LGP Announces Game Development Project

michaelsimms writes "Linux Game Publishing is excited to announce our newest project to increase the appeal of Linux gaming. We are sponsoring the development of a from-scratch Linux title! We are looking for developers to work in a team to produce this game, and we will be publishing the game they make! If you are interested, please follow the link to our detailed announcement and within there you will find the rules, requirements, and application process. If you have wanted to get into the gaming industry, if you love playing games, and if you are a creative thinker, not afraid of a challenge and a bit of risk, then you need to take a look." I don't know whether to be happy about anything that promotes Linux gaming, or disappointed that people are being asked to work on a commercial project without a salary.

Comments

No Salary?

[aelfwyne]

A commercial game with no salary for developers? Count me out - in fact with that attitude I probably won't buy it either.

Re:No Salary?

[AlternateSyndicate]

Maybe you should read the article. The development team gets 90% of the game royalties to split amongst themselves. The average publisher today gives the development studio less (probably much less) than 15% of the royalties. If the game sells well, the extra 75% will more than make up for the lack of a salary.

Re:No Salary?

[meshko]

Of course its a troll, but it's the troll inpsired by the editor ("... or disappointed that people are being asked to work on a commercial project without a salary") so I'll bite.

They say that if the game brings in profit, the developers will get it. I think this is completely fair. Of course I'm not sure if that can be called sponsorship, because the really contribution from the LGP only starts when the game is well on its way (they will help to find artists etc).
I beleive this is quite fare and makes sense. Finding good Open Source developers is possible. Finding good artists is harder. Organizing the development process in any professional kind of manner is hardes. If they will make sure that selected developers have a clue and really provide them with artists and QA -- they have a chance (unlike 99% of game projects on SourceForge, for example).
My opinion is that it's a good idea and really nice of them, but I think that chances of success are around 20%. Success being a released title, of course.

Re:No Salary?

[AlternateSyndicate]

My bad, it's 70% instead of 90%, but my point still holds.

Re:No Salary?

[aelfwyne]

Okay, point taken. See my other post farther down.

Re:No Salary?

[zackbar]

Not necessarily a bad thing. Instead of a salary, you get a piece of the pie. With 70% of the revenue being split up among the developers, it could be lucrative.

But note that the primary benefit is breaking into the industry. It's extremely hard to get a game programming position without experience.

I'd consider it, but I haven't done any development for linux.

Re:No Salary?

[NorthDude]

If you had took the time to read the article, you would have realised that they offer 70% of what the game will generate in revenue.
If the game do not sell, LGP is the only one loosing money. If it sells, BOTH the developers and LGP will earn money.

In my opinion, thats a good deal.

Re:No salary?

[stratjakt]

That's not a salary.

My job pays me whether the applications I write are commercially successful or not.

Considering the commercial viability of linux based games at the moment is virtually zero, I'd say this is more like a lottery ticket than any promise of compensation.

Re:No Salary?

[stratjakt]

Whats 70% of 0 again, anyways?

If linux gaming had any commercial viability, EA and the other big dogs would be all over it. Not to mention that it's very hard to develop a commercially successful game in the first place, regardless of platform.

Without at least a windows port, and *very* aggressive marketing, this will make no money.

Re:No Salary?

[kyrre]

I remember reading about the guy that played Darth Vader in episode IV. He didn't belive that Star Wars would be a hit so I demanded a fixed salary instead of royalties like the studio wanted to give him. Guess who is bitter today? He now seems to make his living the bitter and sad story.

Royalties could be a good thing. The developers should get some money for food though. Game development require lots of time. Not many can have another job on the side. (If game is to be released before Duke Nukem Forever that is)

Re:No Salary?

[pixel_bc]

> The development team gets 90% of the
> game royalties to split amongst themselves.

Whoopy.

Do you have any clue as tohow many games actually end up paying royalties to anyone? I'd put the chance of seeing a cheque from them for working on this game just this side of nothing.

Re:No Salary?

[Anonymous Coward]

Even though LGP is doing this, I imagine that it would be acceptable if the game was developed totally outside Linux, as long as the final product was ported to Linux. At least one person would probably be using Linux, so that should be no problem. So, this may be a great opportunity for somebody who would like to develop a published game (Ha! Take that game companies that require entry-level programmers to have shipped at least one game!); the catch being that it will need a Linux version.

Re:No salary?

[ThaddeusAid]

important side note, 70% of revenue NOT profits, I have worked in the gaming industry before (Nexon.net and QA for Sony CEA PS2). That is a really good deal from what I have seen. (if I am reading that correctly)

Re:No salary?

[davidhedbor]

Who says it's Linux only? As a matter of fact, the press release, which you must not have taken the time to read (just as the editor who posted the story), specifically touches this issue:

"The game must run on the Linux platform, but this does NOT exclude other platforms. The development team is strongly advised to consider cross-platform development, as each platform increases revenue. This is purely at the decision of the development team. LGP will market the game wherever we can for any platform it runs on."

I.e it is STRONGLY ADVISED to develop the game with cross-platform issues in mind. This means that you'd likely see Windows, MacOS(X) and possibly other versions also available. Of course, the Linux version would be released in advance of other platforms.

Re:No Salary?

[math0ne]

It may sound like a bad deal but i think that for moast games that are developed the coders see alot less of the profit that 70%.

Re:No Salary?

[jgerman]

Finding good Open Source developers is possible. Finding good artists is harder.

Uh uh, un-qualified statement. I'd say not only are they of the same dificulty, they're one in the same challenge.

Re:No Salary?

[ThrasherTT]

Without at least a windows port, and *very* aggressive marketing, this will make no money

I argue that WITH a Windows port, AND very aggressive marketing, this will have approximately 0.01% chance of making any money. How many people out there have gotten a group of people together and tried to make a game on their spare time? How many have succeeded? How much did the successful groups and/or their publishers spend on advertising, and how much did they gain in sales?

Game development is VERY HARD, and game marketing isn't a bag of easy either. Add to that the fact that today's linux game market is so tiny, and you have a recipe for "being in the red."

Re:No Salary?

[tomhudson]

another quote from their site:

Artwork/Level Design/Music When the development has reached a suitable point where we know more about the art, level, and music requirements (if any), we will expand the team to include people with appropriate non-coding skills.

So, the coders will find out that they have to share their cut with people doing the art and music, who will also be cut in on the same basis - "if we make money, you make money"

Then, "well, we also need marketers, etc, so they're taking a cut of your royalties too"

Just my opinion, but anyone stupid enough to do this has:

1. Too much time on their hands
2. Not enough experience swimming with sharks

Here's their game scenario: You're the leader of SimThisBusinessSux, and you have to figure out how to get everyone to do the hard work, while you sit back and play big-shot.

Re:No Salary?

[mobiGeek]

If the game do not sell, LGP is the only one loosing money.

Do you live anywhere near southwestern Ontario? I need snow shovelled from my driveway but the pesky kids in the neighbourhood keep charging me money because they say their time is not free...it costs money.

Re:No Salary?

[Sevidrac]

People who run linux don't like to pay for software anyway. I'm sure the game would be highly successful, but I doubt it would "sell" many copies.

Go ahead and mod me down. But it's the truth.

Re:No Salary?

[God! Awful 2]

"Finding good Open Source developers is possible. Finding good artists is harder."
Uh uh, un-qualified statement. I'd say not only are they of the same dificulty, they're one in the same challenge.

Oddly enough, also an unqualified statement. Personally, I agree with the OP that finding open source developers is easier. Artists didn't have it easy for the last 10 years and they are less inclined to work for free.

-a

Re:No Salary?

[jgerman]

Oddly enough, also an unqualified statement

That was the point, it's an opinion. Furthermore, no one said anything about working for free.

Re:No Salary?

[Anonymous Coward]

Game development is VERY HARD, and game marketing isn't a bag of easy either. Add to that the fact that today's linux game market is so tiny, and you have a recipe for "being in the red."

Wrong. Mike Simms just needs to sell enough to cover printing costs which are not huge. He's done it before, using dvd cases (check tuxgames.com).

The development costs to him are zero.

No one is going to get rich from this, but it's a pretty cool deal.
For ten hours a week you get to work on a linux game that actually gets published and possibly even make a little cash.
At minimun its nice resume material for the aspiring game developer.

Re:No Salary?

[AlternateSyndicate]

For the record, I have work for a company like that on my resume, and a major game studio paid money to fly me out for an interview. Though they didn't hire me, I'd infer from this experience that some people take this company more seriously than you do.

Also for the record, this was written by Brian Hook, formerly of Id Software. While other things on his resume are certainly more impressive, his association with LGP also goes to show that real people in the game industry take this company more seriously than you do.

Re:No Salary?

[Anonymous Coward]

Ohh that's right. Nothing is better than something.

"Hire me im a game programmer! Just take my work for it ok?"

Re:No Salary?

[ThrasherTT]

No, 10 hours a week spent on a project that has little or no bearing on reality isn't as good as 10 hours a week spent working on something more mainstream. Face it... linux game development is not the best path to breaking into the game industry. Why? Because the game industry in general doesn't take linux gaming seriously. How do I know? If they did, there would be more linux games.

Re:No Salary?

[ThrasherTT]

For the record, I have work for a company like that [linuxgamepublishing.com] on my resume, and a major game studio paid money to fly me out for an interview

And what else was on your resume? If that was the only thing, I'd be impressed. Otherwise it is a datapoint for which you have no control. How many people were flown out there that didn't have an LGP-alike credit? How many of those people were hired in comparison to those with LGP-alike credits?

Brian Hook doesn't need to break into the game industry. Brian Hook probably doesn't need to work, at this point (pure conjecture based on reading his online interviews). If I were able to spent my "day job" time doing "free time" things, I'd work on something for an LGP-alike.

If you want to break into the game industry, do something more mainstream, like set up a team to make a total conversion for an existing game. IM(not-so)HO, this would give you a much better range of coverage. Also, see my response to your post's sibling AC post.

Re:No Salary?

[Anonymous Coward]

Sam Lantinga worked for Loki, he's now at Blizzard.

Daniel Vogel worked for Loki, he's now working at Epic.

All those guys linux game programmer dudes went on to do something else in gaming.

I personally spent some time working at a game studio in doing some Lua scripting for a ps2 game. Though my programming experience was only business applications, the lead programmer liked that I knew someting about SDL and openGL.

I never said you'd be the lead programmer on the next big title at EA or id based on your linux game programming experience. But everyone has to start somewhere.

Re:No Salary?

[Anonymous Coward]

It just means that you have to use your current job to subsidize your work on another project in your free time. (Basically, you keep your current job and let it pay the bills while you work on this game project.)

The risk to him is very, very little. If you hit it big, so does he. If you fail, he loses nothing.

However, your risk is fairly high. The game market (regardless of platform) is extremely competitive. (BTW: game programmers have been known to work 80+ hour weeks, not 10, and still fail.)

Unless you have a really good idea, *and* the project doesn't manage to fold from lack of funding (oh wait, you get no funding from the start), *and* it doesn't take you 20 years to get the game out because you have 50 people working only 10 hours a week, *and* you have quality people who already know wtf they are doing (those folks are probably already working for someone and aren't going to have the time to work on this), *and* you actually manage to sell some games, THEN you might make $24.95 after the split because it is OSS most will want it free... *with* the source code. Of course, this allows them to modify the game, make it better, use the code in it for their own games and such down the road, leaving you sitting at your machine playing their game.

Re:No Salary?

[duren686]

So? Every other guy at Blizzard didn't work for Loki, and they're working at Blizzard now! Statistically, I'd have a better chance of getting into a good gaming company without Linux game experience.

Re:No Salary?

[Anonymous Coward]

Well no shit, captain obvious.

I was just replying to ThrasherTT's inference that linux experience is irrelevant.

Yes most game programmers don't have linux game programming experience.
But any game programming experience helps even if its on a less popular platform. PS2 programming is not exactly the same as GameCube programming is not the same as windows directX programming is not the same as SDL.

Still, experience in programming things like collision detection, scenegraphs, and AI scripting can carry over.

Re:No Salary?

[curtisellis]

Almost everyone if not everyone at Blizzard has worked somewhere else (if not LGP). If you look at any job posting for a game programming job you have to have 2 published titles before they will look at you seriously. So any chance to get your name on a published title is the best way to get into the industry.

Re:No Salary?

[t0qer]

Counter strike, if I remember right that mod made the dev's no money until it got popular.

Now those mod dev's are laughing all the way to the bank.

It's for authenticity...

[Quarters]

disappointed that people are being asked to work on a commercial project without a salary.

How else could they hold 100% true to their offer of, "Do you want to get into the gaming industry"?

Re:It's for authenticity...

[Anonymous Coward]

It's a good thing I don't have moderator points, 'cause I wouldn't be able to choose between Funny and Insightful.

(anonymous for obvious reasons)

Good intentions, but a dumb method I think

[laetus]

Since they're not paying the developers (but are generously paying the publishing & distribution costs), why not open it up to a competition? Tell people, look, everyone can participate. The deadline for submitting your game is (DATE). After we receive all entries, we'll decide which is the killer Linux game and publish it.

Sounds better than simply, we're gonna choose 8 people and then let them come up with a game. Sometimes synergy in groups doesn't work that way.

Let individuals groups compete.

Re:Good intentions, but a dumb method I think

[treke]

They arent paying the developers, but they are providing some financial support. If you need some tool/library/engine and can justify the price of it to them, they have said they would be willing to pay ( within reason, i doubt they would be able to foot the bill for a Doom 3 license).

Getting a couple of projects to compete for the publishing deal would be a good way to spur development, but would be prohibitive when you know you only have the resources to publish one or two of them.

Re:Good intentions, but a dumb method I think

[MikeFM]

I'd like that but think there should be some influence from them. One of the benefits to how they are doing it now is you get a feedback cycle from them. For new game developers that is very helpful. Also I think they should require any source produced will be opened say 3 years after the game begins distribution. (Similar to id's games.)

I like this idea in general though. I hope they are just testing the waters. I'd like to see more original Linux games funded. If they had a contest I hope they'd think of publishing any worth while games and not just the top entry. Something along the lines of having them each judged on playability, stability, sound, and graphics and publish any game that ranks high enough.

Re:Good intentions, but a dumb method I think

[e2d2]

Playing on your idea - what I would love to see is something similiar to Project Green light, where developers create game idea submissions, complete with specs, etc, and submit those ideas to a game development company, who in turn chooses one game idea to be developed. It would be great publicity for the game development house and great for the developer that lacks the funding/tools necessary to publish a good game. The developer could also come to work for the game development shop after the project if both parties agreed.

Of course on the other hand the game development companies might not have a lack of good ideas and this is all a waste. But I think it would be a great way to promote the development house to the development community and others. Plus it would be a good tool for recruitment, many game developers simply start out building their own maps or add-ons and get offered jobs, this is simply a spin on that.

Re:Good intentions, but a dumb method I think

[Lussarn]

They want exactly one topnotch game, composed by the best team they can gather. Making a top/commerial quality game takes time and thats probably not so well suited for a hobby competition.

Just my take on it.

Re:Good intentions, but a dumb method I think

[kyrre]

Since they're not paying the developers (but are generously paying the publishing & distribution costs), why not open it up to a competition? Tell people, look, everyone can participate. The deadline for submitting your game is (DATE). After we receive all entries, we'll decide which is the killer Linux game and publish it.

Lokigames did this type of thing a few months before they closed shop. Anyone know what happened to that competition?

Anyway, competitions like this tend to create lots of tetris/solitaire/pacman clones. We have those already.

Re:Good intentions, but a dumb method I think

[michaelsimms]

Yes, that is one way of doing it, but, then a lot of people may do lots of work for no return, and that doesnt seem fair. One of the goals of LGP is that people get compensated for their work, and if 9 out of 10 groups that made a game get rejected, that would suck for those groups.

Re:Good intentions, but a dumb method I think

[Tyreth]

I think that if you did this, there would be a lot less committed people in the group. If you make it a select few that feel they earned their way in, then they are much more likely to committ. I know personally that it's hard to get a group of people together to make a game without much motivation.

