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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?"
GET BACK TO WORK YOU LAZY ENGINEERS!
*caps is like yelling so you have to offset it with lowercase text*
Given that I'm stuck on an old overclocked Celeron 300A/450 mHZ which has difficulty running even Half-Life one at full speed, I have a hard time feeling sorry for this fellow.
Editor Emeritus and Senior Writer, TeleRead.org
I just played a good game of Unreal Tournament 2003 on my Linux box. It plays great, the installer came on the CD, and all updates have been available for Linux. If Valve doesn't care about you, spend your money somewhere else.
Whoever said the the Linux gaming scene was full of shit?
Invoicing, Time Tracking, Reporting
The fact is that VALVe is a company. A company which, obviously enough, wants to make a profit. The easiest and most effective way to do this is to pander to the widest possible audience -- Windows users. Linux, as a gaming platform, has been lacking since it came into being. The answer to the question of Linux gaming won't be discovered for a while to come. In the meantime, the more people that run Linux servers for Half-Life and Half-Life 2, the more VALVe will take notice. This isn't something that will be won quickly, but with a little patience and understanding of the ideas behind VALVe's business practices, Linux will have a version of Half-Life all its own.
I swear it was like watching your dog get hit by a car as he returned from the pound.
If Jesus wants me it knows where to find me.
I don't know much from a game coder angle, but my position in recent years has been that Linux is a OS for getting work done, and Windows is an excellent platform for games. With Microsoft in the console market with the X-Box, maybe they are preparing themselves to be a game company when Linux takes over the desktop market (if it does). Another piece of support for microsoft and gaming is this: the last few nights I've been playing Asheron's Call 2, and I gotta say it pwns everquest as far as getting a new player started and interested.
Note to self: No more arguing with the faithful.
I'm running netware, that means I can't even play tuxracer! Why oh why won't Valve give me a netware port?
One other thing, I have this Amiga....
Linux has a strong hold in the server market, but not so much with clients. It would seem be holding true here too, but not for the same reasons.
It won't kill you. Just think of it as a Wintendo.
Strange women lying in ponds distributing swords is no basis for a system of government.
and I'll look into valve studios and find out for you.
Well, I don't know if I totally agree. But I will say this - if you want to play games, use Windows. I mean, we are not talking rocket science here, while Linux is a great OS for things like development, etc, it just isn't the system of choice for gaming. Honestly, how many games are really out there, especially compared w/ the number of games in the Windows market?
Then again, this article does talk about the state of Linux gaming. Which is slim right now. But then again, look at the user base.
It is a tough argument to make. On one hand you have the masses that will buy your games no problem. On the other hand you have this small, but VERY thankful group who will not forget the fact that you put out a game for them (or that you didn't).
But I still have to go back to the fact that if you really really want to play latest games, have a Windows partition so that you can boot to just for that. Compatibility will never be an issue.
RonB
It is human nature to take shortcuts in thinking.
it really comes down to the fact that directX is the most capable api for games at the moment.
DX9 beats the living pixels out of OpenGL, and that's just a simple fact.
I hate MS as much as the next slashdotter, but come on guys.
Windows has Linux beat hands down for gaming.
On another note, while freeBSD runs fine on my 500mhz via mini-itx board, I know I'm not the only person out there buying a whole new system for HL2 and Doom3 in the next few months. and guess what's going on the primary partition? It'll only get booted up to play games, web/e-mail can be done on anything.
"You worthless post!"
-Shakespeare, 2 Gentlemen of Verona, 1. 1. 147
The bottom line is, Valve is a company with many ex-Microsoft employees. They fully embrace DirectX 9. In fact, the reason that the Mac port that was almost completely finished was cancelled was because (I believe) they wouldn't be able to get them to network together due to DirectX concerns.
Valve has made steps to ensure that Half-Life works under WINE, but the reality is, they will continue to use DirectX, as they feel that is how they can make the best possible game. The money that would go into creating a Linux box would be prohibitively expensive, not to mention perhaps impossible because of patents/copyrights on DirectX technology.
It would be great if it worked under Linux, but the bottom line is it doesn't make economic sense.
