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Is LGP Going the Way of Loki Software?
An anonymous reader writes "After the demise of Loki Software, Linux Game Publishing sprouted up in its place, and for the past nine years has ported a number of games to Linux. But LGP may now be sharing the same fate as Loki. Linux Game Publishing hasn't updated its blog or news pages in months, has stopped responding to e-mails, and its only active ports are games they began work on in 2002/2003."
When Wine is good enough to run Warcraft 3, what market is there for a company selling ports of decade-old games for $40-$50 each?
---- I'll take you in a Hunt deathmatch any day.
Loki released a great Bungie game for Linux http://www.lokigames.com/products/myth2/ :)
Work is still going on for the game on OSX and Windows via http://projectmagma.net/downloads/myth2_171/
All the best with LGP, ports are great fun for any OS
Domestic spying is now "Benign Information Gathering"
Why are the assholes at Phoronix still getting linked on Slashdot?
They just make up whatever they think will get them the most hits.
Mod me down, my New Earth Global Warmingist friends!
http://www.gamingonlinux.info/news.php?view=26
Were they the guys behind the neverendingly delayed UT3? I know it wasn't the biggest hit on release, but the UT style is something I always associate with Linux gaming.
Nobody's heard from them since they moved development to an oil platform in the gulf to avoid taxes.
Table-ized A.I.
Well the article does little more than point out that LGP are not responding to hails and stopped updating their information. There is really no concrete facts to conclude that they are finished, thus all we can do from here is guess.
So lets say they are dead (Which might not be the case), what do you think killed them?
Could it be that there is just not enough Linux gamers that are willing to pay to see Windows games on their platform to sustain a porting company?
Could the original Windows publishers be at fault? Perhaps they are not willing to share the code for the porting purposes.
Could it be just a case of poorly run company that finally had their decisions catch up to them?
Really with so little information any guess is as good as another.
Aside: Anyone know why Loki folded? A quick search only states "financial troubles", which is not really helpful.
Steam's DRM is one of the least intrusive out there. I forget it's even there until some Slashdotter brings it up. Kind of diminishes your point when the evil DRM isn't even noticeable.
You can't make money selling games when they're all given away for free.
Oh sorry. LGP, not LGPL.
From the outside and according to the press it looked like they were on track, the IT bubble broke, and then their investors couldn't or didn't keep their funding promises.
The above poster might know more, but then again they could just be anybody making shit up. Above poster, if you do have a clue at least sign up for an account here and we can take your views at a value above zero.
Steam's DRM is one of the least intrusive out there. I forget it's even there until some Slashdotter brings it up. Kind of diminishes your point when the evil DRM isn't even noticeable.
Quite the opposite. Just wait until you do notice the effects on everything you paid for but don't actually own.
Game! - Where the stick is mightier than the sword!
Well, that's total bullshit, because I have and can use everything without connecting to steam.
Thing is, your argument is based on nothing. Why would I use a digital download service if I have bad or no internet? Won't that mean I won't even be able to download anything? I mean, when games weigh in at 7-10GB each, a flaky connection isn't going to make it usable at all.
Your point is moot and just another ill informed troll comment.
LGP's blog shows that the company is still active. Last update was from April 5, 2010.
So I assume you will never move or switch locations to a place with lesser bandwidth?
Also, many places have high bandwidth yet also disconnect spikes. You play a great game for an hour, then bam, two minutes downtime. You can download a 10 GB game in 30 minutes with no problems whatsoever, but at peak hours it's impossible to play due to everyone leeching bandwidth. Etc.
It is a more complex issue than you think. 'Nuff said.
systemd is not an init system. It's a GNU replacement.
There are some retail games (not made by Valve) -- as in you buy it in a box from a brick-and-mortar store and install the game off a DVD -- which require Steam in order to play the game.
I believe Steam lets you play offline for some period of time after authenticating, so this places it somewhere between the "1-time online activation on installation" style DRM and the Ubisoft "must be connected at absolutely all times" DRM.
I get many of my games on Steam, but I don't want to see them become the *only* option.
As I said, I spoke to Michael Simms a couple of weeks ago over email to see what could be done about getting the license to the Linux port of Alpha Centauri so it could be patched and sold again, etc.
Didn't see any evidence that LGP had stopped working, they're a part time company mostly from what I gather, give them some credit!
