Slashdot Mirror
EVE Online's Linux/Mac Client Goes Live Tuesday
The official EVE Online site has details of upcoming patch 'Revelations 2.3'. Along with a number of bug-fixes to the PvP-focused Massively Multiplayer Online Game, this game fix will offer up compatibility with Mac OS X and Linux. Though the Mac client is a native port, Linux will require the used of Cedega. The post suggests that if you'd like a preview of what the game will be like on your rig, you can download the client and tool around the test server. System requirements are also listed, as are the distributions of Linux they are specifically supporting: Ubuntu 7+, Suse 10+, and Linspire 6. Update: 11/04 14:32 GMT by Z : Fixed implication of native Linux client.
I can't speak for EVE since I am a Mac user and never played the game however the idea, game play and such seem an awfully like Vendetta Online who natively support Windows, Linux (64Bit too), and Mac and looks great. Not to mention a great backstory.
It is also quite cheap compared to other online games. Can anyone vouch for EVE being any better than Vendetta? Although I quit playing VO it was one of the few MMOs that still support PPC.
Cheers,
[J]
It won't, really. The Linux and Mac gaming markets aren't all that large, especially since in both cases the option always exists to boot to Windows if you really want to play games. EVE's small market share isn't due to its lack of cross platform, it is sue to its game design. They chose to make a very hardcore game. This really doesn't appeal to a lot of people since they find it to not be fun. As such, it is always going to be far more niche than World of Warcraft. One of the major reasons WoW was so much more popular than any other MMORPG before it is because Blizzard heavily took the attitude that a game isn't supposed to punish you for failure. It functioned more like a single player game, where failure means reloading a save and trying something again, rather than being set back a large distance.
So while I'm sure it will get a boost in sales (they wouldn't do it if they didn't think they'd make some money), it isn't likely to be that huge. The game simply appeals to a much more narrow group of people than WoW. WoW is one of those games that I'll recommend to anybody. I believe it is simple enough for anyone to learn to play, and anyone to find enjoyable. That is not true of many games, and EVE is certainly one it isn't true of. I'd only recommend that to people I know that are very intense gamers, and that can deal with the consequences for failure that game has.
It doesn't change the rules to cater to the lowest common denominator, unlike WoW and other MMOs - it follows a specific vision, and users can either adapt or leave.
The openness and freedom of an old-school PK MUD combined with the concept of Elite/TradeWars/etc. make for an amazing, engrossing game.
Given its quality and lack of compromise, I'm surprised it's managed to survive so long.
Because depending on wine makes you look like you don't care about your market and your relying on a third party such as winehq to make your game work.
If Eve brings out a patch that no longer makes it work under wine and 100 people send in hate mail then you can see why maybe a native client might be a good thing.
"Blizzard wrote a Windows client for WoW that is ported to Linux with Wine for free"
So you didnt know that WoW was written on linux and working in beta before they moved it to windows then?
Whatever you say, they have made an effort to make it easier to play the game on linux machines. Be fucking thankful that somebody is making an effort to reach into your tiny market, instead of whining that it's not perfect. Even if its not a native client, the game should run fine. People with decent computers can run 4 clients at a time in windows. If it was easy to make linux clients, and the money companies could possibly make by creating them was high enough, everyone would do it. The problem is theres not enough linux users, with the hardware, inclination, whatever, to make it financially worthwhile. Once theres enough of you, willing to pay for games and not whine like hell about not being treated the same as windows users, companies will begin to enter the market. Linux is a tiny market compared to windows, seemingly populated by even harder to please nerds, and you wonder why companies don't bother making linux games? Most of the comments here are more likely to put a company off bothering with a linux client. Overall I doubt this is the begining of a trend. The sort of game eve is means that a higher proportion of potential users will be linux users anyway, so they have a bigger potential market to reach than other games / mmo's. Regardless, come try eve. 99% of you will hate the game, eve is the harshest, most cutthoat, brutal mmo you can play, and for that other 1% it will be perfect. The real difference between eve and other mmo's, is the ability to affect the world and other players. Imagine losing every peice of your equipment every time you died in wow, or a wow with completely player run towns, real wars over territory involving several thousand players, a complex almost entirely player run economy, a real and working player mercenary market, and almost every bit of your kit being manufacturerd by other players. CCP can almost be seen as providing a framework for the game, the game itself is created by the players.
I just accidentally enchanted my boots with "+7 Agility" when I meant to use "+7 Stamina", wasting 90 gold in WoW. This would take me a week or so to earn back - so you just aren't trying hard enough to lose money in WoW.