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Scott Draeker Interview About Loki's Demise
An Anonymous Coward writes: "News forge is running an interview With lokigames president Scott Draeker. Looks like the leaked email wasn't a hoax after all. A very sad day for Linux. AOL? Redhat? IBM? someone please help these guys."
NewsForge: What happens to Loki's employees? (There were about 10 before the latest news, Draeker says.) Have they all been laid off?
Draeker: We laid off our development and support staff last Friday. I understand at least one already has an employment offer elsewhere.
It used to be that programmers had to turn away jobs. Now of 10 with some real Linux programming skills, only one has a job offer.
Probably proves the old adage, "It's not what you know, but what you know about Windows programming."
Neither of these care.
And why should they? They're just interested in Linux as far as the server market.
Truth is that linux is a horrible gaming platform.
Most gamers just want to play games. They don't want to recompile the kernel to play. They want to put the disk in and click "play" and that it.
Thats why they buy consoles.
In Soviet Russia, the television watches YOU!
I may be off base here, but it seems to me that Linux users want Linux games, not Linux ports of windows games. Yes, I know plenty of people who play Quake on Linux, but compare its popularity to say, nethack. My guess is that nethack, simple as it is, would be way ahead. Nethack is open source, which carries alot of weight with many Linux users, including me.
It is sad, I still frequently am playing my copy of Tribes 2. Hopefully someone will take the Loki's place.
Sincerely yours,
Chloë
I would like to say that, of all of the games that Loki ported to Linux,
the one that was good enough for me to use a Windows computer to play
before Loki's port was Heroes of Might and Magic III. As it turns out,
the games in the Heroes series were the only games that I ever considered
good enough to use Windows to play. Loki's port of Heroes III meant that
I can now get all of my gaming needs met without having to dual boot;
significant when my computer only has a 3 gig hard disk.
This game wastes hours of my time on my Linux laptop, and hours of my
friend's time when we play hotseat together. The game still has hours of
my time to waste, since I have not yet finished the campaigns; and, even
after finishing the campaigns, there are the single senerio maps and, of
course, the third party maps over at astral wizards.
I only have a small number of dissapointments with the Linux version of
Heroes III. One is that Loki never finished the map editor; one still
needs to use Windows to make a decent Heroes III map. The other is that
the expansion packs were never (and never will be, now) ported to Linux;
while Loki wanted to do it, New World Computing would not give them the
source code to make it possible. And, finally, I am dissapointed that
Loki will not be around when Heroes 4 gets released; Heroes III without
the expansion packs is all the Linux community gets of the excellent
Heroes series.
I am not a hard core gamer; but I am an open source developer who
appreciates having some good games on Linux to blow off steam after
dealing with a frustrating programming problem. Loki has made enough
games to meet this need. I hope I do not offend anyone by saying that
people who feel that Linux does not have enough games need to find other
things to do with their time than play video games.
Now, to the people at Loki, I wish them the utmost of luck.
And, who knows, maybe one of the other Linux game publishers will port
Heroes IV to Linux.
- Sam
The secret to enjoying Slashdot is to realize that it should not be taken too seriously.
Since Loki only worked on ports of existing games and didn't (as far as I have heard) purchase full rights to the existing games' source code, what gives them the legal right to release the original authors' code into the public domain? Are they just doing it because there's nobody left to sue?
Any way you look at it, though, it will definitely be a victory to open source to have such a substantial amount of game source code out there now.
Mr. Uptime
Free Open Source Naked Ladies!
Then support capitalism. "Open Source" and beerware won't work unless there is commercial and profitable incentive for it to work.
Someone needs to figure out how to make the people happy AND make a profit. This communistic ideal is never going to work properly if you want these companies to last... Making a game is not a "group study," its a tough, 60 hour a week, full-time job. And people need to get paid.
Maybe we need "Open Source Money Pools" where you can vote what kind of game you want. I'm sure that'll happen.
"AOL?, Redhat?, IBM? someone please help these guys."
Why? You seem to be missing the main point of Loki's business model. Loki took games that the game developers considered unprofitable to port to Linux and paid royalties to these game developers to port these games to Linux.
Now, with Loki having gone out of business, it has proven the developers' original point: Linux gaming is just not economically profitable. Heck, even John Carmack says (and I quote): "[T]he linux market is not viable for game developers to pursue. Linux ports will be done out of good will, not profit motives."
The harsh reality is that no one is going to bail Loki out. At this point, Linux games remain unprofitable. As long as gamers have good 3D support and decently easy game setup in Windows, they will continue to use Windows. My advice is to move on and not pursue the issue until Linux gets more desktop market share.
Simpli - Your source for San Jose dedicated servers and colocation!
mark
If you want to make an apple pie from scratch, you must first create the universe. -- Carl Sagan
The fact that Loki is going under shouldn't be a surprise: they filed for bankruptcy in August of 2001, according to this Register article.
Anyway, this might be a good opportunity to buy some Loki releases cheap. However, according to the article, we shouldn't expect discounts right away. Scott Draeker said "I don't think there will be any huge discounts right away -- maybe in six months..."
I mean, it's very sad for the Linux desktop people, but I've always felt that Linux's real strength was as a low-midrange server 0S, which is what I use it for (quite profitably) both at work and at home.
Mostly, when I hear news like this, I want to tell people 'right tool for the right job'. Right now, the right tool for gaming is Windows. I wish it weren't so, but I also wish that the cheapest place to buy quality hand-tools wasn't Sears Roebuck.
Until the tools change... and this means an infrastructure change to Linux like any of the Wine-focused distros are harping... Windows will continue to be the best platform for games, just as MacOS continues to be the best platform for many multimedia tasks.
Rather than bemoaning YALCB (Yet Another Linux Company Bankruptcy...) contribute to projects like WINE and LindowsOS. Also, Linux GUI's and apps have all gone well past the point where they should be spending as much time on usability and compatibility as they do on technology development and application power:
Example: One of the complaints I hear most frequently from Windows users who switch over to a big name distro like Mandrake or RedHat complain about the speed of Gnome or KDE up against Windows GUI. The speed hit can be explained and fixed through several settings, program switches, and even kernel optimizations, but if I'm a Joe-Sixpack who doesn't wan't to support Microsoft, but sees this behavior and can't fix it easily, then I'm probably going to stay with Windows.
If you want Linux to be a gaming OS, it has to be just as easy to use and configure for everyone as the other gaming OS.
The next Slashdot story will be ready soon, but subscribers can beat the rush and slashdot the links early!
With reports of employees in the past not getting paid and such, I have to wonder about Loki's financial problems in light of this quote:
"Draeker: My immediate plans are to take a break and recharge my batteries. After that I'll start looking at different opportunities. "Translation - "I don't need to go look for work right away. I have plenty of money for a while."...or am I misinterpreting that?
Hacker Public Radio is our Friend
Uh, there are a few mac only gaming companies, and many games for the Mac that are great and mac-like...
http://www.ambrosiasw.com/news/ for example.
Remember that Bungie was once a Macintosh only game company. Also did The Fool's Errand ever make it to PC? That game was amazing...
Why is it "linux people" whine and moan about companies like AOL and IBM and their evil, incompetant ways, but yet run to them when a favorite company is in trouble. I'd wager when AOL took over Mirabilis, "linux people" were among the voice of the outraged. This article has the ring of hypocrisy to me.
Draeker: We've been working with our resellers to make sure they have adequate supplies of products and anticipate they will continue selling Loki products. I don't think there will be any huge discounts right away -- maybe in six months they'll discount whatever is left.
I think he is mistaken on this one. I bought Loki Heretic II today for $5.00 at Microcenter.
posted anonymoosely so i don't whore for karma:
:-)
Loki's Draeker: If I had to do it over, I'd create Linux native games
- By Grant Gross -
The news of Loki Entertainment Software's demise came late Wednesday in the form of a leaked memo to resellers. In the memo, company president Scott Draeker explained that the company was shutting down operations January 31, and stopping end-user support for its games immediately, after three years of being the most high-profile Linux gaming company.
The announcement didn't come as a complete surprise to the Linux gaming community -- Loki had filed for bankruptcy in August 2001, but Draeker said then he was optimistic the company was in business "for the long haul."