Oh and as for SMAC, it seems Mr Simms tried hard; nay VERY HARD to get the rights to it but with no success, I'm hoping that if Steam does make it to Linux we can use that as the carrot to get a few of the older Loki titles back.
Cheers,
Maquis196
Concerned what? Concerned Citizens?
Btw, Valve seems to be working on that...
Yes, you can't use Steam offline (what's the point in using a an Online-Retail-Store and Management-System offline anyway)...but you can play most of the games without Steam, you just have to start the game directly without the Steam shortcut.
"Wed, June 23 2010
Is grateful to Slashdot for finally noticing that LGP exists, after militantly ignoring any game release we have made for the last 5 years, as soon as reports of our death come through, we get a front page story. Slashdot - Your support of Linux is inspirational. For others who wonder, we are very much alive. We have had a couple of staffing issues, but work is progressing on more than one unannounced title. We will offer furether updates as and when there is news to update you with."
Seems like ya'll have hit a nerve! For me, I've bought 2 LGP games in the past, and enjoyed them, though they were certainly not AAA titles. I do wish they were more forthcoming with information though.
No.
Longer answer:
LGP News
Wed, June 23 2010
Is grateful to Slashdot for finally noticing that LGP exists, after militantly ignoring any game release we have made for the last 5 years, as soon as reports of our death come through, we get a front page story. Slashdot - Your support of Linux is inspirational.
For others who wonder, we are very much alive. We have had a couple of staffing issues on the admin side of things, which explains most of our silence, but work is progressing on more than one unannounced title. We will offer further updates as and when there is news to update you with.
Ignorance and prejudice and fear
Walk hand in hand
I have been gaming on 64-bit Linux in GL mode since 2004. There aren't many titles to choose from, but everything that I have tried--Enemy Territory, UT2004, and a few others--run flawlessly and at higher framerates than they do in Windows XP, not to even get started with Win7. I have never had a video driver crash. I have been running NVIDIA 64-bit binary drivers the entire time.
At one point, I had a problem with ET not liking sound since it is Quake 3 based and was written to use OSS, but I was running Gentoo and of course had to spend a half hour trying to figure out how to restore sound. It runs flawlessly out of the box in Ubuntu.
The problem is not drivers and is entirely the selection of games out there. We will hopefully see some good Source-based games for Linux once Steam makes its way in.
Why would I use a digital download service if I have bad or no internet? Won't that mean I won't even be able to download anything? I mean, when games weigh in at 7-10GB each, a flaky connection isn't going to make it usable at all.
Because I installed it on my laptop at home before I travelled to my cabin in the woods and wanted to fire up a game to kill some time?
The REAL problem with games on linux is that the 'omg OpenSource' discussion kicks in whenever games on linux are mentioned, and a google search on games for linux floods you with stuff like nexuiz and frozen bubble or how to run games on linux using wine. Meanwhile, companies like LGP who, perhaps lack a strong marketing department, end up on row 24 of a google search, buried under a bunch of links which don't interest most serious gamers who are just trying to look for nice games to play on their machine.
Confound that with the fact that linux works via repositories, and there isn't a provision (in fact, there's efforts to default against it) for looking up commercial stuff like this from the repositories, and you get the idea. I consider myself a staunch linux supporter, who advocates that proper gaming would be a turning point for linux, and this is *still* the first time I've ever even heard of LGP today! I buy games for windows all the time, I would (and now will) definitely buy them for linux, once I know they exist!
(... and before the pedants react, no, looking whether a *specific* game runs on linux somehow, isn't good enough, and definitely not the solution to the exposure problem.)
provided native linux ports in the first place.
S2games comes to mind.
You play a great game for an hour, then bam, two minutes downtime.
Haven't tried this with Steam, but I'd guess it would handle it gracefully. Are you sure you're not confusing this with Ubi?
Don't thank God, thank a doctor!
worth noting that a game running well under wine is one compilation away from being native, thanks to winelibs
(1) Compiling is only one small step on the way to release. There is all testing. Now consider the matrix of Linux distributions that now have to be tested. Letting your Windows version get run under WINE avoids this great complication.
(2) More importantly, a native Linux version will often cannibalize Windows sales. Face it, many Linux users configure their systems to dual boot Windows in order to play games. Replacing a Windows sale with a Linux sale does not pay for the extra costs. The economics of Linux gaming is a bit more complicated than that of other platforms.
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