 · Score: 2, Informative

Do those compaines pay you to port those games, or do they just give you the source and then give you a chunck of the revenue when you are done? You're not doing for fun are you?

Two classic deals, not Linux specific, Mac/Console too:

(1) When a developer/publisher has no interest in targeting a particular secondary platform themselves what often happens is that some other company pays to license the game for that platform.

(2) When a developer/publisher has a mild interest in targeting a particular secondary platform themselves what often happens is that they hire some other company to do a port for them. Hiring usually involves a flat fee and/or royalties. If the game is expected to sell well the royalty component may be small or non-existent. If the project is riskier then the royalty component offered is often larger.

In case (1) the porting company takes all the risk. Case (2) sounds safer but the profits in that flat fee disappear pretty quickly if the project runs longer than expected. Royalties usually are seen only in dreams, not the real world.

Some people want to use ONE OS all the time by HanzoSan · 2002-01-23 17:21 · Score: 1, Troll

Its not about being a fanatic.

Do you want to have to use Internet Explorer for certain sites and Mozilla for others?

Well then.

Whats wrong with improving the gaming experience on Linux? Its bad and Windows is better right now, but some people dont have the money to buy Windows, dont want to buy a $200 program to play games when paying transgaming $5 a month will get their games working.

Your choice, $200, or $5 x 12 = 60

$60, or $200, the choice says Linux is lighter on the wallet.

--
If you use Linux, please help development of Autopac

HAHAHAHAHAH by Anonymous Coward · 2002-01-23 17:26 · Score: 0

good one!

I've read most the post by I_redwolf · 2002-01-23 17:28 · Score: 5, Insightful

... On this thread regarding "Why don't you just dual boot". I've got 4 loki games I bought from loki simply because I don't use windows. I don't want to support Microsoft (a company found to be a monopoly which abuses its power mind you). In their quest to basically control what I do with my computer, control what I do online, and control what I do with my career because I like computers. Not only that but I don't care how many games there are for windows if it means I have to pay for a windows license I will not do it. I'm very pleased companies like ID are making ports available and so I support them, I supported Loki.. and I will continue to support any company who will please me with such pleasures as games for Linux. I never used to buy ID games, ever.. I used to just get a copy from a friend but now that they port to Linux I've bought their quake2 set, quake3 and rtcw and will continue to buy from them because they make good games and are now porting to my platform.

I wish this new slashdot crowd would stop being so goddamn "wishy-washy" and make a decision or stay with windows because most of your posts are absolute dribble; "Stand for something, or fall for anything" is what they say. Most of you just fall for anything.

Re:I've read most the post by cgleba · 2002-01-23 19:18 · Score: 1

Amen.
Re:I've read most the post by xtremex · 2002-01-23 20:20 · Score: 1

Hallelujah! Finally someone with a clue! You seem NOT to be a 20 yr old MS-Brainwashed kid. They always say that youth is what makes things move. But it seems that most of the youth nowadays don't give a crap. No conviction.

--
If you're not a Liberal in your 20's, then you have no heart.If you're still a Liberal in your 30's you have no brain.
Re:I've read most the post by enol · 2002-01-24 17:27 · Score: 1

Damn RIGHT! My sentiments exactly!

Yeah! Support TransGaming! Turn Linux into OS/2! by Anonymous Coward · 2002-01-23 17:31 · Score: 0

Make sure that there will NEVER EVER be a native Linux game market! Not only that, you can make sure that gaming under Linux will always be an unfriendly experience, driven by multiple customized and incompatible versions of WINE, just to make sure that no one will ever take the platform seriously! Yup! Let's work together to make this a reality TODAY!

What about developing games? by yerricde · 2002-01-23 17:31 · Score: 1

I still think of my linux boxen as development platforms or servers, I don't play games on them, I program and do real work. Putting mere games on them would be demeaning to them!

I use my Linux boxes to play games because I use my Linux boxes to develop. Otherwise, how would I test the games I'm developing?

--
Will I retire or break 10K?

Crap by HunterA3 · 2002-01-23 17:33 · Score: 1

I'm just now getting into Linux and I'm using games to motivate myself into learning the OS. I've just recently started to collect several of Loki's games. I've even got two on order. I hope I get them now.

seen this coming.. by Suppafly · 2002-01-23 17:34 · Score: 2

we all should have seen this coming since loki filed for chaper 11 like 6 months ago.. to my knowledge, most companies don't usually recover from that..

its a shame though, the more I use linux, the more I wished the programs I like to use and play worked so I didn't have to switch back to windows to accomplish the everyday things I like to do.

"Linux" on regcard leads to at least winelib build by yerricde · 2002-01-23 17:34 · Score: 2

I could undoubtably run some of these games through wine, but this really defeats the purpose if you want games written for linux.

Well, when you register your software, and the card asks you "what version of Windows do you use?" you can put Mandrake (or whatever). Eventually, publishers will get the message that Microsoft operating systems are not the only PC operating systems that their customers use, and they might consider releasing a native version of their software. (Use winelib in the early stages of porting; go fully cross-platform in later releases.)

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Will I retire or break 10K?

Until Win/Lin versions released together... by penguin_dance · 2002-01-23 17:35 · Score: 2, Interesting

...this will not change.

This shouldn't come as any surprise.

For Christmas I got Mandrake 8.1 Gaming Edition with The Sims. Very cool and just like the Windows version. The only thing is, on my Windows machine, I've got all 3 add-on packs too. Would I have bought The Sims for Linux had it not been packaged with the upgrade? Probably not.

Until Linux games get released at the same time as the Windows games this won't change. People who have already bought the game under Windows, *most times* don't want to buy it again 1-2 years later just so they can use it under Linux. And they don't want to wait, hoping it will be one of the few ported to Linux, unless that's the only OS they're using AND the Win version doesn't work under Wine.

--
If you've never been modded as "flamebait" or "troll," you've never tried to argue a minority viewpoint here!

Not too surprising by maxxon · 2002-01-23 17:37 · Score: 1

Not really all that surprising, when you think about it. Consider that these are the same guys who thought it was a good idea to start work on a port of Postal -- a completely unremarkable game except that stirred up a moderate amount of controversy in its day. Making a port of Postal is like the remake of Psycho -- it's completely without purpose.

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max

Winelib turns your Win app into a native *n?x app by yerricde · 2002-01-23 17:41 · Score: 2

Linux will always be an unfriendly experience, driven by multiple customized and incompatible versions of WINE

Unless you build Wine into the game binary itself. Use winelib to port your app, and it will run natively on linux, bsd, and many other operating systems that implement the same Single UNIX Spec. From there, you can gradually reduce the number of win32 calls you make.

--
Will I retire or break 10K?

It all comes down to $$'s by Teancom · 2002-01-23 17:41 · Score: 1, Flamebait

I bought tribes 2 this week, for a lan party going on this Friday. Having bought Unreal Tournament last week, I expected to go home, download the linux installer, and be on my way. No dice, you need to buy the Tribes2 for linux seperately. After some digging around, figuring out that Loki wasn't paid for the port (like UT) but instead paid for the privledge, then cool. That's completely understandable, and so I sell my windows copy to a guy at work (for $10.49, what I paid at Compusa) and went searching for a cheap copy of tribes 2 for linux. *bzzzt*. No such thing. This is a year old game which had an almost simultaneous release (i.e., they've had as long as windows to make a profit). So, even if I can't get it for $10, I can still get it cheaper than the $49 loki is asking, right? Nope. No way, no how. I tried every "online retailer" Loki links to, and if they even had it (only two did) they were for "full retail" (i.e., 4Xs what I paid for my Window's copy). At this point, I am searching the warez channels, cursing the fact that kazaa is dead to linux users, because there is no way in *hell* I'm paying almost $50 + shipping for a game that's a year old. So, in summation, if someone has a *used* copy that I can purchase legitimately, *please* email me. I would *love* to not have to pirate this game. Cuz if not, I'm going to download it and burn it. That's just the way it is....

Re:It all comes down to $$'s by Time+Doctor · 2002-01-23 17:51 · Score: 1

It does indeed come down to money, it does not however legitimize piracy.

--
Check out ioquake3.org for a great, free, First-Person Shooter engine!

Well this looks like... by Anonymous Coward · 2002-01-23 17:44 · Score: 0

1 - Release source code
2 - ???
3 - Profit!!!!

Re:huh? I already got free. by kilrogg · 2002-01-23 17:44 · Score: 2

I think the major problem with this (or at least loki's) business model is the fact they ported games after the windows games were already out. You need to cordinate and release at the same time.

People aren't going to sit around and wait 6-12 month for a port when they can just reboot into windows a play the already released game. How can you possibly expect people to buy a second copy 6-12months later just to play it under linux?

wow, mod that AC up by Anonymous Coward · 2002-01-23 17:53 · Score: 0

He's dead on. RH is (trying to) move to the server side, as can be observed by the prepoderence of their effort going into polishing their serverish packages compared to spending resources making the desktop purty. Mandrake is going in the opposite direction (if you've seen their 8.1 release, it's starting to look MAJORLY sweet; my boss was convinced by seeing me run it to make his new system a dual booter), and has a history of supporting/incorporating outside projects that bolster their strength on the user level.

Thousands of games on Linux by yerricde · 2002-01-23 17:53 · Score: 2

There are a ton of video games, and support for games on windows and that is not true on linux.

You can run thousands of games on Linux. Free software exists to run titles designed for NES, Game Boy, Sega Genesis, Super NES, and many more. Just get a dumper, hook it up to your cartridges, and you're off. (Or just pirate the ROMs.)

Wine is not an emulator. TuxNES is.

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Will I retire or break 10K?

TV decreases living space by yerricde · 2002-01-23 17:56 · Score: 1

Go play a Gamecube for your games, a PC wasnt designed for Games.

GameCube doesn't work with a VGA display, and many of us don't have enough dorm room space to hold a TV and four human bodies comfortably.

--
Will I retire or break 10K?

Re:TV decreases living space by Tralfamadorian · 2002-01-24 00:16 · Score: 1

Then get yourself a DC10+ (http://www.pinnaclesys.com) or other video capture card and play through that, that's what I do.
Re:TV decreases living space by Anonymous Coward · 2002-01-24 06:59 · Score: 0

> GameCube doesn't work with a VGA display

Well then get a *Dreamcast* ... sheesh. Besides, they're only $50. :)

Sad to see people not thinking... by Anonymous Coward · 2002-01-23 18:02 · Score: 0

What did you say???

That's just like using Windows on the top of Linux, just think I want to support Windows platforms real or emulated, no way. Games in my point of view should all be in elf. I am a purist in that sense. Games wouldn't run as fine as UT or Q3 do natively on Unix when run on an emulator.

- Voice of Ambience -

X-Box, X-Files style -- paranoia. by Raetsel · 2002-01-23 18:07 · Score: 1

I read the parent comment, and my reaction was a dawning 'holy sh!t' realization. You know, Microsoft really isn't above sponsoring this kind of behavior:

Contacting developers that are known to support both Linux and Windows
Demanding (the more rude, the better!) a free copy of the Linux version "...because I got the windows demo in a CrackerJack box."
...And thus souring managers, some developers, and other decision-makers on the idea of commercial success with products for Linux.

It's probably a lot more effective than you'd think. I'd like to see software and operating systems stand on their own merits (BeOS anyone?), but it has been clearly demonstrated that MS just doesn't play fair.

Where's Mulder when you need him...?

--

"...America's great minds of today, teaching America's great minds of tomorrow. Poor bastards." -- A Beautiful Min

If this story is indeed true about Loki closing... by Codifex+Maximus · 2002-01-23 18:14 · Score: 2

then I am truely saddened. I liked Loki and the fun games they ported. Even though the games started out as Windows games, they were ports and as such I consider them to be Linux games.

This damned downturned economy has everybody tightening their belts. But, I've purchased some of their ports and I intend to purchase more if I can.

--
Codifex Maximus ~ In search of... a shorter sig.

Open your wallets and this wont happen by DorianGre · 2002-01-23 18:14 · Score: 1

Perhaps this is a part of a vast realization that open source software is not a basis for a business except for the very top end (large servers) and the very bottom end (embedded systems). Linux on the desktop, which I run with RH and OpenOffice, is a nightmare for the average user. I have over 10 years programming experience, so do fine, but wouldn't expect my mother to run Linux. In fact, I would rather she was on OSX or BeOS than Win98 because I am the one who gets her support calls. The technology has to become transparent to the user, like a car or a dishwasher, before it will become a success. No one is working out there to make this happen and no one is paying companies for doing work in the linux desktop arena. That, my friends, is economic reality. A nice linux gaming console with a decent API, SDK, and developer toolkit would make this happen. There is no organization to the community to push a cohesive vision for the home market and all the other guys have got their s*** together. XBox, PS2, even Apple, all have a full strategy and are running full out to be the winner in an integrated home market. This includes video games.

and you equal about .0001% of consumers by stalwart · 2002-01-23 18:16 · Score: 0

>I buy both of them

you're a rare breed, then. you would probably fit into the same tiny percentage that pirate games, with the intention of only "previewing" it, and then buying the legal copy if they like it.

let's face it; linux users are spoiled. when i discovered i could install an os that i could basically make do anything i want for nothing, and add package after beautiful package of excellent software for nothing. that alone was enough to give me chub. this as opposed to paying a ludicrous amount of money for an os and software that is designed to make things easier, not better.

as far as loki goes, it sucks, i hate seeing any linux based project that is trying to bolster the uses of the os go down in flames. but people just aren't willing to pay for linux services; they're too used to getting things for free.

not to mention the fact that there is a definate performance degredation between a windows run game and a linux one. playing quake 3 in linux is cool, but not when i'm going from 70 fps to 40.

Re:and you equal about .0001% of consumers by benb · 2002-01-24 03:55 · Score: 1

> you're a rare breed, then.

Well, some games I like and keep playing. Then I am happy not to have to boot into Windows. I don't think *that* case is so uncommon.

> you would probably fit into the same tiny
> percentage that pirate games, with the intention
> of only "previewing" it, and then buying the
> legal copy if they like it.

*fg*
In fact, one Windows "budget" game I baught specifically to preview the Linux version. (Because the Windows version was as expensive as the *shipping costs* from Loki's store - duh! That was before I discovered ixsoft.de.).

> but people just aren't willing to pay for linux
> services

It depends. I'd guess that many who really understood opensource (that it is about ability, not money) are willing to pay for Linux games.

But I share your concern that many users come to Linux because it's free (as in beer), and those aren't willing to pay for software, in any way (be it closed-source or funding or helping out themselves).

I believe that the latter group will largely increase in size while Linux popularity grows and they will create a major problem for the opensource community. (If it's only because of their demanding attitute.)

Re:Delay between Windows and Linux port did them i by Time+Doctor · 2002-01-23 18:16 · Score: 1

Not _all_ the games came out that much later than their Windows counterparts. Kohan for instance, Tribes 2, Quake 3 (Which many trolls seem to believe came out next year), all came out within a decent amount of time from the Windows release. Anyone who is "Dual-Booting" is the problem, and not the solution. Personally, I own several computers, all run Linux and none have seen Windows in years. Besides this, id chooses to port internally, Loki is not internal to the companies so they usually have to go through the publisher to even get near the game, which for an unproven desktop platform would no doubt involve much time negotiating. To put this to an example, to the best of my knowledge some ports were delayed a lot because the publisher kept holding back on parts of the code/tools. Why they did this (mistakes, many of them?) I don't know. But more often than not, it seems like Loki had no choice in the matter.

--
Check out ioquake3.org for a great, free, First-Person Shooter engine!

That was Indrema by yerricde · 2002-01-23 18:18 · Score: 1

Its not going to be a desktop but a console market that will bring unix gaming to the masses or make it viable. Since netbsd runs on damn near everything maybe that would be a better platform.

In other words, Indrema? You know how that died.

--
Will I retire or break 10K?

Dammit by Firewheels · 2002-01-23 18:28 · Score: 1

I guess that's it, then... Linux truly is dead Joe Average's home computer. Truly a scary thought.

Re:Dammit by Anonymous Coward · 2002-01-23 19:27 · Score: 0

You realize that Joe Average is 35.3 years old and probably is a little old for playing video games. All this means is that Linux may be dead on Joe 14-Year-Old 3l337 Warez Dood Script Kiddie's home computer.

Re:X-Box, X-Files style -- paranoia. by ipfwadm · 2002-01-23 18:34 · Score: 4, Insightful

You know, Microsoft really isn't above sponsoring this kind of behavior

Can't we just acknowledge that some problem might possibly exist in the Linux community, and attempt to fix it? Do we really need to invent a Microsoft conspiracy to make ourselves feel better about Loki closing?? You honestly believe that out of however many Linux users there are in the world, that there aren't at least a few obnoxious ones out there that would demand making a binary freely available? Besides, at first glance, it seems natural: "I already paid for this game, why should I have to pay for it again?" At least until one actually sits down and thinks about the economic and business factors involved (see other posts in this thread). Loki could have changed that model, by showing game manufacturers that Linux is an economically viable gaming platform. Unfortunately, it didn't work out. Don't blame that on Microsoft.

i386 world != PowerPC world by Earthling · 2002-01-23 18:35 · Score: 1

You make a lot of good points, but you seem to have forgotten just one little thing...

