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Does Linux Have Game?
kwpulliam writes "Tom's Hardware has an interesting writeup, discussing the difficulties in bringing games to Linux, and the dilemmas faced by the graphics card developers."
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The problem I have is ATI video drivers for Linux. So far they have been a huge dissapointment. My brother has an Dell notebook with an old nVidia graphics card that works much better than my Radeon 9800.
For productivity, I'm using OpenOffice, FireFox and Thunderbird amongst other open source applications. For games, I play Savage (http://www.s2games.com) which has a native Linux binary. I also play some other games like BattleField 1942 and Vietnam that run under Linux through an emulator.
The rate limiting step here is the ATI video drivers. It's the only thing keeping me running Windows XP instead of Linux.
Why can't someone port the Direct3D API to Linux? This would save a lot of hassle of porting the games to OpenGL.
Well, with Cedega (formerly WineX), they basically have...
Still, with porting to OpenGL, you get the benefit of not having to use a runtime Direct3D-to-OpenGL translator (which is essentially what Wine/WineX/Cedega uses), and you're also a step closer to the OpenGL-only Mac.
Tedious Bloggy Stuff - hooray?
Loki closed almost four years ago. The market today is significantly different then it was then. Linux is used significantly more, on the server and the desktop. Id say with ALSA, and Winelib, the effort required to do source code porting today would be significantly less then it was back when Loki was alive. Also with broadband connections being far more popular as well, a modern Loki could sell direct to users.
So a modern Loki would have more customers. The porting would be easier - cheaper. And they would have higher margins if doing direct-download sales. The economics are compleatly different.
I know this isn't what you asked, but apparently the minimum specifications of doom 3 on linux are much lower than those on windows (doom3 plays great on my linux box, not tried it on windows)
RTFA.
It looks like it's been /.'ed so here's the full article text (sans images).
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Does Linux Have Game
Introduction
[IMAGE]
Live out your Unreal 2004 midnight adventures on Linux.
Earlier this year, our Linux Comes to the Desktop article caused a stir, when we stated that gaming on a Linux platform remained a limited proposition. Now it is time to detail why this is the case. We will explore what is the best you can hope for when you opt for the penguin to play Unreal and Doom III. We will also look at why Linux lovers must be contented with the state of things -- for the time being, that is, because things are looking up for the Linux gaming crowd.
So why is wide-scale gaming support for Linux not 100% there? A better question may be: why would game developers spend the money to add Linux functionality to games for a limited number of users? The answer is not that simple, especially since Linux desktop use continues to grow.
There are many reasons why you might want to shift from Windows to a Linux OS. We won't cover what those reasons might be in detail here, but will note that users routinely complain of Windows instability, high prices and many layers of software that impede performance. For others, there are ethical considerations for avoiding Windows, such as decisions by courts of law in the U.S. and Europe holding that Microsoft has illegally wielded its monopolistic influence in the marketplace. On the other hand, there are magazines out there, backed by now-a-word-from-our-sponsor Microsoft ads, that claim Windows XP deserves your money.
According to a report issued this month by analyst firm IDC, Linux "is no longer a niche phenomenon." The overall Linux marketplace revenues for server and PC hardware and packaged software are expected to reach $35.7 billion by 2008, IDC says. Packaged software revenue is the fastest growing market segment within the Linux marketplace, growing 44% annually to over $14 billion in 2008.
On the desktop, IDC says Linux PC shipments are expected to almost triple from six million units this year to 17 million units in 2008. Percentages of PCs shipped with Linux increase from about 3.8% in 2004 to about 7% in 2008. However, these numbers do not take into account the PC units shipped with Windows, to which Linux is subsequently added.
As you can see, the evidence suggests that Linux on the desktop is growing, and that means more PC gamers who will want to be able to frag at will in Linux. In the game console sector, hackers already know that Microsoft's Xbox and Sony's Playstation II also support Linux.
Until Linux does become as pervasive as IDC and other analysts claim it will, what is a gamer who wants to play Halo on a Linux platform do? And why is it such an issue to begin with? Without detailing differences based on benchmarks, we offer a look at the connection between graphics card drivers and the APIs that developers use for their games, and how the interface between the two works and doesn't work with Linux.
Direct3D Vs. OpenGL
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Doom III shows OpenGL can rock
Whether game developers use Direct3D or OpenGL as their API is the main determinant of whether a game will run on Linux or not. Both APIs are used to create games' 3D imagery, including lines and other shapes, smoke, shadows and all the other good imagery games offer. It has been said that Direct3D is superior to OpenGL, but this is not really the case. While Direct3D is indeed the predominant game API, superior graphics have more to do with the creative skills of the game developers than the choice of API.
Direct3D falls under the brought-to-you-by-Microsoft umbrella, and is geared for the Windows-only world. Because Windows is the main OS in the PC world, graphics card makers have only one OS with which to contend when configuring their drivers for Direct3D games.
OpenGL, meanwhile, is everywhere - it is compatible with Linux, Windows, Unix and Mac OS. But
What if this signature were clever?
Why can't someone port the Direct3D API to Linux? This would save a lot of hassle of porting the games to OpenGL.