If it were easy then there'd probably be more good quality opensource games out there.

Slash

[$$$$$exyGal]

... or disappointed that people are being asked to work on a commercial project without a salary.

Maybe we should all help contribute to the 'slash' code instead of working on this commercial project. Ha!

--sex

Re:Slash

[Anonymous Coward]

and you got modded down by one of his cyber-sex/pic swapping partners. ain't that a bitch?

*braces to get hit with a -1 troll*

Re:Slash

[Anonymous Coward]

It's unfortunate that you must be modded down as offtopic for making an observation of fact.

Go troll his/her horse-shit journal if you're bored.

No Salary? So What?

[Anonymous Coward]

There are a good many open source coders who work on projects without being paid to do so right now. What difference does it really make whether the end result is sold or given away? Some things get done simply because people have a passion for doing them, and whether freeware or commercial, the product could help Linux. Earn your money, put food on your table, and if you're still looking for a creative outlet, here's your opportunity!

Re:No Salary? So What?

[aelfwyne]

Giving away your time and code is one thing.

Giving away your time and code for the sole purpose of creating an open source project that someone else profits from, while offering you no interest in that profit, is a totally different thing.

Perhaps if they offer royalties from the sale, that would be a *start*... Not being sure what kind of sales they could expect, I could see no salary from that angle, but *only* if the developers have hope of a royalty if it is successful.

Anything else is unethical. Why should I give them free money?

Re:No Salary? So What?

[spinkham]

Um.. Because they are giving the developers 70% of the royalties, which is a quite different from 0%.
THe articles short. Please read it...

Re:No Salary? So What?

[oliverthered]

I don't want profit. I want freedom.

I currently redirect a fair amount of my salary towards freedom, so undermining the false economy.

If there were a world wide economic collapse tomorrow, would my work be worth any less?

Wha?

[govtcheez]

How is this any different than the 10000 "Let's make a game!" posts seen on messageboards everywhere?

Re:Wha?

[Antity-H]

This is different in the way that LGP is already in for publishing the game when it is completed.
They won't have to fight their way through publishing companies to find one that will find their project insteresting among the hundreds such companies must receive each month

In addition, there is a high porbability that as soon as they have something with a shape, they will get subventions from LGP to help finish it

I am an idealist .. and so what? If LGP realy wants tu push Linux games they must know they will have to make a few sacrifices at the beginning. Afteward if they play it well, they will 'own' the linux game market

Re:Wha?

[Textbook Error]

Afteward if they play it well, they will 'own' the linux game market

100% of a very small number is still a very small number.

Re:Wha?

[dbullock]

Because all of those naive soul's don't get picked up on slashdot.

This sounds like a horribly misguided way to manage a project. They want to put a team together, then pick a target? Achievement is not accomplished through democracy, it's achieved through leadership and focussed goal setting.

They've only decided on an ideology (released on Linux first), so in one sense they're behind all the other guys who post "let's make a game" because they don't even know what game they're making.

When you fail to plan, you plan to fail.

This will fail.

Re:Wha?

[Eric Damron]

I don't think it is as bad as you portray it to be.

It won't be an easy task but I could see it succeeding if the team members are motivated and dedicated.

Re:Wha?

[dbullock]

This is different in the way that LGP is already in for publishing the game when it is completed.
They won't have to fight their way through publishing companies to find one that will find their project insteresting among the hundreds such companies must receive each month

Reread it more slowly. LGP is only reserving an option to publish it. They reserve the right to not publish it if it's not good enough.

Not being paid?

[binaryDigit]

disappointed that people are being asked to work on a commercial project without a salary

In a way ANYONE who contributes to Linux is doing just that. When people like IBM et al selling product that in large part was written by individuals that will never be "paid" for their efforts, I don't see how this is any different. Is there anyone out there who contributes that thinks that their work won't eventually end up in a product that is sold (i.e. someone else will generate revenue from their efforts)?

Re:Not being paid?

[Anonymous Coward]

But some companies like IBM do *pay* people to work on Linux.

Re:Not being paid?

[binaryDigit]

But some companies like IBM do *pay* people to work on Linux.

Right, but a great part of the code that they sell was written by programmers who'll never see a penny for their efforts. Not that this is bad, since like I said, many/most of these programmers know this up front.

Re:Not being paid?

[briancnorton]

IBM isnt making a cent off of the efforts of the developers of linux. They are bundling them with their systems for their customers convenience. In theory, the customer could download them for free. What they are paying big blue for is the hardware, the closed IBM software, support,and IT services. The difference is that the game they are talking about will be SOLD, with all the profits will go somewhere else. The code they are asking for wont be freely available elsewhere.

Re:Not being paid?

[binaryDigit]

IBM isnt making a cent off of the efforts of the developers of linux.

This is false. If Linux were not pushing IBM hardware sales, they would not be taking the time to sell systems with it installed. People buy solutions from Big Blue, not just hardware. IBM sells solutions based on Linux because that is what SELLS. Linux sells systems. Someone who is spending 7 figures for a system from IBM is NOT thinking about downloading some distro to run on their fancy hardware.

with all the profits will go somewhere else

Err, FALSE. Read their release

2) 70% of sales revenue will go to the development company, to be divided up as the team sees fit. The remainder of the money will go to LGP to pay for marketing, and other publishing expenses.

You DID read it didn't you?

Re:Not being paid?

[rowanxmas]

Someone who is spending 7 figures for a system from IBM is NOT thinking about downloading some distro to run on their fancy hardware.

Oh yeah? I bet that if it is some hacker turned IT manager that is the first thing he thinking of...Dream Sequence: Wow..DeepBlue! I bet this thing will kick as$ at Q3A/D3/New Game Being Made the people this article is asking for/WC3 all at the same time! Dream Sequence

I dunno...

[zeronode]

Working on a game is a long long process, and more often than not, deadlines are missed and toward the ship date, everyone pulls the all nighters. But they get paid for it. I'm not saying that people won't do this, but I think it would be kind of hard to hold down the day job, which pays the bills, and still work on this project and come close to the deadlines.

Then again, I could be wrong.

Re:I dunno...

[michaelsimms]

As long as the deadlines are realistic.

LGP will be supplying an experienced project manager to help the group with this (at our expense).

10 hours a week is a reasonable commitment, its 2 hours every evening or a long day at the weekend, its somethign that people can do and keep a job too. with a good project manager and realistic deadlines, this isnt an issue

Re:I dunno...

[Black_Logic]

If you're a young guy in college looking to get a job in the game industry, this may look good on resume, no?

Re:I dunno...

[Anonymous Coward]

10 hours a week is a reasonable commitment, its 2 hours every evening or a long day at the weekend, its somethign that people can do and keep a job too. with a good project manager and realistic deadlines, this isnt an issue

You're smoking crack if you think 10 hours a week is a reasonable commitment for a professional quality game. At my previous position I put it closer to 80 hours a week, got paid for 40 (love salary!) and we still had an extension before we shipped.

If you have a team of developers putting in 10 hours a week, you might get a game done in oh... 5 years or so. By which time all the technology you were targeting will be woefully out of date. At that point you might have to risk horrendous sales, or start nearly from scratch (e.g. Duke Nukem Forever).

- SEAL

How to get gamers on Linux...

[Anonymous Coward]

Build the best Tetris EVER! Everyone loves Tetris, and we need the best possible Tetris experience. So, in conclusion, focus all efforts on Tetris because Tetris rules. Thank you.

Re:How to get gamers on Linux...

[kfg]

I understand the lure you're trolling before my eyes.

Still, the part of the equation you've missed is that if it really *was* the best Tetris ever, and offered for a fair price, I'd buy it. And so would others.

It's OK to make good things better and better things great.

KFG

Taking free software to the extreme...

[Anonymous Coward]

Work for us! Create the best game ever!

We won't pay you & you don't get royalties either!

Truely free (for us) software! Only $39.95!

Re:Taking free software to the extreme...

[michaelsimms]

erm, we pay them 70% of all royalties and they get 90% stake in the company itself. How is that not paying them anything?

Re:Taking free software to the extreme...

[MisterFancypants]

Haha what a scam this stupid shit is. Hint to developers: Market the game yourself. Keep 100% of the profits, not 70%. Go the shareware route, perhaps. You'll do better alone than tied to these LGP assholes.

Re:Taking free software to the extreme...

[LinuxInDallas]

Market the game "ourselves?" I am no expert but the deal seems reasonable. You put time up-front and the company agress to front the money to market the game. In return you get a share of the pie. I don't know how much money it takes to market a game, but I am guessing it is not insignificant.

Re:Taking free software to the extreme...

[davidhedbor]

Right, because if you want your game published, you usually get to keep 100% of the profits. Of course, as you know, you don't get to keep 100%. If you do online publishing (the various places with downloadable games), you usually get 30-50%. Do "offline" publising and you get perhaps 5-20%.

Getting 70% for a game which is published, and more importantly, marketed, is a great deal.

So please go climb into your own hole - there's obviously a lot of space in there.

Re:Taking free software to the extreme...

[Cromac]

Go the shareware route, perhaps.

No kidding, that seems to have worked rather well for Id, and that was before really wide spread use of the Internet. I downloaded DOOM via 14.4 modem off Compuserve, how much easier would it be to distribute your shareware version today? A good or great game using the business model Id used/uses will almost surely take off (no such thing as a sure thing).

Re:Taking free software to the extreme...

[dolson]

LGP sells their products in DVD cases, not as downloads. You're thinking of that shit company, Transgaming.

They're offering to pay for production/advertistin

[laetus]

Coming up with a killer game is only half the battle. Getting it onto CDs, into boxes, out to stores and into the minds of gamers is the other half.

someone make a new Master of Magic!

[IsoRashi]

Since it seems like most of the game design / planning is left up to the developers, this could be the opportunity for someone to come up with a game that is worthy of being the sequel to Master of Magic! A lot of older gamers absolutely adore that game and still get a lot of play out of it. A game of that caliber could be something of a "killer-app", imo.

Re:someone make a new Master of Magic!

[mrrc00]

I loved that game. Personally, I think if its graphics were brought up to par with Heroes of Might and Magic IV or Age of Mythology, the game would make a huge amount of money today.

Anyone care to create FreeMOM (Masters of Magic) ?

Re:someone make a new Master of Magic!

[Anonymous Coward]

Off-topic, I know, since the overall subject is Linux gaming, but to answer your question...

Age of Wonders (and, I believe, its sequel, although I've never played it) is as close to a Master of Magic sequel as I can imagine. The main difference is that gameplay is much less open-ended; the game is broken into scenarios, and you have specific objectives in each one. Still, the theme is similar, combat is nearly identical, and it even has the same magic types (represented by spheres instead of books). The graphics aren't spectacular, but they're not bad either, and the original game is old enough that I've seen it in a jewel-case-only package at OfficeMax for $9.99. The sequel can be had for about $20. Of course, it's Windows-only, so if your point was that you want a Linux game, then your proposed "FreeMoM" would have to suffice.

Re:someone make a new Master of Magic!

[twalk]

I'm working on such a game. (I'm NOT going to post my website up here. The bandwidth fees would kill me...)

It's on Palm only. (I don't have a team, just me, and working on the Palm is limited enough that one person can do it.) At Handango (www.handango.com) look up Fantasy Realms 2, and then picture this with a map, spell & artifact research, a HOMM type building style, resources, multiple planes, etc. (It will be a minimum of 6 more months before this is out.)

Re:someone make a new Master of Magic!

[Anonymous Coward]

Already done!

Check out Dominions at www.illwinter.com.

Marketing

[The Bungi]

1) When the game is complete, LGP will publish your game. We will pay 100% of the costs to have it produced, marketed, and retailed worldwide.

Anyone have any idea of how effective LGP is at this? Does "worldwide" mean "HTTP downloads from around the world" or do they really have a shrink-wrapped, on the shelf capability?

I've sure as heck never seen a Linux-specific game on a shelf at Best Buy or some other place like that.

Because otherwise, well. The "we'll give you 70% of the revenue" is not so enticing. AFAIK the bulk of game sales is still through the retail channel, not online sales.

I'm genuinely interested - this looks like an Linux project that would be really worthwile to participate in (ie, it has a better than average possibility of turning a profit).

Re:Marketing

[dr_dank]

I've sure as heck never seen a Linux-specific game on a shelf at Best Buy or some other place like that.

Try your local Microcenter. The one near me has quite a bit of shelf space dedicated to Linux. They also sell the Loki titles as well as Tuxracer.

Re:Marketing

[The Bungi]

No Microcenter here. Do you know if Fry's Electronics carries Linux titles?

Re:Marketing

[treke]

It isnt downloads from around the world, but LGPs stuff is mostly sold online. Its more of shrink wrapped products off a warehouse shelf shipped straight to your door. I've seen Linux games on store shelves before, but not in the past two or three years. Guess they just didnt sell well enough

Re:Marketing

[michaelsimms]

We have resellers round the world and have products in physical packages already. The game will sell in a DVD-style box, same as many newer games do.

Re:Marketing

[kfg]

Last time I went into my local Best Buy they had an entire Linux section, including commercial games.

So did EB.

Go figure.

Mind you I havn't been in either since Loki closed the doors, but they've certainly demonstrated a willingness to stock if the titles are available.

KFG

Re:Marketing

[treke]

Not anymore. Fry's used to have a decent sized selection of games ( well about a dozen or so ) boxed for Linux. Dont think I've seen any since about 2001 though

Re:Marketing

[The Bungi]

Cool, thanks for jumping in.

Even if I don't go at it, I wish you (and everyone who takes the challenge) best of luck. Maybe this will be the thing that "mainstreams" Linux on the desktop.

Re:Marketing

[The Bungi]

Last time I went into my local Best Buy they had an entire Linux section, including commercial games.

Not here, at least not the last time I looked (early 2002).

Then again I've been buying games through Amazon lately (bundled with CDs and books where it makes sense to offset shipping costs) or getting them as gifts, so I haven't bought retail in a while.

Re:Marketing

[binaryDigit]

Anyone have any idea of how effective LGP is at this? Does "worldwide" mean "HTTP downloads from around the world" or do they really have a shrink-wrapped, on the shelf capability? I've sure as heck never seen a Linux-specific game on a shelf at Best Buy or some other place like that.

The question is not "can they produce off the shelf titles", the question is "do they WANT TO produce off the shelf titles". Creating OTS stuff takes more money than simply allowing downloads. The issue is whether or not you sell enough copies OTS to make up for the extra expenses involved in producing it.

Re:Marketing

[John Harrison]

Where are you at? The place with the highest density of Fry's (Bay Area) also has a MicroCenter in Santa Clara IIRC.

Re:Marketing

[Blondie-Wan]

I've sure as heck never seen a Linux-specific game on a shelf at Best Buy or some other place like that.

I do realize it's an aberration, but FWIW I saw the Linux versions of both Quake III Arena and Myth II: Soulblighter at a Babbage's in Gainesville, Florida.

Re:Marketing

[FortKnox]

I'll reply directly to you for my question...

What difference is this linux game, and garage games "$100 per license of the Torque engine (with all tools) and garage games will publish the game", deal?

And... the developers probably have to hold onto day jobs, so it'll be VERY difficult to produce anything graphic intensive (well, it can happen, but the graphics will be FAR outdated by the time the development is over).

AND... the standard game developing ratio is 10 graphic artists/animators for every 1 developer. Is there going to be enough artists for the project??

Re:Marketing

[The Bungi]

Not in the bay area for sure =)

Let's just say I'm about 400 miles from the nearest store, if their maps are correct.

Won't work.

[supabeast!]

Open-Source/Free games for Linux will not solve the lack of games for Linux. The only way to get game developers to come to Linux is to develop a Direct-X like API that makes it easy to develop Linux-native games. Until that happens, Linux gaming will continue to revolve around WineX, id Software, Epic, and begging game companies to release Linux executables.

Given how unlikely it is that the Open-Source/Free software community could ever come together to make a decent cross-distro API, your best bet is to just subscribe to WineX.

