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Hyperion to Bring IncaGold Games to Linux

An Ominous Cow Erred writes "Just wanted to let everyone know that Hyperion Entertainment will be bringing IncaGold's game lineup to Linux (as well as AmigaOS and MacOS), starting with Midnight Racing. On a personal note, I'm happy we're giving Linux another shot, being a devout Gentoo user myself! (I should also point out that while the Linux section of the website is kind of old and crusty, there should be more info on the new titles soon!)"

18 of 163 comments (clear)

  1. erm... by lingqi · · Score: 4, Funny
    An Ominous Cow Erred writes...

    That has to be about the most creative name I have ever heard. I do wonder if some chemicals were involved (inhaled, possibly?) during its creation, though. =)

    --

    My life in the land of the rising sun.

  2. AmigaOS by tmark · · Score: 4, Interesting

    Forget targeting MacOS and Linux, and let's assume doing either or both is viable. But AmigaOS ? That's a business plan gone seriously awry and I have to conclude this company is doomed to failure. And I write this as a guy who is looking at a working Amiga 1000 on his dining room table right now...

    1. Re:AmigaOS by SimonKeogh · · Score: 3, Funny

      Apparently they sell more Amiga ports then they do Linux.

    2. Re:AmigaOS by NanoGator · · Score: 5, Funny

      "Forget targeting MacOS and Linux, and let's assume doing either or both is viable. But AmigaOS ?"

      It's a brilliant business plan. Mentioning AmigaOS is a surefire way to get free advertising on Slashdot.

      Here are a few other phrases that'll earn you Slashvertisements:

      - "...battle with Microsoft.."
      - "...support for Ogg Vorbis..."
      - "...AMD...
      - "...ported to Linux..."
      - "...Mozilla..."

      All you have to do is work any of these phrases into the marketing literature for your product, and BOOM your site gets ground to a halt.

      --
      "Derp de derp."
    3. Re:AmigaOS by lsd · · Score: 3, Informative

      I'd think twice before stipulating that Linux is a viable market, and that AmigaOS isn't...

      Hyperion have been making AmigaOS ports of PC games for a while now - when Loki was around, Hyperion were seen as the Loki of the AmigaOS world. The difference between the two companies is that one is a small but successful company that continues to produce and sell products, and the other is very, very dead.

      Hyperion have ported games to Linux before, namely Shogo: MAD and SiN. They decided not to do any more after those though, since they sold poorly compared to the AmigaOS versions. I'm glad to see that Hyperion are giving Linux another shot though, even though I spend a lot more time gaming on my GameCube than my PC these days...

    4. Re:AmigaOS by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 3, Informative

      Hyperion have ported several games to Amiga in the past including Shogo: M.A.D., Freespace, Heretic II and Quake 2.

      They have been at a consistantly high level of quality.

      They are also first and foremost Amiga developers. They have already tried to port to the Linux market, but found out that the Amiga market was more viable. The Mac market is naturally even more so.

      Besides this they are also developing AmigaOS 4.0...

    5. Re:AmigaOS by Mike+Bouma · · Score: 4, Informative

      Hyperion is the company who is leading the AmigaOS4 project. They are very passionate about the Amiga platform.

      After the demise of Loki Games, Hyperion is probably the most important commercial Linux game developing company left on the market today. They now have a really impressive list of Amiga (and Linux/Mac) licenses and released products (Heretic2, Descent Freespace, Shogo, SiN, Soldier of Fortune, Majesty, Worms Armageddon, etc, etc!), but have been pretty quiet lately due to their top programmers leading the AmigaOS4 project, as well as being hired by Mai Logic for developing the AmigaOne/Teron firmware ROM.

      http://amigaworld.net/modules/news/article.php?s to ryid=278

      Considering their expertise in many different fields the "Entertainment" part of Hyperion's name is a bit misleading though. For instance they also have a AmigaOS4 license for porting Real3D, a great professional 3D Raytracer. They changed their name from Hyperion Software to Hyperion Entertainment simply because there was another company with the same name already.

      Keep up the excellent work Hyperion! :)

  3. Re:Wow by fafaforza · · Score: 3, Informative

    If I remember correctly, that Midnight Racing game was bundled with TNT2 video cards to show off the graphics, pretty much. It was bottom of the barrel, bargain bin demo-ware when it was released however many years ago.

    But it was good for a few hours ofmindless racing with little in terms of physics. Decent graphics, pretty colors, so there might be some value to it.

  4. Re:So when are we talking? by deadsaijinx* · · Score: 3, Insightful

    just a bit outdated ^^.

    now, to veer a tad. It's great that companies are releasing titles for Linux, it really is, but I want more and more of the brand-spankin-new games to run natively on Linux. Sure, I know, there are more and more FPSs coming out for Linux, but I want more than that. OTOH, It probably wouldn't kill anyone to keep a 10gig partition on their machine for running the latest and greatest (as well as all the old) games. I understand that you don't want to pay the MS tax, but that's what emule is for (not that I'm suggesting you dl a copy of win2k or winxp [wink, wink]).
    Now, I'd be interested if a big player in the game industry said something to the effect of "all future titles will be released under linux." Now that would be news for nerds.

    --
    YOU SUCK BALLS!
  5. woo by nomadic · · Score: 5, Funny

    "I want to risk our company's future by supporting the Linux platform; it's not widely used, and the few people who do use it don't like paying for stuff."

    "Sounds a little bit too safe for me. Let's support AmigaOS too, and we'll be SURE to fail!"

    "Great idea, Bob!"

