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Savage to Support Linux

Posted by michael on from the support-linux-gaming dept.

focitrixilous P writes "Gamespot writes about the upcoming hybrid strategy game Savage: The Battle for Neweth, which will provide a full Linux edition on the same disk as the Windows version. The title blends real time strategy with action titles, along one player to act as a general while others do the actual fighting."

24 of 259 comments (clear)

  1. What a good idea! by James+A.+A.+Joyce · · Score: 5, Interesting

    It's such an obvious idea I'm surprised that no one's thought of it before. With games makers keeping their games sensibly small it's entirely possible for someone to squeeze a version for Windows and Linux on one disk; heck, they already do it for Windows/Macintosh, why not Windows/Linux more often? Maybe now one company's had the balls to actually go ahead and do this others will follow with higher profile games.

    --

    Bash script for FP whores

    1. Re:What a good idea! by _Sprocket_ · · Score: 3, Insightful


      The reason more games don't get produced for linux is because the general population of Linux users want everything free. Until they can prove Linux users want to spend money no one is going to blink an eye.

      And Windows users like to get all their games from their favorite warez iso source. Any other stereotypes you would like to bandy about?
    2. Re:What a good idea! by Dalcius · · Score: 4, Insightful

      No kidding.

      I figure if just this once, Slashdot put its money where its mouth is and bought the game, the gaming companies might realize what kind of a market there is. Linux is getting more desktop users every day. Keeping software portable isn't difficult if you keep your code multi-tiered and that relatively small effort gets income from Windows, Linux, XBox, etc... this seems to be a trend.

      I thought this game sounded good, much like Allegiance or even Battlezone II. The graphics look nice, and I could use a new game. But normally I'd just wait until it hit shelves and take a look then.

      But Linux support? Hell yeah. I just preordered this game from EB.

      $39.99. That's $10 off, you get access to the ongoing beta when your order is confirmed (which Linux is a part of, per the article), a free comic about the game and Linux support in what looks to be a good game.
      Not bad.

      --
      ~Dalcius
      Rome wasn't burnt in a day.
  2. Publicity by steesefactor · · Score: 5, Interesting

    I'm wondering if game companies will start porting games to Linux if just to get the publicity from sites like /.? A minor story about a game I've never heard of gets on the front page just because it's also for Linux. How many other sites report on cross-operating system games like this?

    1. Re:Publicity by James+A.+A.+Joyce · · Score: 5, Interesting

      Dozens.

      I'm quite glad for companies which do this, though. We already do this for other open source and proprietary products, but we've neglected games. If a company we support wants to get a bit of free publicity by submitting a story to Slashdot, they're free to do so. And if more people start hearing about games for Linux, that's one of the trifedecta of reasons for staying with Windows eliminated (the other two being a perceived lack of hardware support and legacy Windows applications). This can really only be a good thing; I can't see anything negative about it, especially considering how many adverts Slashdot already has.

      --

      Bash script for FP whores

    2. Re:Publicity by AntiOrganic · · Score: 4, Insightful

      I agree. There are really only a few things that are preventing me from switching to Linux.

      1. Multimedia support. Xine and Mplayer are great, if you can get them to work. I've had little trouble on SuSE but it's awfully flaky on Slackware, through my experience. Additionally, there's really precious little to compare to Premiere for video editing.
      2. Games. I do play a lot of them. Thankfully, ZSNES and a lot of other emulators are available on Linux. This alleviates that tremendously. Unfortunately, Tux Racer isn't my idea of immersive entertainment.
      3. Consistency. Red Hat/Mandrake's attempts to unify the desktops with Bluecurve/Galaxy, respectively, are one step in the right direction; now, if GTK+ would only fix that file picker dialog ;D

      With Wolfenstein, Neverwinter Nights, and now Savage, we're headed in the right direction. 1 down, 2 to go.

    3. Re:Publicity by Feztaa · · Score: 3, Interesting

      Xine and Mplayer are great, if you can get them to work.

      Xine is t3h suck. :)

      Mplayer is great, it's managed to play everything I've ever thrown at it.

      The trick to installing mplayer is to use an RPM-based distro (RedHat 9 has worked really well for me), then download all the RPMs that their website tells you to. You need the base package, gui, and all the codecs and stuff. Then just 'rpm -i *.rpm' them, and there you go. If you're like me with a radeon card, make sure you're using X 4.3 with the radeon driver loaded (vesa driver is evil), and mplayer should be using the 'xv' output.

