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Half-Life 2 - A Linux User's Lament
jvm writes "If you're a gamer with a pulse, you've probably heard about the impending release of Valve's Half-Life 2. As a gamer and a Linux user, I always get a little stirred up about the whole Half-Life situation, where we have a dedicated server but no client. So here's my reflection on the sad situation, past and present. How will the rest of the Linux gaming community react to the release of Half-Life 2? Boot into Windows? Wait for WINE or WineX support? Get the Xbox version? With so many Half-Life servers running on Linux, will the same be true for Half-Life 2?"
The problem is, while geeks talk the talk, they don't walk the walk with their wallets.
no... the problem is that Loki got fucked by nVidia's and ATI's drivers. period. If you remember correctly, nVidia's 3d drivers were beta when Loki went bust, and they sucked. Not only that, but current linux nvidia drivers don't even use the platform standard DRI interface. You can't expect casual gamers to spend all their time getting 3d working for some BS game, and that is where the money comes from.. casual gamers.
And the state of drivers, and 3d graphics on high end consumer cards in general on Linux is just bogus, and completely ridiculous.
id ports to Linux on principle, and their engines are the best. One reason I haven't really played many non id games in the past couple years... (i still run them mostly on windows tho, its a small price to pay for the better performance you get with nvidia/ati's win32 drivers.)
Let me make my only point clear as day: Linux 3D for video games today is shit. No engine company is going to make any money supporting Linux when there is no hardware out there to run their game.
Two infinite things: your stupidity and mine. But I'm not sure about the latter. If my sig offends you, I'm sorry.
Some of us are familiar. We just think it's bullocks.