Re:Won't work.

[kiolbasa]

How about SDL, developed primarily by Loki? Pretty decent so far, from what I've used of it.

Re:Won't work.

[oliverthered]

Well, there's OpenGL.
Standard API's for joysticks,
sound (alsa/oss) etc...
Xine, more or less standard nowadays.
KIOSlaves for all you io needs.
What else do you want.

Wine X is good for all the current titles out there.

BTW Last check the ATI drivers didn't work with Wine X

Re:Won't work.

[VP]

The only way to get game developers to come to Linux is to develop a Direct-X like API that makes it easy to develop Linux-native games.

You mean like SDL? It was developed originally by Loki, and was used for their ports to Linux...

Re:Won't work.

[Anonymous Coward]

umm.. libsdl.org ?

Re:Won't work.

[damiam]

develop a Direct-X like API

You mean like SDL?

Re:Won't work.

[La Temperanza]

What does DirectX have that SDL does not, other then zilch portability? Or plib, or ClanLib.

Re:Won't work.

[Anonymous Coward]

>> What does DirectX have that SDL does not, other then zilch portability?

Compatibility with all the hardware on the shelves at Best Buy, for one.

I'm not buying a new (new as in older and less capable but supported) video card just to play Tux Racer.

Re:Won't work.

[Anonymous Coward]

Open-Source/Free games for Linux will not solve the lack of games for Linux. The only way to get game developers to come to Linux is to develop a Direct-X like API that makes it easy to develop Linux-native games.

Ever heard of SDL?

Given how unlikely it is that the Open-Source/Free software community could ever come together to make a decent cross-distro API, your best bet is to just subscribe to WineX.

Wrong. Why are you so Windows-centric? The reason linux lacks games is because no one thinks that linux is a marketable gaming platform. This comes from the observation of, at the current time, there are no linux games, only windows ones. So no publisher even considers it, and writes for the same old directx platfrom. This is wrong. There is no market (...commercial one that is) for linux unless publishers make one. They're not providing one, so there won't be one, so they see no linux games, so they don't make linux games, and just becomes a cycle..

What this offers is a step up for a linux game programmers to create a linux game. There won't be a market until someone(s) just does it.

Re:Won't work.

[Redline]

The only way to get game developers to come to Linux is to develop a Direct-X like API that makes it easy to develop Linux-native games.

What's wrong with SDL / OpenGL? It is stable, featureful, and cross-platform. The API is full featured, and the implementation is rock-solid. Throw in OpenAL, and you have got everything that DirectX does (except stupid patented crap like force-feedback input) in a standards-based package.
That is about as "linux-native" as it gets. I can't think of a single desktop-targetted distro that doesn't include the SDL libraries. If more windows developers used SDL for their games, then the Linux and MacOSX ports would be almost effortless.

Re:Won't work.

[praxim]

I think the wealth of SDL/OpenGL comments you see pretty much spells out what's wrong with game development on Linux. I'm fairly sure that the Linux gaming crowd is a vocal minority at best, and few companies can afford to target this group. IIRC, profit margins on your average PC game are rather slim.
It doesn't matter how good your APIs are- if people don't think they can profit from their work on your platform, they won't write for it. Just look at BeOS, which had a beautiful API but failed because it simply wasn't commercially viable.

Re:Won't work.

[ggambett]

There is such API, it's SDL, as most guys pointed out. However, it's slightly lower-level than DirectX - using 2D and 3D (via OpenGL) in the same window requires some work, but it can be done (I hacked transparent 3D support in my SDL-based sprite library in a weekend).

And it is really cross-platform, as it runs on Linux, Windows, BeOS, MacOS and many more. Personally, I tested its portability making and running a moderately complex game in both Windows and Linux with almost zero changes (I had some trouble with SDL_Mixer and #ifdef'd some native windows calls, but I have to check OpenAL sometime)

Re:Won't work.

[davidhedbor]

I don't understand why this post has is insightful. Rather it is, as pointed out by prevoous posters, entirely based onto invalid statements.

SDL exists and works great (and are also used increasingly by Windows developers in favor of DirectX). There are other API's as well - for audio we have SDL / SDL_mixer, mikmod and OpenAL (to mention a few select ones).

Besides, in this case it we're not even talking about "Open Source / Free games" but rather a commercial product which INITIALLY would be Linux only. It would of course most likely be ported to other platforms - since SDL, OpenGL and such API's would be used, porting would be a snap (it wouldn't surprise me if initial development was done on multiple architectures in the very least).

Re:Won't work.

[ImpTech]

I am not a game developer, but I don't think I buy this. For graphics we have OpenGL, which is as good as, if not better than Direct3d. For sound and other multimedia stuff we have SDL, which seemed to work just fine for Loki, may they rest in peace. I guess we probably don't have DirectX's networking component, but any game I can't play through a NAT firewall setup isn't worth my time anyway. I suppose we don't have DirectX-style peripheral drivers, though I never understood why people needed a wrapper around the joystick interface anyway.

Now, I am a WineX subscriber, and I like their product, but it does not even remotely cut it as a Linux gaming solution. Every game has its own bizarre bugs, no game works on every system, performance is not great, and the sound support is abysmal. Its a stopgap solution at best.

In short, the tools for making great games are there, we just need people to use them, which is what this project is all about.

Re:Won't work.

[Dunkalis]

SDL works. Not only does it work, its ultraportable, and it runs on virtually every platform available. Windows, Mac OS X, Unix variants, and so forth. I think its also available for PS2!

In conjunction with OpenGL, you can create a game that can run on any platform. And the API is simple. Which is good.

Re:Won't work.

[Patoski]

The only way to get game developers to come to Linux is to develop a Direct-X like API that makes it easy to develop Linux-native games.

The existence of all the high quality Loki ports refutes this utterly. SDL, OpenGL and OpenAL are some noteable examples of cross platform and open APIs that are very useable.

The real reason you don't see alot of professional quality Free Software games is the lack of Free art and music assets. Coding is only about 10%-20% of the job of creating a professional level game. Why do you think one sees so many Free Software/Open Source board games, tetris, and old school arcade clone? Its because the art requirements on these types of ventures are very small. Coders grok the concepts behind Free Software but its a much more difficult job getting artists (and musicians to an extent) to understand and contribute.

The reason one doesn't see many commercial Linux ports is because the Linux desktop market isn't quite large enough for development houses to justify the effort (although this is beginning to change).

Re:Won't work.

[Anonymous Coward]

Actually, NVIDIA and ATI both provide rather decent Linux drivers for their latest offerings.

Re:Won't work.

[supabeast!]

"Ever heard of SDL?"

Yes. And if Linux gamers rally around SDL, providing SDL with the funding, support, and evangelism that MSFT gives to DirectX, SDL could be a solution.

"Wrong. Why are you so Windows-centric?"

I'm not being Windows-centric, just practical. I give money to Transgaming so that I can play games on Linux. Maybe it isn't the perfect solution, but it works.

Re:Won't work.

[La Temperanza]

Not to mention SDL has zilch to do with video card support. That's a function of the Direct Rendering Infrastructure, part of the kernel.

Re:Won't work.

[Anonymous Coward]

SDL is an abstraction layer that provides a common API across platforms. In other words, it provides a wrapper around system-dependent rendering systems. On Windows, it uses DirectX.

So, SDL is compatible with every DirectX video card out there, whether on Best Buy's shelf or not.

Re:Won't work.

[StarTux]

Huh,

Been living in a closet? We have SDL (http://www.libsdl.org) and FLTK (http://www.fltk.org). Not to mention OpenAL nor Miles sound system.

Winex is good for those games that either had a developer who would never port to Linux (aka Microsoft).

As for DirectX, well if you follow any game related mailing list you'd know DX9 has been causing a lot of issues with games...

StarTux

Re:Won't work.

[Anonymous Coward]

money doesn't solve anything but it DOES provide a nice excuse

any game produced under linux will probably use SDL. whether aware of it or not....

it's not a matter of sales or evangelism - although both ARE present.

The real problem here IS the art/media prob. Focusing on the code is a nebbish - if you were to write everything in
a full commercial game -could- be coded entirely in, say, python. (see frozen bubble for a nice example).

There's three serious issues outstanding I've seen:

- no usable modellers (although wings3d is nice)

- no usable music creation progs (I haven't had much luck here - I've got MIDI instruments but nothing that can produce nice, say, XM-style music)

- a community that doesn't tend to respect or understand artistic work

TBQH the mundane world doesn't support the last, but c'est la vie, n'est-ce pas?

Re:Won't work.

[Anonymous Coward]

DirectX equivalent?

SDL / OpenGL is a pretty cool combination.
I'd prefer OpenGL for rendering over Direct3d any day, and SDL is simple, but it serves it's purpose.

Huh?

[gpinzone]

I don't know whether to be happy about anything that promotes Linux gaming, or disappointed that people are being asked to work on a commercial project without a salary.

RedHat...IBM...And this is different from that way Linux itself is promoted, how?

Re:Huh?

[Anonymous Coward]

Not even comparable.

People need to read the fucking article. Mike Simms is paying most of the profits to the dev team.

So, basically, they're a new RIAA?

[Anonymous Coward]

Work for peanuts in exchange for promotion/advertising and become a slave for life? Sounds like fun.

Re:So, basically, they're a new RIAA?

[Anonymous Coward]

If "peanuts" is 70% of the revenue, and "slave for life" is no future obligations, then yes, you are correct.

PS: read the article, *then* post.

Re:So, basically, they're a new RIAA?

[Anonymous Coward]

PS: read the article, *then* post.

You must be new to Slashdot.

Re:So, basically, they're a new RIAA?

[Anonymous Coward]

Revenue? We are talking about trying to sell something to a group that has demonstrated time and time again that they don't like paying for anything. As soon as this game comes out, every linux gamer will have a free copy of it.

Re:So, basically, they're a new RIAA?

[masq]

Actually, I usually have a copy *before* it comes out.

Re:So, basically, they're a new RIAA?

[tomhudson]

it's 70% of the "royalties", not revenue.

The poster has a valid point.

As for the RTFA comment, the site is slashdotted :-(

Besides, the next logical question is "who owns the code?" After all, say the game isn't a success, but they use the code/engine for something else. Aren't you SOL?

here's my game idea

[Anonymous Coward]

FORKLIFT KILL!

You drive a killer forklift and steal stuff from Sam's Club. And when the manager tries to stop you, you impale him with a forklift, then you slam his head up and down on a shelf!

Re:here's my game idea

[Gizzmonic]

From a previous slashdot post.

Peepoh:One hot dog in a bun, comin' right up!

YourMissionForToday:Go and steal stuff now!

YourMissionForToday:with a forklift!

Peepoh:Yes, Master of Forkliftery! I must obey!

YourMissionForToday:but don't get it too heavy, or it could weigh down your forklift!

Peepoh:Not the Power Jackoff 2000! Let's get a bunch of blow up dolls and dress them up in graduation robes, and leave them in Church!@

Peepoh:then we steal the stations of the cross with our forklifts!

YourMissionForToday:Yeah, then we blame it on the blowup dolls!

Peepoh:yeah! and it'll work because the night before we'll replace their security tapes with tapes we've edited of the dolls perpetrating the crime!

YourMissionForToday:Yeah, with zombies dressed up as Lenin and Stalin helping them!

Peepoh:no, the zombies ARE Lenin and Stalin!

YourMissionForToday:Great idea, but they wear party hats and the blow up dolls only get to wear graduation hats

Peepoh:yeah, at first.

YourMissionForToday:and there's a jesus piñata!

Peepoh:but then we DRILL the fuck out of their zombie asses with our big industrial drills!

YourMissionForToday:right, and then we look like the heroes!

YourMissionForToday: (we have to dress like mexican peasants)

Peepoh:yeah, because the cops would arrive on the scene just in time to witness us spraying zombie innards all over the tabernacle!

YourMissionForToday:Yeah, and then we just post like mexican construction workers who stopped by to pray to our lady of guadalupe on our way home after the night shift!

Peepoh:oh good thinking! that explains why we have the big industrial drills at church!

YourMissionForToday:That, and cause we were going to get them blessed for St. Blaises' Day!

Peepoh:When we drill into people's throats!

YourMissionForToday:And then we claim that we're Michael the Archangel after we do that...no, wait, you're Michael the Archangel and I'm Captain America!

Peepoh:no, you're Leonardo the Archangel, John's Donatello the Archangel, and Robert is Raphael the Archangel!

YourMissionForToday:Cowabunga, d00d! You're right!

Re:here's my game idea

[Mr Thinly Sliced]

I think you need to expand on the shelf concept. That shows most promise.

no salary? so what..

[zuralin]

if they become a part of this project and project turns out to be a huge success then it will make it for the lack of salary because some huge gaming developer might just hire you. wasn't there an article (i think this one) on /. a while ago that to in order to gain experience and build up your resume in the tech industry your gonna have to volunteer?

Umm. I'll do this too.

[Gannoc]

ANNOUNCEMENT:

I'm taking applications for people to make a product for me. I'm much more flexible, in that it _doesn't have to be a game_. It could be anything. How about a new type of car? Or some sort of exciting new food product?

Anyway, i'll be happy to introduce the team to each other. Then you guys can get to work inventing something fantastic. I won't pay you or anything, you just get together somehow and do it. W00t

When you're done, give me a call. I'll look at it, and if I think its a product that can make money, i'll market it, sell it, and keep 30% of the profits from it. Think about it though, if you invent something worth 10 million dollars, you make SEVEN MILLION DOLLARS. Thats a lot of money.

If your product is crappy, I'm not going to try to sell it or anything. I have a life, you know.

Sound exciting? Well, it sure sounds exciting to me. In fact, i'm not going to limit it to a group of 8, i'm willing to let the entire ./ readership start developing products for me!

Godspeed and Good luck!

Looks like...

[int2str]

...their web server isn't getting paid either ;)

You get what you pay for....

[TedTschopp]

You get what you pay for.... Finding a viable business model for this type of software publishing should be fun to watch. Finding people who will spend their type programming such a program and make it a viable product will also be interesting. Open Source Gaming needs to have some more thought/philosophy put into it before it becomes as sucessful as the OS and Productivity sectors of software development. Ted

Free work?

[Valiss]

...or disappointed that people are being asked to work on a commercial project without a salary.

Hey, it's the "open source" way. This kind of thing is why something like Linux has a hard time breaking into the market. Don't get me wrong, I'm all for Linux, but it's hard to make money when you don't pay people.

Re:Free work?

[liquidsin]

On the contrary, it's a hell of a lot easier to turn profit when you don't pay people!

Re:Free work?

[Valiss]

I was refering to the quality of the work, not the end capitol gains.

You Zealots are Hilarious

[LordYUK]

Okay, you (the vocal part of the /. community anyway) bitch bitch bitch about how Linux needs games and how companies need to make games for linux and how if there was a killer game for Linux, people would stop using windows.

Now someone wants to publish a linux only game made in ths spirit of linux (i.e., the COMMUNITY does the work) and you bitch and moan.

I for one am going to be playing WC3 on my Windows box, happy that I dont lie to myself everytime I look at my computer, the lie being that I am somehow "l33t" because I wholeheartedly advocate the linux movement, unless its not convienient.

Re:You Zealots are Hilarious

[Anonymous Coward]

There's no such thing as a "Linux" movement. There's an OSS movement, which would obviously oppose this because it won't be OSS. There are some people who want to try to create a community out of Linux users, who might support this, assuming they don't realize that this is really just a lazy attempt to wrangle money out of game developers. Then there are ignorant Windows users, who think /. consists of one person with one set of beliefs. Hint: not everyone thinks the exact same way.

Re:You Zealots are Hilarious

[Anonymous Coward]

Who's moaning? A couple people? I think it's a great idea. I might even apply for it.

Re:You Zealots are Hilarious

[random_rabbit]

It's not that inconvenient, just run WC3 with WineX on your Linux box. A subscription to Transgaming, is cheaper than a license for WinXP too....