      For those not in the know, here are some reasons why mplayer kicks WMP's ass:

      - sane key bindings. WMP's keybindings are all CTRL + this or SHIFT + that. I've always found it unintuitive; it's like the normal keys have already been used, so they have to resort to using the CTRL key. In mplayer, 'p' is pause, 'f' is fullscreen, etc. It's very simple.

      - easy rewind/fast forward. WMP makes you fiddle with the mouse clicking on the stupid progress meter, mplayer lets you easily skip ahead and back with the arrow keys (not that you can't fiddle with a graphical progress bar if you feel like it).

      - more codecs. I can use mplayer to watch *everything* that I download; whereas on Windows you need WMP for some files, realplayer, quicktime, WinDVD, and a few others just to have all files covered.

      - support of corrupted files. If I download a movie with bittorrent, but I only get 99%, mplayer can play the file (with just a couple skips and jumps from missing pieces), while WMP will just barf and not play the file at all.

      I think mplayer is one of the pinnacles of open source development, right up there with Apache and Mozilla.

    4. Re:Publicity by Coyote67 · · Score: 3, Informative

      Yeah thats awesome linux guys, but I really have to put my .02 in this. I have one player for everything in windows. Media Player Classic does everything I ever wanted in a media player. Combine it with the codec pack and the quicktime/realmedia alternative codec packs you can get from here . It can play everything you throw at it because all it does is use all the codecs on your system. You can set priority if you want things specific and dolby ex quality dvds play perfectly.

      --
      [Just Shut Up and Do What I say]
    5. Re:Publicity by SealBeater · · Score: 4, Insightful

      The trick to installing mplayer is to use an RPM-based distro

      No, the trick is to actually read the docs and have an idea of what you are
      doing. And no, rpm -i *.rpm doesn't qualify.

      Sorry, I just hate laziness of thought and not too fond of those who advocate
      such.

      SealBeater

      --
      -- Its survival of the fittest...and we got the fucking guns!!!
    6. Re:Publicity by vandan · · Score: 3, Interesting

      2 problems with this argument:

      1) Linux users are soon to outnumber Mac users. See here for a Mac user's take on this.

      2) Since OS-X is based on BSD, making a Linux OR Mac version of an app is doing most of the ground work for the other anyway. If you're going to go after one minority market, why put in another 5% effort and go after the other as well?

  3. knoppix by Mr2cents · · Score: 3, Interesting

    While they're at it, why don't they throw in a knoppix cd? boot.. play..

    --
    "It's too bad that stupidity isn't painful." - Anton LaVey
  4. Graphics Drivers by Eu4ria · · Score: 3, Interesting

    I wonder it will only certain graphics cards will be supported. As I beleive was the case with UT2K3 only working on nvidia cards.

    1. Re:Graphics Drivers by Sammich · · Score: 3, Informative
      UT2K3 works fine with other video cards
      Video System: 3D Accelerator card with 16 MB VRAM (*32-128 MB VRAM RECOMMENDED) 16 MB TNT2-class DirectX® version 6 compliant video card. (*NVIDIA GeForce 2/ATI Radeon RECOMMENDED) DirectX® version 8.1 (Included on game disc)

      On a side note, I recently read an article about some programmers that said it was actually unbelievably easy to port their program to *nix from Windows. It was however an application/design program and not a game, but hell if Winex works. . . I'll see if I can find it.

  5. Portability in Linux by questamor · · Score: 4, Insightful

    So Linux goes a long way to having a nice standard base system for portability. Is this another game released as a "Linux" game, but really meaning "Linux on x86" game?

    I do get a bit pessimistic, and should probably RTFA

  6. Re:I don't see why this is so difficult. by sampowers · · Score: 5, Insightful

    It has to do with decisions that the programmers made very early on. If they chose to use ActiveX and take full advantage of all the APIs that Windows as a platform offers, it's going to be very difficult (ie, almost a full rewrite of display, input, and sound code) to port it to another platform.

    Smart designers plan for multi-platform use early on. Quake 3 was written portably, and its engine is in use on platforms as exotic as Sega Dreamcast and Playstation 2! And probably many more non-PC type computers. And it's used by a lot of other games too! (Nevermind the fact that those games play almost exactly like Quake 3. I'd like to see an RPG based on the Q3 engine, huh?)