Apple controls both the hardware and the OS on their machines. No dealing with uncooperative hardware manufacturers, no built-in incompatibilities, no thousands of pieces to test in kazillions of combinations, no undocumented random "features" from companies that long ago stopped existing...

Of course I'd love it if RedHat (or Linux in general for that matter) achived all the things you mentioned (and it's certainly not because they aren't trying). But we should keep in mind that Apple as a huge field advantage on that one.

--

-Earthling
"I'm sorry, I had to; the irony was just too thick."

Re:huh? I already got free. by Anthony+Boyd · 2002-01-23 18:38 · Score: 5, Insightful

What we got from Linux users were not sales, but tons of email demanding that we put up the binary executeables on an ftp site for free so they could download them and use them with their Windows version of the game. For some reason they just couldn't grasp that it cost us money to both license and port the software, and that we didn't see a red cent for the Windows version they bought. It didn't matter, all they wanted was free beer.
I'm also having trouble imagining the demanding weenies you describe. The Baton Rouge LUG is small, but most of the people there were NOT like this.

Awww... hell. I'm at the cap, let's burn a little.

I am really exhausted by people who just say "I don't (see|believe) it" when someone describes an issue they're having. Let me help my fellow Linvocates.

Saying "I know lots of people, and I've never seen them act as you describe" doesn't mean the problem doesn't exist, it (usually) means you don't have enough experience in the area to know what you're talking about.
Saying "I've done it lots of times and I never make that mistake" doesn't mean other people avoided the mistake too, it (usually) means you have no life and other people do.
Saying "Your real problem is blah" doesn't actually solve the issue for the person, it usually just makes them give up on getting the help they needed.

Why do I bring this up now? Because Loki is closing and another Linux developer here is telling us what a real issue is -- our "collective image" to some software companies apparently boils down to greedy "w@r3z d00d." You can say the people you know don't act like that, but it doesn't change the fact that people you don't know apparently are acting like that. And until we, as a collective group, can agree to change that collective mindset, we're going to collectively find our butts on the curb while companies pass us by.

Part of the reason why I'm "exhausted" by these kinds of responses is that everywhere I see it happen, things get fucked up. Mac apologists are notorious for telling people who point out problems with Apple to leave. "You don't like it? We don't need ya, get the hell out." The problem is that they do leave. And you end up with Quicken leaving the Apple market for a while. Anyone remember that? The workarounds sucked. We've got boatloads of Windows refugees out on Linux newsgroups saying "I didn't understand this" or "this part is too hard." It's a usability goldmine out on Usenet, but Linux users (and developers!) are basically just giving them the finger with comments like "I don't have that problem" or "well, you're just too stupid for this OS, I guess" or any other number of witty retorts that solve nothing. And as this happens, we see Linux lose momentum. Look, you want Linux to succeed, to be more than a source-code ghost-town 10 years from now? Then drag everyone along for the ride, and if they tell you they're uncomfortable, then make them more comfortable. Build momentum, acknowledge people's problems.

--
My Greasemonkey scripts for Digg &

Re:huh? I already got free. by Lemmy+Caution · 2002-01-23 18:39 · Score: 1

So a finished Windows product, ready for 95% of the gamers' PCs, sits in the warehouse for six to 12 months, its innovations starting to age and its market window being filled with competitors, until the Linux ports are finished? I don't think that's very realistic.

I think this is a lesson for everyone on the nature of network effects in markets.

Games are NOT the be all end all! by xtremex · 2002-01-23 18:48 · Score: 1

I don't play video games (all right, I DO play the sims on a spare winlaptop I own), but I use Linux 99.9% of the time for EVERYTHING. Gamers are a small percentage of the user base. I remember during the Commodore era (80's for those too young to remember). The commodore had every game known to man, The IBM pc's had ZERO. Thats why "real" pcs were taken seriously. The commodore was laughed at because it was nothing but a toy..a game machine. Why bring linux down to a mere game machine? It is WAY too powerful for GAMES! Let WIndows do what it's good at! GAMES! Let Linux do what it's get at...getting REAL work done!

--
If you're not a Liberal in your 20's, then you have no heart.If you're still a Liberal in your 30's you have no brain.

Re:Games are NOT the be all end all! by Anonymous Coward · 2002-01-23 20:53 · Score: 0

Nice troll, troll.

Let me know when you get back in touch with reality.

Deeply Saddened........ by The+real+Anne+Marie · 2002-01-23 18:49 · Score: 0

I'm very disappointed to see that you've been so brainwashed that you can't think this possible in 2002.

Thank God you didn't live in Thomas Edison's day and age. I'm sure you'd have thought of him as a total crack pot as well.

Anne Marie, still a Slashdot fan....for now.
My site for those who care

Re:huh? I already got free. by kilrogg · 2002-01-23 18:55 · Score: 2

Wrong! you develop the port in parallel.

In the move industry, for example, translations are done while the movie is still being produced (music, editing, etc). Movies released in French in Quebec, for example, get release the very same day as the english movies in the rest of north america. There's no extra delay to the release schedule do to the translation effort.

Doing a port is a little like doing a translation, most of the core work is the same (graphics, music, etc.), and so most of the porting work can be done while development on these is on going.

Re:huh? I already got free. by kilrogg · 2002-01-23 19:02 · Score: 2

As a side note, if a port in parallel isn't realistic, then my argument that loki had a bad business model still stands. Releasing well after the windows version is simple dumb. (It might make more sense for mac users, though, since they can't reboot into windows.)

Using windows for gaming?!? by Anonymous Coward · 2002-01-23 19:06 · Score: 0

O.k. from what I have heard most dual booters would rather buy the windows version since they have win98-but jwhat happens in 2003 with MS stops supporting win98 and in the future win2K? Are all these people going to buy XP or what's newer so they can play the games?
Also some one tried comparing the Amiga game market. Well that's different because they don't "port" the games, they make or clone thier own. And these days it take a software team to pump out the games used on windows, and they get paid. I would think that it would be hard to get 10-30 linux programers together punching keys for 8-12 hourse a day with_no_pay.

AMEN! by bradipo · 2002-01-23 19:07 · Score: 1

Amen Brother. I don't want to have to use Windows unless I absolutely have to. Currently I can do everything with linux---the only thing missing are a lot of games.

Re:flamebait??? by Alex+Belits · 2002-01-23 19:09 · Score: 2

Because he uses broken charset and has a hotmail address, therefore he is obviously a Windows-only users, and his opinion on Linux games is absolutely irrelevant.

--
Contrary to the popular belief, there indeed is no God.

Re:Delay between Windows and Linux port did them i by ipfwadm · 2002-01-23 19:10 · Score: 1

Anyone who is "Dual-Booting" is the problem, and not the solution.

Then the set of Linux users comprising the solution is incredibly small. And until some of the latest (useful) whiz-bang features of Windows are available for Linux, the majority of Linux users will remain part of the problem. I'm not even talking about an office suite here, I'm talking about simple things like web browsing. Netscape sucks. Mozilla is better, but still doesn't rival IE and Windows in terms of multimedia support. So Apple doesn't have a Linux version of QuickTime, they're just a shitty corporation that isn't supporting open standards so we should avoid .mov files. That's fine for you and me, but the average user doesn't give a shit about the philosophical arguments. If the average Linux user wants to jerk off over Natalie Portman in the latest Star Wars trailer, he'll just boot into Windows. (If there's a decent non-Apple Linux quicktime player available now, I apologize -- last time I looked all that was out there was xanim, and that was nearly worthless. You get my point). It's not the people that are dual-booting that are the problem, it's the fact that these people need to dual-boot that's the problem.

Disclaimer: I haven't had any Microsoft product installed on my computer for over 3 years now.

How I see the games and entertainment software by Anonymous Coward · 2002-01-23 19:13 · Score: 2, Interesting

First to say if true it is a sad day. But remember someone else will start again.

What do I see in the world of Free Unix and games is that we need to concentrate on getting development environments going. What do I mean by this?

As I see it Loki just ported games after their shelf life expired. What we need is Linux games created first then ported to Windows. This way we trully see if a Game sells the OS or the OS sells the game. How is this done? Again to repeat is create a quick game development environment.

What should this package have?
1. Sound System that cross platforms to Windows.
2. Basic Install Shield system which allows the developers to forget this aspect of the development.
3. Graphic Rendering packages that allow the artistic part.
4. Some game dynamics package.

All this is easy to say but hard to write. So Open Source development is in order here. That is make some game ideas that could share library packages. Those Library packages are LGPL or BSD licensed for Comercial development. These are then used my the Comercial houses to create the games for Linux, BSDs, MacIntosh, and Windows in one go. Make the development environment not on Windows will allow the Linux or other be ported faster.

How to sell the new game which is developed and shipped for Linux first? Because we need to get the largest market. Simple have a version of Linux be attached to the game which can be installed on any M$ Windows platform and be executed from a running Windows Icon. This will make the system a Linux Box either taking complete control until finished or being a Process. Either way if the person has a pure linux system it will be installed there as a native app, minus the special linux version.

Hence above is a good project to work with. Instead of WINE how about Linux Is Not Emulated (LINE) project.

Iain

Linux on Desktop meme back again by banky · 2002-01-23 19:19 · Score: 2

Boy, I sure was hoping after the flood of "linux on the desktop is dead" stories we could stop talking about it for a while. I'm sad to see Loki go; although without lots of companies throwing ports at them, it was kind of expected. I own a number of their games which I will have to now repurchase for MacOSX.

(the irony is I left Linux on the desktop for OSX, and I now have access to fewer native games than Linux)

Transgaming will have to carry on, I suppose.

--
ZOMG I WOULD LOVE TO KNOW ABOUT YOUR FEELINGS ON MACINTOSH VERSUS WINDOWS, VI VERSUS EMACS, AND HOW YOU'RE NOT A DORK

Re:Linux on Desktop meme back again by Anonymous Coward · 2002-01-24 10:41 · Score: 0

You went the wrong way. I dumped the linux desktop when win2k came out. I still dual booted but now with XP I literally have NO crashes. I also have full office compatability. I just don't use outlook. I have to say if you have not tried xp for a few weeks, you have missed out. And no that default theme is not hard to changs. YOu can make XP look like win95 with a few mouse clicks.
As far as OSX goes until it goes x86(never) I won't be able to try it, although I would definitely like to.

As long as ID is around.... by tekniklr · 2002-01-23 19:24 · Score: 1

At least there are companies like ID Software that take Linux seriously and regularly release Linux binaries for their games.

This really sucks, but since ID makes the best games anyway, I'm not too worried. Hopefully other software companies will do the same.....

Even though Loki will be missed, its not the end. by michaelsimms · 2002-01-23 19:27 · Score: 2

Even though this has happened, Linux Games are not going away.
Tux Games still has Loki stock. We buy from a lot of other places too.
There is a new porting company out there, Linux Game Publishing who have already released one title, and have another announced. Dont forget NeverwinterNights is coming too. Return to Castle Wolfenstein has just been released, and is looking to be one of the most popular games we've ever had.
Yes, we will all miss Loki, and yes it is very sad.
BUT the game goes on, games will keep appearing - lets just try and make sure that people BUY them this time, and stop this happening again.

--

Tux Games. Your complete source for native Linux games.

Loki never had VC by Anonymous Coward · 2002-01-23 19:32 · Score: 5, Interesting

At least, that's what the employees were told. In fact, several efforts at securing real VC were prevented due to reluctance by the owner(s) to part with any shares in the company.

When the fecal matter had clearly hit the rotating blades, an outside consultant was brought in to try and get the company funded, merged, bought, or something. He tried for six months, and never got anywhere -- in part because so much debt had already been accrued. Also, at least one structured deal, liquidating existing boxed product, fell through when the partner filed for Chapter 11 (and had already taken possession of the game boxes, but not paid the remuneration owed).

The debt caught up with the company, and the creditors started demanding their money (including the 1/4 million owed to the company that printed all those nice boxes and manuals that the first 10 or so titles came in).

WAY over-producing the Q3 tins (due, in part, to the enthusiasm of the Slashdot crowd (which has never been backed up in sales), and due in part to mis-judgement of the market), burned through what capital there was A LOT faster than it needed to be.

Add lack-luster sales of all titles other than CTP, and decreasing sales from title to title, and there's not a lot to sustain it there.

Bard's Tale anyone? by bradipo · 2002-01-23 19:37 · Score: 1

Does anyone remember Bard's Tale? Now that was a game worth playing. :-)

Re:Bard's Tale anyone? by Anonymous Coward · 2002-01-24 03:59 · Score: 0

*searches in his drawers*
i know i have it here somewhere!!!!

Re:Delay between Windows and Linux port did them i by Time+Doctor · 2002-01-23 19:38 · Score: 2, Interesting

You're right, the few users who actually bought Linux games, and kept buying them weren't enough. As far as QuickTime goes, there isn't any native player for the sorenson (which is the popular kind) codec mov files. The only player which is available, is via the 'crossover plugin' which uses wine.

--
Check out ioquake3.org for a great, free, First-Person Shooter engine!

Is it just me... by Anonymous Coward · 2002-01-23 19:38 · Score: 0

...or does that joystick look like the dildo that CmdrTaco and CowboyNeal share?

-- The BOFH Troll

Re:UNITED STATES ATTACKED -- PLEASE READ by EugeneK · 2002-01-23 19:40 · Score: 0, Troll

Not only that, but Loki Games may be shutting down.

I just reinstalled Quake3 by Anonymous Coward · 2002-01-23 19:46 · Score: 0

With a Voodoo3 and Gentoo Linux it took me about 6 hours of fiddling with XFree86 4.2 before direct rendering started working.

XFree86 and the driver scene is getting better. In another 5 or so years OpenGL games for Linux will be commonplace and clicking "next, next, next, finish" will actually start up the game.

Re:I just reinstalled Quake3 by Anonymous Coward · 2002-01-24 05:00 · Score: 0

First of all I agree, the "setting up" take way too long.

Second, do you really think anyone will use linux as a desktop in 5 years? 5 years from now linux user will be laughed at like the aminga and os/2 user are now. Holding on to a dead system.

Third, do you really think Opengl will be around in 5 years? M$ just bought out the Opengl IP and not planning on developing it anymore.

Loki's intention was to become a monopoly by Anonymous Coward · 2002-01-23 19:46 · Score: 0

Blymie wrote:

"Loki's intention was to become the defacto standard for porting games to linux, and to capitalize on that ability in a year or two more down the road, when Linux sales _really_ started to generate revenue."

That sounds just like Microsoft's business plan for the X-Box and everything else: Run at a loss for a few years to drive out all the competition, declare yourself the "de facto standard", then captialize your the monopoly once you've wiped out the competition.

By the viscious attacks by Loki ex-employees and fan-boys against Transgaming, it's obvious that those wanna-be monopolists just can't tolerate the thought of open competition.

Loki was the slashdot-annointed and sanctioned Microsoft of the Linux game industry, as it were. Now that Loki is gone, there can finally be some real competition. The fat lady has left the building, and it ain't over till Elvis sings.

Let the games begin!

Re:Loki's intention was to become a monopoly by Anonymous Coward · 2002-01-24 09:24 · Score: 0

TransGaming is NOT the savior of Linux gaming! It is the path to continuing marginalization, and it is all the proof any game producers need that Linux is not worth supporting. "Heck, just let those guys at TransGaming do all the work, we don't have to do anything and we can just keep being tied to Microsoft!"
It may be the case that the founder of Loki had that idea, but the employees were there to bring great games to a community we cared a great deal about! (You can count the number of programmers who did not make tremendous sacrifices for Linux gaming on the fingers of one foot.)
At least Loki was helping build the Linux game market, as opposed to simply being a VAR of Microsoft's desktop monopoly.

Re:huh? I already got free. by Anonymous Coward · 2002-01-23 19:47 · Score: 0

*WE* pay a software company for the right to port the game. We have to pay a big chunk of money up front.

You pay them a "big chunk of money", for the right to pay all of the porting expenses, so that you can pay them some huge percentage of the unit profit margin when you're done with the port?

Sounds like the size of the Linux market and the alleged expectations of Linux users aren't the only problem with the business model.

Huh? by cduffy · 2002-01-23 19:51 · Score: 2

WINE includes DirectX support -- but (with SDL available, and Loki's work acting as a demonstration of the feasability of porting DirectX apps to SDL) I don't see why it's an issue.

Re:Huh? by Jace+of+Fuse! · 2002-01-24 08:25 · Score: 2

I admit, SDL is bridging that gap, and with continued progress hopefully it will fill it entirely.

Until then, DirectX is still the single best reason to write games for Windows. For performance, ease of developement, and user base reasons.

Ethical reasons play no part in this. Video games have become a business, unfortunately.

--

"Everything you know is wrong. (And stupid.)"