Re:You Zealots are Hilarious

[Bisifiniti]

Last I heard, it doesn't play Battle.net, which is the heart of Warcraft.

Re:You Zealots are Hilarious

[Anonymous Coward]

Now someone wants to publish a linux only game made in ths spirit of linux (i.e., the COMMUNITY does the work) and you bitch and moan.

I agree. Linux doesn't have games, that's an obvious statement. No commericial company want to make games for linux, b/c they rather spend their salaried dev people on a more popular game base; windows.

The community devoting their time and effort is what makes Linux so great. Why can't it go for games as well? And this isn't a game that's made in a week, this is a real project that'll hopefully get people to say for once, "Gee I wish that ran on windows".

Getting paid is just a bonus, don't look at it as a goal. Plus, for people who actualy do game programming, it's a chance to get the foot in the door.

Re:You Zealots are Hilarious

[Anonymous Coward]

Oh yes. Many Windows users are converting by the millions to use WineX. The ease of setup compared to Setup.exe, the stability, and the addition of new features are all amazing. Reportedly 90% of these switchers are ATI users because of the excellent driver support for the Radeon 9??? series cards.

Re:You Zealots are Hilarious

[Anonymous Coward]

The crashing, lack of 3d drivers, and memory leaks aren't too inconvenient. How could emulation not be better than native programs? Really! Give WineX a try.

The point of no salary

[michaelsimms]

We are not asking people to work for free. The situation is the same as when ANY game company is started, but we are giving the people assistance and guaranteed publishing.

Imagine, if you start up a game development company with some of your friends, you wouldnt expect to be able to go up to a game publisher and say 'hey, pay me every week and I'll make you a game'. In fact you'd be VERY lucky if even they reply to your phone call when you offered them a completed game.

The people working on this project will be starting a new company, but instead of the uncertainty, the 'is it worth our carrying on' - they can KNOW that they have a publisher, and they can KNOW it will get onto the shelves if they can get it finished.

Yes, its a risk, but it could pay them bigtime - if it works.

Re:The point of no salary

[Valiss]

A risk? Yes. Viable? Maybe. And that's a BIG maybe. What do you expect people to do for pay in the meantime? Games are not developed in a week, unless you are making crappy Flash games. So people are busily coding between their jobs and sleeping, on a project where they MIGHT make money (but probably not), you're going to get half-assed product. I think in some ways this is a cool idea, but I think the reality of it is that you're not going to get a synergetic team who has the time to make the quality that a published game demands.

Re:The point of no salary

[binaryDigit]

So people are busily coding between their jobs and sleeping, on a project where they MIGHT make money (but probably not), you're going to get half-assed product

Unless you're working at RH, IBM, or any of the other Linux distro companies, how is this any different than those who generally work on OSS. How is the fact that you're working on software that MIGHT make money any different than what a large # of programmers do everyday as they work on their own personal projects that they hope will "make it big". Their project just formalizes what people are doing every day. You say "games are not developed in a week", they say just as much in their format announcement (which you DID read right?). It will take time and it will take commitment. Will it work? Who knows, if it were a "sure thing" then eveyone would jump on it and be doing it. That's the risk you take.

Re:The point of no salary

[davidhedbor]

Think about this small fact: People already DO spend this kind of time working on voluntary projects, even without any plans on making money. I'm not talking about your average open source project, but rather talking about game mods. I know it's not a complete game, but remember - no one says that this project can't use an already existing engine or other technologies.

That said, I think that it's a very viable project overall but I don't think it'll be easy (or easy money).

Re:The point of no salary

[Anonymous Coward]

>> you're not going to get a synergetic team who has the time to make the quality that a published game demands.

Seems to me quality isnt the issue. They'll depend on the altruism of the linux community to make a profit. Ie; "I'll buy this because I like linux and I want to support linux games!!"

Re:The point of no salary

[llefler]

You would think Linux users would have more faith in their own abilities. Obviously, they either don't trust their abilities or capitalism. Lots of people work on result based rewards. They're called Entrepreneurs. And I hear personal injury lawyers earn quite a bit of money with their 'we don't make a dime unless you win' strategy.

Personally, I think it sounds like an interesting project. Unfortunately, it's not my kind of programming and I'm already overbooked....

Re:The point of no salary

[dbullock]

The difference here being, that most companies who are intent on succeeding create a company with a goal and a plan in mind after doing some level of market research and having a cohesive plan.

How is this any different than if any random group sends you a game to publish from out of the blue?

This doesn't have any of the elements of a plan geared for success. It is a very nice sentiment, but the road to the poorhouse is paved with dotcoms who had nice ideas.

Re:The point of no salary

[cgenman]

We understand that you may have good intentions, and if you actually did guarentee publishing this would be a great deal.

But you don't.

At the bottom of your announcement, LGP commits to publishing the game but reserves the right to not do so if we feel that publishing will harm our company.. In essence, you do not guarantee publishing. You are guarenteeing that you have the option to publish, but that you have a convienient out if you choose not to do so. This is the most commonly abused clause in book publishing today, with many authors works tied up in legal tape surrounding the issues of optional publishing.

*Actually* guarantee publishing, and make some guarenteed publishing commitments (x amount or more marketing, x amount of stores, x amount for box art...), and you have a good deal. But remember, you're a publisher now. Nobody will give you the benefit of the doubt on anything because your fellow publishers employ more lawyers than developers. It's a risk, but a significantly smaller one than you are asking the developers to take.

And for god's sake, get a team of free artists and free level designers in on the thing before it is too late to have a complete game.

Re:The point of no salary

[GlassHeart]

Unless you're working at RH, IBM, or any of the other Linux distro companies, how is this any different than those who generally work on OSS.

Because games are a very different market.

For an OS such as Linux to be useful, it has to keep up with new devices. This is relatively easily accomplished by having many people write device drivers, even if they have to reverse engineer. Also, once your Linux box works, there are frequently no good reasons to upgrade the kernel too often.

A web browser has similar requirements to keep up with new formats and plug-ins, and similar solutions to the problem.

For a word processor, spreadsheet, email program, or editor, the threshold of usefulness is nearly fixed. Users have an expectation of certain features, but when you're done you're basically done. Even if Microsoft Word beats you to the market by fifteen years, it doesn't really matter.

For a commercially competitive game, however, the bar is set much higher. The graphics (I'm including game screens, animations, and cinematics here) must be state-of-the-art, where the state of the art is advancing rapidly and continuously. The deadline is thus extremely tight, because if you don't make your original projected deadline, your game can look old and boring. Games also fall out of favor quickly, so they don't stay on shelves as long.

Be serious. Everybody hears horror stories of how hectic things are in the gaming industry, and I think nobody doubts the talents of the people in the industry. So how are a handful of inexperienced (in terms of game development) programmers working part-time going to compete against talent, experience, and well-funded full-time work? Yes, it's still possible (Tetris, etc), but it's still a different ball game than other OSS projects, and any victory will be that much more miraculous.

Re:The point of no salary

[binaryDigit]

Well I would disagree with your assertion of the "staticness" of other forms of software. Word beating to the market by 15 years means your hosed, as companies have a huge investment in files and "training" (not necessarily formal).

I would also disagree with your assertion about "state of the art" gaming. While this may be true for your typical first person shooter, the "bar" in other genres is simply not that high. The frame rate in Everquest is not that big of an issue. When you read their formal announcment, they encourage "original ideas", this is in part due to the fact that it's very difficult to compete in some areas, esp first person shooters. So the solution is simple, don't code one. One of the first things this "group" is going to do is to figure out what their going to do. That usually means looking at the strengths of the members and coming up with something that meets those strengths. If Carmac decides to jump on board, then crazy fast graphics might be a doable thing. If not, then don't come up with a game that has crazy fast graphics.

You're right, the gaming industry is a cut throat twelve pack of jolt an hour place. I know, I'm not in it, but my sis in law works at THQ and I have several friends that either work or worked at Origin, so I get to hear all the horror stories. However, this project would not be "encumbered" by many of the things that creates issues for these large companies. Not to say that this is a shoo in, obviously not. This is definitely an uphill battle, but so what. 10 years ago if you told someone that you were going to write yet another unix like os and make it free, they'd have thought you bonkers and simply wasting your time (not that they wouldn't be correct ;), but it happened, and due to fortunate timing and circumstances, that project has grown and floruished.

But anyway, you know, you're response was a bit off, because my statement that you were responding to wasen't meant to compare games to OS's in regards to OSS, it was meant to address the issue of working on a "skunkworks" software project "on your own time" while not getting paid. Most of us have done it (and still do), and I was just saying that in that regard it was no different. Maybe a project with slimmer hopes of success, but the mechanics of the "company" side are the same.

Re:The point of no salary

[GlassHeart]

Well I would disagree with your assertion of the "staticness" of other forms of software. Word beating to the market by 15 years means your hosed, as companies have a huge investment in files and "training" (not necessarily formal).

Linux now threatens just about every form of commercial Unix. To oversimplify, they all implement POSIX, which is a fairly static "API", and being late matters less.

Word processing is not as static, and as we all are painfully aware the "API" in question - the Word format - is dynamic. However, OpenOffice.org is already making progress, and there's no apparent way for MS to stop it cold. This is because not even MS can really keep adding features to Word.

I would also disagree with your assertion about "state of the art" gaming. While this may be true for your typical first person shooter, the "bar" in other genres is simply not that high.

Obviously I'm not going to argue about exactly how high an imaginary bar is. However, it's instructive to point to some benchmark games in various genres: Quake 3, Myst, Warcraft 3, the EA sports games. You're basically suggesting they give up on FPS, so we'll ignore Quake. Myst contains extremely rich graphical environments, which requires skillful artists and powerful rendering hardware. Warcraft requires good art and at least decent 3-D performance. The sports games require good motion capture, and of course good atheletes whose motions we capture.

So exactly which sort of games are you talking about? It'll be helpful if you name commercial examples.

10 years ago if you told someone that you were going to write yet another unix like os and make it free, they'd have thought you bonkers and simply wasting your time

As I pointed out, even if Linus Torvalds didn't realize it then, the timing of Linux is far less critical. It hit the market at around the time of the 386, but even if it arrived only today, it's still a matter of time before commercial Unix fades away. This is because Linux is equivalent and free. (Yes, hindsight is 20/20.) For Linux to miss, POSIX has to stop being relevant. XFree86 and gcc, for example, also have similarly large "market windows" like Linux.

The game in question has a harder time being equivalent (quality at shipping), and won't be free.

it was meant to address the issue of working on a "skunkworks" software project "on your own time" while not getting paid. Most of us have done it (and still do), and I was just saying that in that regard it was no different.

The difference here is that if you're at least partially attracted by the money promised, you'll want to work on something commercially viable, not just fun to do. Add the fact that commercial viability is a lot harder in games, and it's going to affect your choices.

Something sounds wrong.

[termos]

The developers doesn't get paid.
The game will be sold for money.
I think this ruins the entire idea of making the game in the first place. Sure, it would be good to have a game on Linux, but many good games have already been ported. One idea which would have been good would be to make a game free, and then show the world that there is good gaming for other platforms than Microsoft Windows and that it's free!

Re:Something sounds wrong.

[binaryDigit]

The developers doesn't get paid. The game will be sold for money.

This is no different than any group of individuals that decide to start a personal project. Have you ever come up with an idea with your friends and decided to start coding/designing. Was anyone paying you during this phase, NOPE. This is no different. It amazes me (though it shouldn't) the narrow minded mentality that is exhibted here.

Re:Something sounds wrong.

[Anonymous Coward]

Hey idiot.

First, the developers get 70% of the profits. So, LGP is only earning 30%, and yet they are going to provide development resources, package it, market it and sell it.

Second, if somebody ever made a good GPL game, then it would be ported to Windows. So much for showing off Linux (or any other non-Windows platform).

This sounds familiar

[revery]

Developers are obliged to make the minimum 10 hours a week commitment...

Let's see here, 8 people working at 10 hours a week. Is LGP also managing the team working on Duke Nukem Forever?

sold or given away?

[oliverthered]

The difference is everything.
I work on FOSS because I believe in freedom.
I would rather money didn't exist, so I don't want to put my efforts towards freedom into something the promotes consumerism.

(If they only charge for distribution 'costs', that's ok)

Re:sold or given away?

[Anonymous Coward]

"I work on FOSS because I believe in freedom."

How wonderful! But that's you. Others simply enjoy the challenge; I've done a couple pieces of freeware myself. If someone wanted to take my code and sell it, it affects me not one whit, and probably wouldn't bring about the demise of civilization.

"I would rather money didn't exist, so I don't want to put my efforts towards freedom into something the promotes consumerism."

Money isn't the root of all evil, it's the love of it that's the problem (1 Timothy 6:10, if you're into that sort of thing). Money's just a way to keep me from having to plow fields, or setting up a SQL server for the farmer's wife in exchange for a bushel of spuds. The idealism is cute, but if you eat, you're a consumer. There just isn't enough room in the trees for us to all climb back up. Besides, I look dead silly in a loincloth.

Hahahaha. Rock Band Companies.

[Gannoc]

I've used the term Rock Band companies before based on the high school rock band.

A bunch of kids get together and decide on a 'bitchin name for their band.

Then they scribble it on their bass drum.

Then, they actually start thinking about the music.

Looks like they're doing the same thing here. The first thing they have scheduled is to think of the name for the company, (and make sure you can grab the domain name!!!) then it looks like part 2 of the agenda is to invent a new genre of computer game. Well, wouldn't I like to be a fly on the wall in THAT meeting!

The cathedral, the bazaar and the committee

[dmorin]

This sounds like the worst kind of project management, honestly. Take a random sampling of developers, all with their own attitudes, skill sets, and motivations. It's like herding cats by default. Now choose a leader. How? During the first meeting? To steal from Cory Doctorow, what's the dude's whuffie? I don't know him from a hole in the wall. So the minute that I disagree with him I'm gonna get all tense and no longer be into it with the same passion that I would normally be. Sure, maybe there's a protocol for changing leaders, but all that means to me is that somebody in the group is going to want to change the leader *every single meeting*.

And what role does LGP play as far as leadership goes? If they see the team, leader and all, going down a path they don't like, can they pull rank? Then what? At any time can they keep the idea for the game, toss all 8 programmers, and bring in a fresh batch?

As I apply for jobs I find myself writing several times a day that a hacker who is passionate about what he's doing is 100x more productive than an average schmoe looking for a paycheck. Figure out a way to get a bunch of hackers together who are passionate about an idea *first*, and *then* keep them glued together with the paycheck. Not the other way around.

I think that if you want to do this, then find 8 friends that you trust and respect and then do the exact same thing -- name a company, think of an idea, and code the hell out of it. THEN, maybe, once you've got a demo, go talk to LGP.

Re:The cathedral, the bazaar and the committee

[michaelsimms]

You have some good points so I'll try and answer them.

The developers will all pretty much have one motivation - to create good Linux games. That will be a good starting point. Some of them will want to be in it for the money, some for the creativity. But the goal will be the same. Differences apart from that can sometimes be bad, sometimes be good for teamwork. You never can tell, it is the risk we all take starting a new company with new people.

LGP cannot simply pull the whole team out. We cannot pull any member out unless HALF of the team requests it. If the whole team is messing up and not putting their back into it, then we can tell them that they need to improve or they risk not getting a publishable product at the end.

The only direct leadership we will play is to supply a project manager to the group, to help them stay organised.

I agree 100% that passion is more important than someone looking for a paycheck, which is why we feel that this is a good thing. People applying for this will know they dont get paychecks every week, they are going to have to create something good first. They get out of it what they put into it. Schmoe looking for a paycheck wont even apply.

As for you rlast point, yes, if you have a good game, come tell us about it, we'll look seriously at any serious proposition we are offered.

Re:The cathedral, the bazaar and the committee

[dmorin]

Hi Michael,

I didn't mean to sound discouraging to the idea, actually. I hope that it does work. I've just watched too many games fall victim to the committee syndrome where everybody has an idea for what they want, but don't want to code it..and don't want to code anybody else's idea, either, because hey screw em they didn't like my idea.