    BTW, it must be incredibly painful for anyone who writes a complex 3d graphics engine to hear you say that it's "minor work".

  7. Linux and Windows on the same CD? by zr-rifle · · Score: 3, Funny

    Seems like the battle will start way before the game is installed...

    --
    Hack your mind out of its sandbox.
  8. Mac Gamers! by AntiOrganic · · Score: 4, Funny

    This is all Linux needs to overtake Mac as the gaming platform of choice!

    Reminds me of that Mac Gamers video... Photoshop.

  9. Linux version runs well by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 3, Interesting

    I can personally say that I have been in the beta test of this game, and the Linux version runs just as well as the windows version on my machine. And so far, aside from the normal beta crap, bugginess, and elitist attitudes of some of the testers, the game ranks up there for me, with BF1942, and Counter Strike. Just my 2 cents.

  10. believe it when you see it by DrSkwid · · Score: 3, Insightful

    Maybe now one company's had the balls to actually go ahead and do this

    "the upcoming hybrid strategy game"

    they've had the balls to announce it and we've heard it all before

    --
    There are places where the networks are not touching,and there are places where they are-Boeing's Lori Gunter
  11. Linux and PC version??? by KamuZ · · Score: 3, Interesting

    Just a tought... Why sites use "Linux" and "PC" version like if they were different, i mean i HAVE a PC with WINDOWS and LINUX. They make it sound weird.

    Anyway, i believe it's like telling people the difference in "hacker" and "cracker".

  12. Re:I don't see why this is so difficult. by chrisd · · Score: 5, Informative
    For one thing, a number of companies are not rolling thier own graphic front ends anymore. For instance, for renderware and gamebryo, you need to pay your licence per platform. So if you are going to use these kinds of tools, you have to ask yourself, how much will publishing on linux actually make us? If that answer is (as it currently is right now) not much, then that is something that you need to consider. Keep in mind that licencing an engine can save you 1 or 2 years of development depending on your application.

    This is not to intimate that there are renderware or gamebryo platform licences available. I'll put it another way, until a signifigant number of gamers say "I will pay 50$ for a game only when it hits linux natively (not transgaming or others)" then is when you will see linux reach parity with the Mac or windows. Currently, our research shows that hard core gamers that use linux are not loathe to reboot into windows or use an emulation technology. Until that changes, the state of linux gaming won't change either.

    Also, describing the engine as minor shows you don't understand the state of AAA gaming. The engine would comprise a scenegraph, an interface to the video hardware (either via opengl, directx, console video, or a software renderer like pixomatic), the positional sound or mappings to other libraries like miles, AI connectors, physics or physics tie-ins to havoc, networking, matchmaking, and a variety of other components. Keep in mind that you can make most of this cross platform, but it's not like it just happens magically.

    Chris DiBona

    --
    Co-Editor, Open Sources
    Open Source Program Manager, Google, Inc.
  13. To all the NWN trolls by Drakker · · Score: 4, Informative

    As a linux beta tester, I can tell you that the Linux version is every bit as good, if not better (more stable) than the windows version.

    Patches for the beta are released at the same time for linux and windows and linux performances are equal or better than windows (if you run a lightweight WM, or no WM at all and no other proggy, you WILL see a difference).

    Every features of the game, even the little graphical details no one would notice are in the Linux version, auto updater included.

    So, there, if you dare miss this game cuz of all the FUD you see here, I'm really sorry for you.

  14. ...And it's a good game, too! by elzbal · · Score: 5, Interesting

    I've been in the beta playing Savage for the past few weeks now on my Gentoo Linux box. It's actually a really good game. The combat is very different - it focuses heavily on melee weapons, so you can't just hit everybody from a distance - you eventually have to get into the chaos and get bloody. Performance and graphics are great.

    I would recommend Savage to any gamers who run Linux - keep this one on your watch list.

  15. Huh? by j4ck50n · · Score: 3, Interesting
    "With games makers keeping their games sensibly small ..."

    What? Small? How many recent games ship on one disk or dont consume over a GB of space?

    Currently installed:

    Medieval Total War - 1.96GB

    Vice City - 1.57 GB

    Half Life with Mods - 1.1GB

    Mafia - 1.87 GB

    Midnight Club 2 - 1.49GB

    Never Winter shipped on 3, Splinter Cell on 3, etc.

    Storage is cheap both CD and HDD, but games are hardly small these days.