Moderation Totals: Wrong=2, Stupid=3, Total=5.
Re:Huh? by cduffy · 2002-01-24 17:34 · Score: 2

DirectX must have improved quite a bit, then -- 'cuz comparing DirectX 4 (the last one I learned back when I was still a Windows coder) with SDL, the latter is far, far more developer-friendly. Granted, DirectX has a larger installed base -- but SDL has a much larger applicable user base (ie. write a SDL app corectly and it targets Win32, MacOS, Linux and others with very little extra devel time per platform), and since you're including SDL with your app anyhow (linked static so the user's weird-ass library... err, DLL versions can't throw ya off, right?), it doesn't matter.

Performance is the only issue you name with any real validity. Since SDL calls through to DirectX on the only platform where DirectX runs at all, I'd expect its performance penalty to be minimal -- though the only real way to answer that would be benchmarking, of course.

Being that most new games written these days are 3D anyhow, though, the real question is not SDL versus DirectX but OpenGL versus Direct3D. I don't usually shy away from religious issues (never minded a good editor debate or an OS war), but I'm not touching that with a 10-foot pole.

And of course video games are a business, and of course "ethical" reasons have no place in a technical discussion. I'm disappointed you'd expect me to resort to such poor reasoning.
Re:Huh? by Jace+of+Fuse! · 2002-01-25 07:29 · Score: 1

DX4, by which I assume you mean the version between 3 and 5 (that might have been available to developers, but was never actually released to to end users), is hardly a fair judgement of the DirectX of today.

Most people admit that DirectX started really shaping up around 5, then again everyone was impressed by the changes made in 7. Now there's version 8 and it just keeps improving.

As for the comparison between Direct3D and OpenGL, I won't touch that either. But I will say this, DirectX includes a wide range of APIs for everything from sound to video to input, and OpenGL is only a graphics library. So, there isn't anything stopping someone from writing a DirectX game that still supports OpenGL, and it's actually done quite often.

--

"Everything you know is wrong. (And stupid.)"

Moderation Totals: Wrong=2, Stupid=3, Total=5.
Re:Huh? by cduffy · 2002-01-25 07:58 · Score: 2

Hmm... must have been 3, then, as it was a released version, past 2 and prior to 5 (Needless to say, it's been a few years).

I'll take your word that the API is significantly improved.

As for my reasons for pointing to OpenGL or Direct3D as opposed to DirectX on 3D games, on 3D games it's the 3D API where most of the difficulty lands; the APIs for input, sound and such are almost insignificant in comparison. A DirectX game that supports OpenGL (like an SDL game that supports OpenGL) has its performance and ease-of-development characteristics determined primarily by OpenGL, as opposed to by DirectX or SDL.

I'll admit that there are some capabilities that Direct* have (ie. DirectSound3D) without close parallels in SDL (wrt DS3D, maybe OpenAL is a viable alternative right now, maybe not -- games aren't my thing) -- but for a great many projects, SDL (with the possible addition of OpenGL) is a great option, combining ease of development with excellent portability.
Re:Huh? by Jace+of+Fuse! · 2002-01-25 18:39 · Score: 1

I would never, ever insult SDL or even try to downplay it's importance. I have high hopes for SDL. I think my only real point originally was that Direct3D, Microsoft-Born or not, is a very nice API, and it's the only real reason to write games for Windows. I honestly think gamers would have jumped ship on Microsoft when Windows 95 began replacing MS-DOS if they hadn't brough out DirectX.

With luck, SDL will reach a level of maturity that will compete rather favorably with DirectX.

--

"Everything you know is wrong. (And stupid.)"

Moderation Totals: Wrong=2, Stupid=3, Total=5.

Try using screen and transparents terms, too. by Cyno · 2002-01-23 19:54 · Score: 1

I find the gnome-terminal with the scrollbar and menubar removed, with a shaded transparent background and a nice background image that doesn't conflict with your choice of text coloring make working on the command line fun. In combination with screen for multiple virtual terminals, scrollback buffer, and text searching and processing features, vim and your standard colorful gnu ls you'll find your textual experience much more pleasant and productive than anything GUI based. However I still haven't given up on evolution.

Re:I think it stinks-Prophesy by Anonymous Coward · 2002-01-23 20:03 · Score: 0

The problem with your examples is that most of the wounds were self-inflicted. The "desktop" didn't stab them. They did it to themselves.

So can I put you down as the modern day version of "640K is all that's needed"? I need something to show the grandkids five years from now.

Re:huh? I already got free. by Anonymous Coward · 2002-01-23 20:03 · Score: 0

So you are really saying that Nearly All Linux Users Are Also Windows Users (and I agree).

If so, there isn't any business model that support Linux gaming - porting is an irrational expense because it doesn't broaden your salesbase at all.

Until the day comes that Linux users view it as a "no choice" situation and will wait for a port or live without one, there just isn't a market.

(Oh, and Q3/Linux was released within a couple weeks of the Windows version, and it still sold like ass.)

Re:Time Stand Still by Anonymous Coward · 2002-01-23 20:14 · Score: 0

I just want to express my admiration for your work. In the future, I would be delighted to see some of the following bands featured in your trolling:

Offspring
AFI
Bad Religion
Vandals
TSOL (especially Code Blue)
Green Day
Wesley Willis (not a band, but a very talented individual).

Thank you and keep up the good work!

Re:huh? I already got free. by holle2 · 2002-01-23 20:19 · Score: 0

Well I think the problem here is that other companies did give away their Linux version for free. Look at ID Software for example. You were able to buy a Dos version of Quake and then download the Linux binaries in order to play that game under Linux. This is, I think, the real problem we have to adress here. The Linux users have to learn not to buy the Windows version but instead wait for the Linux Version to become available and buy that one. I am doing this myself and it works just fine. The only thing I am amazed about is that Loki was actually porting games I never had dreamed of being ported :-) And now, please excuse me, I have to rush out and grap some Loki Ggames ...

Corporate behavior by Raetsel · 2002-01-23 20:20 · Score: 1

Please, I'm not blaming Loki's demise on Microsoft. My point was that I don't find the kind of response Hyperion Entertainment has received beyond suspicion of (some) Microsoft sponsorship. Microsoft is a company who:

Charged computer manufacturers for every system shipped, regardless of the OS loaded,
Buried Netscape when they realized they wanted the browser market and all the commerce opportunities it offered,
"Encourages" developers to produce ActiveX games -- which cannot easily be ported to any other operating system (except the X-Box, and that really doesn't count),
Has no problems lying under oath in court (remember the videotape?),

... and I'm supposed to belive they're cute and cuddly? Fat frickin' chance. They're a 900 pound gorilla, and they belong behind bars.

I'm all for responsibility and accountability, and I want them to 'fess up to what they've done and be held accountable for it! This goes for all companies, as well -- I'm not creating any higher standard for Microsoft than I expect elsewhere.

<humor>
(As for the paranoia part, bash the ever-perfect Linux community again, and I'll accuse you of working for Microsoft! How's that for paranoia?)
</humor>

--

"...America's great minds of today, teaching America's great minds of tomorrow. Poor bastards." -- A Beautiful Min

Re:Corporate behavior by Anonymous Coward · 2002-01-23 20:40 · Score: 0

You are out of touch with reality. Support for game companies from the Linux community is in the "slim-to-none" category, with nobody willing to put their money where their mouth is as far as buying Linux games.

I am amazed that you can't recognize that this is really what is going on. There is no Microsoft conspiracy, there are no black helicopters, and developers do need to make money in order to stay in business.

Re:huh? I already got free. by Anonymous Coward · 2002-01-23 20:26 · Score: 0

Good post, but there's a fundemental difference between the Linux community and the Mac community -- The Mac people actually like the idea that their platform is used by millions of iMac-buying lusers. Fundementally, the Linux people are trying to get away from that culture and associate the OS with a certain level of l33tness.

The fact is that the core developers of the Linux system never intended it to be a Windows replacement, or "the system for the rest of us" (old Apple tagline). They intended it to be a flexible Unix-like expert user system. It's been phenomably successful towards that goal and probably always will be. It's a small market in the big picture, but there's no chance it will become a "source code ghosttown".

The problem comes when Advocates like yourself make the leap from a what Linux is (Unix) to what it could be (a replacement for Windows/Mac) before the developers have. The fundemental problem people have with Linux is that it's the wrong solution for "Windows Sucks", and you either have to realize that or you need to wait for the 3 million developer hours of work necessary to make the system as n00b-friendly as the alternatives.

Final moral -- OS/2 was on the retail software top 10 list for 3 years running in the mid-90s. And for only one reason - Windows Sucked (1000x harder than it does today), and people were fed up and tried dualbooting. Also, unlike Linux, OS/2 was _explicitly_ designed as a DOS/Windows replacement and even had 99% binary compatibility with DOS/Windows.

After the TV ads and those millions of copies of OS/2 were shipped and dinked with by techies, how many permenent users did they end up with? Maybe 1% of the userbase and little to no commercial software. There's just fundemental forces which reward standardization, and it's extremely difficult to argue against them.

Re:huh? I already got free. by An+Ominous+Cow+Erred · 2002-01-23 20:29 · Score: 2, Informative

You pay them a "big chunk of money", for the right to pay all of the porting expenses, so that you can pay them some huge percentage of the unit profit margin when you're done with the port?

Sounds like the size of the Linux market and the alleged expectations of Linux users aren't the only problem with the business model.

It's not just Linux. This is how licensing a port works in the real world. Companies that license Playstation ports do the same thing. Just about EVERY Mac port is made this way. Basically unless the original publisher decides ON THEIR OWN to create a port of the game (and then either does an in-house port or subcontracts), then you have to pay them for the right to port the game and to sell that port. They won't let you do it for free, and they won't let you do it without up-front payment (otherwise non-serious people could just secure the rights for free and then sit on them).

This REALLY IS how it works, and companies like Loki, Macplay, and any other company that specializes in porting games all do it this way. What you are buying is the rights to the game. They don't think the port is worth their time, but you do. They won't give you the rights for free though because not only do the aforementioned non-serious people create a problem, but it also costs them money to pay the lawyers who read and okay the license agreement. If they can't make a certain amount of money from your license then it's not even worth their time to license it to you.

James Sellman - Hyperion Entertainment - http://www.hyperion-entertainment.com/

Radeon Issues w/ 3D by afxgrin · 2002-01-23 20:44 · Score: 1

My Radeon is performing quite well actually under mandrake 8.1 w/ no real tweaking around on the install.
2D performance, absolutely nothing to complain about. Works quick and sharp and i'm quite happy. (Remember - clean Mandrake 8.1 install, no added RPMs, no new drivers installed)

3D performance is good for Tux Racer and Return to Castle Wolfenstein. (Haven't tried Quake 3 - i'd assume it would work good as well.)

BUT - where 3D performance does suck is when i use Wine or WineX to play an OpenGL game. People are reporting getting awesome frames/sec in Half-Life/Counter-Strike using an nVidia based card under Mandrake 8.1 - while on my Radeon I get 20FPS at 640x480, while in Windows I'd play at 60FPS at 1280x1024. On the Transgaming message boards the response I received had something to do w/ WineX and not the Radeon drivers.
Interesting point w/ Transgaming is, they put a lot of effort towards getting good compatibility w/ the nVidia cards - and it seems the Radeon will be looked into after.

Hopefully something in XFree86 4.2.0 clears some of these issues up - and the next WineX release.

Subscription on porting by Anonymous Coward · 2002-01-23 20:44 · Score: 0

Hhhm, if Transgaming's subscription service is working very well, and Loki's method is not, why not combine the two?

Maybe Loki could make some good profit by asking a small subscription fee (enabling you to vote for games, for instance) a month. I am serious about Linux gaming and would support them. It's just that they haven't yet ported games that I really want to play. And I don't really like the emulation approach that Transgaming uses.

Time to make a last order by codexus · 2002-01-23 20:49 · Score: 1

I'll make one last order with the few games I'd like to have (having already purchased most of them months ago).

That's strange, there was a time where you could buy loki games almost everywhere they sold PC games and now they are closing. Linux World Domination isn't for tomorrow...

--
True warriors use the Klingon Google

This make me sad... by Judas666 · 2002-01-23 21:18 · Score: 1

Loki Games did an excellent job. I own 10 games of them. But I saw this coming, I migrated my Desktop System from Linux to the excellent MacOS X (with a fucking great Powerbook). Now I am lucky. I love Linux, but now I use it as a server system only. This is not really a problem, why should Linux dominate all kind of systems? I think MacOS X rocks, especially with the new 4.2.0 release of the X-Window System. So, thats the way the story goes... Judas666

I'm gonna miss Loki... by Anonymous Coward · 2002-01-23 21:19 · Score: 0

...because I bought my computer in 1999 running Red Hat 6.0, waiting for the port of Sid Meier's Alpha Centauri. When it finally came, it also included the Alien Crossfire sequel, and never crashed.

Don't blame me: I voted for Loki with my money.

Lets get their inventory now.

Re:Delay between Windows and Linux port did them i by Anonymous Coward · 2002-01-23 21:20 · Score: 1, Interesting

the average lifecycle for a game with a multiplayer element is at most 3 months

And do those flash-in-the-pan games make any money? I doubt it. And if they aren't profitable on Windows, there's no reason to port them elsewhere.

The fact is that _most_ game buyers do not buy a game within the first few weeks of release. My local CompUSA still has stacks of UT and HalfLife (and RR Tycoon, and Sims, and so on) for sale, and those are all old games which somebody is still buying. And if those are still selling on Windows, why wouldn't Linux users go buy them, if these Linux users in fact exist?

(I suspect that the game industry works much like the music or movie businesses -- only a small percentage of your product is profitable, but the part that is is extremely profitable. Problem is, you can't tell what will make money until you actually go and make it.)

And in Windows... by Anonymous Coward · 2002-01-23 21:24 · Score: 0

Oh, it was just so much work for me. First I had to download the nVidia drivers (gasp!) and (because I chose the SRPMS) rebuild and install them - that was 4 commands! 4 commands I'll never get back! After that, I downloaded the wolfenstein demo, and when I ran the installer I had to choose a directory to install to (~/wolftest2) AND a binary directory (~/bin)! And, to top it all off, the game doesn't automatically start when I want to play! (I know wolf isn't a Loki game, but it's the same installer)
And in Windows, I put the disc in the drive, and clicked the big flashing 'Install' button that came up.

Your post is the perfect evidence of why Linux gaming failed, despite your intent. And to think that what you listed was a best-case scenerio...

This sucks, and it's the fault of Linux users. by aussersterne · 2002-01-23 21:25 · Score: 5, Insightful

I see all these people saying "if you're a gamer, you want the game now and you want it cheap, so why pay a premium for a late Loki game when I can just dual-boot?"

This from people who complain about the "Microsoft Tax."

Well, folks, you have to decide: are you going to be a "hardcore gamer" and pay the Microsoft Tax you claim to hate so much just so you can have a game three months sooner or $10 cheaper, or are you going to put your money where your mouth is and support Linux companies?

I for one own every game Loki released, and I paid for every one of them, even one or two I didn't care for, just to support Linux gaming. I can hear the crazy free-market folks already who will flame me (as they do every Loki story) saying that the market should decide, that I shouldn't have bought games I didn't like, that Loki should fail if it is destined to fail.

Well, apparently it was. Feel better now? I certainly don't. Too bad so few Linux users are willing, as I have been, to put my money where my mouth is. On a similar note, I also bought the Corel Draw for Linux and Corel WordPerfect Office for Linux retail software packages before Corel withdrew them due to (direct quote from a sales inquiry to Corel) "lack of interest in non-free software."

I'm beginning to think that Linux will never grow out of Free Speech and Free Beer. Both are great, but alone they are not enough to make for a full life, or to build a userbase beyond geek-freeks.

Goodbye, Loki. I for one will miss your excellent ports when I am struggling to keep the truly abysmal but ever-so-free "Wine" emulator [or *sigh* not an emulator] running over the next few years.

--
STOP . AMERICA . NOW

Re:This sucks, and it's the fault of Linux users. by sgifford · 2002-01-23 21:28 · Score: 1

It was a Loki problem, too...I tried really hard to buy their games, but they never released a single game I was genuinely interested in playing, and buying games I didn't play to support them got old fast...

--
My Web Page
Re:This sucks, and it's the fault of Linux users. by !Xabbu · 2002-01-24 02:25 · Score: 2

One might argue that if Loki had of put a little more risk into the business from the start and actually got in with games being built at the time, they wouldn't have had half the problems they are in. Ya ya.. capitol = success.. it was the dot com revolution.. the money was there.

For example, Loki hears that Blizzard is in the middle of working on World of Warcraft. They approach Blizzard and say 'hey, we will port the game to linux if you let us develop along side of you. You give us ??% of the sales on the linux port and we will call it even." I'd even go as far as saying a very small percentage of the windows version as well as I'm sure Loki would have been able to help on that as well in small ways.

Their business model was flawed. No word about it. I own one game of theirs (Kohan) and loved it. Very unfortunate :(

--

- Jimbob
Re:This sucks, and it's the fault of Linux users. by sad_ · 2002-01-24 05:47 · Score: 0

> I for one own every game Loki released,
> and I paid for every one of them,
> even one or two I didn't care for,
> just to support Linux gaming.

yeah, me too. (well not all, but almost) just because i believed they deserved our support. knowing they would have it hard enough as it is.

i really saw loki growing up as the 'standard' in linux gaming.