The developers will all pretty much have one motivation - to create good Linux games. That will be a good starting point.

I hope that this is enough. But I think it's too abstract. I remember a project I tried once a few years after I got out of college. I tried to deliberately stay up all night hacking. Couldn't do it. When I called my hacking buddy from college the next morning to tell him, he laughed and said "You didn't leave yourself a concrete enough plan, right?" And he was exactly right. Just saying "I will hack all night" couldn't get me over the hurdle, because I kept hitting these down periods of "All right, now what?" when the hacking stops. And I think that just saying "create a Linux game" might suffer the same fate. There's a certain critical mass you have to reach before people's passions will carry them over the finish line, and it's getting to this milestone that kills most committees for the reason I mentioned above. There's a catch 22 involved, absolutely -- I don't believe the game will exist until somebody can show me a concrete enough plan (or design, or requirements, or *something* to get it out in the open and agreed upon), but yet who wants to start a game if you don't believe it will exist?

Good luck. I hope it works out.

Re:The cathedral, the bazaar and the committee

[michaelsimms]

heh, no worries, if I cant take constructive comments Im in the wrong business {:-)

I agree completely with what you are saying. Comittees rarely get to the end, they dont inspire. Thats why we want people to make a game THEY want to make, rather than we tell them 'make this game'. Hopefully the goal of the game of their dreams will be enough.

Planning is VERY important, that is why the big initial contribution from LGP will be an experienced project manager, who previously worked as a project manager at Oracle (OK not always the best reccomendation but they are good at their job).

This will help with the planning, no development will be done until they know what they are making, I couldnt agree more that lack of planning kills a project. 'Hey, lets do STUFF' is never enough {:-)

Thanks for the good wishes, its appreciated. Its gonna take a lot of luck, and a lot of hard work from everyone, but I think we can do it. If we go down, we'll go down fighting {:-)

Re:The cathedral, the bazaar and the committee

[IamTheRealMike]

Rock on michael, I'm rooting for you :) Oh, and get Ballistics out, it's the one I'm most looking forward to, I'm a sucker for speed.

Re:The cathedral, the bazaar and the committee

[Tyreth]

That's a good way to let them choose the game for motivation. I tried that recently on my friends - previously I've offered them ideas which they seem interested in and do nothing. This time I asked them if they were interested, and if so let them take the steps. They were slightly more motivated, and got further, but still nothing concrete :) But I think the problem was only a few people. If you can find a group of self motivated people (and that may be hard to work out because people can sound motivated when they're really likely to drop off) then it should work well.

Work on a game without pay? Silly!

[raytracer]

Next you'll be saying that people will just donate their work to, oh, I dunno, say create an entire operating system from scratch.

We all know that that will never work.

presenting...

[Joe the Lesser]

LinuxQuest!

Yes, create your own Linux progammer that you control in a simulated world! Fight the evil memory-leak demons! Defend the kernel from rampaging orcs!

Re:presenting...

[alpha17]

or TuxQuest

the whole point of the game is spending hours setting up Linux and going to the store to find an old video card that is actually supported properly to play Tux Racer. Then you repeat trying to beat your old time...

No salary?

[Anonymous Coward]

I don't understand why everyone is saying the team won't get any money... quoting from the article:

2) 70% of sales revenue will go to the development company, to be
divided up as the team sees fit. The remainder of the money will go
to LGP to pay for marketing, and other publishing expenses.

That's awesome!

[Anonymous Coward]

But let's expand it a bit... we can add some customers (including kids!) to impale, and maybe even have different levels at different stores with different items on sale. Oh, and different vehicles with different killing options! YEAH!

There is already one...

[Anonymous Coward]

It's called "SDL".

Read up.

Great

[Anonymous Coward]

Bioware finally may have an incentive to finish the NWN Linux Client :-)

Re:Umm. I'll do this too.

[liquidsin]

Dear Gannoc,

I have devised a wonderful method for quickly factoring large prime numbers. I'm sure this discovery is worth quite a good bit of money but I have no knowledge as to how to go about marketing my idea or even patenting it. I would love to share my money with you, and maybe your friends too.

Thanks

I don't understand it

[NorthDude]

They are offering peoples the opportunity to write a game for Linux.
That's great in my opinion, even if the developers do not get paid.
I mean, no one ever got paid for creating Tux Racer? Are do they?

So, they don't get paid, but LPG offers to pay for the publishing AND the marketing.
In doing so, they encounter the risk of LOOSING money.
If the title do not sell well, THEY will lost money, not the developers.

BUT, they also state that they will give 70% of the money made out of selling the game and keep the remaining to pay for the afore mentionned publishing/marketing cost.
How can people see this as wrong is beyong my understanding.

Peoples work on project for free because they like it, for fun, to learn, etc. etc. and no one complains about it.
Now, a company offers those same people the chance to make money out of this work and all you can say is that they are bad?

As much as I like the free software community, at times I have much troubles understanding what all of you value so much.
Is it really "free speech" and "alternatives" or is it ONLY "free as in beer"?!?

Re:I don't understand it

[cgenman]

People can write games for Linux on their own. Many do. People can self-publish in the shareware realm. Many do. LPG is risking money, but without actual guarenteed publishing and committed amounts, that money is somewhat insignificant compared to the value of the time lost by the developers. If the game is a financial flop, the developers can't even take solstice in those that would download and play the game for free.

The developers are risking a huge time investment. The publishers, a small to moderate financial investment. If your time isn't worth any money, then yes, the publishers are taking the bigger risk. But if the programmers want to become professional developers and sell their time, they need to value it.

And apparently the 8 programmers do not get 70% of the income. The development team gets 70% of the income. Chances are, the development team will have to lure at least 8 good artists and musicians onto the team with a sizable portion of that 70%. Unlike in programming, there is no open-source art, so likely those artists will command up to 45% of that money... leaving the programmers to split 25%. Assuming the programmers put in 20 hours per week for a year and get to an actual professional level of polish, that they would command an entry-level salry in the programming industry, and a 15 dollar wholesale price, they would have to move nearly ninety-thousand units to break even.

The free speech, free software community isn't that hard to understand. When a company changes your work into their profits, it exists the realm of philanthropic software and into the workday realm. Many of the people here have hired lawyers to pour over our workday contracts looking for the exact sorts of holes and outs that LGP has put in place for themselves. We're used to routinely being abused by these systems. People may be willing to work for free to contribute to the development of a free piece of software, but a large part of that payout is that a large number of people will be using it. Would you work for free so that someone else could make money restricting access to your work?

Work with publishers for a few years, then come back and tell me what you think is wrong with this deal.

Re:I don't understand it

[mystran]

Peoples work on project for free because they like it, for fun, to learn, etc. etc. and no one complains about it. Now, a company offers those same people the chance to make money out of this work and all you can say is that they are bad?

With me, it's like this: I can do what I'm interested in, for free, with my own timetable, but I'll be GNU.

If you want a deadline, non GNU licensing, any authority over me, a say to what I do next, or generally me to work something I don't find interesting enough to do it free, you have to pay me.

Fear of commitment

[Otter]

LGP commits to publishing the game but reserves the right to not do so if we feel that publishing will harm our company. We will advise the developers in the planning stage if a game design is unsuitable, and as early as possible during development if development standards are not high enough.

That's certainly a novel use of the word "commits".

Honey, I'm entirely committed to this relationship, but reserve the right to not do so if it will harm my life. You will be notified as early as possible when I get sick of you or if someone better comes along.

Why not pick an existing game project?

[Wee]

I don't get it: Why not pick some existing project and get that off the ground? Why start from scratch when there are lots of Linux games that could use the help getting done (and probably getting wider notice by being "published" in a more formal sense)? I'd personally like to see Parsec get finished.

Having said that, this sounds like it might be a complete turn-off, purely because of the way they are going about it. LGP kinda sounds like they want to make money without making much effort. "You work for free, we'll make money" doesn't come across well, and is an easy forst thought.

I'm all for Linux games as much as the next guy (probably more so; I bought every title Loki put out), but I don't think turning people off to the OSS dev model is how to go about it.

-B

Re:Why not pick an existing game project?

[Anonymous Coward]

Or perhaps even Planeshift (www.planeshift.it)

Re:Why not pick an existing game project?

[ThaddeusAid]

All game publishers work like this, you can get a salary at an established game dev studio and the publishers will pay known quantities at mile stones. For any new company, or any company that only has a few games under thier belt, they build the game and then get paid for it. Usually a flat fee not a percentage of the whole.

Re:Why not pick an existing game project?

[Anonymous Coward]

or vega strike?
that's a personal fav of mine
http://vegastrike.sourceforge.net/

That was expected

[fredrikj]

According to the text file they are looking for 8 programmers and 0 designers at this point. So, the programmers will have to do the design. No offence to programmers regarding their ability to design stuff, but, seriously, isn't this a bit typical for Linux-related projects? (I'm not trying to be flamebait)

Design is just as important as programming when it comes to games and should not be considered at first in the last stage of development. Mind, powerful game engines like Quake II are already open under the GPL, so it wouldn't even be necessary to code everything from scratch if you are lazy (or clever).

"A new kind of game"

[dmorin]

You know, I don't think this idea will work, and already posted why. Having said that, it did give me a reason to brainstorm about the "new kind of game" concept and I can't let a good idea go to waste... :)

What I want is a game that follows me places. Sometimes I'm at a terminal, sometimes I have a laptop (wired or not), sometimes a PDA, sometimes a cell phone. I want a game that takes advantage of as many of those as possible. A game that, when I'm not at one of those gadgets, has me thinking about what to do next time I am. A game that I can talk to my friends about, not in the past tense of "Dude, so I was playing Unreal last night..." but rather in the present, because the game is constantly going on and I'm using my friends' input as part of my strategy toward winning.

There was such a game going around in 2001, sponsored by EA, but I forget the name. While playing you would get various emails and phone messages giving you clues about the game's progression. But I guess 9/11 had something to do with it's cancellation. I never got a chance to join.

Anyway, that's the kind of game I'd be pushing were I to join this project. After all, where is Linux big? Servers, and embedded devices. If you go straight for the userinterface / graphics route, and don't end up at Windows, you're gonna die in the market. Come up with an innovative reason for why your game is a Linux game in the first place, and help the long term cause (getting more people onto Linux) rather than just providing a toy to the people who already have Linux (and know where to get all the free stuff anyway).

Re:"A new kind of game"

[dmorin]

There was such a game going around in 2001, sponsored by EA, but I forget the name. While playing you would get various emails and phone messages giving you clues about the game's progression. But I guess 9/11 had something to do with it's cancellation. I never got a chance to join.

Just found it, the game was called "Majestic" by Electronic Arts.

Re:"A new kind of game"

[vrocket]

"Majestic's" cancelation had nothing to do with 9/11. It was a failure on its own.

Well?

[13Echo]

Michael - Perhaps you failed to read the article (as usual)? Maybe you missed the 70% remark? Sure, LGP isn't offering them salary, but the dev team will get 70% of the profits. They can do whatever they see fit with the 70%. The other 30% covers marketing, etc. Why did you fail to mention this?

This is a damn fine idea, if you ask me. And it seems very fair. If a small team of good, dedicated coders wants to work on this, then so be it. They do this all of the time anyways, coding GPL apps for the benefit of everyone who sees fit to use it.

MSimms of LGP even mentioned that they'd front the cost of tools (he used the Garage Games engine as an example) if they were needed, as long as it was a reasonable request. Either way, I see it as a good way for LGP to get noticed, assuming that they come up with a good game. What have the devs got to lose? If they volunteer, and have free time, the worst thing that they can get is 70% of the profits. You take a gamble. Make a crappy game, and don't make much money. Make a good game, and there may be very many benefits. I'd say that its not for everyone, but it is a reasonable offer, and a good (and unique) way to get in on commerical game development.

Re:Well?

[pixel_bc]

> Sure, LGP isn't offering them salary,
> but the dev team will get 70% of the profits.

Hate to be a nay-sayer, but 70% of 0 (or some other low number) is still bloody well close to 0.

Re:Well?

[Anonymous Coward]

No, the other 30% does not cover marketing, etc. LGP is offering them 70% of the *profits*, which is the stuff that's left over after they pay themselves, pay for marketing, pay for all the other people who weren't suckered into working for free...

Maybe you've heard that joke about the actor getting 10% of the net profit?

Money isn't the only reward

[phorm]

For those that have always dreamed about making a good (and popular) game, it's not always about salary. I think that the fame and pursuant job offers for making a free game would more than make up for the lack of salary during development. If every 15-year-old was picking your title up off the shelf/net and saying "coool" - reading your name in the credits - don't you think that would be a fairly rewarding experience in itself?

Re:Money isn't the only reward

[Anonymous Coward]

"If every 15-year-old was picking your title up off the shelf/net and saying "coool" - reading your name in the credits - don't you think that would be a fairly rewarding experience in itself? "

Nah. I'm a game developer. I had that dream too. But once you really start to publish games, and good games, you realize that a kid loving your game is cool, but that doesn't change your life at all. You still need that bread and that glass of milk.

Re:Money isn't the only reward

[LordMazza]

Heh more like every 15-year-old kid leeching a pirated copy of your game at a LAN or from a Warez site, who then looks at the .nfo file with the names of all those "1337 haxxxors" who very skillfully made a pain in the arse midi file playing dialog which displays their names after running someone else's crack making application over the game's binary...

If they saw my name, I'd be as gratified as if my neighbour's dog deigned to relieve himself on my lawn. :)

I would however find gratification just in finishing an exciting project like a game. That's why I'm part of a Sourceforge game project which will probably never get finished despite the talented group of designers and programmers it has on its team. :(

Re:Money isn't the only reward

[phorm]

If it's a free game, why would anyone crack it though?

MMORP Please

[capedgirardeau]

I think these online role playing games are really the future of gameing (and much greater human interaction in general, but that is another story).

People seem to love the community they build as well as like to just have little video game super hero represenations of themselves to goof around with, at least I do :)

I think there are already some OSS projects desiged for this type of game development server side, but I couldn't find any on a quick search.

You're setting yourselves up for failure

[TrebleJunkie]

I'll probably get trolled for this. Oh well. Troll me if ya gotta if you really wanna miss the point.

I'm sorry to be the one to say it, but as you've set up this process, you've doomed yourselves to failure.

Hiring the programmers first and the designers, artists, later, you're putting the cart before the horse.

You don't start making a moving by hiring actors. There's a script. A director. A lot of storyboarding. Conceptual Design. Location planning. Scene planning. Shot planning. You know, for the most part, how every piece fits together before there's any action in front of the camera.

A game doesn't start with programmers. A game starts with an idea. A concept. A concept that is then fleshed out by writers, artists, etc... Quite possibly one or two programmers/developers with a knowledge of whatever game engine will be used (and/or maybe helped choose the appropriate one in the first place.) are available to consult with the conceptual team and prototype some things along the way. But the code is more than likely the LAST thing to be written.

It's a shame. It sounds like an interesting project. It's one I'd certainly like to lend my artistic talents, writing, and imagination to. But it's going to fail unless things are done in the right order. You can't tell 8 programmers "make a game, we'll make it pretty and give it a plot and music and a look, etc... later." You've got to take the proper time to conceptualize your game _before_ you get programmers on-board.

Re:You're setting yourselves up for failure

[michaelsimms]

You are making a VERY good point.

The developers will be the ones to decide on the type of game, and then as soon as it is appropriate we will get onto finding artists, musicians and the like. The time of WHEN we do this is not fixed, it is for the developers to decide, and LGP will advise them to th ebest of our ability.

If they want artists and mucicians in right at the start, then thats what they get. Their call.

LGP is a guide here, not a master, they have creative freedom and decision-making freedom. We just nudge occasionally {:-)

Re:You're setting yourselves up for failure

[phulshof]

I fear that you might be right in this. As I had a look at the site (I was actually interested, much like you) I was baffled by the setup. Why not get a complete team together immediately? You'll need the artists' input on the gamedesign and gamestory. Probably even before you're thinking about getting your programmers on board (although one or two to indicate what is possible, and what isn't, might not be so bad:).