Loki continued to release new Linux ports of popular Windows games, even after the bankruptcy filing, shipping Kohan and Postal Plus between late August and mid-October. Loki also ported games such as Tribes 2, Alpha Centauri, Quake III Arena, and SimCity 3000 during its lifetime, but the main criticism of the company was that the Linux ports often appeared many months after the Windows versions.
Draeker responded to questions from NewsForge Thursday in what he says will be the only interview about Loki's closing. We asked him about what went wrong at Loki, his future, and Loki's competition from efforts such as TransGaming Technology's three-month-old effort to use WineX to allow Windows games to run on Linux.
NewsForge: When did you decide it wasn't working? You seemed hopeful after the bankruptcy filing that things would work out.
Draeker: Based on monthly sales figures when we filed, we had every reason to believe the reorganization would be successful. What happened is those sales fell off dramatically over the holidays. With lower-than-expected revenues we were digging a hole each month.
NewsForge: What do you think went wrong?
Draeker: If we had come into 2001 in better shape, we could have ridden out the slow months and done well going forward.
NewsForge: What happens to the games? Does another company get the rights to distribute your games? Some of NewsForge's people want to know if you'll be selling them off for cheap?
Draeker: We've been working with our resellers to make sure they have adequate supplies of products and anticipate they will continue selling Loki products. I don't think there will be any huge discounts right away -- maybe in six months they'll discount whatever is left.
NewsForge: What's next for you personally?
Draeker: My immediate plans are to take a break and recharge my batteries. After that I'll start looking at different opportunities.
NewsForge: What happens to Loki's employees? (There were about 10 before the latest news, Draeker says.) Have they all been laid off?
Draeker: We laid off our development and support staff last Friday. I understand at least one already has an employment offer elsewhere.
NewsForge: How are you feeling about this big change in your life?
Draeker: Relieved! We did everything humanly possible to make this work. It was hard to make the decision to shut down. It was hard to lay people off. But it was the right thing to do. And I'm relieved that it's over and that all of us can start focusing on The Next Big Thing.
Loki has been a great experience and the Linux community is great. Starting Loki will always be one of the proudest moments of my life.
NewsForge: What happens to your public CVS repository and the projects it hosts?
Draeker: We'd like to find someone to continue hosting it.
NewsForge: How do you feel about the future of Linux gaming? Do you think there's enough of a market for a company to port Windows games to Linux?
Draeker: It's problematic. After three years I know it can be done. The market is there. But it's also very challenging. We did it out of conviction, which is why we lasted as long as we did.
NewsForge: How about original games native to Linux?
Draeker: If I were going to start a new Linux game company tomorrow that's what I would do.
The idea with Loki was never to create a thriving Linux porting business. We wanted to create a Linux gaming industry. If you want a perfect example of the difference, just look at Mac gaming. There are many games available for the Mac put out by several great Mac porting companies. But no one develops new games for the Mac. As a result Mac gaming is always a second cousin to Windows gaming. Games come out after the Windows versions do. They look and feel like Windows games, not Mac games. And there's nothing you can play on a Mac that you can't also play on Windows.
We saw porting as a transitional stage. By porting games we were able to develop the software infrastructure needed for gaming on Linux. We were also able to prove that a market for Linux games exists. The next step would have been to use what we had created to start making original games for Linux. That has always been our ultimate goal -- we wanted Linux to have its own unique, compelling games. Think how many people would be running Linux on their desktop if Diablo had come out for Linux six months before Windows!
NewsForge: Or how about the TransGaming model of using WineX?
Draeker: The arrival of TransGaming to me is the clearest indication that Loki failed to jump-start a Linux gaming industry as we'd hoped, because TransGaming has nothing to do with Linux games. Their message to game developers is: "Use DirectX and develop for Windows. We'll help you sell your Windows products to Linux users."
TransGaming's strategy is the same one Corel used in its Linux applications business. In the end I don't think they'll be any more successful than Corel was.
NewsForge: What advice would you give to anyone who wants to start a Linux gaming company?
Draeker: Cut your teeth in the established gaming industry first. If you can successfully complete a title there then you have a shot at doing it for Linux.
NewsForge: What happens to the Nokia Media Terminal project (in which Loki games were to be distributed for the Nokia hardware)? Does that move forward without Loki?
Draeker: I don't think this affects the Media Terminal at all. If it did then Nokia would have bailed us out.
I wonder is creative will do anything with OpenAL....
My Hello World is 512 bytes. But it's also a valid Fat12 boot sector, Fat12 file reader, and Pmode routine.
I'm assuming these guys are experts in porting, right? If they could just take some of their experience and translate it into enterprise software porting instead of games porting (read, go from an expensive proprietary system to a free one), they could probably earn their weight in gold. Even if the software itself is different, I'm sure a lot of the problem-solving experience and testing ability and intuition and insight would probably come in handy...
--------
Bleah! Heh heh heh... BLEAH BLEAH!!! Ha ha ha ha...
What's going to happen to those games that they've developed? Surely, as these games are propritary, etc, they're not going to be GPLed, which is what Loki would do if they owned the games. Does this mean that people will not be able to buy the games anymore? Or is some large game company going to snatch the games up and continue support + sales of the existing games? I'd hate to see such gems of modern gaming as Tribes 2 and Kohan become unavalible for the Linux platform suddenly.
Everything is mainstream now.
AOL? Redhat? IBM? someone please help these guys.
The only people that could have helped these guys were Linux Gamers. Where either a) there aren't enough of them, or b) they're not used to having to actually pay for software, c) they didn't like the games Loki did.
whichever it is... the market has decided.
Hmm, let's see how long it takes for this to get modded down...
not some tired knock-off of a clone of a racer or whatever.
:-)
... Its Linux!!!
something new.
something different.
something only available on linux
give people a *reason* to want to play games on linux instead of windows... a reason better than
... hi bingo
Linux is free software.
People who use free software are cheapskates who won't buy anything.
Companies need people buying their stuff to survive.
No one using Linux will buy stuff.
Companies go under.
SIMPLE! Who the hell's gonna support Loki, Salvation Army?
Moderation Totals: Offtopic=1, Troll=2, Total=3.
What is with these moderation totals?
With Mandrake creating a "Gaming edition", why don't they pick up where Loki left off? That seems pretty logical to me.
>Windows will continue to be the best platform >for games, just as MacOS continues to be the >best platform for many multimedia tasks.
I hate to mince words here, but dig this: Some might argue that *BeOS* is the best platform for many multimedia tasks. But it's gone the way of the dinosaur because almost *nobody* used it in that manner, regardless of how well designed it was.
Likewise, I would argue that *Linux* is the best platform for gaming...if you're ready to cope with a limited selection of games. I won't bore you with FPS benchmarks, but Linux (3rd party drivers and all) has evolved to a point where it can spank Windows 2000 and XP on a regular basis every time a part-time gamer wants to turn that badass mail server in the back room into a temporary gaming box. The file system is faster and more efficient. A user can easily give any game close-to-realtime priority if fragging a friend is foremost on her/his mind, picking up 5-10 extra frames per second in the process...
My point is that Windows is *not* a superior gaming platform compared to Linux, just that it is far better supported by game developers and hardware manufacturers alike. Until that changes, we will all find ourselves downloading the new DirectX version 37.
-------
I have no signature.
When I started using Linux the very first thing I did was get Civ:Call To Power for Linux. Sure it was out for the Mac but here it was, a shrink wrapped game for Linux. I played then game for hours and hours. Sure, Civ:CTP ain't the greatest game but it ran great on Linux. I still play it, along with every other game Loki ported. The games installed so well. It was a joy using them. It is sad to see Loki go. Loki is example not only of a great Linux porting house, but a great porting house on any platform, period. Good luck, guys!
CDE open sourced! https://sourceforge.net/projects/cdesktopenv/
Does anyone know what kind of revenues Loki made? I'm curious as to how possible it is for a company to do linux ports of Windows games in the first place. Was this doomed to failure? Was there a lack of sufficient marketing? I've purchased a few Loki games from a local retailer and have reviewed one (Railroad Tycoon II). I found all of the games to be well done, functional, and extremely playable on my hardware (PIII 500, 512MB RAM).
... sheesh. At least if there was a problem with the game under Linux, I just had to restart the game, not the computer!
As an avid gamer (I boot Windows ONLY to play games) I was very happy to see Loki port Windows based games to Linux. And contrary to a bunch of the posts so far, I thought that it was a) simple to get the games running and b) pretty decent in performance. Yeah, sure, Windows generally played the same game better on the same computer (although generally not by much), but then you had to cope with all that Window's garbage, like reboots and mysterious hangs and
Anyhow, does anyone have the answers to my questions?