It's not so much that no one can...just that it's way too much trouble for the benefits you'd get. Specifically, D3D relies heavily on a lot of the rest of the Win32 API. If you want D3D, you'll need either a Win32 API, or to rewrite all those calls. This makes sense in the context of wine, which is why cedega/winex have basically done all this. Not perfectly, mind you...but this is their goal.
Of course, you can add to this the fact that Linux already has perfectly good API's for this sort of thing in the form of OpenGL and SDL. And the fact that Microsoft has kept D3D a moving target.
And finally, there's the fact that porting D3D wouldn't necessarily solve all the problems; presumably, games that use D3D also make a bunch of other Win32 system calls. So, you're back to needing both D3D and Win32.
In other words, you might as well have said, "why doesn't somebody just port Windows to Linux so we can forget about all this bullshit?"
Given a choice between free speech and free beer, most people will take the beer.
Windows:
3D Hardware Accelerator Card Required - 100% DirectX® 9.0b compatible 64MB Hardware Accelerated video card and the latest drivers*.
English version of Microsoft® Windows® 2000/XP
Pentium® IV 1.5 GHz or Athlon® XP 1500+ processor or higher
384MB RAM
8x Speed CD-ROM drive (1200KB/sec sustained transfer rate) and latest drivers
2.2GB of uncompressed free hard disk space (plus 400MB for Windows® swap file)
100% DirectX® 9.0b compatible 16-bit sound card and latest drivers
100% Windows® 2000/XP compatible mouse, keyboard and latest drivers
DirectX® 9.0b (included)
Linux:
GNU/Linux system,
Pentium III, 1Ghz
256Mb RAM
Kernel 2.4, 2.6 is recommended
glibc 2.2.4 and up
3D card:
NV10 or R200 minimum hardware
OpenGL hardware acceleration
64 MB VRAM
sound card, OSS or Alsa, stereo sound and 5.1 are supported with both APIs
Alsa version 1.0.6 or above is required
I got both of these from the respective download sites. The only difference being the Linux version is the demo release, which should cause minimal concern since they are going by how well the engine itself runs on the platform.
My system is an AMD XP2100+ 512MB & ATI9700Pro @ 4x AGP. The Windows version runs great, the Linux version runs so-so. It is playable, but not much fun. I think this has more to do with needing to upgrade to something in the FX53 range than being any blame of ethier operating system.
Let's face it, performance isn't nearly as much of an issue as developer support at this point.
From what I've read, porting MFC-based utilities (such as game editors) is more of a pain than switching 3D APIs.
It's really not all that difficult if you use something like wxWidgets (formerly wxWindows). Slashdot has covered the MFC and wxWidgets comparison before. If your interested, IBM has written an article on Porting MFC applications to Linux. Just let it be known, it is something being done. I've personally converted applications directly from MFC to wxWidgets with very little difficulty and really very little code change. However, none of the apps had non-standard interfaces.
MFC is history anyway. Just something to think about.
In D3D you need to check caps bits for feature, OpenGL you need to check if the extension is supported, seems about the same to me.
I don't understand your comment about OpenGL being Stateful, D3D also stores its own internal state and it maybe more than one copy, one for the DX runtime and another in the driver proper.
About the extensions, nothing stops a Radeon (or anyone else) implementing the NVidia extension (which I think they do). OpenGL allows you just to call the new features (if supported). In D3D access the new feature means you will need to move all your calls to the new interface.
Vertex Arrays do the same sort of job as Vertex Buffers in D3D, plus you have display lists so you can combine geometry and state change into a single call.
In the end to support cards with different features sets you are still going to have different codepaths.
Direct3D is exactly like OpenGL. You can argue features (vertex shaders integral or an add-on, etc.), but they are both graphics APIs.
Your point is valid, but you are thinking of DirectX. DirectX contains Direct3D (graphics), DirectSound (um... sound ;), DirectInput (keyboard, mouse, joystick, whatever), DirectPlay (or at least it used to, networking code), and others (I think).
So your right. I doubt many games use just Direct3D. If you are going to use D3D, why not use DirectSound and DirectInput too? They are much better than just programming Win32 for that stuff (I would imagine). Even Quake2/3 used DirectX for everything but graphics (I think).
As the parrent said, there is more to the problem than just Direct3D, there is all of DirectX (which WineX/Cedega/whatever is working on alongside D3D). If more games were written with OpenGL+SDL (or any other cross platform combination that may exist) things would be easier to port.
Comment forecast: Bits of genius surrounded by a sea of mediocrity.
You mean keep doing what the mass majority of gamers have been doing for years? Its that kind of attitude why Linux is so heavily shunned by casual gamers. Most people are not willing to expend the time and energy and reap the rewards of what you learn just to get UT2004 running in Linux when they can use the auto-installing and play it on Windows. People want EASY. People don't like having to change their video settings everytime they want to play a certain game.
The masses don't like to get told, 'you should learn our complex and difficult methods to achieve the same results using your simplicitic and traditional ways.' Its like telling the American people that the electorial college is inferior (and in a way it is) but even if its true, people aren't going to go along with it for the sake of ease. (Do you REALLY want to spend the time and effort necessary to constantly remain updated and educated on what goes on in the government while having a job/family/school/social life/playing video games/reading Slashdot/etc.?)