Also: I've noticed that there's enough programmers willing to work on projects like these. It's the artists that are lacking! Even if you somehow manage to get the greatest game idea ever; if you can't get your artists together, you'll have nothing!

Oh well, let's see how this will end up. Perhaps I'll give it an email anyway. After all: next to being a musician I'm also a programmer. :)

Re:You're setting yourselves up for failure

[IamTheRealMike]

A game doesn't start with programmers. A game starts with an idea. A concept. A concept that is then fleshed out by writers, artists, etc...

Yep, absolutley. I mean, look at Tetris. That was started with a programmer first, they even completely forgot the plot writers, and look where that ended up!

I mean, damn, you wouldn't want this thing to turn into another Tetris would you. That'd be pretty sucky.

Re:You're setting yourselves up for failure

[TrebleJunkie]

Michael, it still sounds, though, that you're using "developers" as synonymous with "programmers", when, in fact, "developers" *are* the artists, musicians, conceptual design folks, project managers, programmers, and so on. That's flawed thinking. The developers are everyone involved.

Honestly, too, I think some of the other folks in this discussion have a much better idea: Let folks submit concepts for a while. The concepts can then be evaluated for originality, creativity, happyfuntime potential, feasibility, and -- and this is an important one that I've seen _noone_ mention yet -- marketability. (The almightly dollar does still rule things around here, and there's no sense putting any time and effort into something you can't sell.)

If you want to try to put 8 conceptual people in a room, rather than programmers, to come up with something, have at it. But I think you'd be have a better chance of success with a larger pool of ideas, initially.

Once you've got a strong concept, THEN start puttin g together the larger team, under the direction of both a project manager and the head of the conceptual team. The conceptual team should guide all development. (With, of course the occasional whip-cracking of the project management staff.) The programmers, musicians and artists -- while their feedback and suggestions will ultimately be valuable -- exist primarily to do what they're asked, when they're asked to do it, and to please have it done by such and such a date.

If you want to let them help to Name That Game Company (which, I think, makes a cool name for a game company, don't you? :) ) that's all well and good, but don't assume that the 8 best programmers for the job are the perfect creative, conceptual lead for such a project.

Lest I offend programmers out there, I do not mean, with any of this, to say that a programmer can't have good ideas. They can. Just that you should start with the idea, rather than the code, and in all likelyhood, the ideafolk won't be the programmerfolk.)

Re:You're setting yourselves up for failure

[Chester K]

Troll me if ya gotta if you really wanna miss the point.

If disagreeing with you is "troll[ing] you", then prepare to be trolled.

They're specifically looking for creative programmers, not just people who can write code, but people who can also do the design work necessary for the project. No, it's probably not going to turn out something that you'd expect from Blizzard due to hiring designer-slash-programmers instead of professional designers and professional programmers, but it could possibly still turn out something decent, and having people who wear more than one hat makes sense given the budget for design and development ($0).

Re:You're setting yourselves up for failure

[TrebleJunkie]

Your sarcasm is noted.

Looking at how most games are made today -- or even back in Tetris' day -- Tetris was an exception, not the rule. In rare instances, the same person will have not only the conceptual insight, but the technical skill to bring it to reality by himself.

Yeah, the first Ultima or two were created by one guy. (A guy that if I ever meet, I wanna buy him a beer.) But after that, teams of people put those games together, under Garriot's conceptual lead, I'd imagine.
Given the quasi-theatrical nature of most games today, most times, the programmers are just one of many groups of people carrying out the Will of the Conceptualfolk.

Re:You're setting yourselves up for failure

[TrebleJunkie]

You could very well be right, and I don't mean at all to suggest that programmers can't have good ideas for games. I'm rather prolific, myself. I program, I write, I do graphic design, music, you name it. I only mean to suggest that, as written, the plan of attack isn't all the clear and/or is going about things the wrong way.

Re:You're setting yourselves up for failure

[IamTheRealMike]

Sure, point taken, but I know lots of good games that didn't follow formal creative design, then coding rules. Frozen Bubble? bzFlag? Even Tux Racer. Programmers are not magically exempt from being creative.

Re:You're setting yourselves up for failure

[Chester K]

the plan of attack isn't all the clear and/or is going about things the wrong way

I'll admit it's strange that they're offering to fund a project without having a clear vision of it to start with (this reeks of something dreamt up by an MBA, not a programmer), but it's a good chance for any of those thousands of programmers out there with "the ultimate game idea" in their head to get it greenlighted.

I don't see why they anyone interested in this wouldn't have just gone with Garage Games already though.

Re:You're setting yourselves up for failure

[TrebleJunkie]

I don't mean to say that they are. And I don't know that there's really a "formal" creative design process. "Formal" and "Creative" used together are almost a contradiction. : )

I only mean to say that if the goal is to make a game [for Linux]that can attract an audience, compete head-to-head with Windows or Console games, and maybe make a buck or two, you're probably going to want to put it together like the big boys do. You're going to want to start with the strongest concept available, not necessarily the bestest programmers.

Re:You're setting yourselves up for failure

[mati]

I agree with you completely that they're going about it the wrong way. However, I tend to agree with Carmack that artists, writers, and designers don't have much more of a clue about what makes a good game than game programmers do (with a few notable, extremely experienced exceptions like Miyamoto, Warren Spector, etc.).

Games are not movies. I've seen a large number of energetic start-up game devs that are mostly (if not entirely) comprised of artists and designers who have some great ideas, but put their creativity before the game. Your great idea does not belong in a game if it doesn't add to the player's fun (and certainly this applies to programmers with gee-whiz special effects too). There's many commercial examples of games that have well-conceived themes, stories, and artistic design, but are simply no fun to play; then there are (admittedly fewer) examples of games with no story, subpar art, but are a blast to play.

If you want to make the next Final Fantasy, then by all means do as much conceptual design up front before anyone starts to code. Most games are more gameplay-centered than that, and the best concept in the world won't help to make a game fun as much as a smart dev team that puts the player first.

Re:You're setting yourselves up for failure

[FuriousBroccoli]

No you're dead wrong here. The best games start with custom Tools. Some rudimentary story boards and concept art are good to have near the start, but these do not need to be production quality. Once the tool sets are workable, then those tools are given to an artic team (read: modellers, animators, texture artists). Music and sound are definitely some of the last resources added, b/c they don't take near as long to make. I'd join this thing, except...games on Linux are about as exciting and profitable as...well, anything else on Linux ;)

Re:You're setting yourselves up for failure

[Tyreth]

The programmers this time are the ones who come up with the concept - and why shouldn't they? I enjoy programming more than, say, making art or levels - but I have ideas for games and I want to make my game. Why shouldn't I get to decide what game I make?

Then once the game is known the appropriate people to join the team are known. But the programmers are the ones who come up with the game concept and design.

WARNING TO ALL WOULD BE PROGRAMMERS!!!

[Dolemite_the_Wiz]

Get this projects promises in writing before you begin!!!

If this turns out to be a money making process, you could get screwed.

Just my $.02

Dolemite

Re:WARNING TO ALL WOULD BE PROGRAMMERS!!!

[EllF]

Well, seeing as this is a proven company (Linux Game Publishing) that has released a number of games to the community, and also given that Michael Simms is known for being responsive and patient when assailed with questions, I'd say that LGP has a pretty solid reputation going. The likelihood that they would screw that over to make a few bucks is incredibly slim.

I'd also be highly surprised if LGP *didn't* have a handful of paperwork for the eight people that they choose.

Re:WARNING TO ALL WOULD BE PROGRAMMERS!!!

[michaelsimms]

Thanks for picking this one up, its always nice to hear someone say we have a reputation for being honest and solid. Thanks! {:-)

Yes, you are correct, we have paperwork ready for people that are chosen for the project. We would never ask people to work without an agreement in writing, otherwise, it is as dangerous for us as for them.

In effect, the agreement structre will be

LGP will have an agreement with the dev company (which will be a legal entity, I will have a UK Limited company formed for the development).

LGP will pay that company.

That company will have agreements with the developers. The developers, having 90% stake of the company, can then completely control the money received without LGP being able to interfere.

LGP cannot fail to pay that company, we would be in breach of contract and the company could take LGP to court and claim the money. It will be watertight. The documents are drawn up already.

And as a final note, it is *so* not in our interests to screw anyone over. The long term goal of this is to help form a self-sustaining game development company that is Linux-friendly. This will give is all more games, most likely published through LGP, so we would be stabbing ourselves in the foot if we screwed the group over.

Nethack?!

[Deflagro]

I thought Nethack was the ultimate linux game! It just doesn't get any better than roleplaying your @ symbol and dying a billion different ways. And they've even got Falcon's Eye for those ppl that need to see what they are doing.
Woo!

Game Idea

[CFusion]

Develop a simulation of a bunch of programmers trying to create a "from-scratch" Linux game. Call it "Open-Source Mayhem"

The caveat is that most of the developer's have major ego problems, as prevelant in the UNIX/Linux community. So you have to negotiate with all these "unpaid" open-source programmers to try to get them to work together.

Once this is accomplished you have to try to get the programmers to aggregate their skills and knowledge to come up with something that won't be far to complex and boring for the general public. Your developer's will probably spend 12 weeks discussing security of the game so that malicious players won't hack into your config file and steal your private information.

In the end the developer's all lose funding due to an enourmous economic crash and the fact that NOBODY is stupid enough to develop a Linux only game, considering the massively low market-share of the OS and the fact that the sales won't even come close to covering the development costs of the project.

At this point you are forced to negotiate the sale of the game to Microsoft, who in the end turns it into an X-Box game and becomes a best-seller.

Wrong Market?

[ThrasherTT]

Maybe it is just me, but is a game for linux really marketable? How many linux-only games have turned a profit? How many linux ports of other games have sold enough copies to make up for the porting effort?

How do you market a game to users of an OS that:
A) Is currently focused on servers
B) When "on the desktop," are being run (in general) by people who want all of their software to be free (beer and speech)
C) Is planning on making it harder for hardware vendors to create/distribute closed software in the form of drivers

If this ever gets off the ground (low chance), and if it makes it to completion (extrememly low chance), would it even sell enough to make up for the marketing costs? I worked on a game for free for a while, during which time I had a day job which was VERY slack (this was not long after working on a game for an actual game dev house/publisher). Even so, it took many months to get to the point where we even had an idea of the kinds of tools that would be required to generate/integrate the content into the engine.

I'd love to see this work, but realistically, it won't. Not at this point.

Re:Wrong Market?

[michaelsimms]

You are right, the Linux market pays less money than other game markets. But, the fact is this. I started LGP cos I am a gamer and because I am a Linux user. I dont do it to make me rich, I do it because I am getting games for the platform of my choice.

This project has the option, they can also make their game for windows, consoles, anything. They have that choice. LGP has contacts in windows publishing houses to pretty much guarantee we can get them a good windows publisher too. The only restiction is - it must work on Linux - not exclusively on Linux.

Re:Wrong Market?

[ThrasherTT]

Have you and/or your company review the success or lack thereof of the marketability of games created by the Game Developers' Conference's Indy Game Festival award winners? I would tend to think that those people that are active in the game development community would be interested in the GDC, and those that have free time to make games would be interested in working toward that sort of exposure. I don't know of a single game from the festival that was successfully marketed, perhaps you can prove me wrong?

Have you actually worked in the game development community in the past 5 years? When LGP says that justified tools will be purchased for the development team, does that include budget for the Quake 3 engine, for example? Or just a linux clone of Lithtech? My point is that the non-Linux market isn't going to tolerate less-than current technology, and current technology is expensive, whether you develop it from scratch or buy it outright. Which leads you back to the problem that the linux gaming market is small, perhaps infinitesimally so.

What in your business plan can you say makes LGP look more promising than Loki?

original text:

[Anonymous Coward]

YourMissionForToday: bleeng bleeng
coed.jpg: ohohohoh my hehahahahad
YourMissionForToday: Trophy's Mine!
coed.jpg: I'm glad the fall is coming. it's statistically the second-best time of the year for my prospects of getting laid
coed.jpg: #1 being may-april
YourMissionForToday: I should play some Castlevania, no?
YourMissionForToday: Getting laid is t3h r0x0r
coed.jpg: yes. the dss forum site i most recently signed up on had a bunch of castlevania and chrono cross characters for icons
YourMissionForToday: wish the gameboy advance screen didn't suck so much...I can feel my eyes struggling after playing for about 20 minutes
coed.jpg: frank said he's bringing his to the apple store tomorrow
coed.jpg: the more i think about it the more it occurs to me that this whole adventure is really just gonna be a big joke... and i laugh
YourMissionForToday: Frank is steeped in materialistic excess! He must be re-educated!
coed.jpg: my friend anj said that the apple store in plano had a big line out the door on opening day. if that's the case, meet me in the food court
coed.jpg: i'll be scarfing SBARRO
YourMissionForTodayy: Meet me at the forklift dealership, I drive a forklift through your wall!
coed.jpg: did i tell you home depot won't hire me cuz i have no forklift experience
coed.jpg: "Have you ever driven a forklift"
"Well, no" (not since i was 6 yrs old in dad's warehouse, i shoulda said that)
coed.jpg: "Well we really need someone good with a forklift but we'll let you know if we need you for something"
YourMissionForToday: Show them your forklift experience by impaling them, then lifting up their body and leaving it on a high shelf
coed.jpg: hahaha
coed.jpg: "Well I drove one in my most recent string of brutal unsolved murders, perhaps you heard about them. The people were impaled with a forklift and then slammed repeatedly against the top and bottm of the highest shelf, and then left there"
coed.jpg: "They were insolent"
YourMissionForToday: I want to make a video game where all you do is bust through a wall and steal stuff with a forklift, then drive out
coed.jpg: that's a fantastic idea for a game
coed.jpg: the vague aesthetic of that zoo game witht he lasso and the truck
YourMissionForToday: Yeah, and then it turns into Unreal Tournament in my mind when you impale somebody and the announcer says "FORKLIFT KILL!"
coed.jpg: "There's a pallet of flat panel LCD's on that loading dock! Steal the forklift and put it in your buddy's pickup! GO!"
coed.jpg: hahaha an FPS with a forklift as a weapon would rox0r
coed.jpg: you'd move kinda slow, but you'dbe fuckin invincible. like having the school bus in vigilante 8
YourMissionForToday: you have to corner real fast and you get turbocharged nitrocack for your forlkift
coed.jpg: but your weakness would be the propane tank... someone hits that enough times and you're toast!
YourMissionForToday: if you crash into the wall at sams club, 10 tons of cat food tins land on your head
coed.jpg: Or... CRAZY FORKLIFT! You're a newly-hired night-shift loader at Sam's, and your boss is an asshole. He says "Get this pallet of new Color-Safe CHeer(tm) to aisle 7, put it on the third shelf!" ANd you have to do it as fast as possible, your forklift can go up to 120 mph, and you leave a wake of terror as you rip through the warehouse
YourMissionForToday: Yeah
coed.jpg: your forklift is all bad-ass, with not just the prongs but also the big side-clamps that hold the pallet on the lift, cuz you drive like a maniac and blare rock music on your forklift's boomin system
YourMissionForToday: Pimpin forklift with loads of chrome
coed.jpg: yeah!
YourMissionForToday: You can crush someone's head with the side clamps! They're like a vice!
coed.jpg: you can smash through walls, knock over shelves, none of it matters! as long as you get the pallet to the shelf!
or wait, you know what fuck the shelf... into the truck that's backed up to the loading dock that your buddy's waiting to drive off in
coed.jpg: Ditch the soap or whatever and head over to electronicas
YourMissionForToday: But watch out for land mines in the Cambodian Jungle forklift level!
coed.jpg: hahaha
coed.jpg: yeah you have big mud tires on your forklift, and roof lights
YourMissionForToday: There could be one level where you have to steal enough parts from an assembly line to make a killer forklift, and oyu have to drive across a bunch of conveyer belts
coed.jpg: haha! Forkker?
YourMissionForToday: Yeah, and when you drop all the proper parts in the foundry, it cuts to this FMV where your AWeSOMe NEW FORKLIFT EMERGES off the assembly line
coed.jpg: haha
coed.jpg: it's so appropriate!
YourMissionForToday: I can't wait for some stoned guy to see that
coed.jpg: hahaha
YourMissionForToday: Maybe you have to kill zombies with your forklift, or you're a superhero and you can fly off your forklift to like ten rows down at sam's and land on some guy who'ss trying to run away
coed.jpg: hahaha, or you have a reach-lift, with a big extendible arm you can lash out with and smash people and things
YourMissionForToday: Yeah, or like you can impale a big can of oil with your forklift, and then ram it in reverse so that oil spills all over the place and the cops can't pursue you
coed.jpg: oh that's great
coed.jpg: and if you grab something and send it up real fast as you drive real fast (without impaling it), it flies over your head and lands behind you
YourMissionForToday: cool, you could use crates of explosives...or depth charges!
coed.jpg: yeah! have summadis!
coed.jpg: but impaling people, stacking 3 or 4 on each prong, that would be the real point of the game
YourMissionForToday: and you could ride your forklift over to these hydraulic lifts, and the higher you dump people on the shelf, the more points!