Best of luck to all who worked at Loki! You did a great job!
from the article:
NewsForge: What happens to your public CVS repository and the projects it hosts?
Draeker: We'd like to find someone to continue hosting it.
Any volunteers?
-
--- Will in Seattle - What are you doing to fight the War?
Not really. Loki was a regular ol' closed-source non-free company that ported games from windows to linux, slowly.
If you don't have any problem using closed-source software, go ahead and install XP. It's closed-source, but it's also quite stable, pretty secure (just grab a personal firewall) and most importantly, it has the best software and hardware compatibility (esp. games) of any platform.
If you want free software, Loki is not the answer. Let's keep with the idea of freedom, it is a good one.
Some people are willing to create games for free. Let's instead make it easy for them to reach a wider audience (linux) by supplying them with good tools, like Windows compatibility layers or stuff like SDL. (There may even be some people willing to use something like the street performer protocol to get paid simply to make the games, not to make copies of them. But maybe the world is still not ready for that idea.)
Really I did. I drove all the way out to microcenter with my friend because supposedly they had "linux games". I was looking for Alpha Centauri... Or maybe Heroes of Might and Magic III. Or whatever that RTS game was that got ported over. If they had sc3k, I would have payed retail, taken it home, and even would have been pretty happy knowing I supported a linux company. I got there, and what did they have? Quake3. That's it. Yeah yeah, when I called, I should have asked more than simply "do you carry linux games?". Yeah yeah, I could have gone online and ordered the software from any number of online stores. But buying games isn't like buying a word processor. It's scratching an itch. You go out, and you want to buy a game, and you want it right then.
Anyway, I ended up with a $10 copy of Alpha Centauri for windows. Had a jumped through extra hoops, and waited a bit longer, I could have had loki's version for linux. It looks like I wasn't the only one that wasn't willing to do it.
Nite_Hawk
A very sad day for Linux. AOL? Redhat? IBM? someone please help these guys.
Gee, had this article been posted 2 weeks ago, nobody would ever dream about AOL buying Loki. But now, thanks to the AOL/Redhat "rumor", it seems like AOL is the solution for all financial problems in the Linux world...
how much you need? I can help you out, I am Prince Fahdar Bin Eriz ok. cool send me mail with pr0n. Thx. U first make porn linux game 4 me. 3d shooter ok.
It sounds like it's a little late, but why not follow the model of the Green Bay Packers?
l
http://www.packers.com/history/stockhistory.htm
Issue voting, non-divident-paying shares, with no chance of stock appreciation. I would be willing to pay $100 for a share. The motive for us is the same as it was for the Packers - to save a cherished institution; buy Loki enough time to make their business model work.
It would be important to prevent any single entity from gaining control, just as it was important for the Packers, by limiting how many shares any individual or organization can possess.
I know, ideally we should have bought the games in the first place, but Mandrake only recently was able to autodetect NVidia cards and install 3D support automatically. I think manually setting up NVidia cards was the big stopper for a lot of people.
...Loki is a business, and if they don't have a viable business model, it's their problem. When you start a business you either make it successful or you don't. It's nobody elses problem to make things work, and it's especially nobody elses problem to infuse cash into a business that has proven time and time again that it's not viable.
I'm not saying Loki was a bad company. I'm saying that the business they were in was not robust enough to sustain Loki. Even the best of the best can only sell ice cubes to eskimos for so long. The Linux gaming market just isn't there, folks. Make your peace and move on.
I wish the folks at Loki (and the former employees) all the luck in the world, and maybe some day Linux will have a viable game market that will bring them all back together again. For now, though, it's not there. Pooling money together to keep Loki alive for the few people who bothered to buy their games is just plain silly. Ditto for asking RH/IBM/AOL to bail them out.
Loki wasn't in the business of charity; nobody should be asked for charity to keep Loki in business.
I haven't read the article so I dont know. But I'd be curious to know why they folded. Was it because the market for Linux games is too small? Or was it business of poor business decisions or something else?
how about this:
Number of games I've bought for Linux ?
[]0
[]1
[]2
[]3
[]4+
[]i use windows
[]buy? i steal them
If i have to choose payin 30$ for a game translated to spanish for windows, or 40$ for the same game in english but ported to linux, sorry, but i just choose the first option.
Yes its a shame that this business folded; for the acceptance of linux as a viable gaming market and such potential growth across desktops etc; for those talented programmers who worked for the company; and those - myself included - whom have enjoyed their games.
However Draeker (an ex Apple lawyer) apparently had some rather novel business practices, which (at least when things began to get awkward) allegedly seemed to involve manipulating a rather gullible employee into bankrolling the company. Before any more moderators get too slap happy on the parent post please consider this:
Loki Speaks up on Chapter 11
Specifically this and related threads: More informative media on Loki
Which highlights this:
Founder, Creditors Differ as to Loki's Future Course
troodon.net
Linux games were expected to sell?
Hmm... lets see. The Linux camp is divided into two camps; the hacker geeks and the l33t windows gamer d00ds.
The geeks are too busy coding away (gracias) and the gamer d00ds are the type of people that leech their games from FTP sites. Not their local video game store. Unless you Linux is not brought to the wider audience, then there will be no revenues in Linux games. It's quite simple.
Windows will keep on dominating as the gamers platform of choice unless someone makes a Window out of Linux.. and that is not going to happen any time soon.
This is an obvious troll if I ever saw one. And mod the parent back up again, plz.
In addition to everything else you did, you made a four-year-old happy. My granddaughter discovered your port of Heroes of Might and Magic III on my computer and promptly learned how to move the characters around. She now begs to play "the horsie game" when she comes over on weekends.
Of course she has no concept of the strategy or even of the point of the game, but she likes creating armies full of sprites, water elementals and unicorns.
You could always do worse than pleasing a child.
Someone you trust is one of us.
Yes. That's my eventual goal for Exult, and is why I'm putting so much effort into the creation of a map-editor and script compiler.
I agree with what you say about SDL being necessary, so is openal for sound, but who do you think created these libraries - Loki did, from scratch i believe. Loki was a good company that ported games AND created/maintained the cross platform gpl libraries needed to write games/media players etc on linux. Loki did a lot of good for gaming and media in general on linux, it is sad to see them go.
(btw if you want to run games on windows, don't bother with xp, a few games have compatabilty isues and most need to be run as administrator - you'll probably want 98/ME instead)
Loki went out of business because not enough people paid them for their product. Whether or not it is a problem with the Linux community having to pay for software, or if it is because Linux does not have enough of the core gaming market is up for debate. Either way, you can't operate a profitble business without customers/users.
If Loki been able to get some big name games to the platform things may of been different. Sorry, but Postal is a crap game that was crap on PC and no amount of good will can make a 2-3 year old crap game a viable product.
Maybe they should of looked at the charts more and sold out. Who wants to be a millionaire? sold bucket loads. Yeah it is shallow, but it is mass market and a damn sight more likely to sell than The Return of Postal-Unplugged Special Edition.
Oh, and for all those people who say things like "I use Windows ONLY for games" why bother saying that? Does it make any difference if you use Windows for ONLY games or if you use Windows for everything? Do you feel proud that you pay the same amount to Microsoft for their operating system but don't use it for anything (apart from games)?
That WAS a serious question people...
I've bought a couple of Loki's games (and am quite pleased with them, I might add). Evidently, the moderators haven't been following this story long, though. If the company's been going broke for the last few years, as seems to be the case from the stories that have been coming out, either Draeker had a HUGE savings (possible, I suppose), or has drawn a comfortable paycheck for himself all this time. Either way, his quote implies that he is evidently walking away from this supposedly long-faltering company with enough personal wealth to not need to look for work any time soon. I'm sorry if this thought offends people, but what other interpretation is there?
Hacker Public Radio is our Friend
I guess this means we're not going to get Kohan: Ariman's Gift for Linux/FreeBSD. This is a real shame since I love Kohan: Immortal Soverigns so much.
I read the internet for the articles.
Draeker himself said that they did everything possible to make this work. If there is one thing this shows as is that Linux and serious gaming wont be any time soon (at least the way Loki did it). I'd like to see a porting company succeed, since it would mean i'd spend more time on Linux but i wont hold my breath.
these people make Elvis look anorexic!
