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10 Points About Transgaming's Cedega/WineX
jvm writes "Attempting to raise the level of the discussion, Dan 'theoddone33' Olson has put together a list of ten critical observations that every potential Linux gamer should consider before buying Transgaming's WINE-based product Cedega (formerly WineX). Dan invites credible rebuttals to the points he's raised. The debate over the value of Cedega/WINE as a solution for the nascent Linux gaming community continues..."
here are the 10 points if you can't get to the site
# Performance
Cedega is designed to maximize compatibility with Windows games. However, many users find that their favorite games work poorly in Cedega, if at all. While TransGaming offers voting services to determine the most popular games, there are still hundreds of games that are not playable in Cedega. For games that are not officially supported by TransGaming, users may find that the performance of Cedega is "hit or miss."
# Pricing
TransGaming charges $5 a month for the use of the commercial version of Cedega, yet makes a development version freely available. The commercial version has additional support for games that use copy-protection methods such as SafeDisc, among other features. The commercial version of Cedega requires a minimum subscription of 3 months, and all games that it can be used with must be purchased separately.
# Progress
TransGaming's list of supported titles has not grown significantly since the first release of WineX in 2001. Today, less than 10 games have been given a 5-star rating, meaning that they can be expected to run without problems. Many games run with only minor annoyances, but they are not officially supported. TransGaming has also been criticized for slow release times, with 3 month subscriptions starting and ending without seeing a new release.
# Potential
TransGaming has stated that their goal is 100% compatibility with Windows games. However, it is highly improbable that they will ever attain this goal. Windows and Direct3D are in active development, and TransGaming developers will always be playing a game of "catch-up", while at the same time trying to find and fix current bugs in Cedega. In a sense, Cedega's destiny is tied to Microsoft as much as it is tied to TransGaming.
# Priorities
While TransGaming still offers Cedega to Linux gamers for the time being, it is clear that their primary interests reside elsewhere. They actively produce titles for Mac OSX, and their website advertises plans to support XBox and PS2 in the future. TransGaming has stated that no income from Cedega subscriptions is used to fund their other ventures, but while their finances may not be divided, the same cannot be said of their interests.
# Promises
TransGaming began with the promise to release their changes to the Wine project under an "open" license when the number of subscribers reached 20,000. Shortly after this, they introduced code into the project which they are not able to release openly due to contractual obligations. While the current number of subscribers has not been publically announced, it is doubtful that TransGaming would be able to release all of their changes when this milestone is reached. TransGaming has, however, given code back to Wine at various times.
# Packaging
While TransGaming offers a free development version of Cedega, they have repeatedly threatened Linux distributions that have offered packages of it to their users. Debian and Gentoo have both withdrawn packages of the development version of Cedega at the request of TransGaming, who stated that they would no longer offer the free version if it was packaged by third-party Linux distributions.
# Portability
TransGaming advertises Cedega as the world's foremost portability solution, and they claim that it can be used to migrate applications seamlessly between platforms such as PC, PS2, and even PDAs. These claims are sketchy for a variety of technical reasons. One example is that most PC games use over 100M of memory, while the PS2 has only 32M of main RAM. Cedega's strategy of reinterpreting runtime calls is likely to add more overhead than it can reduce, and is not sufficient for this task.
# Propaganda
For as long as TransGaming has had a website, it has been filled with dubious claims about the company, about the game industry, and about porting software. Unsurprisingly, most of these claims paint TransGaming in a positiv
Uselessful technology (Air-Charged
Have to say I was impressed... I can now play Counterstrike without rebooting, which is very nice. Doom 3 works too. It's cheap, it works, haven't seen any reason to complain.
It actually makes me think of Linux as a viable platform for games... not a viable platform in five years' time, but a viable platform now.
I'm sick of these halfwitts sledging a real contributer to the gaming industry in Linux.
/rant over
These guys have a good history, yeah its not squeeky clean but so bloody what?!?
