Aruze Develops Linux-Based Arcade Machine System

Thanks to GameSpot for its news that Japanese arcade/pachinko giant Aruze has announced a Linux-based arcade game system for Japanese release this year. Apparently: "Aruze plans to release twenty games for the AP-3 by the end of March 2005, and aims to persuade third party publishers to develop games for the board as well", and furthermore: "The company expects the adoption of Linux to cut development costs for software developers... Aruze also cited the system's high versatility and consistent updates as other factors in its decision." It's also pointed out: "Taito announced in June a similar PC-based arcade board named Type-X. In contrast to Aruze's AP-3, however, Taito's board uses a special edition of Microsoft Windows XP."

Comments

Consistent updates

[Brento]

"Aruze also cited the system's high versatility and consistent updates as other factors in its decision."

Consistent updates? Maybe I'm missing something, but it feels like my Windows boxen get security updates at least once a week when the root-of-the-day exploit comes out.

Oh, you mean that's NOT a selling point? Oh.

Re:Consistent updates

[rf0]

Well just recompile the kernel once in a while to get that 1% extra performance

Rus

You don't expect me to believe this??

[PowerBert]

I know Aruze when I see one.

well..

[borgdows]

nobody will ask if this thing run linux at least!

some other companies use linux also.

[junkymailbox]

all the touchscreens i've seen in sportsbars and etc use stuff made by Merit Industries and AFAIK they all pretty much use linux.

Re:some other companies use linux also.

[bubbaprog]

That's funny, because I was playing megatouch in a bar about a year ago and the thing kept rebooting. DOS. I kept feeding it quarters just to enjoy seeing autoexec.bat load for nostalgia's sake.

Aruze != Good Games

[oasis3582]

Let's just hope they don't use this technology to make more banal mediocre games like Shadow Hearts for the PS2. Now there's a case of squandered potential...


Doubt the sequel will be any better.

Re:Aruze != Good Games

[JaredOfEuropa]

...more banal mediocre games like Shadow Hearts for the PS2.

Ever been in a Japanese arcade? Shadow Hearts is nice and soothingly normal compared to the games sou see there. Think 'Extreme beach volleyball' for the Xbox, only more bizarre (in case you don'tt know this one: it's beach volleyball, but you first have to convince your opponents in the game to play with you, by bribing them with gifts & flowers in your hair). Head-to-head pancake baking (I kid you not), shooting elves with crossbows... and those are the games where you can at least understand the objective.

Games for Linux?

[MurkyGoth]

I wonder if they're going to licences the games to run on standard installations? Not free or open source (they've got to make money somehow!) but pre-packaged binaries for the most popular distros. They could also get more revenue by creating 'authentic' arcade gamepads for standard PCs. Imagine being able to (legally) play your favourite arcade games at home!

This is pretty cool

[polyp2000]

Presumably that means we can expect Linux to be garnered with an influx of arcade quality, native games now.

Seeing Linux growing is such a good feeling

[Neo's Nemesis]

Its beginning to be seen that Linux is making waves all over now. First on Servers, then on PCs, then on mobiles/handhelds, and now as a base OS for a game.

Finally!

[cafard]

After all those years of Gauntlet or D&D...
Nethack: soon in an arcade room near you! :)

Do you think we'll get a bargain on credits for playing tourists ?

Obligatory link

[polyp2000]

Looks pretty good .. Appears to be links to a Linux Package (SDK maybe ?)

http://www.aruze.com/ir/16_linux/global/info.htm l

Time to get coding !

Nick ..

Games are what will make Linux succeed

[Ridgelift]

Not everyone will agree with this, but games are what will make Linux succeed as the #1 desktop in the world. When you can buy the same games for Linux that you can for Windows and anyone can install them, there will be a massive push behind Linux as an operating system.

Games push hardware, which sell more computers, which spur the development of faster machines. Microsoft used to do a good job of releasing bloatware that forced companies to upgrade their work PC to keep doing the same jobs (word processing, spreadsheets, databasing & communication apps).

If your a Linux fan like me, having a Linux-based arcade machine is a very, very good thing. Linux will definitely succeed in the desktop arena - we have games coming.

Re:Games are what will make Linux succeed

[pandrijeczko]

Not everyone will agree with this, but games are what will make Linux succeed as the #1 desktop in the world.

You're probably right but I don't see why it's that important that Linux is #1 in the world. Surely, it's more important to have open standards globally such that you can view any web site with any browser, exchange documents with anyone else's operating system & applications, etc? What does it matter what OS people choose to use to achieve that - sure, you and I porbably use Linux but others choose Windows which is fine also, as long as they have a genuine choice.

When you can buy the same games for Linux that you can for Windows and anyone can install them, there will be a massive push behind Linux as an operating system.