Considering that Loki filed for bakrupcy in the summer, and 90% of companies that do aren't in existence just 1 year later, this is no surprise.
In hindsight and now knowing what the Linux gaming market is like, this was inevitable. The fact that most Linux users either dual-boot with Windows or have another x86 machine with Windows was the critical factor. As most of us Linuxheads are in the technically-savvy section of the computing market, and those users tend to be aware of new products & software faster and early adopters, why would they want to wait months for a game to come out for Liunx if they could play it today on their Windows partition? Even if our hearts were in the right place and we tried not to play a game until we bought the Linux version, obviously our desires exceeded our willpower otherwise Loki would still be with us.
This is unfortunately not good news for the rest of the Linux gaming industry (or what's left of it). The circumstances that made Loki die still exist, and I'm sure other Linux gaming companies are feeling them too. But our own use of x86 hardware - as much freedom and value as it has given us - is the very reason Linux gaming is faltering. Mac-porting companies are doing well, and even Amiga companies get good responses to their ports, all because they have captive audiences. It's the price we pay for inexpensive and abundant hardware.
Nobody wants to listen to your pedophile communist creationist rants. You're an obvious troll.
I just tried to run new (Windows) version of
Wolfenstain (new one) using Wine. It runs almost perfect - I was amazed. If Loki does that - it'll take them half year and more...
Loki sold it's games far too cheap.
I love Heroes III, and play it all the time.
I too wanted to
People who use Linux *love* using linux. It's
the platform we chose.
I still remember how flabergasted I was a the
price (like $9 or something) I paid for Heroes III.
Loki made one, fundamental mistake. They
should've charged $30-$60 for the games and
done a good job on them, maybe made them better
on Linux. I would have still bought Heroes III,
and Loki would have had maybe 8X the revenue.
The Linux game market is most certainly *NOT*
dead. Loki's business model of selling the
games so cheap was the error here.
Blizzaed needs to tap into this oil well we call "Gaming On My Firewall". Better get those mail servers geared up for some Warcraft III!!!
(+1 Funny) only if I laugh out loud.
i'm disappointed, this should have been in your customary bold angry (obviously a result of lack of heterosexual intercourse) font.
>>I hate to mince words here, but dig this: Some
>>might argue that *BeOS* is the best platform
>>for many multimedia tasks.
Hate to mince words, but those people are idiots.
First - don't talk about BeOS in the present sense. It's dead. Sad, but true.
Second - where would be all these multimedia apps on BeOS? Where's Illustrator? Photoshop? Quicktime? Painter? Freehand? Media Composer? DS? Symphony? ProTools? Quark? Maya? SOFTIMAGE? 3DSMax? Lightwave? Houdini? Pagemaker? Framemaker? InDesign? Combustion? Inferno? Media100? etc etc etc...
See a trend? Certainly BeOS *may have had the potential* to be a good MM os, but there was zero software. And that's what matters. Unless I'm willing to write all the tools myself. If i'm being paid to do graphic design i couldn't give a damn about the OOP'ness and threading model of the OS. I need apps - period. And I need *specific* apps. For example - If i need Photoshop I need Photoshop. I don't want GIMP. It's always kind of laughable when people declare GIMP to be a Photoshop killer. Maybe it will be in 10 years - but it's nowhere in the ballpark now. Not to slag on GIMP, but it's no Photoshop. And when I have a job to do, spending $600 on Photoshop to get the tools I need, vs. getting GIMP for 'free' and having endless headaches and missing 80% of the tools I need.... well there is no choice. Spending $600 on photoshop would pay for itself in a week.
Lets drop the 'coulda-woulda-shoulda' attitude. Next thing you'll bring up how killer the Amiga was.
>>Likewise, I would argue that *Linux* is the >>best platform for gaming...if you're ready to >>cope with a limited selection of games.
You could argue, but you'd be wrong. Limited selection of games, terrible drivers, and an OS that is stuck in 1979.
Example: I want to change the resolution/color space of my monitor. On Win32, ControlPanel->Display->Settings. Click click click I'm done.
On Linux - oh christ. Go try and dig out the chipset docs for your PC and gfx card if you've got them and start digging into the Xfree config files. Make sure you don't type in bad settings that'll cook your monitor or fry the card because you've put in a sync value that exceeds their specs. I got to fight with a default of Xfree4.x for a hour because my mouse type (though supported) isn't even documented (luckily i had an old v3.x config file still laying around). And no, Xconfigurator isn't even close.
>>The file system is faster and more efficient.
Lets see, it seems like they've FINALLY fixed the corruption problems in the 2.4 kernels...... we hope. Too bad about the VM subsystem. We're getting there......
>>My point is that Windows is *not* a superior
>>gaming platform compared to Linux,
Sure it is. It the OS facilities that are required, it is easy to use, and it has the games selection. You should start reading the linux kernel mailing list. The kernel has some *serious* problems. Even the powers that be can admit that.
Where is the linux equivalent of DirectInput? Nope.
Where is the linux equivalent of Direct3D? We've got OpenGL, which is proceeding at a glacial development pace, while D3D updates pop up every couple months --- significant updates. Being able to work with retained mode in D3D instead of being forced to deal with immediate model in OGL can make a big difference to a coder. The points go on and on. If you think D3D is junk, i suggest you read Carmacks points on his opinion of D3Dv8. It's quite nice, and MSFT is doing some good stuff with it.
It's funny --- there are so many things that Win2k/XP offer the user that the linux zealot will say "NOT IMPORTANT!" until linux finally adds it.... then it's the best thing since sliced bread.
C'mon. Lets be realistic. Linux isn't great for games. Generally it's a colossal pain in the ass - and ocassionally not being too much trouble.
I write code all day on Win32 and Linux so I'm not one of these armchair quarterbacks who's talking out of their ass. I like linux for what it's good at, but it isn't good at everything. And it just makes you sound like a naieve zealot to spout off that it is.
If Linux companies had produced Linux-only or Linux-first games that were original and playable, most would still be in business. How can you compete by porting something that's already out for Windows, if most of your user base can already dual-boot into Windows and sees little reason to wait for the Linux version to come out? Not a good business plan, unfortunately.
Although not the most technically advanced game, Tux Racer is a good example of the possible success of Linux games. If even a simple Linux-only game as this can achieve as many fans as it has in the Linux market, larger projects that were creative and Linux first had a good chance of success. But a port of SimCity 3000 months after you could already play it on your computer in Windows? Good game, bad business.
it really sucks about loki, but i don't believe that this is going to hurt linux gaming in any way, if anything, we can thank loki for paving the way. since loki there have been several ports to linux not involving loki in any way, ie wolfenstein and strike force. although they're only linux binaries to use win versions with, they still run better under linux, as linux handles processes and memory much better and of course uses only opengl. I believe game companies are starting to catch on. Besides someone will pick up where loki left off.
...There's nothing wrong with Southern California that a rise in the ocean level wouldn't cure...
Loki supported sevel open-source projects. One of these was supposedly their "uninstall utility", but unfortunately they never released the code (as far as I can tell).
I will be releasing some UNIX software soon, and this thing would be useful for sure. The Loki binaries don't run on all of my target platforms.
Since they don't have any employees, now, does anyone have any ideas about how I could obtain this code?
IBM and AOL Time Warner should get together
they are both powerfull, if they don't stop Microsoft, nothing will. Linux to Windows-
MSNBC to ALL of time warner's stations
and all of their other resources. i'm just woried what replacing one monoply with another would accomplish
We seldom regret saying too little but often regret saying too much.
I see a lot of people concluded from this that the Linux gaming market is not viable. While that may be the case, Loki in no way demonstrates it.
The problem here is they port a game after it is popular, with a lead time of at least 6 months to get from Windows to Linux. The Linux users who also like to play games alot are typically on x86 architecture, and have some version of Windows (even 95) lying around. Is it worth it to wait 6 months to a year to play a game on Linux, especially since by then the Windows version is in the bargain bin at 1/5 the price of the Linux version.
*If* there is a potential viable Linux gaming market (and that is a big *if*, the Linux desktop userbase is already small compared to Windows, and of those users, I would venture to say that most don't really care that much about games.), then the only hope to see it come forth is if the playing field is level, meaning that releases would have to be simultaneous, equally available (on the shelves), and equally priced. Given the circumstances, only Transgaming can have a short enough lead time to really sell enough to have any good numbers.