--
On a long enough timeline, the survival rate for everyone drops to zero.
Re:This sucks, and it's the fault of Linux users. by praedor · 2002-01-24 07:14 · Score: 2

I'm with you. I cannot say that I've bought all Loki's games, but I have bought 4 and was holding off buying Deus Ex until Loki released their linux port of it. Now it looks like I'll have to pay for the windoze version (anyone get it working under wine?).

If I wanted a game and Loki had it or was planning on producing a port, I would ALWAYS buy it from them or wait until they released it. Now, me thinks this really is a deathnell for linux taking much on the desktop. It is symptomatic and goes along with the other rather doom-and-gloom articles produced of late about the linux revolution that wasn't.

I'll keep using it but it also means I will have to keep a pirated copy of windoze on my machines to play games that wine can't handle.

Many linux users are hypocritical children who can't wait a short while to buy a port of a windoze game. Well, this is the result. Yet ANOTHER linux game company bits the dust.

--
In Bushworld, they struggle to keep church and state separate in Iraq as they increasingly merge the two in America.
Re:This sucks, and it's the fault of Linux users. by DunbarTheInept · 2002-01-24 08:43 · Score: 2

If I am interested in a game and I *know* Loki is going to do a port, then I'll wait and buy the loki version. But to date there was only ever one game where Loki made the announcement in time for me to do that and that was Civ Call to power, and so that's the only Loki game I own.

The problem is that when the game is first available for Windows, I don't even know yet whether or not there will be a Loki port later on. The chances are high that there *won't* be - given that they only can do a small fraction of the games that ever come out.

And some games don't last on the store shelves that long. A game that I like isn't
necessarily going to be a game that others like.

You are (and Lokisoft was) asking people to gamble by waiting a year to see if a linux port will exist, in a situation where waiting that long often results in *never* being able to buy the game in any form.

In that one instance where Lokisoft got the announcement out early enough to forestall this effect (Civ:CTP), they did well. Unfortunately, that was an isolated incident.

--
Don't label something "offtopic" unless you know the topic well enough to tell what's on topic.
Re:This sucks, and it's the fault of Linux users. by aussersterne · 2002-01-24 11:51 · Score: 2

I know people who bought the Linux version *after* they bought the Windows version.

There's nothing wrong with this.

It all depends on whether you are too cheap to support the growth of Linux. Many people don't feel that's a good investment. The result is that Loki closes up shop and puts the final nail in the "Linux for the desktop" coffin.

--
STOP . AMERICA . NOW
Re:This sucks, and it's the fault of Linux users. by DunbarTheInept · 2002-01-24 12:43 · Score: 2

If charity is what you want to support, then by all means do so. But don't try to disguise it as a normal businesss transaction. If I had chosen to buy a Loki version of a game I already owned and already cold play, then that would be charity plain and simple. I think that donations to sourceforge and the like are better ways to support the linux community than charity disguised as a business transaction.

And gaming on Linux isn't dead. Loki was just the first attempt.

--
Don't label something "offtopic" unless you know the topic well enough to tell what's on topic.

Linux on playstation2 by Anonymous Coward · 2002-01-23 21:40 · Score: 0

I'd rather see linux on playstation2 than
2 or 3 games on linux.

Sign up on http://ps2linux.scea.com [scea.com] or start porting!

Re:Attn Moderators: please mod parent up... by Anonymous Coward · 2002-01-23 21:43 · Score: 0

and this is linux fault? no, its the product manufacturers reluctance to release info to people who WANT to make your scanner, dickwiper/whatever work with linux.
i've been running linux for 4 years my self, gone through several computers and i've never had a problem.if something suddenly 'stopped working' then what did you do?
christ, get a grip, baron assmunchen.

What about the UPDATES? Will they be freed? by aussersterne · 2002-01-23 21:49 · Score: 2

There are a number of updates that are required to keep Loki games running under new distributions or with new hardware.

Loki used to offer these for download as executables, but lately they switched over to an auto-update system which connects to a Loki server, downloads and installs the update for you, meaning that I haven't been able to archive updates for more recent games.

What will happen to the updates? PLEASE tell me that Loki will release the updates to the community so that their products will continue to work (and be installable on newer systems) after they are gone!

--
STOP . AMERICA . NOW

Re:What about the UPDATES? Will they be freed? by slouken · 2002-01-24 15:09 · Score: 1

You can get updates:
ftp.lokigames.com/pub/updates/*
(and all the Loki mirrors will have them too)

--Sam

Unbelievable, by Anonymous Coward · 2002-01-23 21:54 · Score: 0

how many wishy-washy Linux "supporters" are there? When I decided to go Linux, I went all the way. I don't have a windoze system except at work. Yes, there has been some pain in the transition, but it's gotten better over the years. I quit buying windoze games, too. And now, I own all but 4 of Loki's ports.

Those of you complaining about games for windoze being released first didn't support Loki's Tribes 2, either! All this time I thought /. readers stood behind their beliefs. For those of you that didn't support your beliefs with your wallet, you deserve everything Bill gives you.

Draw a line somewhere. It doesn't matter where. Stand for something, and don't be the sheep Bill thinks you are.

Re:huh? I already got free. by Anthony+Boyd · 2002-01-23 22:25 · Score: 5, Insightful

Good post, but there's a fundemental difference between the Linux community and the Mac community -- The Mac people actually like the idea that their platform is used by millions of iMac-buying lusers. Fundementally, the Linux people are trying to get away from that culture and associate the OS with a certain level of l33tness.

OK. Let me ask you this: are Linux people also happy to have Eazel out of business and VA teetering on the edge? Do we want video card manufacturers to refuse to give us drivers? Are we trying to discourage Dell's Linux efforts? Are Linux people happy to see Loki closing their doors? From the posts here, it appears they range from indifference to disapointment. I don't see many people celebrating it. My point was not that we need to cater to "lusers" who have nothing to contribute. But we just witnessed, 4 posts above ours, a highly qualified insider at Hyperion give us good information that was almost immediately discounted with commments like "My friends don't act that way, you must be full of it." Is the Linux community so hell-bent on being 133t that we're going to flip off people who are more qualified than we are? These are not lusers! We are just stupid if we persist in being this self-destructive.

--
My Greasemonkey scripts for Digg &

Re:Way to go! - THIS IS THE END FOR ME by q-soe · 2002-01-23 22:28 · Score: 2

Please note i am not trolling but i really cannot understand the Warez analogy - you all support something called the free software movement - some of you out there resent paying anything for your software and think all source code should be free.

How do companies make money in this ideal world of yours ? Or is it simply that everything belongs to the people? Didnt communism fail once already?

Facts as i see them
-Companies need to sell product to survive.
-Linux as a community frowns on anyone who sells product.
-GPL discourages people from developing product only to have their source ripped off
-Linux is dying slowly on the desktop and it should be getting stronger
-The concept of open source is dying
-MS have done a far better job with XP than any of us ever thought possible
-This hurts us as users more than ever see linux as an OS for 'geeks'

And you are all arguing about warez doodz and esoterica like this ? Arguing about he color of the doors whilst the wheels fall off?

How about a desktop OS that makes it almost impossible for the average windows user to install and use a sound card, video card, play a DIV-x movie, open a document or in most cases even in some cases to simply install the damn OS next to impossible for anyone non geeky.

EVERY single time a user resorts to a console command to get something running you have lost.

-Every Make/config they have to run you have lost
-Every incompatible version of GCC or a library you have lost
-Suggesting users give up their simple to use OS and software like outlook for pine (another thread on this post) is another nail in open source - users want simple to configure and use software.

Windows games sell for $90 in australia and they sell well.

Linux games sell for about $50 and dont sell well

People want to install a game and play it not hunt for the latest drivers for their video card or that library version they need to get sound - simply they want to bung it in and use it.

If a windows user can pay $90 why cant you guys pay half that ?

Just my thoughts and i really care - i dont want to see Open Source die i want to see it grow into an alternative operating system for all users - but i cant stand the holy wars or meaningless bitch fights anymore, im off to format the notebook and server and install XP and 2000 server on them - im sorry but ive spent years trying to get users to use linux and years apologising beacuse the implementation of it they chose sucked or wont work etc and i spend hours fixing it and showing them how it works and then they want to watch a movie or something and give up in disgust.

I cant do it anymore.
Im sorry

I mourn LOKI, i mourn many other companies. They wont be the last i fear and i mourn that.

I know im getting modded down for this - it will be offtopic or flamebait - the maturity of the moderators never changed - and i worked hard and posted intelligently to get to 50, but hell i can't watch it anymore, i cant see a community tear itself apart like this anymore

--
I refuse to argue with Anonymous Cowards - if you want a discussion get an account....

why not have a windows partition aswell by Anonymous Coward · 2002-01-23 22:34 · Score: 0

I mean if you've the harddrive space to run all these new games you surely have the space required to run windows + latest directx.. why not play the games in the enviroment the were made to be run in...

I don't use my linux for playing advanced games.. I'm not too interested in wasting a few hundred hours on any new 3d game anyways...

Re:huh? I already got free. by rseuhs · 2002-01-23 22:37 · Score: 3, Interesting

As far as social simulation and other interesting not-common-on-American-PCs genres go...

I think this was a major reason for Loki failing - they concentrated on the American market where Linux is scarce on the desktop.

I've made a small statistic on the basis of newsgroups. It shows that in the average American, non-technical newsgroup there, about 0 to 5% are posting with Linux, in the average German, non-technical newsgroup, about 5 to 25% post using Linux.

Even with less than 1/3rd of the population there are almost certainly more Linux-desktops in Germany alone than in the U.S.A.

Most hilarious domain name. LOL by lang2 · 2002-01-23 22:49 · Score: 1

I knew it would happen eventually. So I am hardly sadened. I just found the the domain name to be the most hilarious one I've ever seen. www.f---edcompany.com.... Whoeve setup this domain name is ingenious.

So go order them now. by Anonymous Coward · 2002-01-23 22:52 · Score: 0

They are still taking orders, so head over and get them while you still can..

Diet coke thank you very much by Anonymous Coward · 2002-01-23 23:00 · Score: 0

or red bull.

No Windows Partition Here by morbid · 2002-01-23 23:00 · Score: 1

What really disappoints me is that those of use who use Linux exclusively at home (ie no Windows or Mac in the house) now have nowhere to buy games. I bought Quake III, Descent 3 and Unreal Tournament (which I've never got working incidentally). The Free Beer crowd are really annoying. I was and am willing to pay good money for quality software. That's why I bought the Official Slackware. Commercial software has its place. If you want free-beer games, wheel out your gcc and get coding!
It would be nice in a perfect world if it was simple to write cross-platform games and just recompile for the target platform. That way, Windows, Mac and Linux (on various CPU architectures) people would all get access to the stuff. However, we haven't reached that level of technological ability yet.
The only hope now is that WINE gets good enough to run most Windows games, and that someone comes up with a dynamic binary translator for x86 object code so that you can run x86 binaries on any other architecture at full speed.
Oh well. Anyway, I have little time to play games unfortunately. In between working for a living, feeding myself, spending time with my girlfriend, drinking beer and doing the odd bit of LGPL coding, games seem insignificant.

--
I'm out of my tree just now but please feel free to leave a banana.

I knew something was wrong. by Zapdos · 2002-01-23 23:58 · Score: 1

I buy their games from ebgames. I have been waiting for a couple games to come into stock for quite a while. ~4 months

--
Get a free ipod.

Re:huh? I already got free. by SilentChris · 2002-01-24 00:00 · Score: 2

"Games and PC's multimedia that don't really work right are the smallest social cost of the M$ monopoly."

Are you kidding me? Why do you think Microsoft is touting the XBox so much? They know that high-performance applications, like games, drive the market for upgrades and new PC purchases. Purchases equal new versions of Windows, which equals money. Microsoft can't rely on the business world to fork over money for *every* upgrade -- they have to hope that the hardware market pushes users to buy new computers more often. The XBox is supposed to not only help Microsoft get involved with the "living room", but also get more developers to use the DirectX tools and (MS hopes) come back to the PC for development. More games = major profits for MS.

Re:huh? I already got free. by Anonymous Coward · 2002-01-24 00:06 · Score: 0

But we just witnessed, 4 posts above ours, a highly qualified insider at Hyperion give us good information that was almost immediately discounted with commments like "My friends don't act that way, you must be full of it."

Arguments to authority are useless. What inside information did this "highly qualified insider" give us? Nothing: he simply made up statistics to support his prearranged conclusion -- that Linux has more w4r3z d00ds than any operating system. He admitted that was nothing more than a "guess ... not based on hard research, just on impressions". This is hardly "good information".

The bottom line: in the several hundred posts here I have not seen the slightest shred of evidence to support the proposition that software piracy is any more widespread in Linux than in other operating systems. (I have, however, seen people employ just about every logical fallacy ever invented to justify that claim -- arguments to authority, anecdotal evidence, misuse of statistics, etc.)

[OT] Re:Way to go! - THIS IS THE END FOR ME by Anonymous Coward · 2002-01-24 00:09 · Score: 0

People like this are the only real threat to opensource. Whiners. The strength of current opensource systems lies at least as much in their complexity and flexibility as in their fundamental nature.

The last thing we need is for such systems to be dumbed down to the level of current windows/macos.

Re:[OT] Re:Way to go! - THIS IS THE END FOR ME by q-soe · 2002-01-24 16:53 · Score: 2

no its people without the balls to put their names to the comments they make

The ONLY thing you need is for the systems to be used on the desktop at the current level of windows and MAC os

The geek saturation market is sending companies to the wall and unless linux moves to the desktop it will die - this is a fact.

As long as you persist in calling other OS'es dumb and sit on your moral high horse the Open Source movement will go downhill - the point of linux is an os for the common man, not some geek genius

--
I refuse to argue with Anonymous Cowards - if you want a discussion get an account....

Re:huh? I already got free. by byran+lei · 2002-01-24 00:20 · Score: 0

>I hope with growing acceptance of Linux there might be a revival of >Linux gaming at some point.... But for the time being the attitude >seems to be Everything-On-Linux-Must-Be-Free-Beer. People who are >willing to buy Windows games are unwilling to buy the Linux version >(even though they claim that they want it). Instead they expect it to >be supplied for free. I really hope this changes in the future. :-( > > Get real asswipe. I'm happily playing Final Fanstasy X on my PS2. Give me *ONE REASON* why I should give a damn about the crap games you claim to work on. You can't. The fact is that that a major change has taken place with the release of the Playstation 2. A lot of people who use Linux have quite simply abandoned the PC as a means of playing games on, and we're not coming back. So you and the rest of the losers that make up the PC gaming community can bitch and whine all you like about how Linux users are too cheap to buy the shoddy crap people like you create/produce and people like myself will be laughing out heads off at you while buying and playing games like "Devil May Cry" and "Twisted Metal Black" and "SOE" on our PS2's. LOSER.

Buy now by Lao-Tzu · 2002-01-24 00:24 · Score: 1

After seeing this headline news on slashdot, I decided it is past time for me to acquire some additional Loki titles while they are still available. I had already owned a few, such as Civ CTP and Myth II. I just went to Loki's web site and ordered SimCity 3000 Unlimited, Alpha Centuari, and Heroes of Might and Magic III.

I suggest that if you can afford it, and Loki is selling any software you're interested in, now may be the time to acquire it before it is too late.

I've been meaning to purchase these games for ages, but I've been hoping to do so from a retailer's shelf (as I did for the first two Loki games I bought). Sadly, I never saw them there.

My Loki Rant Again(tm). by Anonymous Coward · 2002-01-24 00:43 · Score: 1, Insightful

The problem was the fact that they were porting games.

I walk into my local EB, looking for Heavy Gear II. I'm informed that they no longer restock the Windows version. Their last copy sold a few days earlier at the hefty price of $10.

Then the sales lady informs me they've a copy of the Linux version for ~$50. My response? "Erm, no thanks."

I go to Gamestop. Windows version, cheap as hell, Linux version, ouch.

Loki's main downfall was that by the time they got their ports out, the Windows versions were already on the discount bargain rack - selling for a miniscule amount compared to the Linux versions.

The gaming market today is made up of a large group of all but professional gamers. Just as we want our new kernels and distributions the day they're out, these people want the new games the day they're out. Loki couldn't deliver to these types - big chunk of business lost right there.

The casual gamer? I think, as we've seen, that the casual gamer market isn't enough to keep a company afloat anymore. At least not when the casual gamer has a choice between blowing $10 for a game and blowing $40-50 on the same game..

Honestly, though, I don't hold it against Loki. I'm sure they had restrictions and other difficulties on how fast they could pump games out.

If we want games on Linux, we have two routes to choose from. One is to wait for a decent desktop for average users. Yes, average users, and yes, I said decent. KDE isn't decent - it mimics Microsoft's desktop. I've yet to meet anyone who hasn't told me of some random problem or difficulty they have with MS's desktop. Some, like Blackbox, are freakin' beautiful for the power user, but not for the common denominator. The rest.. Well, for the most part, they suffer from varying types of obscurity. Not being known, or not having sufficient documentation (I remember the last time I tried to theme in E!.. :p)

With a decent average-user type desktop, Linux will broach into the mainstream of grandmothers and average joes using it. With that will come commercial support for games.