Unfortunately, the major problem here is that, like it or not, Microsoft DirectX provides a more readily available suite of games APIs for developers than does the cross-platform OpenGL standard and that's probably the biggest thing stopping games companies producing for Linux. Those that do, like ID, can do it because they work in OpenGL in the first place.

Games push hardware, which sell more computers, which spur the development of faster machines.

I'm not sure this is necessarily a good thing. In the days of the classic 8-bit and 16-bit machines like the ZX Spectrum, Commodore 64 and Amiga, etc, upgrades were virtually unheard of and games developers were force to push the machines to their limits to achieve certain features in games. My personal belief is that this made games of old generally much better than most modern games - sure, graphics are thousands of times better now but I don't think that addictiveness or playability has got any better in all but a handful of titles.

having a Linux-based arcade machine is a very, very good thing

There may be some developments as a result of Linux going into the arcades but it's important to realise that although the Linux OS in these machine is Open Source (it has to be), the games definitely won't be (and don't have to be) so it's not as though you'll be able to play these at home unless a games publisher decides to releases them for home usage.

Any games exposure for Linux is a good thing but it always boils down to financial concerns in the end and games developers will only release Linux games if they are confident they can make money from it.

Before someone starts to whine...

[News for nerds]

Aruze Linux source code site

Click "English" in the right to go the English web site for Linux source code distribution.

Finally

[Anonymous Coward]

Something I can comment on, if only I could remember my pass so I didn't have to AC it.

I work with a lot of SWP type machines (Skill With Prizes aka Quiz machines) and the overwhemly large majority run some form of Windows, either NT, XP or embedded. I can tell you this, Before PC's turned up in arcade machines, they were great fun to work on. Normally they are quite simple electronics for a reason, simple doesn't normally break as often. I'm not even going to start on the amount of BSOD I used to see on a daily basis because my company thought it was a good idea to use Dial-Up to push down updates like videos/new games.
At least one company I know use Linux in their terminals already, some German/Austrian firm who make the MegaTouch series. I remember being very impressed seeing Linux booting for the first time in a Arcade cabinet!

Young man, you know not what you say!

[numbski]

These are the same geniuses that tried to rip off SNK/Playmore by using KOF characters in some casino games.

Wonderful....although the idea of a Linux machine at the arcade is kind of interesting, especially given the fact that a few games have started to utilize net connections to share stats.

It's more than a little tempting to find out the local aracade's IP, nmap it, see if the machine shows up, if sshd is up by default, and uh...oh...Trinity, you around? :)

Or

[rf0]

Get youself a copy of XMame

Rus

More specifically...

[numbski]

The exact frame.

The interesting part of this is:

1. It uses RPM.
2. NFS? On an arcade machine?

Ooooh, this could get interestin'. ;)

ironically

[numbski]

That's precisely what many of us MAMEer's do.

I mean, I have an arcade cab that I've salvaged, and most cab owners will install Windows because, aside from MAME, most of the better emulators run on Windows only.

Nebula and Kawaks are two for starters that drive me nuts. They add some absolutely AWESOME enhancements to CPS2 and Neo Geo titles, such as transparency, and 4-8 player games in Capcom's vs. Series and KOF, over the internet no less!

I'm trying to get some of my favs working in Wine, and I'm getting there...slowly. Now I have to get it to take command line params, and load it up in a front end I'm happy with. Yay....

Anyway, sorry for the dissertation, it's just amusing that what you do every day is what many of us try to do as a hobby at home. And you hate it. :P

Re:Linux game just waiting to be coin-opped

[Wicksta]

It is based on a coin-op. Puzzle Bobble, or Bust-a-Move depending where you are playing it, a classic NEO-GEO game from the 90's. And having it on my debian based advancemame arcade machine I can say its probably twice as addictive as Frozen Bubble!

Linux Arcade Systems Already Here

[Perl-Pusher]

I was playing guitar in a bar one night and the power died. The bar had about 10 of these arcade games with touch screens that had about 20-25 games each with great graphics. I've watched people dump alot of money into these games all night. When the power came back on I was pleasantly suprised to see everyone of those machines going through an init with a bright green OK after each step. After closer examiniation each system was running RedHat 7.3. I've played these games several times and never realised they were running linux. These games were really quite good.

Tux Racer is in arcades...

[Dr. Blue]

There's an arcade version of Tux Racer -- there's one in our local Chuckie Cheese. Surely they wouldn't commit the sin of putting Tux Racer on a Windows-based arcade platform, would they? Makes me think the claim of these people to be "the first" may not be 100% accurate.

Aruze is evil

[mr_angry]

Aruze nearly killed SNK. They didn't respect the license contracts. Think they also got sued by the Japanese government for tax fraud. I know they got sued by SNK/Playmore.

And some rumors of ties with the Yakuza have been around for a while...

I'm wondering if they'll do things correctly with this Linux project and i can't say i'm too excited by Taito's WinXP platform.