  6. Linux gaming is alive and well... by Toasty16 · · Score: 3, Insightful
    Truly this is the dawn of a new era of interactive entertainment for Linux. I mean, how can you not be *ahem* bowled over by Bowling USA! Or if tossing heavy balls is not your thing, then try your hand at every podunk dweller's favorite pastime (not including watching NASCAR) with Paintball Heroes!

    Seriously, is this truly front page news? This seems more like a press release than a real story, and it's not really news to announce the Linuxification of Family Collection 1 and 2. And the last *real* game released by Hyperion for Linux was the poorly selling Shogo. It's gonna take more than a couple of B games to sprout a thriving Linux game community. Maybe the real starting point for Linux gaming is the distro for the PS2? At least I know one thing for sure: this is not it.

  7. Mindnight Racing is a terrible game by recap · · Score: 5, Interesting

    While it's nice to see Linux and even my old favorite Amiga OS get some new software Midnight Racing is a terrible game.

    I picked it up for the equivalent of about $2.50 US and felt thoroughly ripped off. While the screenshots look fine it plays like it was written by someone who's never been in a car much less driven one! On the bright side the DVD style case could be reused after throwing the game out.

    I hope their other titles are better but given Autobahn racing looks like it uses the same game engine I don't hold out much hope.

    --
    Cheap DVDs - Amazon with all the crap filtered out
  8. Not much of a lineup sadly. by mrseigen · · Score: 4, Insightful

    Don't get me wrong, it's fantastic that Linux is getting more games. I love games. It's just that your average Joe definitely isn't going to jump on with Linux if the entire game collection consists of clones of other games and very few "big-name" games will run on it.

    Porthouses like Hyperion need to start talking to the developers that make big-name games, considering that the publishers certainly aren't taking a chance on it. Simplistic? Yeah. Idealistic? Definitely. But it needs to happen.

    1. Re:Not much of a lineup sadly. by nova20 · · Score: 3, Funny
      switching to linux because of the games is like deciding to be a gas-station attendant for the money.

      /tim

  9. Ah very impressive... by NanoGator · · Score: 5, Funny

    "Three of these things belong together
    Three of these things are kind of the same
    Can you guess which one of these doesn't belong here?
    Now it's time to play our game!


    Now let's play our game!

    "Half Life 2"

    "Doom 3"

    "Midnight Racer"

    "GTA3 Vice City"

    --
    "Derp de derp."
  10. And in other news... by fireman+sam · · Score: 5, Funny

    AMD is in a battle with Microsoft to force the version of Mozilla with support for Ogg Vorbis to be ported to Linux.

    Damn, this is front page stuff!

    --
    it is only after a long journey that you know the strength of the horse.
  11. Quality-not quantity. by Martigan80 · · Score: 3, Insightful

    That about says it all; sure we want more games on Linux but I think we want to see quality games. Sorry but with the hardware we have these days we should expect more from a game. The graphics from this game look a bit dated. What worries me is how much do they want to charge for this product? If they even think about $20 they will have one heck a battle in the sales department. Yeah, yeah I know they don't have the big teams like ID, EA, or anyone else. This doesn't excuse one of putting out a crappy game. For those people that want to prove Linux is better than Windows in every aspect-don't show them this game.

    --
    This SIG pulled due to lack of funding. (This damn war is costing too much!)
  12. Game Titles by StormReaver · · Score: 3, Insightful

    I'm not a big game player, so I'm not that upset with the limited game selection on Linux. However, I do like to play them sometimes. I bought the tin-box Linux version of Q3A, bought UT and downloaded the Linux installer, and bought RtCW for Linux.

    Last year I bought a PS2 to satisfy my non-FPS gaming desires. Since then I've bought about eight games for it (GTA, GTA/VC, Spiderman, ATV Offroad-whatchamacallit, and a few others I can't recall right now). I mostly play them with several cheats enabled to bring them down to a level where they're fun. I'm not a gaming purist. I have games to pass some time and divert my attention for a while, not to forge a new lifestyle (which is why I won't buy or play NWN or participate in any MMORPG).

    The point of all this? I'm more than willing to pay for quality games that I'll only play every now and then, and they don't necessarily have to be big blockbusters.

    Two of the most enjoyable games I've been playing recently aren't even commercial. I've been playing FooBillard off and on for a few weeks, and I love the game (I'm not even a pool fan). Same thing with Kolf. They're quite simple (from a playability perspective) and a great way to recharge my brain after (or while) working.

    High quality doesn't have to mean expensive or big name. Too many game designers are focusing heavily on visual effects and too little on re/playability. Castle Wolfenstein, Doom, and Quake were brilliant (I am quite impressed with Carmack and co.) in terms of both replayability (I still fire them up from time to time) and uniqueness.

    But now everyone and his brother (and including Carmack and co.) keeps pumping these rehashes out. When I had first heard of RtCW, I couldn't wait to get my hands on it. After playing it for a while, though, it quickly dawned on me how repetitive and uninspired it was. It just just another Quake with different graphics and a new storyline. The gameplay was the same old stuff. Like Star Wars and Star Trek, it's time to let these franchises take a vacation.

    I know that John, for example, is capable of great gameplay insights, and I'm still greatful that he is allowing for Linux versions of ID games (and releasing old games under the GPL!). But I just can't bring myself to buy yet another FPS or common rehash.

    I remember from years ago, a company called MVP [Software | Games] made a very simplistic but incredibly fun game based on the 1991 gulf war. I had no money back then, but I would have bought the full version if I could have. Now that was different and fun. It was shareware, and would have been well worth the money.

    Now that I've been gainfully employed for a few years, I have discretionary income that's looking for fresh outlets. If shareware game makers would use OpenGL/SDL and exercise creativity, I'd be happy to pay for their products. As it stands, games have become mostly monotonous and trite over the last couple years.