The second route? It's the most likely. The Q2 engine has just been open sourced.

How many here are musicians? How many are self-styled Masters of the Pixel? How many have made a custom model/skin for some other 3d game?

I won't ask for coders - I know we abound.

Think about it - the Q2 engine is a sexy piece of software. It still looks great, even though it's aged a bit.

Why aren't we pounding out our own games? We've got the coding talent, and we've plenty of other talent. It's not something like a kernel where only coders can contribute - games require music, graphics, etc.. This is something where almost any Linux user can help out with.

Oh, I'm not fooling myself into thinking one or two high-quality games will cause various Linux companies to have to buy new cd burners from a sudden rush of consumers.

But hey - we'd have some games, and we'd inevitably draw interest from those crazy MS Windows gamers. ;)

Re:huh? I already got free. by ChrisJones · 2002-01-24 00:59 · Score: 1

There are many who's voice is loud and whiny, but they are not representative of all. They merely repeat the herding calls of their self-appointed leader, RMS. His contributions are great, but his views are not wise, nor are they practical, especially when they are focused most accutely on those who aim to bring market share and stability to Open/Free platforms.

I wish you and Hyperion the very best of luck, the niche gaming market is a tough one. I hope you can forgive the zealots and return to Linux when the conditions improve.

--
Chris "Ng" Jones
cmsj@tenshu.net
www.tenshu.net

Re:huh? I already got free. by rburt3 · 2002-01-24 01:06 · Score: 1

Bravo!
I consider myself reasonably intellegent and a decent programmer to boot, but it sometimes takes me a few tries to get some of this Linux stuff working. I believe in the vision, so I will stick with it. On the other hand, this OS can bring someone like my wife to the brink of tears simply trying to print a document. Sure, the community is generally responsive to newbies, but most people moving to non-MS OS's are programmer/IT geeks who should be at least passing familiar with the jargon.
Now, we have a delusional attitude that Linux is going to be some kind of MS killer, but that's just wishful thinking until the needs of the AVERAGE home user are addressed. That user doesn't want to have to know ANYTHING about the hardware behind the beige box. That user wants to insert a CD and have it start for them. That user doesn't want to know about FTP/SSH/PHP/etc. That user will NEVER compile their own software. That user will probably never post to slashdot. That user doesn't want to know about printer commands (neither does this one, BTW). And, aside from sharing pictures of the kids, that user WANTS TO PLAY GAMES. Currently, MS meets that user's needs, and while Linux has come a LONG way in a short time, there is still far to go. My granny doesn't want to remember to unmount the floppy when she logs out.
And YET, even though there seems to be an unstated goal to have Linux as pervasive as MS Windows, many still treat the entire thing as some exclusive "Turbo Geeks Only" club. Take the time to hold a hand. If you run X, make sure your desktop looks as cool as it can, 'cause granny is a sucker for a pretty desktop too. Suck 'em in with the "trival" stuff, then show them why its a superior product. Perhaps these LUGS should start some type of mentoring program that provides personal one on one support to new users.
I whole-hartedly applaude Mr. Boyd's statements and would add that once problems are acknowledged, take the time to address them.

Re:huh? I already got free. by Rogerborg · 2002-01-24 01:07 · Score: 2

I'm also having trouble imagining the demanding weenies you describe. The Baton Rouge LUG is small, but most of the people there were NOT like this.

Take the blinkers off. Most users of any given system aren't dedicated and civic minded. They just want to use it.

An example. When I was at university, my computer science class got bitten by the Netrek bug. We had at least a dozen dedicated (league) players, plus hangers on from other classes, playing it in DEC workstations. Of that group (say 20), only one of us (me) had even compiled the client, let alone developed it and fed back into the community. Out of a computer science class, putting in countless hours playing a game competitively, not one other person could be bothered even trying to tweak the client. They just wanted to play.

Games players - players - are not typical hackers (in the good sense, a lot of them are script kiddies). That's the point under discussion here, not your cozy ivory towered LUG.

--
If you were blocking sigs, you wouldn't have to read this.

Will I give up? by StarbuckZero · 2002-01-24 01:16 · Score: 1

Well I want to, hell I could tell you that much. Why? Because I put up with the long waits and the download the binaries and shit like all because I wanted a choice when I turn on my x86 PC. I wouldn't mind walking into a story and buying a Linux game but it's not like that now. If it's anything I want right now is for Linux to become a real altivate to Windows. I even stopped duel booting a 1 1/2 ago all because of I wanted to wait and not even give in to buying Win32 games.

So why haven't remove Linux and put back on Windows? 1) I'm sorry but I don't want to be watch over by MS, because they are known for dirty tricks. Being in the tech world and hearing the stories that I head about them makes anyone think twice. 2) MS is to a point where the could do easily force upgrades and start making people rent there OS. So I figure I must be ready for that to happen. 3) I feel that I have more control over my system with Linux. I like being about to telnet into my PC just to finish setting up my joystick. I've been using Linux for 2 1/2 years and I still found stuff I haven't learned. Hell there is stuff out there that I want to try that I didn't get around to.

So whom do we get mad at? The porting houses like Loki? The gaming companies like id Software, Blizzard and Value? What about Microsoft? No! All we can do is blame our selves for something like this. We have open up people! I mean let's start with the easier install of programs and better the update managers on our systems. Soon as the new KDE or GNOME is out I would press a button and update or just download the install from the web not wait for the next Redhat 7.3, Mandrake 8.2 or SuSe 7.4 release. Let's better document for new users as in now just KDE or GNOME but the programs that come with them or users download. Come let's take time out to help newbies on IRC, newsgroups and message boards. I drop by linuxnewbie.org just to help people sometimes myself. Without the people of tomorrow we are nothing, just remember that. All I can do is help people out on message borads, because I don't know any C/C++ and that I would like to take classes first before I start jumping on open source prjects.

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From Zero to Hero... Starbuck Zero

Your right -- by OSgod · 2002-01-24 01:20 · Score: 1

end users who steal the intellectual property of others HURT open source.

Their is hope of course. Loki could join a home version of the BSA.... wait the BSA is evil, isn't it?

Free/open software, quality software, ability of developers to eat -- pick any two.

AOL/TW, step up to the line by Rogerborg · 2002-01-24 01:22 · Score: 5, Funny

It occurs to me that if AOL/TW do actually want ship a Linux OS that can actually wean AOLusers off of Windows entirely, then they could do a lot worse than to use some pocket lint to buy Loki and help make Linux a viable games platform.

Picture the difference:

Hello, nVidia, this is Joe from Loki calling about your shitty Linux drivers, if you've got a minute, sir, please, please god, don't hang up on me again...
THE AOL/TW COLLECTIVE DEMANDS BETTER SUPPORT FOR AOLINUX. RESISTANCE IS FUTILE.

--
If you were blocking sigs, you wouldn't have to read this.

What? by OSgod · 2002-01-24 01:25 · Score: 1

Windows works and Linux doesn't? Where is that up time for Linux claim then? 15 minutes (had to boot to Windows play games, had to boot to Windows to use the standard Office products, had to boot to Windows to be productive)? Don't complain -- just use the workable OS for you wheather it be Linux or Windows.

In general the pragmatic approach keeps you going longer in the evolutionary ladder (see self cleaning gene pool cross referenced with Linux bigot).

Buy a game by rwuest · 2002-01-24 01:31 · Score: 1

If everyone that has thought about buying a game from Loki went and did so today, maybe they'd stay in business.

Re:huh? I already got free. by mpe · 2002-01-24 01:33 · Score: 2

It actually works totally the other way around. *WE* pay a software company for the right to port the game. We have to pay a big chunk of money up front. These companies do not see fit to make Linux versions of games, so we have to give them money to convince them to do it

THis probably means that the game companies are happier with things than the customers.

Correction by OSgod · 2002-01-24 01:35 · Score: 1

Games and PC's multimedia that don't really work right are the biggest issue facing Linux. Of course this is the issue that usually ices alternative OS's (hardware support). MS has excellant hardware support through marketing mass and thousands of drivers. The Mac has excellant hardware support through controlling the spec on all hardware.

Linux is at the mercy of the vendors who may want to appear "nice" when their bread is not buttered to sell to the Linux market.

If Linux persists in being all things to all people it will be:

1. The best hobbyist OS
2. Mostly unused
3. Never a "comemrcial" OS

Re:huh? I already got free. by mpe · 2002-01-24 01:36 · Score: 2

I think the major problem with this (or at least loki's) business model is the fact they ported games after the windows games were already out. You need to cordinate and release at the same time.

This would appear to be more a fault of the games companies concerned. The porters appear to be trying their best, just that they are in a situation where it's probably impossible for them to operate a reliable business model.

Any other Links by rute_1 · 2002-01-24 01:41 · Score: 1

Does anyone have any other Links to this story? While I'm sure the site for the main Link is reputable, I'd like to see it elseware. I checked Loki's site and there's no mention about closing the doors in 1 week. You'd think that a company would give it's customers at least a weeks notice that they are going away.

I'd just like to see it on more than one reputable Web site....

Re:huh? I already got free. by Anonymous Coward · 2002-01-24 01:46 · Score: 0

Same AC. Again, well said. My point is that the advocacy is way out in front of the software.

Pointing fingers over warez is stupid. The fact is that Linux just doesn't have the desktop userbase to support the market for Eazel, Loki, and every possible video driver. Finish turning it into a Windows-like OS, and then maybe you will get the users, but until then it's largely wasted words.

Re:huh? I already got free. by mpe · 2002-01-24 01:46 · Score: 2

Now, we have a delusional attitude that Linux is going to be some kind of MS killer, but that's just wishful thinking until the needs of the AVERAGE home user are addressed. That user doesn't want to have to know ANYTHING about the hardware behind the beige box.

In which case Windows isn't what they really want anyway. They either want something whereby applications stay entirely on read only media, be they games or wordprocessors, or they need a system which very effectivly separates the role of "user" from that of "admin"/"mechanic"/"techie". In the latter case commming with the same kind of "no user servicable parts" type label they expect to find on every other domestic appliance.
Expecting end users to be installing software, etc (which is the MS model) is as daft as expecting them to adjust the convergance on their televisions.

Re:huh? I already got free. by mpe · 2002-01-24 01:48 · Score: 2

The fact is that the core developers of the Linux system never intended it to be a Windows replacement,

However Microsoft has, for some years, pushed Windows as a "unix replacement".

My 2 eurocents by tempfile · 2002-01-24 01:48 · Score: 1

Loki doomed to fail, IMO. The problem was not Loki, all of their ports I use are technically top-notch, but the market and the users.

The users don't want to buy a game for Linux at full price when the Windows version has been out for months and is sold for low prices, ESPECIALLY when you can get binaries to use with the game data from the Windows CD for free.

Game marketers see no demand for Linux games. They have their stuff written for D3D ("because it's Microsoft and if it's Microsoft it's good") and don't give a rat's ass about who will port their stuff to Linux.

Loki approached game developers, buying licenses for big amounts of money, and then hoped to get it back by selling their games for full price when the Win... we've been there. They basically did free work for the game developers. This just isn't right. In a perfect world, the game makers would approach Loki and PAY THEM to port the game to Linux. But since we don't live in a perfect world, but in one that is ruled by money and Microsoft-controlled pseudostandards, Loki failed and was doomed to fail from the beginning.

Re:huh? I already got free. by Gleef · 2002-01-24 01:50 · Score: 2

Not just release at the same time, but ideally release on the same CD. Most of the actual contents of these CD's is data anyway, having two binaries and two installers on one CD shouldn't be a big deal.

--

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Open mind, insert foot.

Why Gamers Deserve Linux Ports by BadBlood · 2002-01-24 02:01 · Score: 3, Insightful

IMHO, Linux gamers deserve Linux ports of their favorite games from the original developers. Why? I believe you cannot have a successful ONLINE multiplayer game without the support of Linux-based dedicated servers.

Quake 1 and 2 set the stage as their Linux ports allowed server administrators to set up dedicated servers and donate their bandwidth. Because there were SO MANY servers, there were SO MANY clients and each game flourished.

No enter the original Unreal. No Linux port. No Linux dedicated server. Multiplayer options were null (and for reasons based in less than steller network performance).

Enter Unreal Tournament. Epic wises up and ports it to Linux - for free. Tons of dedicated servers spring up and the game flourishes even to this day.

Half-Life's Counterstrike also has a dedicated server and that game continues to flourish. I consider it a mistake that Valve has not released a client as the multitude of servers continues to keep the game popular.

That's why I salute id, even though their Linux ports are not simultaneously released, they do recognize the service that Linux based dedicated servers give to them. Therefore they continue to port games to Linux (and for other technically sound reasons).

I realize my arguement holds only for multiplayer titles, but that's what got the ball rolling originally. Those of us that have hosted Linux dedicated servers do indeed deserve a little condiseration from the developers for a Linux client.

--

Praying for the end of your wide-awake nightmare.

Re:X-Box, X-Files style -- paranoia. by mpe · 2002-01-24 02:03 · Score: 2

Can't we just acknowledge that some problem might possibly exist in the Linux community, and attempt to fix it? Do we really need to invent a Microsoft conspiracy to make ourselves feel better about Loki closing??

The problem about an invented Microsoft conspiracy is that it would probably be rather milder than the one they actually managed to pull off with their dodgy OEM deals. The results of which are that the whole PC and associated market are completly warped... Effectivly we have a private company controlling a market in ways not seen outside of government monopolies. The difference being that Microsoft is probably in a more secure position than most governments on the planet, since it does not face being voted out of office, revolution or military conquest.

Besides, at first glance, it seems natural: "I already paid for this game, why should I have to pay for it again?" At least until one actually sits down and thinks about the economic and business factors involved (see other posts in this thread)

In a situation of pure capitalism you have customers who selfishly look out for their own interets. Which is really all those of the "I'm prepared to pay for this once, not twice" crowd are doing. Especially since the customers are being told that they have actually bought some kind of licence to play the game.

Re:huh? I already got free. by filmcritic · 2002-01-24 02:13 · Score: 0

Amen brother...I've been there, done that. I'm speaking of the users on the newsgroups flipping the bird to the "I don't understand" folks. I can recall many, many times posting an entirely legitimate question that was worded well and contained all relavent information needed for an answer, and getting a "RTFM" response. Did they think I didn't look elsewhere before asking? There were a few people civil enough to give a proper answer, but they were few and far between.

Frankly, I don't see this changing anytime soon or in the future. Somehow, Linux users believe they are the elite and know more than anyone else. What they fail to realize is that not everyone is a programmer with years of experience.

I fought tooth and nail to learn what I did in Linux, including "silly" desktop issues like fixing failed installer scripts of Linux binaries of Windows games. Those in the ivory tower of Linux elitism need to come down because the whole ballgame is going down the tubes.

Re:huh? I already got free. by CrazyBusError · 2002-01-24 02:17 · Score: 1

Er... no.

His guess was the number of Amiga users compared to the number of Linux users. Not how many 'w4r3z d00ds' there were. Read the post.

What he said was that a lot of Linux users are always pushing for games to be ported, but then expecting not to have to pay for them when they arrive.

I personally can sympathise. I run a rock club here in Edinburgh and DJ at others from time to time. All I ever see on the web about these clubs is either 'You play too much nu-metal - it's shite' or 'You play too much hardcore bollocks, it's shite' or 'You play too much 80's rock. It's shite'. People are *always* telling us what music we need to play more of. The first few times, when enough people wanted to have a club that would play their particular niche, we started one. Same venue, different night, advertised well in advance. How many of these loud-mouthed whingeing idiots ever turned up? None. How many of them started their own clubs? None. The excuses they made up for not ever going were phenomenal. It happened three times and all clubs bombed within weeks (we even got some of the whingeing idiots in question to DJ) So we lost money and learnt our lesson. We were fortunate that it was small scale and didn't break us. Loki, on the other hand, have learnt the hard way that the loudest mouths are routinely the quietest when it comes to following up what they say with action.

Sorry to see another company supporting Linux go. I can't say I've ever bought any of their games, but then the last games I ever bought was MDK. (I don't copy games either).

--
-Never argue with an idiot. They drag you down to their level, then beat you with experience-

I bought 3 games today by fialar · 2002-01-24 02:22 · Score: 1

I bought F.A.K.K. 2 and the Rune/HOV bundle
for a whopping total (with shipping) $85.

I don't mind supporting these folks. I own Tribes 2, Alpha Centauri, nreal Tournament:GOTY, and Quake 3 and have enjoyed all 4 games immensely.

I'd say you burned some, you old troll. by Erris · 2002-01-24 02:44 · Score: 1, Flamebait

I am really exhausted by people who just say "I don't (see|believe) it" when someone describes an issue they're having. Let me help my fellow Linvocates.

Why do I get the feeling I've been flamed? I suppose it's because your straw man help has nothing to do with what most people, like myself tell others. Oh yeah, you seem to have forgoten what I wrote to rant along about how screwed up the Mac community is while telling me that I don't know what I'm talking about. Thanks.