XML is like violence. If it doesn't solve the problem, use more.
the whole free software, open source thing doesnt really cut it with games.
with the majority of popular games coming out now, mainly in the land of FPS and RTS, you can gain access to an SDK within days of the games release, as well as normally a section of source code with which to rewrite sections to make your own mod or just to tinker with the game, making the whole 'port games to linux because its open source etc etc' a moot point
and with every developer and his mother trying to release another version of quake, c&c etc, and all the 'its like <genre defining classic> but quicksave is now F10 instead of F6' games coming out, its hard enough to make money without charging the large amounts companies already do for games.
how could a company that is rewriting already existing games for an operating system that is really only a niche market *in the land of gaming* (note this point before you flame) expect to cope? even though they dont have all the issues with art, music etc, these things dont convert themselves. and the amount of people that downloaded a full OS for free, then a browser for free, then everything else for free arent gonna wanna pay just to play games. i think this whats happened to loki has proved this point.
<redundant>
windows is the premier gaming platform, and its gonna be a hard thing to change. sure, i whinge like the rest of us when IE crashes for the millionth time for no good reason, and i despise all the 'invasion of privacy bullshit that makes me use Eudora and Netscape/Opera instead of Outlook/IE, but games wise, you arent gonna get a better platform.
</redundant>
That makes one!
So the problem with Loki's business model is that it was porting games that were already available. The only people interested would be those people who don't run Windows, but want to play the games - that's a minority of gamers. The vast majority of gamers just want to play the game; since it was already released for Windows, they have no need to get it again for Linux.
Now if they were producing new games for Linux, that'd be another matter entirely. But they're producing games for Linux that the hardcore gamers all already have for another platform; there's little incentive for them to buy it again.
10 PRINT CHR$(205.5+RND(1)); : GOTO 10
Would it be easier to write the game for Linux and then do the port to Windows? Which is more difficult, going from Windows to Linux or from Linux to Windows? I'd imagine Linux -> Windows is easier to do since you'll be using a set of libraries that are more likely to be cross-platform than if you started with Windows.
But that's just my guess.
Use 'slashdot stuff' in the subject line in any email you send me if you want to get past the spam filter.
Comment removed based on user account deletion
Remember junior high school when everyone strived to insult everyone else? Didn't it suck? Looks like your goal is to turn /. into seventh grade. Be gone!
I have some problems with your arguments. First, you exagerate the problems with getting X to work. If you buy decently supported card and use a recent distro. X setup usually works out of the box and is a piece of cake. (And windows usually has to download drivers too.
Also linux does have a directInput equivalent, SDL. And while SDL doesn't yet support force feed back (which is kinda pointless IMO) it does everything else DirectInput does, while being much nicer to use. (at least that is what my friend told me who rewrote his directX based game to a SDL based game)
Your right Linux can be a pain in the ass, if you don't have the right equipment, and if you don't know what you are doing. However, the same can be said about windows. I know plenty of people who have stability problems playing windows games.
Dude, have fun coding on Win32. Personally as a recreational programmer I find linux alot more fun. Everything is there for the examining and comes with free compilers for most languages. And the OS doesn't hide stuff from you and treat you like a dummy.
They misunderestimated me. -- George W. Bush
Face it, Loki died
No, Loki will not be bought
Not enough buyers
What version of DirectX was your friend using? How did he write his code? First off, DirectX has gone through many changes since its inception years ago. It went from truly horrible, to passably decent (around DX5) to pretty darned good (DX7 time frame) to awesome (DX8). DirectX 3 is very much different than DX 5, is very much different than DX8. They're all backwards compatible, but if you're targetting DX8 and writing like you're targetting DX3, then you're not targetting DX8 at all.
Also, since DirectX is very much about COM, there are plenty of ways to make it easier on the programmer. For example, ATL takes most of the pain out of COM programming. The various smart pointer classes relieve you of the tedious details of querying interfaces, making sure you properly ref count (AddRef and Release), and cleaning up your pointers when you're done. And if your friend was trying to slog through DX using pure C code (yes, it's possible), no wonder he thought it was nasty.
SDL is nice, yes, but it pales in comparison to DirectX. That shouldn't reflect poorly on SDL, since SDL is developed by a very small number of people with a very limited budget, when compared to DirectX (not to mention that SDL for win32 wouldn't even exist without DirectX, as it's just a portability layer over DX code). If your goal is an easily portable game, SDL and OpenGL are very good choices. If your goal is to make the best game you can on one platform (okay, two platforms if you consider that porting from win32 to XBox isn't too difficult as long as you're using DX), then DirectX is the way to go.
In the typical myopic fashion all of the
replies missed one important thing.
Its not only desktops that are affected.
I have a TRIBES2 >>SERVER running on a Linux
box with an ISP (sin.senet.com.au:28000).
With Lokis demise there will be no one
to update the binaries. Whilst Sierra killed
Dynamix the developers of TRIBES2 they are
reforming support team for it and a patch
is in the works.
When the patch comes out, my TRIBES2 server
will become unplayable and I will be forced
to put NT on it. Now there is no way
in the world for my clan to come up with $1400
Australian dollars for the NT licence.
Therefore one less community service.
I don't know about anyone else, but I am very saddened by this for very selfish reasons. Loki ported some of the best games. They are the reason I just upgraded my video card, processor, and totally removed windows from my machine. Now I either put windows on for games, or I have just wasted a few hundred bucks.
So what? Should he not be paid?
cmon face it, gaming on linux was always gonna be limited as the the only people that showed any interest were 'enthusiasts' like carmack and the sort... Oh and wasnt most of Lokis stuff mods of id code anyway? besides wtf should i have to feck about with nasty X and nasty driver installs just to play a game, games are fun, breaking X trying to play them isnt.
Besides... why would you want to play anything other than netrek anyway?
Well, _some_ gamers buy consoles. If you like sports games, or driving games, consoles are great. If you like RPGs with depth of gameplay, or strategy games, consoles kind of suck.
Most gamers I know are neutral or even hostile to Windows. But we're stuck with it because that's where the games are.
I bought a few Linux games from Loki. They did a good job, but Linux is not a strong gaming platform. Transgaming will not help the situation; why bother with Linux if I'm playing Windows games? Only the truly committed will play them on Linux.
What Linux needs is a strong technical advantage to games running on it. Right now, no such advantage exists. The graphical APIs are behind Windows. The driver support is obviously weaker. I cannot imagine why a game would be better on Linux. (And I like Linux... for what it is.)
I think Windows has got this market locked up at the moment. It's sad.
The "open source engine, closed content" model sounds good... but is "art" the only thing you can think of to sell? Do we all really go that long between playing games with an interesting plot?
Is there any way the community can save Loki from it's end? Donations? Game purchases?
Well most of the reason for people not liking Loki is the closed source model and the late porting, how about a open source games company that made money, not possible? Well try this how about games (developed natively for linux) where the game engine, and assorted code is open source but the content ie graphics textures, models game levels etc are under a commerical liscence. so the code is still avaliable and can freely be used for game development or modification, and the company makes money of the most difficult and generally expensive part of the game (Graphics people aren't cheap!). I can't say it would work buts its another idea to add to the collection ;-).
The hypocrisy is almost unbearable around here at times. The Linuxites love to go on (and on) about free markets and fair competition, but when a company they like is forced out of business because those same people won't buy its products, they suddenly want a handout. Grow up, people. Either you believe in competition, and i
674nherent risks to businesses, or you don't.
A sad day in the Linux world. Once again we're caught in the Catch-22 wherein we can't break away from Microsloth if our favourite games aren't written for Linux, and yet we can't buy those games when they're the only thing that runs under Linux!
While Free Software is the lifeblood of this community, I have to urge everyone who cares about Linux to vote with their money when they see a company trying to turn things right. It's the only language capitalism understands...
Let's not get personal here. After all, I could go on and on about how "furious george" is both a lame no-talent punk band *and* some sort of programming guru who's never heard of SDL. SDL, by the way, is the very library that the Loki programmers employed to create "Civilization: Call to Power."
.dot files can be a banal, unnecessary waste of anyone's time. Linux is not some sort of perfect cure-all to any computing problem. But believe it or not, it has plenty of untapped potential as a gaming OS. I'm sorry that Linux hurt you, baby. Most of us love it for its flaws as well as its beauty.