Since 1/2 * 2 = 1, shouldn't this version of the game be simply called One-Life?
By buying Doom 3 and running the native client in Linux.
I'm a little disappointed with Valve about now. Strike one is the DRM nitemare called Steam that they're shoving down the gaming community's throat. OMG! What a fiasco that is. Strike two is the shutting out of linux users. If Id can support linux, why can't Valve?
What I don't fully understand is why Valve went with DX9 over CG and openGL, especially since DX9's HLSL is essentially identical to CG. CG offers cross-platform compatibility. DX9 limits the portability of HL2. So why do it?
When all else fails, run.
Wait a long time for it's release.
Oh darn... wait, you mean something like this? Well, if you don't like that, how about this one? Oh, I see... you forgot to do any research before you made you groundless claim.
"Linux 7.2", huh? Thanks for proving my point that you don't know wtf you're talking about. "Interesting" my ass.
Join Tor today!
Lets assume we write a portable version of code instead of a Windows tied version. Mac OS X (and by extension Linux which is *nix like) is then a very obvious targets. So, original development costs possibly go up a bit. Then, work is done to tune the port it onto multiple platforms. You use OpenGL, have to write a different core sound driver for each platform you target, different installers, maybe a few other tweaks, and that's it. Now, this only brings in a possible 5% of the market place, like you stated. But 5% of 300 million is 1.5 million. If 1% of that market buys the game, you've got 150,000 more customers. You've also got a very portable game which minus the graphics engine should work on an xbox (yet another market). You've also got very little rewrite. Now, it might make sense for a one time shot company who doesn't have the resources to write for multiple platforms, but for even remotely large projects now days there's no reason to use anything but mostly portable C or C++. It's not like you need to write anything in assembly which was the old excuse. Or is 150,000*$30 (aka $4.5 million) not worth the upfront extra work to write portable code in the first place?
Technically, this probably means that some small part of the engine runs under Linux. In the past, dedicated servers have been little more than headless clients, clients without a rendering engine. As with Half-life, there is probably no technical reason that Half-life 2 couldn't run under Linux, especially given that the latest Linux drivers from ATI and NVIDIA have expanded support for even the newest hardware released by those vendors. Given that a game as new as UT2003 runs under Linux, I think that it isn't that much of a stretch to say that Linux could handle Half-life 2 as well.
No, it doesn't. Just because you can run a server, which people connect to and run maps from, doesn't mean your server is actually "rendering" anything. It's loading data for your clients to read/write to, and its controlling the flow of that data. Linux does this much better than Windows, which is why the Linux server exists in the first place. No one would bother cooking up a dedicated server for it otherwise.
But Half-Life 2 is DX9 from the ground up. This means it uses extensions, functions, and rendering calls that are so deeply ingrained into windows, that you can NOT run the game any other way. This is where WineX and whatnot come into play, taking those same function calls and telling Linux how to use them.
Firstly, this type of translation is going to make any port of the game run slower, until the code is much faster than it will be in the first few WineX releases supporting it. Yes, I know how fast UT2003 can run in Linux. But have you seen the tech demos for HL2? It will be quite some time before we see that level of speed and clarity on a Linux system.
And, this sounds really pathetic, but their licensing agreements with Installshield may hold them back as well. From what I recall, this is the same thing that held up NWN from being released on Linux. The Windows registry can be a shit-filled bog, and the Installshield makes the game-makers lives that much easier. It sounds pitiful, but little stuff like that can hold up development.
And finally, Valve has busted their ass on Steam, and even though it stumbled out of the gate with their recent full-on release (who didn't see that coming), they put so much time and effort on a solid DRM release platform that to try and convert that to Linux, who by nature is a registry-less system, would be too much time and trouble for a company to put themselves through, let alone farm out the work at considerable cost.
In this dreamworld that the article-writer lives in, he forgets that game companies are under intense pressure to deliver perfect product all of the time. It is easier to leave it up to the community than to put serious time and resources into making the same thing available on both OSes.