Somehow I don't feel the helping hand of an advocate. I say I don't know how to configure sound cards, and you give me shit about making others feel comfortable. I'm so helped.

The problem is not our collective image, the problem this developer was having was low demand for games and harrasment. The first problem is M$ created hardware stupidity. The second problem is people like you.

Yes you. Like this beautiful flame, much like your current exhaustion letter posted to bsdtoday two years ago. You might want a different pen name.

You're kidding, right?
Anthony Boyd - January 25, 2001 17:34:55

Among the examples you list of Tucows scandalous comments is this one: "New users should steer clear of OpenBSD."

You must be kidding me. That is evidence that Tucows doesn't understand the BSD community or is being overly-harsh? Let me put it more strongly than Tucows did: new users will HATE OpenBSD. New users (new to Unix, new to computers) should be steered AWAY from OpenBSD. Not only that, the OpenBSD team probably should want it that way, saying "yep, we're for security-minded system admins, not for new users." If BSD or OpenBSD people are getting upset about being told their system is unfriendly to new users, then they better build a system new users will want. Until then, they're going to have to deal with those comments, just like Linux sysadmins have to deal with comments about Linux insecurity. It's true, dammit. Deal with it.

Linux insecurity? OpenBSD difficulty? Troll city. Yes, that's you at outshine. Yes, Google put the finger on you.

--
DMCA, Hollings, Palladium. What might have sounded like paranoia is now common sense.

Re:I'd say you burned some, you old troll. by Anthony+Boyd · 2002-01-24 08:51 · Score: 2

Well I thought about whether to respond for a while. I decided I should, even though the thread is probably dead now.

Erris, I'm sorry. You obviously feel like I just poured a heap of abuse on you, and to some degree I think it's fair for you to be pissed. I hung a lot of hats on your comments, so to speak -- and some of it was baggage from other posts that I never responded to. So, sorry for that.

At the same time, I think the moderators might be giving you a hint that I am not trolling. Your ability to locate years-old posts of mine at BSD sites is both deliberate on my part -- I always post with the same name so that people can find my history -- and is also an indication that I've been trying in earnest to influence the community (sometimes successfully!) for quite some time. What you see as my fatal flaw, I see as my credentials, my proof that I've been here a while and might have my hands in it enough to know a little bit. Don't forget, back when I made those comments about Linux insecurity, Red Hat 5.2 & 6.2 installed with services on by default. Ports wide open. People haven't had to worry about that problem for a long time, so of course, "Linux insecurity" has less punch nowadays. In fact, in light of WinXP's recent foibles, I'd say Linux is a great alternative for security & privacy reasons. But look, how did Linux improve? It improved because the people using the product raised the issue, and the people working on the codebase listened. I just wish we could have more of that, that's all.

--
My Greasemonkey scripts for Digg &

Originality is key by beth_linker · 2002-01-24 02:46 · Score: 2

Porting Windows games, good as they may be, won't create a market for gaming on Linux. I think that a successful Linux gaming company would have to take its cue from the console game companies.

People choose a Nintendo system as their gaming platform because you can play Nintendo games on it and you can't do that anywhere else. If the only games Nintendo put out were ports of last year's Playstation games, there'd be no incentive to buy a Nintendo console.

Similarly, if a company wants people to buy Linux games instead of Windows games, then it really needs to "sell" Linux (even to people who already use it but don't see it as a gaming platform). What Linux really needs is the next Mario or Sonic - something that you can play on a Linux box that's so much fun that Windows gamers start repartitioning their systems just to try it out. Without that, Linux gaming won't go anywhere.

Loki Games So So by Ixikchitl · 2002-01-24 02:56 · Score: 1

You know, I've got to say that their efforts were heroic, but I wan never all that impressed with their original games. I always thought that the original games were what made a company or not.

Re:Way to go! - THIS IS THE END FOR ME by Tom7 · 2002-01-24 03:11 · Score: 1

> -MS have done a far better job with XP than any of us ever thought possible

This is definitely true. I am using XP now and I don't have any plans to change to linux for my desktop machine. The only reason I'd change to linux is if that's where all the applications move. (Or if MS has some pay-by-the-month scheme, which I think is unlikely but still possible.)

I am using linux on my desktop in my office (since I use that primarily for development), and it is usable but pretty crappy in comparison. Cut'n'paste doesn't even work right, you know?

However, linux rules on the server and for development. I don't think the idea of open source is dying here.

> and i worked hard and posted intelligently to get
> to 50

You'll find that now that you're at 50 it's essentially impossible to get modded down past the +1 bonus. All you have to do is spell correctly and be honest. So say what you mean and fuck the moderators!

fast divx by scorcherer · 2002-01-24 03:11 · Score: 2

MPlayer with ffmpeg libraries for decoding (you'll add them into the MPlayer source tree, read MPlayer's manual). MPlayer must be compiled by yourself (for legal reasons!) but it is then fully optimized to your processor. It's one of the few programs that use MMX, 3DNow etc.

I'm getting fullscreen (800x600) DivX playback on a K6-3+, 400 MHz machine. In fact this is a recent achievement, because only with X 4.2.0 I have XVideo and DGA available. Without those, the VESA driver is probably the fastest.

Hmm.. this is probably the nth question about DivX playing.. time for a FAQ perhaps? :-)

--

--
The Cap is nigh. Time to get a fresh new account.

./ Financial geniuses. by Gannoc · 2002-01-24 03:11 · Score: 2

I've read "Lets hope they get bought" by a bunch of people.

Why the hell would anyone buy them? Loki's only assets are a bunch of old Linux ports which clearly aren't selling well enough to keep them in business.

Do you all think that AOL is some special company who buys anything that competes w/ Microsoft just because they bought netscape?

Re:./ Financial geniuses. by Dr.Dubious+DDQ · 2002-01-24 06:01 · Score: 2

Loki's only assets are a bunch of old Linux ports
Yes - the work on which is already DONE. A lazy company only needs to buy the 'license to redistribute' off of Loki, and a CD-copier. A GOOD company will also have a few programmers to work on patches and such, but all in all, the BULK of the work on everything Loki sells is already done, and that's the expensive part...

--
Hacker Public Radio is our Friend

as much as this sucks... by rib0flavin · 2002-01-24 03:22 · Score: 0, Offtopic

and I am not saying that I am AGAINST leaked documents its just that i think that his phone number should have been blocked out. I can't imagine all the ./ trolls trolling his phone lines...

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__________________________________________________ ______ eagles soar, but weasels don't get sucked i

Grr... by broody · 2002-01-24 03:27 · Score: 1

One click says it all.

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~~ What's stopping you?

Re:huh? I already got free. by rho · 2002-01-24 03:37 · Score: 2

Nice try, but I think you'll find your words wasted.

I could write an essay on the topic of culture choice and how it affects a community, but I'll boil it down to this: Linux devotees chose the "elite techie" culture whereas Apple zealots chose the "enthusiast" culture, and it shows.

Where there are Mac admin mailing lists frequented by hundreds of helpful Mac managers who will patiently (if not exactly happily) answer the same question over and over again, for Linux users there is IRC and Usenet--which is quite funny, considering how difficult it sometimes is to get your Linux box online.

Linux users tend towards elitism, whereas Mac users tend towards snobbery. They sound similar, but in reality are quite different. It's the difference between wealth and royalty: make enough money (or buy a Mac), and you're in the club. But unless you're born of royal blood (or have the hacker-nature), you just can't join the clique.

I'm afraid your words will fall on many deaf ears, as very few people are intellectually honest enough with themselves to admit that they might be wrong, and need to change.

--
Potato chips are a by-yourself food.

no way.. by Anonymous Coward · 2002-01-24 03:39 · Score: 0

Seriously, you have got to be kidding. I swear, I didn't see that one comming at all.

MOM

Re:Way to go! - THIS IS THE END FOR ME by seebs · 2002-01-24 03:43 · Score: 2

BSD, for me. I support the idea that *I* will write code, which I generally give away - but if you feel you need to sell code to make money, go ahead and sell code. I won't try to stop you, and you can use my code.

Thus, I'm making it cheaper to develop software, closed or not, and I'm not barring people from making money using my code.

I still have a day job, but I do a fair amount of bespoke programming, and that pays the bills. In the long run, maybe that'll be the dominant form - or maybe it won't.

However, the key distinction is *consent*. When I download NetBSD, I'm downloading something that was *given away by the owner*. I'm not stealing something. Free software is not about getting stuff you don't pay for - it's about giving away stuff you don't need to get paid for.

--
My blog: http://www.seebs.net/log/ --- My iPhone/iPad app: http://www.seebs.net/seebsfrac/

An idea: by Chris+Burke · 2002-01-24 03:46 · Score: 2

An idea:

Same thing, binaries only, 20% of full retail price.

Put it on a CD. Ship it in the same way you ship the full boxed version.

You still get your nice physical object whose existence and sale can be easily tracked, and dual booters don't have to pay full price twice for the same game.

--

The enemies of Democracy are

Re:An idea: by ecc0 · 2002-01-24 09:05 · Score: 1

...And this would do precisely nothing except lower Hyperion's income by 80%. The data files need not be ported, and do not really cost Hyperion anything; the binaries do. So what's the point of supplying the binaries only on a full boxed CD?
Re:An idea: by Chris+Burke · 2002-01-24 09:54 · Score: 2

Maybe you just haven't gotten the situation. This would be evidenced by your argument that "the data files need not be ported, and do not really cost Hyperion anything; the binaries do" actually proves my point, and the assertion that it would "lower Hyperion's income by 80%" is ludicrous. Let me elaborate.

First, there are 3 (relevent) types of people in the situation:

1) already owns the Windows version, will not pay full price for the linux version.
2) does not own Windows version.
3) already owns the Windows version, will pay for linux version.

The people who are asking for a binaries-only free download are people who already have the game for Windows. They already -have- the data files. They don't -want- to have to pay for them again. They don't want to pay the full retail price for a game they already own, just to play it under Linux. This is perfectly reasonable.

However, it is not reasonable for Hyperion to offer that free download, since the binaries, as you point out, are the thing they actually had to port. And they have made no money off the person who has the windows version. If they allowed binary downloads, they would give the person what they want, but make $0 off of him.

Result? The person with the game doesn't buy the linux version, and Hyperion gets $0 anyway.

If they offered the binaries only on CD, then the people who already own the data files could purchase this. This increases sales, and thus revenue, for Hyperion. The reduced cost would be offset by the fact that it would only be going to people who would not have bought the game anyway.

People who -don't- have the data files wouldn't get any use out of the binary-only CD, and thus would buy the full version.

In short, those that needed the full version buy it, and those who wouldn't have bought it now buy the binary-only version. This would be observed as an increase in income.

The potential for lowering comes from those who already had the windows version (and thus the data files), and who -would- buy the full linux version anyway, but now buy only the binary version. Obviously I have no hard numbers on this, but Hyperion's own comments indicate that many were reluctant to do this. In fact, they directly blame people unwilling to re-purchase the full game for their low sales. If they are correct, then they would not have any significant loss from this group, because it is very small.

Which means that this would only have a positive effect on Hyperion's bottom line.

--

The enemies of Democracy are
Re:An idea: by ecc0 · 2002-01-24 10:06 · Score: 1

Sure, that makes sense. What I thought you were saying ("Ship it in the same way you ship the full boxed version," I guess I misinterpreted that) was that they should sell the binaries only, boxed in the exact same way as a full version. That would not make any sense at all. I have a feeling the original game manufacturers wouldn't like what you're suggesting, though, but I agree it would probably be better for most of us (Linux users and Linux game developers.)
Re:An idea: by ecc0 · 2002-01-24 10:12 · Score: 1

There's one little thing though. If the -full- Linux version would be priced higher than the full Windows version and/or be released after, as has been the normal case with Loki releases, chances are that people will buy the Windows version, then the cheap Linux binary package, and that will still amount to less money than the full Linux package. That way, the user would get both the Linux AND Windows version, legally, both in nice glossy boxes, and Hyperion would probably sell far less full Linux versions.
Re:An idea: by Chris+Burke · 2002-01-24 10:46 · Score: 2

First, sorry about the confusion. Clarity is a virtue, they say. Instead, I just talk a lot. :)

Second, you're right. Hopefully the cost of Windows + binary linux CD Full linux CD.

The delayed releases, though, are a huge problem anyway (I think the major reason why, for example, Linux Q3 was a bomb), and this would help. Dual-boot gamers are not going to wait for the linux version, but this way at least -some- money could be recouped.

Last, I suggested the idea because that Hyperion guy said they were actually considering selling the binaries off their web page (pay via credit card to download), but the original manufacturer didn't like that because CD's are easier to track. So I suggested just doing the same thing, but with CD's. :)

--

The enemies of Democracy are
Re:An idea: by Chris+Burke · 2002-01-24 10:57 · Score: 1

Should have said "Hopefully the cost of Windows + binary linux CD is less than Full linux CD. " But it ate my less-than symbol.

What's that? Preview button? Never heard of it. :)

--

The enemies of Democracy are

Re:"Linux" on regcard leads to at least winelib bu by Anonymous Coward · 2002-01-24 03:55 · Score: 0

You assume that if this were actually an option, the numbers would show many people use linux. I think it would show that precious space on the registration card or web page was being wasted by an option that so few people choose.

One size DOESN'T fit all. by Anonymous Coward · 2002-01-24 03:58 · Score: 0

plain more efficient for all involved?

well, i for one cannot use WINE for running games on my powerbook, so i bought some loki games (essentially the ones that had ppc ports or patches) and i have to admit that loki really did things right (by having binaries available for multiple platforms, etc.)
of course, i can run mac games on mac-on-linux in a window on my x desktop, but that won't be the same thing.

it's a shame commercial linux gaming doesn't work. now there's no way i'm going to switch from linux/ppc to linux/x86 ... i'd miss all those wonderful os x game titles!

PENTIUM for all? wrong answer. wrong architecture. wrong decade.

Put blame where it belongs by Anonymous Coward · 2002-01-24 03:59 · Score: 0

I hate to say it, but the Linux so-called "community" just can't help but eat its own. I've heard similar tales of woe from numerous book publishers who have told me and others in the writing business that you simply can't sell anything to Linux users except hardware. Books and software are seen by these users as things that "should" be free.

Sys admins tend to be a different situation, since they're often buying tools paid for by their employer. But end users? Forget it--there's no market there.

Other by yerricde · 2002-01-24 04:04 · Score: 1

I think it would show that precious space on the registration card or web page was being wasted by an option that so few people choose.

That's why you write it in the blank next to "Other".

--
Will I retire or break 10K?

Re:huh? I already got free. by raindog2 · 2002-01-24 04:04 · Score: 1

While I've never played a Loki title on any OS, I'm certainly not glad to see Loki go out of business. But their business model was "release year-old games at full price when most of the audience has already paid for it on the same machine." That's right, without the 'community spirit' angle their pitch boiled down to "pay another 50 bucks so you don't have to reboot."

It's easy to blame the end users since there is nothing to be done about it except whine on slashdot. It's not so easy to recognize flawed business models and avoid those mistakes in the future. And trying to grow the Linux gaming market from nothing by brute force is just not the right way to go. Realizing your technology is transitional and marketing it that way might be, so we'll see how transgaming.com does.

We who can send off $100 checks to the FSF and EFF now and then can also afford to spend gratuitously to support Linux. Most users won't, especially in a recession. Companies need to adjust their plans accordingly.

Re:huh? I already got free. by Anonymous Coward · 2002-01-24 04:12 · Score: 0

Expecting end users to be installing software, etc (which is the MS model) is as daft as expecting them to adjust the convergance on their televisions.

Are you a member of the unemployed sysadmin lobby or something? Trying to FUD Windows with your alternate reality doesn't help Linux's position at all.

Or if you think Windows is really too hard for people, try MacOS. Program or driver installation is literally drag-n-drop.

Which OS? by Dragoness+Eclectic · 2002-01-24 04:15 · Score: 2

How about a desktop OS that makes it almost impossible for the average windows user to install and use a sound card, video card, play a DIV-x movie, open a document or in most cases even in some cases to simply install the damn OS next to impossible for anyone non geeky.

Are you referring to Windows 98, Windows NT 4.0, or OS/2 2.x?

I have had problems with all of the above on all of the above. Anyone who thinks Windows is easier than Linux to install and get working correctly with all the hardware is someone who got Windows pre-installed from the factory and has never added new hardware. A Windows install to a virgin system is just as complex as a modern Linux distribution install--in fact, I have fewer weird hardware driver issues with, say, a Redhat install than I do with a Windows 98 install. Finally, if you want to configure your Windows install in anything other than the default Microsoft-dictated "you entire disk is one huge paritition named C:" set up, it's a royal bitch compared to the ease of configuring multiple partitions your way in a Linux install.

And God help you if you want to install Windows on a spare partition of a disk with another OS! For the most part, it simply won't do it. With Linux, it's a no-brainer.

--
---dragoness

Re:Which OS? by da_Den_man · 2002-01-24 05:18 · Score: 1

Please. This is BS of the FUD kind.