I feel that talk of the burgeoning "DirectX equivalent" that the Loki programmers actually used to code most of their games seems a little more germane to the original post than some inane babble about how you spend your days, but oh well. I'm just some armchair pundit. Or something. The DirectX problem will no longer be one in the very near future. Bet on it.
Your entire (and I do mean entire) post reads like so many sour grapes. Uh, of *course* Linux is difficult to install and configure. Of *course* coping with
As an aside, when someone says that something has "gone the way of the dinosaur", they're generally not speaking in the present tense. I'm not the Verb Tense Police, but you might want to look into that.
It comes down to this: I'm just not really sure how you've disproved my point. You specifically have problems with X--mostly stemming from how you're unfamiliar with your hardware--so somehow that means that the rest of us will never enjoy a decent game running Linux?
For the first part (no apps) I think you missed the point a little, the parent was talking about OS Design, not app developers picking up on the OS.
/etc/XF86Config file.
BeOS was very well designed for MM, app developers did not pick up on it. That does not negate that fact it was well designed for the task, it might not oh been that practical usefull (RADAR used it, as did some other companys so it was a little usefully).
The rest of you comment I aggree with.
Mlk, hiding from the
Wow, I should not post when knackered.
I am a Linux proponent but I have to agree with you on most points but not all (X is powerful but a huge pain it the arse). And yes, 2.4 should still be 2.3.xx ... But 2.2.20 kicks butt - who's making you upgrade?
I also program on both Win32 & Linux. I like VC++ 6 a lot (there are some nasty things they left in there to avoid breaking compatibility with old/broken software) and lots of the newer API are good but the old Win32 API is junk. I still can't get past the stupid notion that you have to have a message queue (read: window, visible or otherwise) to use the whole API. Geez! Overall I think Linux is a stable and better development environment (at least I enjoy it far more).
I hope someone comes up with a viable business model for Linux desktop and gaming, using GPL or otherwise.
I am saddened to see Loki go.
Cheers.
Linux gaming is just not economically profitable.
i don't think you're correct there. *porting* games to linux is not economically profitable. porting games to the mac has never been economically profitable. what makes windows the most popular gaming platform is the fact that there are really no new popular games coming out for anything that don't come out on windows first, usually with better support and higher performance.
if you read the interview, you'll notice that Draker points out it was never they're intention to make a permanent business out of porting linux games. they were merely testing the waters to find out if people would buy linux games at all... if there was a market to be had in linux gaming. they simply didn't manage to make it all the way to the eventual goal of creating new high-profile games for linux FIRST, something that may well have turned the tides and put linux into the gaming market (a market that honestly only exists for windows pc's at this point)
how many mac or linux games do you see on the shelves when you walk into an electronic's botiquie in the mall? not many. how many windows games do you see? walls of them. think that doesn't affect the judgement of anyone deciding what type of computer to buy for the first time? you bet it does.
i *weep* for the linux community at this tragic loss
but seriously. the point you're missing is the gaming industry is a MAJOR factor in Window's market share. if the industry simply waits around for a larger market share to magically appear just becuase Linux deserves it, it's never going to happen. if linux is ever going to "beat" windows (i'll leave the discussion on whether this is a proper idea or not aside for now) in the desktop market, then it needs to be given the same weapons that *got* windows the desktop market in the first place.
isn't this obvious to anyone else out there?
Agreed, but if you're willing to run Wine, it's now getting pretty decent, even without Transgaming's DirectX extensions. What's nice about Wine is that it doesn't actually require any installation of Windows. So you install Linux, install Wine, and you can get away with never spending the cash on a Windows OS. Some of the great sites that are soooo helpful for this include:
My Greasemonkey scripts for Digg &
Larry Ellison has stated that if Apple ever starts going under again, he will buy it just to keep the, around and piss off Bill Gates. Can someone convince him that buying Loki and making people think that "if the CEO of Oracle considers Linux gaming viable, it really must be," would truly piss off Bill Gates and Fester Ballmer?
Dude, that was rubbish.
Because Open Source development and the surrounding community is not compatible with traditional business models. And yet everyone refuses to open their eyes to this, innovate, and move forward. Thus far, there have been two approaches:
1.) Distributions - supposedly 'value-added' compilations of free software with various technical support options as the real selling point. (Well, tech support if you really want to use the quirky, obfuscated mess that is most commercial Linux distributions.) Now if these same companies had just helped to enhance the Debian project (with say.. a newbie-friendly installer / hardware detection / GUI control panel / etc.) and then supported that instead, maybe it would have worked. But instead, the commercial distro people waste enormous amounts of time and energy redo'ing work that other people have already done a good job on.
2.) Proprietary Software for Linux - these are the people who believe that Open Source doesn't work for all types of software, so instead of fully supporting the community, they've created proprietary products to "fill in the gaps" in the landscape of free software. Problem is, this isn't economically efficient for them OR the customers. And it certainly doesn't further the cause of Open Source software. People who use proprietary office suites or games are throwing money into a black hole. Sure, it may temporarily suit a need or desire, but that money doesn't go towards producing software that will live on, continually improving as an open code base.
So here's the part where innovation comes in. People are willing to pay for software that they need as long as it actually fits the bill. Because of this, there is no reason why these users cannot pay Open Source developers to write software they need, but which will also be free to the community. Why would you pay for something that will be free? Because if you don't, it will never exist.. or at least it won't exist by the time you need it. So would you, as a user of software, rather sink money into proprietary software whose code will never see the light of day? Or would you rather get better quality software for the same price and support Open Source at the same time? The key, of course, is how to *organize* this exchange between users and developers in some sort of contract form.
Unfortunately, I don't believe Eric Raymond ever really touched on this when he wrote The Magic Cauldron. Of the Open Source business models he listed, the closest match is perhaps found in section 9.3 "Give away recipes, Open a restaurant." But it does have a powerful point, one that needs to be re-thought and expanded. Software can be, in every sense of the word, a service. Programmers are paid for the labor of writing code that does what people need. That's it. Forget selling things. Forget delusions of 'value-added versions.' And forget distributions plastered with bright logos and 'commercial looking' shrinkwrap. It's a waste. The true value is the functionality of the code itself. Contract for it to be written to specification, then stick it up on an FTP server for the world to see. Or sell your services, promising that you will transform any current and future Open Source software into a turnkey solution. Because that's what customers want: a solution. It's that simple.
There are many ways to go about this and it's time to starting trying them. People, stop sitting on your asses complaining and go start making a difference.
I bought three of Loki's titles and NEVER did I need to do any tweaking.
Alpha Centauri and Kohan being my favorites out of the three.
And another thing, gaming companies drop like flies all the time. Dynamix, Looking Glass and other big names were no exception. Loki lasted pretty long all considering and did some very good work.
Do not spread "09 F9 11 02 9D 74 E3 5B D8 41 56 C5 63 56 88 C0" over the internet, thank you.
That Codeweaver's App Database in particular is pretty choice, thanks.
I buy at least 2 new PC games a month. I run Windows 2000. I have yet to have one not work correctly since Win2k FIRST came out and the sound/video drivers still sucked. If I recall correctly, at least half of the games and device drivers I've seen in the last few months have had to have special patches to "make" them work with XP.
This message brought to you by the Council of People Who Are Sick of Seeing More People.
Draker failed at Linux gaming. He's right, the market's there. It might have helped if he'd realized, contrary to his comments, that there are now native Mac games because of OS X.
The opportunities should be obvious. Working with native Linux and Mac games would have given him an even bigger market. OS X wasn't born yesterday. Several other developers and programmers with solid *nix backgrounds are now working on Mac games. Some have already shipped.
Good, new interesting games for Linux and the Mac makes more sense for quality games for both Linux and Mac users. Both markets need all the users they can get.
Draker failed. He's no hero. Too many in technology wear the dark glasses too long. If you fail you're a failure. And giving out "advise" as he does in the interview should make one wonder, why should I listen to this guy?
Do Linux users really want ports of Windows games? Do Mac users? Now the Mac users are getting them with a *nix kernal running the boat and Linux users are out of gas, the biggest and best source of ports is gone.
No "rescue" needed. Someone else needs to step up to provide the *native* games Linux users will buy and want. Very handy for the next guy, hopefully, to also do them for Mac.