And don't forget about DRM. We geeks chuckle at it, but the fact remains that as the years go on, and MS has its way (which it always does, eventually), between the Windows versions of iTunes and delivery mechanisms such as Steam, you'd be surprised at how this will begin to hold Linux back, in my opinion. DRM is awful, I agree, but everyone loves iTunes and what is it but a wolf in sheeps clothing (nice interface and high moral standing but really just DRM)?
Food for thought.
> When linux comes out with a directx equivelent then they might write for it ( this is ONE set of API's ) . Not opengl doesn't count, that is only graphics.
> You need sound,graphics,networking,AND graphics card writers writing to those drivers. That is what makes windows such a good gaming platform. Linux needs to consolidate and throw away the 4 graphics libraries and the 3 different sound package and the 60 windowing library packages and get down to one standard that EVERYONE uses.
Sounds like a recipe for SDL.
Sheesh, evil *and* a jerk. -- Jade
Welcome to earth. Nice to have you here.
This has been an issue in computing for the last decade: PC game companies write games for Windows. That's the way it was, that's the way it is, and unless something drastic happens, that's the way it's always going to be. Gamers use Windows because it's the platform the majority of PC games are on, and PC game companies target Windows because that's where the vast majority of their audience is.
This isn't a Linux-specific issue either. As an OS/2 user for the last 12 years (and Linux user for the past 4 or 5), I've seen it first hand. The only thing that will potientiall change the situation is if the game companies either see a huge decrease in the sales of their Windows titles, or feel there is sufficiently pent-up demand for Linux-based titles.
Personally, I don't see that happening anytime soon. My advice to you is to do what I did -- leave your PC for serious work, and go out and buy a PlayStation 2, a good TV, and a surround sound system. Add in the network adapter and the PS2 Linux kit, and you have a kick-ass game system, DVD player, and Linux box all in one nice black box, leaving your PCs available for more serious computing tasks.
Yaz.
Prolly true, but then try playing Half-Life2 in Linux. How much better are your frame rates now? Until Linux has enough games to compete with MS, Windows will be a better platform for games regardless of Linux's technological supiriority. Even though the X-Box has better graphics, most people will say that the PS2 is better. Why? Because it has more games that is why.
Note to self: No more arguing with the faithful.
so THAT's why they call it W(h)INE...
As others have mentioned, the problem is that Valve embraced DirectX 9 as the only API they would use to run the game.
The stupid thing is, they couldn't even just say they would code pure DirectX 9, because Nvidia in their wisdom decided to implement DirectX 9 in their own proprietary way, thus leading to the current public spat with Valve saying they had to code separate paths to have Nvidia hardware work with the game anyway!!
It really is time that a game protocol is made that is truly able to be used as a cross-platform API. I mean, game developers must surely realise that if they were able to code in one API and have it compile under Windows, Linux, Xbox, PS2, GameCube etc, they would make way more money servicing all the market segments, not just one, and save on development costs to boot!
OpenGL 2 is touted as being all that DirectX 9 is and more, plus it is an open protocol, but game developers need to use it and help formulate it for it to be a success.
I use Windows because of the games. That's the ONLY reason. Linux is more than capable of being my primary OS for web browsing, email, office work etc. But without developers coding for Linux, it will never gain the crucial support of the younger generation whose first question will be "What games run on it?" And if you don't hook 'em while they're young, then you will lose another generation to Microsoft's grasp.
ATI and Nvidia both supply 3D drivers for their cards, so why aren't they trying to get developers on board to actually code or port GAMES for the Linux market???
Someone really needs to write a GameOS version of Linux, and basically give it away as open source. If one or two top games like Half Life 2 or Doom III were able to run on it, it would soon saturate the market and provide developers with a free alternative to developing purely for Microsoft. Heck, why doesn't Sun write it? It could be a whole new line for them and firmly establish them as a true competitor to Microsoft. Just make it an open source game protocol is all I ask.
Visceral Psyche Films
The reason they made a linux dedicated server but no linux client is twofold:
1: The dedicated server is simpler and easier to port because most of the source remains unchanged and you don't have to fuss with OS-specific API's and graphics libraries beyond the very rudimentary GUI
2: Linux is sucessful in the realm of servers, but is not yet a mainstream primary desktop operating system. Sure, maybe there are 10% as many linux desktop installs as windows, but the vast majority of those linux users also have a windows partition or another computer running windows, therefore it's not worth porting the client to take advantage of an extra 1% of market space.