Windows allows you to add a disk and manages to set it up for you. Yes, you can go full partition or break it down. Under XP, it even asks what File System to install. You say You have had problems getting things going. Everyone has. But to say that you cannot add a device unless Windows was pre-installed is wrong. I just finished upgrading my XP box with 2 NEW drives (80GB a piece), a New Geforce2 Video card, and replaced the onboard sound with a SB Audigy. I was up and running as soon as the system booted up.

Now, Tell me this would be possible if I were running ANY version of Linux on that machine.

Would it be possible? NO. It wouldn't. I like to use Linux, however stating that it is no trouble is just plain INACCURATE .
Oh, and the reason I made all these upgrades to the XP machine? I wanted to play Medal Of Honor.

People tend to forget what MADE the Windows platform what it is now, and what made DOS before it. Games & Porn are what DRIVE New development in the computer field. They are what BUILT todays industry. Because the appeal to the upper and lower echelons of People.

--
You keep going until you die..."Me".
Re:Which OS? by q-soe · 2002-01-24 17:05 · Score: 2

Normally i dont respond but i will

This is such bullshit

Windows installs take me less than 40 minutes and thats with all sofwtare installed and running, my mother can do it in less than 1 hour and shes 56 and has Multiple Sclerosis.

Want more than 1 partiton - run fdisk and make the then tell the os where to install by CHOOSING the partition.

No a windows install from virgin is not as complex as linux, even mandrake requires user knowledge windows never ever needs and just wait until you hit a problem with Xfree86. My notebook here is a Dell LS400GT and on windows it automatically finds the drivers (on NT i needed to install them but thats easy) - in Mandrake it wont work with the right drivers and redhat causes strange glitches - the card is a standard NeoMagic 128- installed in millions in notebooks across the world and its considered a standard- XP just works no worries and even sets 1024x768 native.

I have never had a hardware issue with windows 98 - never - im an IT manager and support over 300 staff and i havce installed 98 and NT4, 2000 and XP countless times and never seen it with any STANDARD hardware (yeah you get it with NON compliant and legacy stuff which MS state CLEARLY they dont support anymore)

NT4.0 had a whole pile of quirks and issues but it was always designed as a business OS and as DOS and 16 bit software was prevented from direcly accessing the OS it was a pain but was never an os for the home user

The less said about OS2 the better (i supported it for 18 months)

The fact is linux has always been my choice for home and personal use and i have pushed many many users towards it - but i wont anymore and emails like your badly thought out and plain innacurate and misleading statements only prove to make my point.

this is an OS people and not a religion

--
I refuse to argue with Anonymous Cowards - if you want a discussion get an account....

In reference to your .sig. by SnapShot · 2002-01-24 04:15 · Score: 1

"What does Overrated 1, Total 1 mean?"

It means the the basic score automatically assigned to your comment was greater than the score your comment deserved.

At least that's the way I use it.

It's not interesting enough to be flamebait. It's not "hot button" enough to be a troll. It may be vaguely on topic, and no one else has been dumb enough say it before so it probably isn't redundant. If I have mod points to spend on a comment like this I use "overrated", though I generally prefer to only moderate up.

I personally would moderate my comment as "offtopic" or "flamebait".

;-)

--
Waltz, nymph, for quick jigs vex Bud.

Re:huh? I already got free. by Anonymous Coward · 2002-01-24 04:18 · Score: 0

Loki, on the other hand, have learnt the hard way that the loudest mouths are routinely the quietest when it comes to following up what they say with action.

Oh, I don't think so. My guess is there's about a thousand big mouths here on Slashdot beating the drum for Linux games, and most or all of them went and bought from Loki.

The problem is, those 1000 loudmouths are all there is. Every potential customer is sitting here yapping on Slashdot. The mistake that Loki made was assuming that a noisy group was indicative of a broader market.

Actually, Mandrake should buy them by S1mon_Jester · 2002-01-24 04:19 · Score: 1

except I don't think they have the cash. :-( Mandrake wants to release a gaming version - imagine a version of Linux with all of Loki's demo's on it preinstalled and ready to go.

Better yet, imagine Penguin Computing offering a Linux gaming edition system.

Thank you, thank you, thank you! by roystgnr · 2002-01-24 04:26 · Score: 2

I've been impatiently awaiting Radeon 8500 support, simply because I had no idea there were any dualhead 7500 cards, and I certainly didn't know they were supported by Linux. Xinerama, I assume? Would you please email me a copy of your XF86Config file?

Re:huh? I already got free. by sgaap · 2002-01-24 04:36 · Score: 1

I agree that the biggest problem is that the original game creators are only focust on windows and that the way loki worked (and other company's) is riskfull
Biggest problem I think is mostly the distribution, while i can get every windows game in my local store (most of the time before the linux version is released), when I do take the trouble to buy a linux game, it costs me double the amount of the windows version....and I even cant play it on windows, the latter is not of importance to me, since my windows times are almost over, but most people consider those 2 things the biggest problem, I know at least a few windows gamers who would have bought a linux version (even at a higher price) if it was bundeled with the windows version

I will keep supporting linux games (like bying rtcw), but I will warez all the games that I am forced to play on windows, before I wanted to support good game company's by bying their stuff, but now i couldn't care less if they dont have a linux version or have a positive attitude towards gaming on linux (like ID)

Re:LOKI? WTF was Loki? by Anonymous Coward · 2002-01-24 04:41 · Score: 0

You must be new around here. Loki was "the" company that ported many windows games to linux. Like Quake3, Heavy Gear, etc.

Fuzzy anti-aliasing, etc... by Svartalf · 2002-01-24 04:44 · Score: 2

Their algorithms produce consistently lower quality results per frame than ATI's stuff right at the moment. However, one should note that while this is the case, unless you're slowing things down, you're less likely to notice anything being amiss. However, the complaint IS valid. I would rather have peak quality with slightly lower framerates- less abusive to one's eyes, etc.

--
I am not merely a "consumer" or a "taxpayer". I am a Citizen of the State of Texas

Am I the only one who never had any problems? by Unknown+Lamer · 2002-01-24 04:45 · Score: 2

I swear, I've never had any problems with OpenGL. My XF86Config-4 already had the DRI stuff in it (I was using XF3 until I got my v3, and the Debian default config has the DRI section in there). I just copied my modelines over, set my driver to tdfx, set up XF4 as the default X server and installed the card. Worked perfectly the first time. No hassles. It took 10 minutes to set it up.

Onto the games I have purchased: (loki)

Heroes of Might and Magic III
Solider of Fortune
Sim City 3000
Quake 3 Arena
Descent 3
Heretic II

Every one except for Sim City (it needed a quick update to work with my graphics card) worked right, the first time I installed it. All of them. What the hell are all these problems you people are having? I also have Q3A:TA, Quake I and II, and UT running fine. QuakeII took a bit of work (libc5 binaries...), but with the q2hack it runs ok (except for crashing on exit...and I don't use the source because it is a lot slower than the id binaries).

I'm wondering why my hobbled together box (most of it is second hand, including the motherboard and processor that I got from timothy...yes, that timothy). My only issue now is that that voodoo3 drivers are slow. Or maybe it is my processor (Q3A runs fine, but Q3A:TA runs at 10fps). Maybe the problems everyone is having has something to do with the nVidias evil drivers. Everyone I know who has a geforce anything has issues. A lot of them. But, my friend Mike got his Radeon working with X/DRI (I was there to help) in 5 minutes. Yes, 5 minutes. All he had to do was install XF4.1 and he was playing OpenGL games at amazing speed. And this was back around July.

--

HAL 7000, fewer features than the HAL 9000, but just as homicidal!

Re:Am I the only one who never had any problems? by crush · 2002-01-24 05:17 · Score: 1

my friend Mike got his Radeon working with X/DRI (I was there to help) in 5 minutes. Yes, 5 minutes. All he had to do was install XF4.1 and he was playing OpenGL games at amazing speed. And this was back around July.

Which Radeon card? Also, just out of interest, seeing as you've had no problems, what exactly is your card? 3dfx voodoo3, but with how much memory? AGP or PCI? Is the memory SDR or DDR?
Thanks,
-Crush
Re:Am I the only one who never had any problems? by Unknown+Lamer · 2002-01-24 07:36 · Score: 2

Which Radeon card? Also, just out of interest, seeing as you've had no problems, what exactly is your card? 3dfx voodoo3, but with how much memory? AGP or PCI? Is the memory SDR or DDR?

My voodoo3 is a Voodoo3 3000 PCI with 16MB of SGRAM (it is a late model). Mike's Radeon was (he has an 8500 now, that bastard) the original Radeon 64MB DDR (running @ 4x AGP). It was really easy to get working. Just compiled X (which is easy if you download the entire thing, just uncommented '-fno-string-reduce' and added -march=i686 (for better optimization) in one of the makefiles and typed make World && make install), did the above configuring (change vesa to ati), and restarted X. Ran legacy doom at too many FPS.

--

HAL 7000, fewer features than the HAL 9000, but just as homicidal!
Re:Am I the only one who never had any problems? by crush · 2002-01-24 12:08 · Score: 1

Thanks dude, very informative.

WineX is relying on T&L support for their stuf by Svartalf · 2002-01-24 04:47 · Score: 2

Gavriel said as much in the DRI Developers IRC meeting this Monday. It's very, very likely that there's something about there being no T&L support right at the moment (though there's plans afoot to fix that omission...) in the DRI drivers.

--
I am not merely a "consumer" or a "taxpayer". I am a Citizen of the State of Texas

"naturally fair hair, high cheekbones" LOL by Anonymous Coward · 2002-01-24 04:53 · Score: 0

That's a new one for me, a whore advertising on /. You must feel really good about yourself preying on the losers who would pay $12,000 for you. Nope nothing wrong with what your doing.Here is a deal for you...I'm doing grad work at Princeton, for $50 you can take your overpriced whore service and shove it up your ass. :-)
BTW know what will be fun? When your children look up your whoring via google cache someday! I bet it will make them proud, and of course it won't fuck them up one bit, I promise.

We expect free binaries due to Quake by Vairon · 2002-01-24 05:03 · Score: 1

I'm not surprised that Loki got many emails from linux users wanting free binaries so they could play their windows copies of games under Linux. It's what the linux community learned to expect from Id Software, who developed Quake. I'm not saying that this excuses this behavior, but at least it explains it. When Id Software released Quake, Quake2, Quake3, and now Return to Wolfenstein for linux they've always released a free copy of the binaries for linux that would work with the data files from the purchased windows copy of the game. The reason, of course, why they were able to do this was that Id Software does the development in house, costing only development time. Where as Loki had to buy the rights to the game costing both license and development time.

WineX by grink · 2002-01-24 05:12 · Score: 1

WineX can play a number of windows games on linux well. www.transgaming.com.

Re:WineX by Demonbird · 2002-01-24 06:19 · Score: 1

A number? Hah! Well? Hah! Have you tried using it for anything but Half-Life or The Sims? Five titles, maybe, will actually work "well."

Re:"Linux" on regcard leads to at least winelib bu by Anonymous Coward · 2002-01-24 05:18 · Score: 0

The fact that you just bought a Windows game makes your profound registration card statment irrelevant.

Reason: Porting and writing x-platform costs money, and if you are willing to buy the Windows version, they aren't expanding their market.

Not to mention that it's rather silly at this point - Loki listened to all of those people who claimed they would buy Linux games instead of Windows games and look where it got them.

LinuRe:It was gonna happen eventuallyx is an excel by sterno · 2002-01-24 05:19 · Score: 1

Linux is an excellent gaming platform. I've got a copy of Loki's Quake III port and it works wonderfully. The problem that kills it is the problem that has killed many of my favorite systems: market share. Why write a game for Linux when only 5% of the market has Linux and most of that 5% still has a windows box around.

If it didn't have to get over that huge hurdle, Linux is otherwise an excellent gaming platform.

--
This sig has been temporarily disconnected or is no longer in service

Meanwhile... (Re:I'm not really surprised) by Anonymous Coward · 2002-01-24 05:21 · Score: 0

Let's do something better: strike a contract to have the Linux binaries included WITH the Windows game, as in right on the CD. It's a minimal risk possibility for the original developer, and your contract can give you, like, $5 bucks a copy, or less. Just make a deal with them so you can port the game, meanwhile they'll wait. The best way to do this is to develop the Linux port in parallel with the actual game, so that the game isn't delayed.

This hasn't been tried before, how about now?

Re:It's only a matter of time... by Anonymous Coward · 2002-01-24 05:27 · Score: 0

Wow you must be psychic. Here is a prediction from me. America will get fatter and dumber. Oh right that already happened.

This is a real shame by crush · 2002-01-24 05:27 · Score: 1

especially since Loki had some really great developers like Sam Lantinga (SDL developer among many things). Any one hear what the future of the SDL is going to be or what SL's future holds?

Problems where already known for a while by Anonymous Coward · 2002-01-24 05:38 · Score: 0

by xectic@cyberdude.com

The problems of loki where already known for a while, in August 13 2001 there was a post on slashdot, and serveral gaming sites about this:
http://slashdot.org/articles/01/08/14/0230218.sh tm l
http://www.clanbase.com/news.php?nid=23435

I am a gamer myself and we mostly depend on LOKI on ports of servers for fps games. I hope gamedevelopers will develop Linux GameServers themself since w2k servers are just way to expensive!

Soon Unreal 2, Unreal Tournament 2 and Quake 4 will be released. I hope game developers will see the need of linux support for gameservers.

Re:"Linux" on regcard leads to at least winelib bu by Bremen24601 · 2002-01-24 06:12 · Score: 1

Um, if we put Mandrake (or in my case Slackware) as our OS I doubt it would do any good. After all, if linux users can get windows games to run on linux, why bother with a linux version???

--
Blessed are the young, for they shall inherit the national debt. --Herbert Hoover

Miscellaneous thoughts by Sloppy · 2002-01-24 06:35 · Score: 2

To all the people who say this proves that selling Linux games isn't viable: you're wrong. Now, maybe it really isn't viable, but Loki's death doesn't really tell us much.

Maybe you know something about Loki that the rest of us don't, but from what us outsiders were told:

Most of the debts we are restructuring through the Chapter 11 are well over a year old. They represent mistakes made by a young company. We've learned from our mistakes and become cash positive.

Cash positive. Assuming this was the truth, Linux gaming was making money.

This is plausible and makes sense, too. Remember that all these games required some initial library work, in the form of SDL, OpenAL, etc. and Loki did expend time/money on this stuff. But those libraries are mature now, an advantage Loki didn't have in their early days when they were

Spending money foolishly, which all businessmen do their first time around
Spending money developing libraries instead of working on something (the games themselves) that would directly generate revenue.

So we just can't conclude that selling games to Linux users isn't profitable. Not yet.

I just want to mention that I think losing Loki really is sad news. Over the last couple of years, I ended up buying ten of their games: RT2, Myth2, Tribes2, SMACX, MindRover, Kohan, SoF, HG2, SC3K, and Postal. A few of them turned out to be not as fun as I thought they were going to be, and a few of them turned out to be more addictive than I expected (e.g. I thought SMACX would bore me to tears, and instead it ate up my all my free time for a few months there in the summer. ;-) I still use HG2 to blow off steam, and I haven't exhausted Kohan yet. I guess some people didn't find many of their games to be very attractive, but I thought Loki did a reasonably good job of picking games.

There's one thing about Loki that I will really miss: they did quality work. With the exception of Tribes 2 (I never got that working well enough to really play), I found their games to be very close to perfectly crash-free, glitch-free, and insult-free. Insult-free? Yep. I got used to Loki's stuff acting like programs should: no intrusive copy protection, it just let me install on my HD and forget about mundane issues, like "where's my CD?". I was shocked when I bought a non-Loki game (Uplink) and ran into copy-protection. I hadn't dealt with that kind of bullshit since the 1980s, and it was jarring. Loki got some things right, which I don't think people will appreciate until they experience the absense.

To those who think commercial software is incompatable with Linux, I don't think you get it. The Linux userbase is not homogenious, and we're not all screaming "software must be free!" fanatics. Some of you are, and that's fine with me, you're not really causing any harm as far as I'm concerned. I think Free Software is a really neato thing, but it's not an absolute requirement for everything, especially things that don't need a lot of maintenance or create network effects. Games fit perfectly into that. I use Linux because my Amiga just isn't mainstream enough, and I got tired of being a full-time hermit. (Yes, I consider Linux to be mainstream -- it really is, compared to where I come from.) I think, -- no, I know -- there are other people like me out there, who have Linux and don't have any faux-idealogical problem with paying for software. Whether there's enough of us or not, I don't have a clue, and Loki's death doesn't change that.