At least the GUI wouldn't look like Windows for either the penguins or the mac heads. Bigger market than just one platform for native *nix stuff. Someone gofer it.
"Someone needs to figure out how to make the people happy AND make a profit. "
Release the engine GPL. Sell you the stuff that makes a game, a GAME i.e artwork,models,music, etc.
It seems that that Ragnar BOY finally destroyed Loki's evil plans to destroy the world.
Now, was it *really* wise to port that Rune, eh?
May you live forever in the halls of the One-Eyed.
I'm part of the KDE-project and am always trying to get more desktop-users over to Linux, and I'm convinced that Linux will one day take over the majority of the desktop-market, the only problem is that there needs to be a reason for people to switch. Better uptime, lesser crashes, a better looking gui etc etc is nice, but it's really no good reason for a family to replace their windows-desktop with Linux yet (besides the philosophy, which most people don't care about anyways and certainly not enough to replace their windows because of it). I've always been trying to find that one thing that will start the convertion, but I haven't been able to think of anything yet. Untill today. After reading Scott Drakers interview it hit me. A killer native Linux game! I believe Scott has a good point here. Imagine Quake4 released ONLY on Linux!!!!?!?!
What would happend if something like this occured? Well, I know that most of my friends would certainly install Linux on their machines (in addition to Windows) just to get to play this game, and they would certainly pay for it too. The problem with the general Linux user is that he doesn't play games under Linux, and the ones that do often doesn't care enough to pay for it, but with a killer game available only for Linux you wouldn't have to worry about that, because most of the players of the game would be windows-users, people that are used to paying for games!
Is there anybody out there that knows of any really good game available for Linux only now or in the near future? (TuxRacer is too small mind you) Or any games planned to be released only under Linux?
Imagine sitting at a LAN with a lot of windows-friends around you, firing up a killer game while everybody starts gathering around you watching. Guys: "WOW! What game is that?" You: "It's Quake4." Guys: "Damn, I want it!" You: "Sorry, only available for Linux" Guys: "Can you help me setup a linux-installation on my pc then?"
--
\ Christian A Strømmen
Thank god for the lameness filter! It prevented the above post from being posted!
No, wait... wtf?
Are you OK? Mod down that lamer, he fsck'ed whole page! Than mod me down too, please!
I beg to differ (this is Slashdot, after all).
For the majority of systems out there, Xconfigurator makes configuring X as painless as configuring graphics on Windows--more painless, actually. For starters, I get dizzy looking at 640x480x16 being refreshed at 60hz. Secondly, there is a greter chance that a given graphics card will work fine in Linux "out of the box" at full resolution than it will in Windows.
Also, it is easy to change the resolution in X; once it is set up, it is as simple as CNTL+ALT+'+' or CNTL+ALT+'-'.
Then again, I agree with you that Linux can become very difficult to work with if one has to get "off the beaten path". For example, when I was down in México, there was this old Panasonic printer there that I wanted to print to. It took me literally two hours of me offending the Latinas because I was cussing in Spanish (Cultural note: The Spanish word for 'computer' has a really obscene Spanish cuss word in the middle of it) to get that printer to work under Linux. However, once I got the printer to work, that printer worked without fail every time I needed to use it.
- Sam
The secret to enjoying Slashdot is to realize that it should not be taken too seriously.
It's not about the enormous amount of money that's charged, it's about the costs that are made that should be earned back from the customer. I write software for a living, and I can't pay my bread if my software isn't sold. Stop whining about the 'support' model, because that's not working in every area, it probably will fail in most area's: people pay first and want FREE support later.
Giving the software away which was build in 1 year by 10 people is throwing away a lot of money, unless you didn't pay these developers. How are YOU planning to pay 10 developers who work 8-10 hours a day for a whole year? With promises that supportcontracts will pay them in 2 years? Aren't there a lot of bad examples about companies who thought that way and went chapter 11?
Dream on. It's about money, deal with it.
Never underestimate the relief of true separation of Religion and State.
BUT, they did have the advantage of closed-source. From a seller's point of view this is a big improvement compared to open-source. Release the source and you lose control. Which the users are all for, obviously, and most of us here agree it is a good thing. A dead project can be taken over and resurrected, modifications peculiar to one's own circumstances can be made etc.
My question is, who is actually making money out of writing open-source code? Not consulting/support or packaging. Who is actually able to support themselves full-time from the money they make selling the product of hours of development work in a project where the source is open? Is anyone?
People who have received large grants or prizes don't count. People like Alan Cox don't count either since the company he works for is not making a profit from his work (RH makes money on the support angle) so he, too is artifically subsidised.
I've written various programs which I use on my machines which are useful to me but require work to get them to a stage where they have any hope of general applicability, and as far as I can see, there is no chance that I would ever receive any payment for that work. Given that I have a full-time job and other commitments, part-time development would take a loooong time to get anywhere and I'm not inclined to do that.
I could do it; I would do it if I was unemployed and living off savings or the state, but I'm not.
TWW
"Encyclopedia" is to "Wikipedia" what "Library" is to "Some people at a bus stop"
While everyone is shocked, surprised and sad about the recent event with Loki. I would like to point out that Windows games are also dropping sells big time. The sad truth is that games in general are leaving the PC market. Why? Because all OS's currently have become so increasingly bloated and hexed with mismatching library's or DLL's that it's becomming a increasing nightmare to write software for Linux or Windows. Both operating systems waste resources that could have been applied better for game. While its a little more understandable with the Linux scenerio, I mean it is a UNIX clone designed mostly for the intentions of serving to multiple users using multiple services. Microsoft knows that XP has no prayer in hell to be a gamer OS, so they created the X-Box. Windows XP is just completely unreasonable and senseless on how it wastes resources. I view the X-Box as the bullet to the head for the PC gaming industry. Loki's demise seconds that opinion.
In answer to your title question I don't know how much Draeker made at Loki.
I think it is fair to infer that he has enough money not to need to look for work immediately.
I do not think it is fair to assume he was profiting at the expense of the viability of the company. It's a possibility but we simply don't know.
Another possibility is that he could have other sources of income or a partner able to support him.
It is likely however that he has at least some money. Which may well be the mark of a man with some financial common sense. Save/Invest when times are good so you can make it through the leaner times.
And we don't know how long 'a break' is - for all we know he's talking about 6 weeks.
I'm not saying that it's not possible that he's gotten rich while others have suffered and is now sitting pretty - but it's just as possible that's not true.
I'd like more data before I decide - and while I'm waiting I'll give him the benefit of the doubt.
Less than a week ago now I installed SuSE Linux 7.2, I was -totally- new to Linux and knew nothing about it, other than that it was supposed to be good for writing software and it was more reliable than Win98. Games?
SuSE comes with loads of them, they all worked right out of the box, no configuration needed. All my hardware both the standard and the exotic just worked, OpenGL was fine, and changing resolutions was a piece of cheese (I think YaST has some kind of auto-X-config program). Linux hard to use? Maybe if you have old or unusual hardware, but the idea that Windows is easier to configure for video is a joke!
Windows regularly seems to forget my monitor settings, meaning that I can't change resolutions without telling it what my monitor is again (means rebooting often). The slider can get "stuck" at 800x600 and won't go any higher, I happen to know how to fix this, but I've had to give tech support to my friends several times for this problem. Sure, Linux is far from perfect, but before you bash the technology, remember that it's the community that matters.
Is X a heap of junk? That's the impression I got from reading some posts, but in reality it seems alright to me. The differing widget themes/toolkits seemed wierd at first coming from a windows background, but I'm used to it now and really it doesn't bother me. And soon I read X will support true transparency and anti-aliasing. Great!
OpenGL is proceeding at a glacial pace huh? Well yeah, in the same way that the web is proceeding slowly compared to if Microsoft were running the show and every new release of IE had great new features, but I prefer standards. Also rememeber that OpenGL has lost a lot of its momentum since MS dropped support for it. I think Linux gaming is alright, I love tux racer for instance! But we need more like it.
thanks -mike
A lot more game company startups do fail than succeed. Game business is very hard, and the only people financing startups here are mostly publishers which would never take any risk. This means no financing for creating games for a new OS - hell, mostly they don't even take the risk of financing ANY new ideas! As sad as it is that Loki failed, this does not mean that another company won't succeed in the same market.
:-).