Repeal the DMCA!
Oh, please. Look how irritable and angry you are. You have a chip on your shoulder.
SDL is nice, and so are a lot of other freeware graphics/audio libraries, but most every developer will tell you they still don't stand up to the massive suite of DirectX technologies. You've probably never even bothered with a DirectX app or an SDL app. I have done both.
None are equivalent to the speed and power of DirectX. Hate Microsoft all you want, but that's just something you have to cede at this point in time. Why don't YOU do "research" before spouting off and insulting people for giving their opinions on the poor state of Linux gaming development?
"Sufferin' succotash."
If you want a decent desktop OS and games you have to dual boot. Period. That's the god-awful truth and it's not changing any time in the next 5 years.
But there is another kind of evil that we must fear most... and that is the indifference of good men.
So here's a typical slashdot response. I mean, just because it runs on Windows and not linux, you have a bajillion people calling shenanigans on Valve. I didn't hear nearly as many complaints when Nintendo released Legend of Zelda for the Gamecube only. And the same can be said for any third-party-developer game released for a single platform, so don't say that's a bad analogy.
And of course, for those people who say that it's the same hardware, so it should be easy, well, just look at how long it took to get WINE working. It's not easy. It's essentially developing for a different platform even if the hardware is the same.
So before you get all self-righteous about this, just stop and think for a second. If you're about to whine because Valve won't support your platform of choice, just remember that you made a choice. No one's forcing you to use linux. No one but you. And quit saying that Valve is in bed with Microsoft. It sure seems that they've been pretty linux friendly, compared to say... ohh. I don't know. Blizzard. And pretty much everyone else out there. Sure there are some exceptions, but in the end, they're about making money, and yes, you hate that, but many of you live in America, and enjoy doing so, what with the whole democracy and capitalism thing going on, imperfect though our implementation may be. Like the subject says, this is like whining about it not running on your toaster with netbsd. So. Yeah. Stop it.
It's sadly amusing that we get lessons in morality from somone that doesn't even have the wherewhital to use their name.
Oh, wait... this is Slashdot.
OK, folks, here we go again.
/dev/null.
Go back and look over this story. There, one before, we had a story on Slashdot about a software vendor not supporting Linux. At that time, I made a very reasonable suggestion - write to the company involved and ask for a Linux port. I also asked folks who had done so to comment in my Journal, so as to have a public record of the number of letters so written so that when the company involved said "We've never had any requests for this" we could trivially disprove the claim.
And what came of it? Nothing. cat
Why did Valve release a Linux server for Halflife? Because the community innundated them with requests for it.
So you want a HalfLife2 for Linux? Innundate Valve with requests! Stop bitching on Slashdot, and write them a physical, paper and toner letter requesting a HalfLife2 client for Linux.
Now, as for the whole "Just suck it up and run Windows" crowd, and the whole "Fuck Windows - Linux or Nothing" crowd: Each of us must make a decision what is more important - running the OS we choose, or playing a game. And you know what? That decision is going to be different for different people - imagine that!
If you are willing to put up with Windows to be able to run Halflife 2, then by all means do so, have fun, and SHUT THE FUCK UP!
If you will 'live free or die', and refuse to run Windows in order to run Halflife 2, then great! Welcome to the fold, accept the consequences of your decision, and SHUT THE FUCK UP (on Slashdot, that is)! Bitching on Slashdot won't change things, writing a letter to Valve just might!
Or if you don't want to write Valve, then help out on the Wine DirectX layer (and yes, I actually DO have contributions in the Wine source tree.)
But whatever your choices are, accept that they come with consequences, and STOP BITCHING ABOUT THEM WHERE IT WILL DO NO GOOD!
www.eFax.com are spammers
From http://www.blame-the-french.com/portal.php?article =0&sid=c6d361f221e8bb6e95ac4b053c4928de
Email and reply from some bloke and the HL2 pr bloke, Gabe.
--
Gabe Gabe Gabe!!!