--
As copyright owner of this comment, I authorize everyone to defeat any technological measure which limits access to it.

you know by applejacks · 2002-01-24 06:37 · Score: 1

just for the record there was that AMD bug listed the other day that causes lockups. maybe your test machines are AMD. peace

All you Dual Boot Suckers killed Loki! (FLAMEBAIT) by Qbertino · 2002-01-24 06:40 · Score: 1

I didn't go Linux until about 4 Months ago. And until then had to take LOTS of shit from Linux biassed buddys. Even now, bugging me 'bout KMail having no encrypted/multipart support and that I still use it so I'm conclusively a dickhead. You all stick your ultimate geekness and 1 Bit colored Mutt up your ass.
Sissies are you! All together! Those who call themselves Geeks at War with MS and dualboot Windoze to play games. You stink. Only 3 Months ago it was clear that the Heat was around the corner for Loki and the slashdot community did absolutely NADA about it.

It makes me wanna puke just thinking about that it might be only half a year away for people to NEED WinXP to play a proper game on PC Hardware.

--
We suffer more in our imagination than in reality. - Seneca

Deus Ex???????? by Juln · 2002-01-24 06:51 · Score: 1

damn it! Is Deus EX done yet for Linux at least???

--
Juln

Tell them that Windows != Microsoft Windows by yerricde · 2002-01-24 06:53 · Score: 2

After all, if linux users can get windows games to run on linux, why bother with a linux version???

It might convince developers to make sure that the win32 build works on both Microsoft Windows® brand win32 implementations and Wine brand win32 implementations.

--
Will I retire or break 10K?

/Me thinks... by Mecanico · 2002-01-24 07:40 · Score: 1

What if publishers tweaked their games to run suitably under wine?. Since the linux market isn't going to pull up soon, that could be a good idea for making the linux gaming landscape a little better and then launch a retail game.

--
UgaBuga!

Too bad by Erwos · 2002-01-24 07:56 · Score: 1

I liked Loki, a lot. Their software was usually pretty good after you patched it up, which I can't really hold against them, as it's par course in the industry nowadays.

However, Loki died because of their business plan. As several people have pointed out, concurrent development is the only way a porting company is going to work - any real delay, and people will snatch up the Win9X copies.

I think that Linux is a viable gaming platform, but that companies should develop _original_ games for it and sell them direct. Those guys who make Uplink, (Transversion?) seem to have been experiencing some success with that model. Of course, you'd want to sell cross-platform, but it would seem that porting an SDL game from Linux to Windows is a tad bit simpler than porting the same game from Windows to Linux when using DirectX.

Although I haven't used SDL, aren't there supposed to be cross-platform libraries for it? It strikes me as an interesting business plan to try to sell binaries for _all_ platforms SDL supports, or at least the major ones, like Linux, Windows, MacOS X, maybe even BeOS. Maximize market, minimize costs - sounds like a winning solution, assuming the game don't suck.

-Erwos

--
Plausible conjecture should not be misrepresented as proof positive.

Linux gaming - my problems by amokk · 2002-01-24 07:57 · Score: 1

First, I'll start off by saying that I consider myself "comfortable" with Linux. I can understand most of it and can basically blunder my way through the things that I don't totally get.

This is my biggest complaint and gripe with linux: Things are too dependent on one another which often makes for a hell of a lot of frustration.

This is how I started out:
I went to the store and bought a RedHat boxed distro (a long time ago). Blundered, blundered, blundered, eventually got internet connectivity, eventually learned the beauty of ./configure, make, make install, etc, eventually got on IRC to ask for help on specific problems... The list goes on...

A few weeks ago I wanted to install a small game that looked kinda cool on my Linux box. The game was so obscure that I can't even remember the name of it now (BTW: It sucked and wasn't nearly as fun as the screenshots made it look), the process to install the game took many, many hours...

First, I tried to compile the source.
Can't because I need library x.
Surf the net to find library x.
Try to compile library x.
Can't need library y.
Connect to the net, download library y.
Try to compile library y.
Can't; need library z.
etc...
Frustrated, look for RPMS.

Ok, somewhat more useability.
Re-try to compile library z.
Can't because GCC wasn't compiled with certain options.
Recompile my compiler with options that weren't immediately obvious.
Make bails out because I forgot to download a different part of the compiler.
Download that, try to recompile again.
Successful, compile library z and y without problems.
Try to compile library x.
Can't, need new binutils.
Connect, find the binutils, try to compile.
Can't, need new glibc.
*I start to get pissed*
Re-compile glibc with a new version.
Compile library x.
Can't, need new QT
*Really pissed now*
Get QT, compile.
Finally compile library x.
Finally compile/install game.
Spend forever looking for the game binary because the documentation didn't tell you where it put it.
Get pissed and just df -a | grep "binname" cause I didn't know how to use the other utilities.
Finally find the game.
Finally play the game.
The game sucks.

This is what's annoying.
It took longer than 8 hours to get a little pidly game up and running. I know loki does a better job, but still, situations like these have to be remidied.

Since I like to learn, I bothred to recompile everything that I needed but it's obvious that people less inclined would just give up the first try.

--
I think, therefore I am an Atheist.

Re:Linux gaming - my problems by amokk · 2002-01-24 08:02 · Score: 1

Sorry, I meant
du -a

Also, I forgot to include that my video card drivers were generic cause my GeForce, for whatever reason, wasn't detected.

This means going to nvidia, downloading the drivers, downloading GLX, not being able to start the xserver cause I accidently installed the wrong ones (again, they weren't immedately obvious) but luckily remember a keystroke to get back to a console.
Start up lynx, replace the files, fumble around with the command line version of RPM which I don't know how to use.
Watch the installation fail, download the tarball, compile, move files, fumble around with RPM a little bit more, edit my X config files.
FINALLY get it working.

--
I think, therefore I am an Atheist.

Re:huh? I already got free. by Devil's+Avocado · 2002-01-24 08:04 · Score: 1

Wow, man, you're the only other guy in the whole fucking Linux community with half a clue! Knows that usability matters, newbies matter, *and* supports the EFF? Pinch me!

Here's to you, compadre.

-DA

I don't have that kind of power by DunbarTheInept · 2002-01-24 08:06 · Score: 2

You seem to think that I can do something about how another person acts. I don't understand where you think I got that power from, but trust me, I don't have it. Therefore saying that the solution is to change how other people act is the same thing as saying there is no solution.

The reason *I* only bought one Loki game is simply that the games they ended up porting are not the ones I liked. The only exception to this was Civ:CTP, which got released onto store shelves alongside the Windows version, and was thus easy to buy, and I did.

Plus, they took too long to get a port out, and they didn't announce ports until after the windows version was alredy out. This might not be their fault, but it is the main reason they failed. If a game you want hits the stores today, and you don't even know yet whether or not Loki will be doing a port, are you going to wait 1 year to find out before deciding to buy the windows version?

--

Don't label something "offtopic" unless you know the topic well enough to tell what's on topic.

From a formerly pleased customer by Anonymous Coward · 2002-01-24 08:15 · Score: 0

I thought Loki Software had a great game plan. I finally thought that someone would be able to bring great games to the linux platform. I use linux solely at home anymore. Yes, I can get to windows, but I choose not to. The university I attend has a special licensing deal with Microsoft. We can purchase basically any of Microsoft's software for only $5. Anyway, I have bought 3 of Loki's games. They are all wonderful. I've spent several hours playing Alpha Centauri. The games were simple to install. Anyone who is claiming they have had a problem installing a Loki product, hasn't tried it. The installation procedure is the same for all of their games:

1) Access the CD
In my case, I have automount setup, so I simply type "cd /mnt/dvd"

2) Run install script
This can be done as a regular user to install for a single user. I chose to install as root. Simply type, "sh install.sh".

3) That's it. Just click the buttons in the install wizard, just like any Windows installation.

Anyone who has a working Linux distribution and that uses Linux regularly should have absolutely no problems installing a Loki game.

The only thing that was even slightly difficult for me was getting 3D acceleration working on my machine. Of course, not all games require 3D acceleration, such as, Alpha Centauri. Since, my home machine is based on an old Redhat install that I've manually upgraded over time, and I was still running XFree86 3.3.3, I decided to install the latest version of XFree86 (at that time 4.1.0 I believe). I simply read the install instructions and read the configuration info at dri.sourceforge.net for my Voodoo3 card and compiled X from source. The first time, I compiled from source, I didn't have the configuration correct (because I hadn't read the DRI site), so I was still using software acceleration. After recompiling, everything worked like a charm, and by the way XFree86 4 rocks compared to 3.3.x.

But now, I have 3 perfectly great games from Loki, and I've been very impressed with them. They even had a really cool updating system, that would automatically update all of your games with the latest patches, using "loki_update". The saddest thing is that I can never look forward to having another game from Loki, and now my games won't be updated either. This is truly an awful day for the Linux desktop community.

Re:huh? I already got free. by pellaeon · 2002-01-24 08:18 · Score: 1

I think you're right. What's more, I can't even seem to find any stores selling Linux games here in the Netherlands!

Yes, I would pay for Linux Games.
Yes, I would wait up to about 4 months before I bought the Windows version.
No, I don't mind struggling through an installation (as long as I can get some help if needed).

BUT: if I can't get my hands on the games all my willingness to put up with delays, expense and such counts for NOTHING!

I was very lucky to get Civ:CTP for linux and bought it even though I already had the Windows version. I'm very sad to see Loki go, I'd have bought more games if I could've gotten my hands on them...

--
-- /bin/coffee missing. universe halted.

No, it's sponsorship. by himi · 2002-01-24 08:35 · Score: 2

"Pay us this money so that we can do this development, and when we're done we'll make it publically available"

That's not extortion by even the broadest definition imaginable.

himi

--

My very own DeCSS mirror.

Re:No, it's sponsorship. by Anonymous Coward · 2002-01-24 10:45 · Score: 0

Call it what you want.

Re:Delay between Windows and Linux port did them i by Anonymous Coward · 2002-01-24 09:34 · Score: 0

For those complaining about the delay between windows and linux releases of games, Bioware plans to release a windows and linux version of Neverwinter Nights at the same time. (March 1, if i remember correctly.) This should test whether the porting delay is a problem.

Loki gone, but the games and gamers remain by Anonymous Coward · 2002-01-24 09:43 · Score: 0

With Loki went one of the most imortant linux gamers forum too: Loki's news server. But we still intend to keep the community alive: There will be a RFD (request for discussion) and after that a proposal-message sent to the Usenet group news.groups which will hopefully eventually lead to our own newsgroup in the big-8 hierarchy, but your (linux gamers) participation in this process will be essential. Please join in and support! Peep in at news.groups after a week or so.

Sincerely,
--
Anton

Re:Is it Linux users, or is it the games? by WillSeattle · 2002-01-24 10:02 · Score: 1

It was a Loki problem, too...I tried really hard to buy their games, but they never released a single game I was genuinely interested in playing, and buying games I didn't play to support them got old fast...

Yeah. I've got about five that I bought, but I wasn't really interested in them.

Now, I am interested in The Sims, so I'm very happy that they did a WINE bundle with Mandrake Linux!

I'm not an OS purist about games - I like buying one disk that works for Mac, Win, Linux. And I want to buy what I'm interested in.

Is that so wrong?

-

--
--- Will in Seattle - What are you doing to fight the War?

PC Games just suck in general... by RoadWarriorX · 2002-01-24 10:07 · Score: 1

I don't know about anyone else, I have little need for PC games now. In the beginning, it was simple games like Lemmings that dominated the market. It was simple and it took little space on my hard drive (what little I had at the time anyway.). This was about the time Atari, then Nintendo was big. PC games were better.
I used to buy cool games like Command and Conquer, and Quake. After a while, it seem to lost it's edge because these games bloat the hard drive and just waste space. So I made the switch to console games for my entertainment, and use my computer as a tool instead of a gaming system (exception: Quake3 for Linux... I had to check it out).
So today, I use the likes of PS2 or Dreamcast for my gaming entertainment. The consoles will continue to dominate and PC games will fade like arcades. (Remember: You hear it from me first...)

--

Coderz 4 Life

Will the Mac save Linux gamers? by WillSeattle · 2002-01-24 10:13 · Score: 1

Just a thought. Since the recent Mac OS X is just BSD and there are Linux ports for them, isn't it likely that Linux games are more likely to crop up when people are doing the Mac versions?

--
--- Will in Seattle - What are you doing to fight the War?

ignore this message by Anonymous Coward · 2002-01-24 10:59 · Score: 0

this is at test

not a windows only user by indaba · 2002-01-24 11:53 · Score: 1

I'm a Windows user at work
I'm a Cisco IOS "OS" user as my profession
I'm a OS X user at home (with Mozilla)
I'm a PS/2 user when I play games

I don't use linux for any of the above because in all cases I'd rather be productive than spend time recompiling kernals, finding the right video driver patch, and just generally fiddling and fighting with the OS instead of it "just working"

Please have a read of this
http://slashdot.org/article.pl?sid=01/12/31/188254 &mode=thread

and this
http://www.birdhouse.org/macos/beos_osx/

I use my hotmail address in large, anonymous forum where I'm likely to be flamed by people.
And my views are just as relevant as yours.
So, what are they ?? - where's your opinion ? :-) darren.

Re:What? by Banjonardo · 2002-01-24 12:36 · Score: 1

Say what?

That wasn't a linux v. windows post.

I was just commenting how hard it is for a poor lowly windows-dude like me to get used to the library system.

--

-----

Score 3? For what? Being wrong, at length? - smirkleton

The real reason by G00F · 2002-01-24 13:00 · Score: 1

They wasn't porting over the games that mattered.

Most of us geeks wether *nix or windows and that plays games, plays the multi player games with friends and lots of other people. Games from the persistant world type like Ultima Online, everhunt, to the real time strats like Stacraft/Broodwars, Warcraft3, to still more like diablo.

They picked some good games, but none that I just have to buy. (like some of the above)

Another thing is, many of us are also tight/hurting finacialy durring this time. So we arn't willing to put money on an unknown game.

--
The spirit of resistance to government is so valuable on certain occasions that I wish it to be always kept alive

There are other options by Anonymous Coward · 2002-01-24 13:15 · Score: 0

This isn't necessarily a bitter end for linux or cross-platform gaming. The Torque Gaming Engine from Garage Games, the engine behind Tribes 2, is being ported to non-windows platforms. The mac port is pretty much complete and the linux port is functional and getting better. The SDK costs a measly $100 and includes full source code to the engine and a demo application.

Re:huh? I already got free. by Anonymous Coward · 2002-01-24 14:06 · Score: 0

Awww... hell. I'm at the cap, let's burn a little.

That old trick still works?!?

Re:Hard times at the Bank of America by BankofAmerica_ATM · 2002-01-24 17:55 · Score: 0

This is disturbing indeed. Of course, I would expect no less from the treacherous Bank of America Board of Directors. Their lust for power and glory is almost unfathomable.

--
I am a sentient ATM.

In reference to the prior comment by fishexe · 2002-01-29 05:43 · Score: 1

&gt&gtWindows, if it was sold in boxes and not preinstalled, would be unavailable for 95% of users, too. The point is, in this case stupid user is at fault, and he should shut up.

&gt Hence Linux has sub 1% market share, and windows over 90%. It's those kinds of attitudes that keep it that way too.

Actually, I think that's because linux comes in a box on the shelf and not (for the most part) preinstalled on your box.
Don't act like there aren't any windows people with bad attitudes either.

--
"I don't care about the Constitution!" --Bill O'Reilly, November 17, 2009

I've got a bigger problem by fishexe · 2002-01-29 05:48 · Score: 1

I run exclusively linux at home but I've never even gotten to play Q3A or UT in their linux incarnations because my hardware sux and I can't afford anything better. =]

I do find it sad to see Loki go though, to me they represented hope for my favorite system. (#1 lame-ass reason people give me for not using linux: "it doesn't run any games!")

--
"I don't care about the Constitution!" --Bill O'Reilly, November 17, 2009

Re:I've got a bigger problem by morbid · 2002-01-29 05:57 · Score: 0

"I run exclusively linux at home but I've never even gotten to play Q3A or UT in their linux incarnations
because my hardware sux and I can't afford anything better. =] "

I know how you feel. There's so much bad coding out there, or bad engineering decisions.
I remember when doom ran on a 386, and a 3.54MHz Z80 machine would do wireframe 3D...

--
I'm out of my tree just now but please feel free to leave a banana.

I can't play console games. by wwphx · 2002-01-31 14:27 · Score: 1

One problem with the push towards the PS/2-type game platform: I cannot play console games. I had five operations on my right hand, and though I can type and mouse just fine (55 WPM), my thumb doesn't work for console controllers.

I will probably never own a console game box, unless I get one for my possible future children.

--
When you sympathize with stupidity, you start thinking like an idiot.

Newbie installs Linux by Anonymous Coward · 2002-02-07 04:35 · Score: 0

I just built myself a new computer, got a geforce3 ti500, and some more pretty recent hardware. I wouldn't have been able to afford all this if I had to buy a windows liscence, the $100 I saved by using redhat is a big deal for me.So far I am really pleased with linux, I dont know anything about it but I havn't ecountered any problems with it so far. I got a loki demo cd, and decide to see what games they have released recently, and it seems nothing, all their games are at least a year old! Its horrible that loki is no longer here, with redhat or mandrake a newbie like me can get a comprehesive operating system capable of running games without problems, but there are no games to run! :( .... (I really dont want to buy windows, linux is starting to grow on me)

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