Btw. Loki programmers did a real fine job... finishing that many projects in just 3 years is great - even when they just did the porting. So i guess we can once more blame marketing here
Sad day for the linux community, good luck to all the good loki people. Thx for all the great games they put out there.
Five minutes ago I had a glimmer of hope that this was all some cruel hoax.
After the interview now it sinks in.
A bad bad day for linux.
I hope they keep the loki news server up long enough for the community to reorganize somwhere else.
Since most open source fans now-a-days seem to embrace gnutella (and napster, etc) as their "fundamental right to pirate", what happened is that most of us pirated their games. And they went out of business. Is this actually a surprise? I justified copying their games because "they should have been GNU GPL and free" because "open source means freedom". Why dont you all ask RMS what his opinion on this is? Oh wait, I think I already know the answer, to make money from your software is "wrong". This troll speaks the truth, there is a fundamental flaw in the free software mentality.
Lets get together and donate, it doesn't have to be big lets all contribute.
I had never bought a game since the demise of the commodore 64, until LOKI.
I'm not much of a gamer but my son plays the sony and nintendo, I bought him linux games to introduce him to a real operating system, better than some handy capped thing which teaches your children nothing but how to point & click.
Come on LOKI cough up that number!
Man, I am extremely new at to the Oen Source community. The only reason I have any ties to a basterdized OS as Windows is for my beloved games. I thought that Loki games was a miricle in disguise because here was one of my most favorite games on an OS that I have come to love and enjoy. I find it a bit dishearting that I will have to keep these ties solely for a few hours of endulgment while I play games like SMAC, SC2k, and C&C. As for AOL, it is such a gaint that they are turning into the next Microsoft. Just about everyone hates IBM because of their prorietary nature, do we really want propriety in Linux? Unfortunately, I don't know enough about Red Hat. Oh well, hopefully, someone will pick up where Loki left off and I can sever the ties that are holding me down.
SEUL is already talking to them about doing this.
If Linux is to have an original killer game it should be something that uses the strength of the community and the platform: some kind of peer to peer exploration / questing / hacking game with lots of procedurally generated content...
..just my 0.0175 euro cents.
/usr/games/fortune > ~/.signature
For me, the main reason I will sorely miss Loki, is that now it will be harder(impossible?) to get server versions of Windows games. Right now my friend and I have a UT and CounterStrike servers running on RH. I know I am preaching to the choir here, but MS has yet to build an OS that is as well suited for this task. The toolsets, logging, scheduling, proccess control, remote management, etc.. all of it is better on Linux. Loki has been great in providing updates for UT and was hoping they would continue with UT2.
And I am not saying that Windows can't do this, I am saying that Linux just does it SOOOO much better.
"Those who make peaceful revolution impossible, make violent revolution inevitable" - JFK
Or Freeverse.
There is a healthy, profitable, Mac-only gaming market, with plenty of interesting, fun games. But there are no Mac-only blockbusters, because they neccesarily get ported to the largest marketshares. Like Myst. And Marathon. And Halo.
In the end, the Mac has enough fun games and blockbusters that it makes a good desktop platform. A platform doesn't need Nintendo-sized game selection to be succesful on the desktop.
Lies about crimes
It's fine and dandy for you to ask people not to buy Windows games -- and if everybody listened to you, the Windows game market would crumble tomorrow. However, truth is that very few people will honor this request, because they want the games, and while many of them may not like it, they're still willing to boot into Windows or go to another computer to play them.
If you want to port Windows games to Linux, and you want to make decent money doing this, then you need to get your Linux ports out at approximately the same time as the Windows version. In the game world, today's chart topper is tomorrow's bargain bin title, and the next day's `abandonwarez' (where you can't even buy it anymore -- the only place to get it is from some abandonwarez site or maybe Ebay or a garage sale.)
I understand that this is not as easy as it sounds, and that the problems are perhaps even more political than technical, but it IS the way things are.
Another suggestion -- if you can't get a Linux port out at approximately the same time as the Windows version, when you do get it out, also ship a stripped down Linux version that 1) costs a lot less and 2) only contains the Linux bits, and uses the data files on the Windows CD. Call it a `Linux Upgrade for Descent 3' (or whatever.) Where I'd be unwilling to pay $50 for Descent 3 for Linux now, I'd probably be willing to pay $10 so I can use my Windows version under Linux.
How can you compete by porting something that's already out for Windows, if most of your user base can already dual-boot into Windows...
You've hit the nail on the head. Mac ports are successful precisely because you can't do this. Linux on the desktop will receive a big boost the day you can easily buy a desktop without Windows for significantly less than with.
This is why, despite repeated crys from "the pundits" for Apple to bundle a Windows emulator, Apple has refused. The day most Macs dual-boot Windows is the day software publishers tell users to just use the Windows version. Jobs treads a fine line in many things and gets them right, and this is one of them.
Lies about crimes
OS/2 had this very same problem. With the ability to run Windows apps, why would anyone produce native OS/2 software? To be sure, there were several companies that did but all went the way of the dodo (Describe, Inc.) or retargetted for Windows NT when they saw that they could/might make much more money on a Microsoft platform (Stardock).
We only have to look at the recent past to see the results of something like Wine - WordPerfect Office 2000, MusicMatch, etc. which claimed to be "native" Linux apps but were in fact simply Windows apps running under Wine. They were Windows programs that acted like Windows programs. In fact, in the file save/open dialog in WP you had to deal with drive letters !!!
The other problem with Linux as a game system is that the requirement to run the games can sometimes be very specific. For example, many of Loki's games stated that a 3DFx card was required. Even if other cards would work, most purchasers who didn't own a 3DFx would pass on it. Why couldn't the requirements have been a working OpenGL installation. Wouldn't that have made more sense? I personally own GeForce cards and never bought these games because I didn't want to be stuck with something that wouldn't run on my machine.
In any case, should another company come along and try to do Linux games, don't give us something that we've been playing on Windows for two years.
Look to Aspyr who does games for the Mac. In addition to porting some Windows games, the also make several very fun Mac only games. Ottomatic is a prime example of a great Mac only game. We don't have to have first person shooters or grand strategy games. Just give us a robot that protects earthlings from being abducted!
* As is generally the case, my opinions do not reflect those of my employer.
I think you could make money by charging for the binaries and giving away the source. The GPL doesn't say you can't, and in fact only states that the source has to be available -- not even included on the media.
I'm a programmer by trade, and there have been many times I've decided not to download a program simply because it would have to be compiled. For the vast majority of the world, that's way too much effort. Sell 'em the binaries.
I imagine a Buy-nary Public License that would say, "Compiled binary versions of The Program are available for sale through The Company. You may not distribute binary versions of The Program. If you distribute binaries which are modifications or derivatives of The Program, you must charge at least 10% more than The Company charges for The Program." Along with the normal GPL language, of course. When someone fixes a bug, writes an expansion, or includes a new feature, The Company could even pay them from the funds collected so far.
Look at it this way: even if everyone downloads the source for free and compiles it, you'll have contributed to increasing the average computer knowledge of the world.
Worth a shot.
For geek dads: Contraction Timer
I like video games, but not just FPS ones. I keep Quake2 and sometimes Doom for FPS, but other than that I don't play them. Postal (ja, I know, but I like psycho games like that) was the only game Loki had that I was interested in, but I didn't feel it was worth the price. If Loki had ported games like The Sims, GTA2, and some sports titles I would have been more apt to support them. I just can't see shelling out $50 for a FPS that just rehashes Quake and is cheaper for Windows.
Everytime you look at porn a devil gets their horns.
Alright!
This is what we love about Open Source - it never dies, and we can always keep coding.
--- Will in Seattle - What are you doing to fight the War?
> Also, it is easy to change the resolution in X;
> once it is set up, it is as simple as
>CNTL+ALT+'+' or CNTL+ALT+'-
Bah, and how do you disable that stupid "virtual desktop" ??
It is a nice option but it shouldn't be mandatory.
I think that the "graphic part" of the OS, is really behind Windows..
KDE feels too slow, Radeon's driver is quite limited and slower than the Windows version (if memory serves me well).
I've never been able to see "correctly" my TV on my computer on Linux (full-screen, with the correct resolution, with no virtual screen).
Is-it important? Well if you want mass-adoption things like this should work "out-of-the-box"..
I hope that Linux will have those capabilities in the future, but I believe that it will take quite a few years..