As I'm sure you are aware the HL2 community is going crazy with the rumour that HL2 is going to be like a MMORPG and you will have to pay a fee each month via Steam to play HL2 multiplayer.
I don't believe this to be true but can you please put it to rest once and for all. PLEEEEEEASE.
Kind Regards
Matt
Here's my current thinking: Some people want to buy Half-Life 2 in a store. Right now we have three SKUs planned at three price points. One will have single-player only and not play MODs and we think of that as the mass market SKU (sold mainly at the Costcos and Walmarts of the world). The second is our traditional single-player plus multiplayer SKU that runs MODs and is sold at places like EBX. The third is the collector's edition SKU with lots of cool bonus stuff for people who like cool bonus stuff.
In the Steam world, some people will want to buy it once, like the middle SKU above. Other people will want to buy the game on subscription (e.g. $9.95/month). The good news for the "buy it once" crowd is, well, they only have to pay once. The bad news is that when we come out with new content (expansion products, TF 2, and presumably other games) then they have to pay separately for those. We're pretty sure that the $9.95 guys are going to get the better value, as we've been pretty good over the years at generating a lot of content.
Now nobody has done this before, so we're scratching our heads and massaging the plans to make sure we've got the best set of options. We've had some feedback that we should sell the top SKU (single-player only no MODs) on Steam, and my reaction has been "yeah, right, for the three people in the world who have a broadband connection, are sophisticated enough to purchase software over the Internet, but DON'T want to play MODs and multiplayer". Some people have said "I want a subscription, but I think the box and the manual are cool, so what about sending me those" and I think that's pretty interesting and we're trying to figure out what to do for them (needless to say Sierra isn't exactly jumping for joy at the idea of selling us boxes so people don't buy Half-Life 2 in stores).
But nowhere has there been a suggestion that people pay in the store and then pay a monthly fee on top of that a la the MMORPG.
Gabe
The problem with slashdot is that most of its users were bullied and stuffed into lockers as kids!
Look some companies have tried to sell linux games, but no one bought them! They sold a bunch of the windows version though. I like open source, alot, but open source folks have to realize that alot of companies make money from SELLING SOFTWARE! We can't have everything for free.
Instead of signing a petition, wait till a company
comes out with a linux game, and BUY it, buy 2 or 3 for your friends. Thats how we will get good games on linux.
petition with your wallet...
So Long and Thanks for all the Fish.
I assure you, Linux Game Publishing, Hyperion, and others would be more than happy to help w/the testing, tuning, etc. with a game company. And we'd not be mis-managing the situation like Loki did.
I am not merely a "consumer" or a "taxpayer". I am a Citizen of the State of Texas
Loki didn't go out of business because there wasn't a market. Loki went out of business because the upper management was utterly clueless.
Scott bought some 50k units of those stupid tins, etc. and delayed the release of the Linux version (which SHOULD have went out only a week or so AFTER the Windows version) by nearly a month. Worse, he wasted the money on the massive production run when he should have done something more reasonable like 5k units to limit his losses. Had he done that, the margins per unit would have been smaller, but the game might have broke even.
Loki bit off more games than they could comfortably afford and did pathetically stupid business decisions with the ones they DID have.
THAT is what killed Loki.
I am not merely a "consumer" or a "taxpayer". I am a Citizen of the State of Texas
Linux gaming is at the point where Mac Gaming has been for the past 10 years, hopefully it will increase in the future, but the only way to do it is to be good advocates and make noise with our wallets AND tell the companies that you bought their product BECAUSE of the linux version.
The Mac Game Market is not a useful comparison, the Mac and Linux situations are different. Counting users is a mistake. The Mac situation wildly differs from Linux in that Mac users can not dual boot or effectively emulate. On the Mac they not only have to emulate the APIs but the CPU instructions as well. For modern games it a native version or nothing. On the other hand Linux users can use the Win32 version of the game. Most Linux gamers dual boot or use Wine so they are already customers. Targeting Linux does not generate any new money from them, it merely replaces a Win32 sale with a Linux sale. That's a money losing situation for the developer. The Linux Game Market only consists of those Linux Gamers who would never buy the Win32 version, those who would do without rather than dual boot or use Wine.