They contributed to Loki's technology, Gavriel is on good Terms with Ryan (Icculus) and there are many other linux NATIVE technologies that owe their success in part to direct help from Transgaming.
FFS, if you don't like them then DON'T BLOODY use their product, stop stabbing the poor bastards in the back.
*mutter grumble* *kicks cat*
"Consider how lucky you are that life has been good to you so far. Alternatively, if life hasn't been good to you so far
The debate over the value of Cedega/WINE as a solution for the nascent Linux gaming community continues..."
I think this debate is pointless. If you purchase a Windows game, you are a member of the Windows gaming community, period. It doesn't matter if you play it on native Wintel platform or on Macintosh emulating x86/Windows via Virtual PC - or Linux emulating Windows APIs. The next logical step is to quit all your Linux activity and reboot your computer to MS Windows, the same game will run even better then. The *only* way to build Linux gaming community is via native Linux ports, just as the relatively small Macintosh gaming community does. Mac users got used to waiting months or years for native ports to be released. They don't complain paying premium prices for games whose Windows ports are already in bargain bins. There will be no "Linux gaming community", not until Linux gamers accept similar solution.
# Performance
The games I play actually run faster on my system than they do on my wife's XP system. I guess I'm doing something wrong.
# Pricing
15 bucks...wow...that's like...3/4 of a $20...
# Progress
In the 3 months I've "subscribed" to it they've had 2 major releases.
# Potential
True, they play catch up with MS...but what else can they do, they have to see where MS is going so they know how to emulate the calls MS is calling for etc etc. They can't just make the shit up and hope MS follows THEM? Right?
# Priorities
Oh, so a company can't have two areas where they're branching off? Apple released the iPod, did everyone start screaming saying they were going to abandon the Mac or now their interests lay elsewhere? Come on.
# Promises
Sounds like a wash here. No opinion either way. They do release back to the community though, but perhaps not enough it seems.
# Packaging
Agreed here. They should let the distos have it as a package at least. The development package.
# Propaganda
Sounds like this point is propaganda itself. Notice that he offers no proof that they "fail to hold up under scrutiny". Ok, how so? Honestly, I'd like to know...break it down for me because frankly I'm too lazy. But then again, I don't belive 90% of the claims of any product...even the ones I like. lol (i'm joking people...don't get your panties in a bunch).
# Prevention
He states: There is speculation that Cedega... Ok...SPECULATION? So, how is this a bad mark on their part? I could speculate also doesn't make it true. And as we can see, companies are still making ports for Linux. But he did pull it together at the end.
I don't know...he makes some points to make one think...and they would be worth thinking if it weren't for the fact that Cedega cost me all of $15 bucks and it works great with the games I throw at it.
And that's kind of a hard thing to complain about...if it works, it works. And for me it works. Doesn't work for you, not much I can do about it. I can't rally around something that works for me and doesn't work for others. I mean, how can I do that? I would just be repeating what others are saying and not going from personal experience: "Boo...down with Transgaming! BOOO...Yes, it works for me on the games I play...but I've heard that others have problems with it...so BOOO!"
I'd sound like and idiot! Ok...perhaps I already do.
"Music is everybody's possession. It's only publishers who think that people own it." - John Lennon.
Comment removed based on user account deletion
Since the article is slashdotted, here's a list of games that I run successfully under WineX 3.2.1 (not even the current version):
- Age of Empires II
- Icewind Dale
- GTA 3
- GTA: Vice City
- Baldur's Gate II
- Diablo II
- Starcraft
- Warcraft II BNE
- Fallout II
- Max Payne
- Thief (Gold)
- Thief II
- Deus Ex
- Grim Fandango
Not all of these work perfectly; for example BGII network play is not available. However, for the most part these are totally playable and sometimes even run better than the same games running under Windows. I really wish Transgaming would put more effort into supporting older games, but I guess more gamers want to play Counter Strike 2, not Diablo I.