Oooh, I have a better idea.

[Gannoc]

6 teams of 8 programmers each. Give the teams names like "The Lightning Crew" and "Project: Dynamite".

Then, let them compete with each other in a bitter struggle to earn the affection of LGP by developing the best game.

The contest can be punctuated by weekly challenges. Say, two teams have to play a UT2003 team deathmatch against each other... WITH THE MONITORS UPSIDE DOWN. The winners get use of a rendering farm for a day. The losers lose their internet connection for 48 hours.

Or, the teams need to rot13 encode the first page of Hitchhikers Guide to the Galaxy by hand, while a naked man squirts lemon juice in their eyes. The winner receives their choice of an O'Reilly book. The loser probably goes blind for a day.

Or, a chosen member of each team has to write a functioning HTTP server (text only!), while being forced to watch the goatse.cx website - Clockwork Orange style. The winner receives a 2.0ghz P4 system from Gateway.com. The loser has his liver pecked out by ravens.

Slowly but surely, a product emerges and is judged. Now _thats_ something that will propel the linux gaming movement forward. Hop to it.

Re:Oooh, I have a better idea.

[DoNotTauntHappyFunBa]

Ha ha. Excellent idea! The TV rights might bring in more revenue than the game does.

I'll be a game designer

[JeanBaptiste]

All I have to say is take nethack, add a bunch of new stuff, and make some kickass graphics for it, maybe using that quake2 engine there, or at least make the graphics as good as NWN. I dont know much linux but I did write some games waaaaay back in the day with C....

although 10 hours a week for no pay..... okay I guess Im not interested...

OPEN Source.

[SatanicPuppy]

Massive retail seems to go against the idea of Open Source.

Build it and they will come; this has been well proven. But the kind of marketing they seem to be espousing really only works for Microsoft based stuff, mainly because they hold the majority share of the desktop environment. I mean, MAC beats Linux on the desktop, thus there are Mac game sections in most game stores.

I don't see this happening for Linux until the desktop market share is higher.

Now a flat-out free Open source game would kick some serious ass. Zangband is cool as hell, but we really need to move on.

For-Profits and OSS

[HydeMan]

This is another example of an organization trying to take advanage of vast work done in the name of free computing. Of course, this instance is a silly attempt to get someone to work for free in the interest of making a profit. Sadly, many will volunteer. While this of course is not an OSS effort, it is attempting to ride in the wake of OSS success.

The OSS community must come to grips with the true goal of OSS. Is it to provide free software to For-Profit organizations, or is it to provide for the free computing of individuals? Of course, these are differing goals. For-Profits cannot be allowed to milk the OSS community for all its worth. Having For-Profits adopt OSS wholesale may sound like a successful outcome for OSS, but the ramifications for the programming profession may be huge.

The economic reality is that a "total success" for OSS will turn the programming profession into a hobby. All of us who depend on software development to put food on the table should consider this. Maybe it is time that For-Profit organizations be required to contribute economically for the value they derive from the free efforts of OSS developers, not because it can make money, but because OSS software should not steal from commercial software mearly because it is free. That is not the goal of OSS. If commercial software industry is to exist long term, we must have economic balance. Otherwise, the software development industry might not be viable.

Re:Umm. I'll do this too.

[govtcheez]

Gannoc's not available right now - I'm his assistant. Feel free to e-mail me that method, and I'll get back to you when we've secured a buyer.

Re:Hahahaha. Rock Band Companies.

[Anonymous Coward]

Reminds me of the greatest line from a wonderful film called "Slumber Party Massacre Part 2", which features a female rock band spending a weekend 'rehearsing' at some rented house.

"This song will be a number one hit, as soon as we write it!"

Been there, done that

[Micro$will]

Anyone remember Dave Taylor, crack.com, and the now defunct Golgotha Project? He wanted to make the first commercial game for Linux, but after the dot com crash investor interest diminished quickly.

It was a nice idea, but he ran out of money after a year or so. The site is still up and they have some of the code available for download.

Re:Been there, done that

[Anonymous Coward]

Logic error. crack.com did not go out of business because they were going to have a Linux version, as the game was not going to be Linux-only.

Re:Work on a game without pay? Silly!

[HydeMan]

Your comparison of course is ridiculous. Of course, volunteering is everyone's right. This is a For-Profit organization trying to recruit free labor in the interest of making a profit. IMO, people who volunteer for this are foolish. If you don't think so, I have a large web development project that you can help me with. Hey, it involves Linux, so that means you'll work for free, right?

Non-Coding Skills?!

[NickFusion]

Yeah, I'd like to sign up for Lead Non-Coder. Pffft. Here's a hint: A good game is a collaboration between Engineers and Artist (non-coders). Art is not something you tack on when the code's complete.

I will now fail to acquire a ten foot pole, which will preclude my touching this.

Also: "Depending on how good the game is, how much the public like it, and any porting to other platforms, the revenue from the game could be a
modest 50,000 pounds (75,000 US Dollars) up to a substantially larger sum in excess of a million pounds."

Or a really modest 0 pounds. The public, god bless 'em, can like something zero-much. Not trying to be an ass, but someone really needs some clue-sticking re: current state of the game industry. And I'm not even talking about the current down turn, just on the relative odds of success for any developer. It's a damn tough world, adjust your expectations accordingly.

That being said, done properly, it could be a good education for young 'uns who want to get into the industry. But education & opportunity are not necessarily equal. You might then be able to leverage that education into an opportunity. Therein lies the trick.

Good luck to all, it will be required.

Re:first post , no - ugly yes

[Anonymous Coward]

Not first -- Still ugly

LGP should go into Music...

[HaeMaker]

This is very similar to a music contact, but without the "evil":

* The developers get 70% instead of 7%-10% (or less)
* Development costs are *NOT* recoverable (except they are paid after the fact)
* There is no mention of who owns the copyright, that should be ironed out, but it appears the developers would.

what? just coders for the game creation phase?!

[Roguepixel]

Only coders/developers will be included in the game idea phase... adding non-coders later?!

Just what the world needs, another id Software and Quake5.

RTFA!

[Anonymous Coward]

nt

This is a good thing.

[Judecca]

You know how many people are developing games for linux for free? This is a positive motion from LGP. Maybe if they had loads of money they could pay the developers, but either way its a step in a positive direction. I've been working on a game in my part time for the past while, mostly to learn and keep my skills in use. No incentives other than that existed, until maybe now.

Maybe you should encourage them... I've read way to many negative posts on this story.

Re:This is a good thing.

[Anonymous Coward]

Don't you mean http://www.icculus.org/bitstream/ ?

Re:This is a good thing.

[Judecca]

Yeah, I'm also a moron.

Why not work on an existing project??

[Anonymous Coward]

There are some nice projects that could help attain this goal, ie. Ogre, Crystal Space. Why not devote yourselves to one of these project???? What's the point of a Linux only game when most gamers run on a Winblows platform?? Won't it be easier for a Winblows user make the transition to Linux when a game that is already available to use on either platform????

Re:Umm. I'll do this too.

[DeltaSigma]

Here's my business contribution:

"Synergy"

Now, I expect to be entitled to a cut in whatever you end up manufacturing of course...

"Killer Linux Game??? KILLER LINUX GAME???"

[masq]

Hello? TUX RACER???!!! Duhh.

Who needs anything more?

And for you first person shooter fans, all we need to do is give Tux a gun and a psychopatic personality and we've got something really special all the kids can get into. "Dressed like James Bond, cool as ice, it's ... Tux the chubby linux... penguin

yeah, i guess i see your point.

Well

[Treeluvinhippy]

don't know whether to be happy about anything that promotes Linux gaming, or disappointed that people are being asked to work on a commercial project without a salary.

However on the flip side this may be a good for someone who wants to get a start in game development. Nothing like a title under their belt to spruce up the ol' resume.

whoa

[Anonymous Coward]

That could get freaky real fast. Remember the film with michael douglas called "The Game"?

Imagine that being played on you in real life over all those devices.
Getting weird messages from 'The Game' whenever you log into a term, sms on your cellphone etc. haha.

Re:Even worse than no salary

[tomhudson]

quote from their site:

Contracts Once the development team is committed, contracts will be sent for all to sign. These contracts will be outlining the details given here, and will protect the rights of both the developers and LGP

Why not post the actual contract details BEFORE people waste their time on this shit?

It seems to me that there's the question of ownership of the code written, as well as future rights for derivative work.

Also, some jurisdictions (Quebec is now one of them as of a few weeks ago) forbid the "employing" of people on a project for less than a guaranteed minimum wage. Check your jurisdiction - you may be able to collect a wage from them after signing the contract, as such "if we make money, you'll (maybe) make money"!

In summary - "show me the money".

It Could Work

[nullard]

It seems like a fair system. You do need to find people who have the time to donate. That is the hard part. Sure they may eventually get paid if the game sells well, but they need to give that time away now not later. Their availability will be limited since they have to feed themselves as well.

I'm sure that you will find programmers who meet these criteria. I just wonder if they will be the right ones to write this game.

Your best bet might be to use SourceForge or something and find a small group of motivated developers and offer distribution to them. That way, you have something to start from and you can tell ahead of time if they are any good. Additionally, they won't mind giving up the time to work on the project since they were going to anyway.

No way

[Anonymous Coward]

I paid $60 (!!) for winex, and it was a waste. A year of failed promises and deceitful tatics. I would definitely recommend people stay away from this company.

Re:Umm. I'll do this too.

[Anonymous Coward]

Kind of like one of those Startup Incubators, except that you only take 30% whereas they take more, and you're actually offering to do something! Sounds like a great deal to me!

Tetris is setting yourself up for failure

[Chris Canfield]

You know how many copies of Tetris there are for Linux?

Re:Hahahaha. Rock Band Companies.

[kevinvh]

Actually, I know exactly how this meeting would
go..

"Hey boys, I have a great idea for a game..
you play a penguin and you jump up and down
on a 3D triangle, changing colors of the blocks
as you jump. We'll call it, Tux-bert!!"

"Nah, that's not original enough.. I was thinking
something along the lines of an RPG.. you play
a penguin that has to collect 3 pieces of a Vax
machine in order to save his town of Slashrule.
We'll call it, the Legend of Tuxelda!!"

"YES, that's it!!! NICE WORK, JENKINS!!!"

I can't afford to participate in this

[Matt Ownby]

This sounds like a cool idea, but I tend to need money to keep me working on something once the "cool" factor wears off and the drudgery sets in. All of the free projects that I am involved in work because I can quit anytime I want to and pick up the work later when I am motivated again. But working on a project like this where there is a start and a finish and a long-term commitment, there's really no way I could keep this up without getting paid at regular intervals.

I think I have a better chance of writing linux games if I get hired on at a windows-only shop and start porting our games to linux in my spare time.

Re:They're offering to pay for production/advertis

[FortKnox]

Actually, if you use the 'Torque Game Engine', (which was used to develop Tribes2) at $100 a seat, Garage Games will publish the game for you...

Re:They're offering to pay for production/advertis

[JohnFluxx]

Hate to be dumb, but what's a "seat" ?

Re:They're offering to pay for production/advertis

[FortKnox]

$100 per 1 person license. A 'seat' license is a license for a person. So if you have 5 developers, all that need the engine for coding, you need a 5 seat license.

Call the first game "DOOMed to failure"

[Anonymous Coward]

so that when it's never released, y'all can have a big laugh at the apropros name.

Very little chances of success

[vlad_petric]

Why ? Because of 2 reasons:

There's no real Linux gaming market (the sales of all Linux games barely add up to the sales of a medium Windoze game). Granted, they're trying to do it differently - attract people to Linux with a completely original game.

The gaming market is the most ferocious software market; the failure rates are between 90% and 95%. I find it difficult to believe that 8 people, working 10-20h per week (after all, they need a real job to pay the rent) can compete with the big guys (because of the wonderful dualboot, they'd be competing with the Windoze games)

As a person who purchased quite a few Linux titles, I wish them good luck nevertheless.

The developer's may get paid. . .

[Eric Damron]

After reading all of the "What! They're not getting paid!" posts I have to wonder how many of these posters also feel that open source developer's should not ask for donations.

Come on people! LGP will be selling this game and as we all know, Linux users are notoriously tight fisted when it comes to paying for software. So this is a risky venture at best.

LGP has a lot to loose if the game doesn't sell and it is reasonable that they would limit their risk. It is not the developer's won't be paid. They may not be paid up front and if the game does poorly they may not get paid at all but if the game does well they will get 70% of the income!

Re:The developer's may get paid. . .

[qa'lth]

As has been said many, many times before, 70% of nothing is still nothing.

The odds of a team being assembled that a) has no ego, b) has plenty of talent, and c) can agree to do something within reason is pretty slim. We all know of the number of projects that get started on SourceForge with the noblest ideals.. and never get beyond the planning stage. Chances are the team will want to make something truly huge, the next great RTS or FPS game. However, convince them to do something like a little sidescroller, or one of those gem-based puzzle games that are so popular, and they could probably make enough money to fund another game, of a similar variety. A few of those, and you end up with enough money to fund one of the big games that the devs are likely dreaming of doing.

LGP Game Titles revealed

[Anonymous Coward]

The company, with support from lead artist Imari Stevenson, is apparently going to be publishing an online RPG called Eternal Destiny Conquest and a title for "mature" gamers called Survival Horror.

Dr. Phil Is My Cousin

[Acidic_Diarrhea]

Hey pussy, how's the whole not-hacking-it-as-a-CS-major working out for you? I know you have trouble with Math and real problems. It's much easier to install MS Office for someone than to program. Good career choice! Of course, you didn't have a choice since you're a fucking idiot with no dick and no brain - fagmaster. From this point on, when you introduce yourself to people you should say the following: "Hello! I am General Fagmaster of the Brown Army of Sodomites. May I bend over and receive some form of large object in my anus from you?" Got it homo?

Fuck you, you pansy. Anyone with a CS degree is about two billion times more intelligent than you, you worthless communications faggot. You are not a tech by any stretch of the imagination and you should not describe yourself as such - you fucking queer. Fuck you!

I've tried Linux games

[Bendebecker]

The simple ones are fine but the more complex ones run choppy, really choppy, like my system doesn't have the necessary resources but it does, in some case it has 4 times the necessary requirements.

Re:Work on a game without pay? Silly!

[Anonymous Coward]

Sure he will. But only if the project has a name like koogle, gahoo, or lamazon.

Game Developers? Look at the Gamasutra

[SilverThorn]

The Gamasutra (http://www.gamsutra.com/) is prob the best place to look for posting projects like this (I use it quite often for my game development projects). They have a listing of where game projects can be posted as contractual-based and list if their is no pay, royalities, etc.

Opening posting an announcement like they have to /. is a quick way to get flamed or trolled upon. In fact, there is a new article on Gamasutra about public relations and to do's & don'ts.

-- M

I guess RedHat is really pissing you off then.

[BoomerSooner]

Because Advanced Server 2.1 is selling very well. Everyone has a choice to make as to what they do. If you desperately want to get into the game industry, what better way than to demonstrate your ability by building a game for free.

As I recall the developers of CS (counter strike) have made out quite well and as a owner of Half Life I've never paid a dime for CS.

Just because you would prefer money doesn't exist doesn't mean everyone feels they are being exploited by the system (consumerism as you put it).

If you want to believe the world would be a better place if money didn't exist and everyone worked on only the projects they want to work on, there would be no sanitation workers, no one at taco bell, no one delivering mail, ...

Socialism only works in SciFi. As much as I wish the opposite were true, socialism is a joke. The only way people work is if there is a tangible reward on the other side (99.99% that is).

Re:I guess RedHat is really pissing you off then.

[oliverthered]

"Socialism only works in SciFi.", well true, though most Sci-Fi is communist not socilalist.

Communism has worked for thousands of years, your just blinded by modern history.

Most people forget that a hundred years ago almost no-one had a cooler and freezers were rare. Just like you forget that there were humans around, surviving in communes for thousands of years.

Re:I guess RedHat is really pissing you off then.

[Anonymous Coward]

Yeah Communism has worked out wonderfully!
Sure, whatever. Moronic statement.
Communism is the opposite of freedom, I never understand why people act like consumerism limits their freedom. It's the most free system anyone's come up with, and it works! Freedom of choice, all the way!

Re:I guess RedHat is really pissing you off then.

[oliverthered]

Your just a american freek, the only communist societies in the past couple of hundred years were the un-conolinised parts of africa.

I have seen this before...

[Anonymous Coward]

It is the common "I do not have any thing to contribute, I just want to dictate to you and have you do all the work for me." I read homebrew sites and it is common for some person to request "devlopers" to make game X, with the intent of doing nothing and not helping at all.

The "from scratch" and "We are looking for developers to work in a team to produce this game, and we will be publishing the game they make" gives it away. I would also question the non-seriousness of what is written, as well as the non-existent legal details, but it sounds like typical game companie PR.

While I would like to belive other wise, I know there are projects like this that are not like what I posted above. But I have the feeling that this one is just a scam.

I also wonder just what the licence agreement will be, will the source be made avaliable?

Re:They're offering to pay for production/advertis

[Anonymous Coward]

I don't know, knowing how buggie Tribes2 was I doubt that I would want to use their engine.

You may get paid.

[StarTux]

How many of you read through the details? Not even sure Michael did either:

Basically you're expected to work 10 hours a week, so its part time. If the team makes a good enough game it will be marketed and sold by LGP worldwide. 70% of profits go to the development team.

This seems to be more commissioned based, your income based upon sales, thats pretty good incentive to make a darn good game.

StarTux
PS Go and read it and make your own mind up.

Some actual data

[Teppy]

I'm the president of eGenesis, the company that does A Tale in the Desert. Six days ago we became the first MMO game to release with both Windows and Linux clients. We even got slashdotted. Here are the numbers so far:

Out of the 4978 Accounts created:
4198 Use the Windows Client (84%)
780 Use the Linux Client (16%)
Creating an account is free.

So far, 1148 of those 4978 (23%) have paid for a subscription. Of these 1148:
1043 Use the Windows Client (91%)
105 Use the Linux Client (9%)

The Linux client is somewhat harder to get working than the Windows version right now, because of different library versions installed on people's systems. The potential percentage of Linux users is certainly higher than the above. However, once you are in the game, both versions work equally well (and the Linux version seems to be slightly faster.)

Re:The point of no salary or how to get flamed.

[ebooher]

Ok, look. I'm going to have to admit to being a little naive here and .... why is my rear end suddenly getting warmer, please put the flamethrowers down until *after* the post. I don't really understand why so many people are so caught up in complaining about this.

I don't play games, typically, so I'm not your average raving fanatic ready at all times with my tome of useless time line knowledge on the whole of the gaming industry. However, I know that it is big business, and I also know that manufacturers are beginning to look in the direction of the gaming developers as the next level of high line computing.

But did Id software start out, fully formed. Leaping from the bushes, games firmly in boxes hidden beneath trenchcoats ready to make nefarious deals? Psst. Buddy .... need a game? One of the great things about online forums is no one really knows how old anyone else is, until statements like the one I am about to make are made. Then one dates themselves. But, I remember a time back in the days of dinosaurs when we had these little programs called "Shareware." I seem to remember that the original Wolfenstein 3D was shareware. Wasn't it out before Doom and Quake? The first 3D shooter of the genre? Even though Doom was the biggie, and apparently built modern gaming as we know it. The ol' Wolf was pretty "bad" back then. For all the youngsters, "bad" is a term indicating something was really "rad," "hip," or "cool." Which are all terms to indicate "Good." God I hope "good" is still in Webster's Dictionary.

These games, you see, were on a floppy diskette. You could pick them up all over the place, flea markets, the gas station, the grocery store. I kid you not, you could buy Wolfenstein 3D from my local grocery store. Then there were other true Id favorites. Duke Nukem. Which had three parts, or seperate games, if memory serves. All of them shareware. Written by some really imaginative people in a garage somewhere. All they ever asked for was like $10 - $15 bucks for a game. You mail them a payment, and they send you a code to unlock all of the game, or send you the floppy with the full game already on it.

Don't you think that all of these "High line Gaming Developers who would Shape the industry and our world as we know it" had day jobs? All of them did, I'm sure of it. Even if there day job was coding another project (maybe even another game) They weren't feeding their families on this. They were using it for the exact same thing that I read out of this.

A chance.

Plain and simple. They wanted to be noticed, wanted their software to be used. Wanted their games to be played. And shareware was so much more than games, they had spreadsheet programs, comic book databases, you name it there was a shareware program that could do it. Oh wait .... that is kind of like the GNU/GPL/OpSo software today. Software all written for a chance to get noticed and have the opportunity to do something really really cool. By really imaginative people.

I can't help but read through all the posts that are saying things like "This sucks." or "You suck." or even "You want me to code you something for free so you can make money off of it." and think to myself. How disappointing. No vision in any of them. Not a single imaginative soul in the lot. You don't seem able to see things in the larger perspective. This isn't about working for free. Hell, it can be argued that all of us work for free. It is about attaching *your* name to a project. Giving *your* John Hancock to the world of gaming. Something that Rare and InfoGrams and Sega and hell even Microsoft might notice

This is about screaming I to the world. Well I say I damnit. Crazy script kiddies that don't know how to do anything that doesn't come with instructions. If you can't click next, next, next then you think you can't do it. You have to have it all spelled out for you because you as a world are afraid, you're all terrified of failing. This has nothing to do with money, it has everything to do with knowing the whole world is laughing at you. But you know what. Sign me up.

That's right. Sign me up. I don't know a thing about C, or C++. I know bash shell scripting, I'm a UNIX administrator. I know some PERL and a little BASIC. Go on, laugh at me. That's right. I used to code games in BASIC for the Commodore 64. Bring it on. Because I'm not afraid. Whether you think that you can, or that you can not, you are right! And I tell you I can. I'll learn C, I'll learn C++, put my name on the list. Bill it as Ed Booher's Optika World VII. But give me my chance!

Mr. DeVille, I'm ready for my close up.

Announcement!

[Anonymous Coward]

Attention Devlopers, make X game for me. I will do absolutely nothing, just yell at you and tell you what I want you to do.

If there happens to be the chance that it could actully be profitable I will take all your work and sell it on systems other then Linux. Don't feel bad, I will make sure to screw you even more in the process some how.

Heck this sounds so good that I am off to start a sourceforge page for "Teh best 'Linux' CURRENT GAME TREND game evhar!" right now!

You know..

[Anonymous Coward]

Sex sells. More power to the troll exploting this fact and the stupidity of slashdot mods.

Calm down.

[Anonymous Coward]

it's only slashdot.

Only if they are not actully working on it

[Anonymous Coward]

Anyone taken a look at what 3drealms has been doing lately?

Let me correct that, anyone notice what they haven't been doing lately? Far as I can tell they sure are not devloping a game in there.

Take a look at their plan files, for quite some time it has been the only news about what is going on in there. While they are intended to let us know what is going on, the only thing that gets reported there is their personal lifes, which sound like all they are doing is watching movies, building up their MPOGG character, sleeping, etc. Most of the other game worker's fingers actully tell us something about what is going on involving the games in their business.

So if the team is spening 10 work hours on something besides the game, then they are managing the DNF team.

Re:Only if they are not actully working on it

[Anonymous Coward]

After continually getting raked over the coals on the Internet forums, the DNF team was specifically told not to update news sites on their progress anymore. Not exactly a media blackout, but pretty close.

Professionalism

[Anonymous Coward]

You failed to leave contact information in your press release!

How can you ask people to work for you for free if you can't do your own job...

Re:Even worse than no salary

[yomegaman]

Are you the Tom Hudson who wrote Spectrum 512 for the Atari ST? I'm pretty sure you're not - judging by your postings you weren't even born then - but I just thought I'd ask anyway.

In the works already

[Anonymous Coward]

Xarvh

The best part about OSS...

[SmirkingRevenge]

...is that the people who are generally writing the code, WANT to be writing it, not that they're being paid to do so.

Since this is a free project, why would you want to limit yourself to such a small group? When people are donating their time (and if they're any good they likely have "real" jobs for 70% of their day) for free there's no good reason to impose limits on group size. If you get 1 hour a day from everyone, EVERY DAY, then you will have gotten 7 hours a week from the group...that's less then 1 day of real-life work, and certainly much less then the 12 hour days many game devs put in.

Why not do something more like this (Using a traditional CRPG as an example)?

2-3 Producers, with a shared vision, who together could overlap enough to hopefully catch issues that'll derail/delay the project and help coordinate the dev teams.

2+ developers for every part of the system, a standard breakdown would be like:
3+ devs for the graphics engine
2+ for the scripting engine
1-2 for the asset management system (definitely needed when artists/sound/level/content makers get involved)
As many people as you can for the various editing tools that'll be released to the content guys.

8 people given 5 years at 1 hour a day may produce pong, or maybe even zork, but I wouldn't expect anything anyone would ever buy. Why limit yourself?

Re:The best part about OSS...

[qa'lth]

The problem is, artists and other content creators aren't going to go for this. We like to be paid. We don't normally like doing pro-bono work, and when we do, we tend to do game modifications, or other projects where we have some measure of creative control. You can get paid good money to churn out artwork in a style you hate. Yes, we WANT to be creating art, but art on our own terms, not someone else's. In a game environment, it has to be someone else's, or the art style looks very amateurish.

Did I also mention that damn near no artist is going to GPL, or similarly license their artwork? It would be, to put it lightly, incredibly stupid. You'd be laughed off the forum for such a suggestion at most of the major art communities on the 'net. "I want people to help with my free game project, you won't be paid, and you lose the rights to your artwork if you help out! Killer deal!"

Re:The best part about OSS...

[SmirkingRevenge]

I'm a software engineer (in gaming actually, casino slotmachine stuff in real live casinos, but direct x gaming nonetheless) and know much more about the software side then the content side, but code alone won't do a whole hell of a lot without art/sound/music/content/animation/yadda/yadda

Re:The best part about OSS...

[burns210]

"8 people given 5 years at 1 hour a day may produce pong, or maybe even zork, but I wouldn't expect anything anyone would ever buy."

Yes, but it would be native pong!.. Err, that souned much more impressive in my head.

history

[Anonymous Coward]

Hasn't this been done?

http://abuse2.com/

Re:Even worse than no salary

[tomhudson]

A bit of history:

Boris Tsikanovsky immigrated to the United States from the Soviet Union in 1979. By 1986, he had teamed up with two Russian friends (brothers Boris and Michael Elman) in Boston as Trio Engineering to develop Atari ST software. ... Boris' new paint program. This paint program, Spectrum 512, used tricky color palette switching

... Atari ST with Tom Hudson's famous graphics program D.E.G.A.S.

So, no, the other Tom Hudson (not me) didn't write Spectrum 512 either.

Curious, though ... why would you say that, judging by my postings, I wasn't even born in '85, when I've been working w. computers since before then? Just wondering ... :-)

The Flop heard around the Slashdot

[t0ny]

oh man, this game is gonna either

A. Tank badly and never be made, or

B. Be released, but suck really bad

On the good side, it will probably be free. I'll go back to playing WC3, a game with really good production values.

Re:They're offering to pay for production/advertis

[JohnFluxx]

Okay I sort of thought that - but it doesn't make much sense. Aren't you basically integrating the engine into your game, then distributing to everyone?
I mean, if an inside tester played the game, then they are using the engine. Would they count as a user or developer?

Re:Dinero Nada?

[applejacks]

Sounds too good to be true. Well that is what you would expect me to say. I wish them the best of luck. Man I get into more arguments with friends over what languages to write in. I can already see the discussions on the special forum they will set up.

Several people will want to code in strictly C++. Others, will complain and want C. Then still others will be pulling for the underdogs of implementation. Round one.
Round two: BSP Trees, Oct trees, or this here.
Round four: 3D Studio Max, Blender, or Lightwave.
Crystal space, this, and unknown lib that. Sounds like another Redhat to me. There are already from scratch games being made. I foresee no need for a publish title. Yet I'm not necessarily against it. I really hope they take their time and plan this right if it comes to fruition. No 6 month miracle like EA' is notorious for. Please GOD no first person shooter. Quake 3 is doing just fine for me in that area. Neverwinter nights upon completion of their linux port will handle the 3rd person area. So I really don't see the need as I have stated. The games we have already are good games. They fill the void. What we really need is a really good 3dmax type modler for Unix. Free as in beer. l8r

No salary, so what.

[DeVilla]

I'd be lying if I said that the lack of salary along with my employer not wanting to share me was not the only reason I'm not applying. That aside, how is this any different (or rather worse) than the small game companies that effectively start with some guy or guys in a bedroom (or their parent's basement) hacking away until they have a game they think they can sell. In previous days I would think of Origin Systems. In more recent years need only look at the games on my desk and see Introversion's Uplink. Every startup has risk. Frankly, in the case of the LGP scheme, if they make a killer game, the return is almost guarentteed. That is better odds than any game startup gets.

If anything, LGP is offering a sweet situation for a group of developers to try to make something special. I would guess LGP also wants to get 'The Right People' to make a cool game that might just put Linux on the radar of the gaming mainstream.

My 2K Demos

[Bill Kendrick]

Ok, one demo is a TAD larger than 2K of source, and uses 5K of data (a MOD music file).
The other is EXACTLY 2048 bytes of source, and is a simple little T*tr*s(tm) clone.

ftp://ftp.sonic.net/pub/users/nbs/unix/x/2k/

Tux the FPS game

[Brave Ulysses]

Innaresting concept, but what about those of us who like not only FPS but Strategy and RPG? A futuristic RTS wargame in which Tux takes on Gates? Where you can play select battles in FPS as well as direct them from an RTS perspective? Perhaps make it a MultiPlayer bonanza with one team as MS and one as Linux?

Sounds great to me...

tux logo

[hitchhacker]

Michael, I can't be the first to notice that tuxgames' logo is a bit.. well, x-rated.
this one
A masturbating penguin is not a good thing for representing your company.

-metric

Re:tux logo

[michaelsimms]

You arent the first person to say that {:-)

Its a joystick, and not THAT kind of joystick {:-)

The logo does have a nickname at the office, I'll leave it to your imagination...

Re:They're offering to pay for production/advertis

[FortKnox]

Its more along the line of coding on the engine, not necessarily using it. The reason they use the word "seat" is because everyone will probably use the same source in some type of source control on a server, so its the same code, just used on different 'seats'.

Re:Umm. I'll do this too.

[jamesh]

You give me any large prime number (you make sure it's prime :) and i'll tell you all the factors within a few seconds. i'll even sell you the code to do it for a mere 1 million dollars ($US of course... my currency isn't worth anything anymore :)