Loki selecting beta-testers again

Faizout writes "Lokisoft is once again selecting beta-testers, this time for `Myth II: Soulblighter'. There are a few spots that are already taken; some of the people are those who failed to make it onto the beta-test list for Civ:CTP. "

Comments

Problems with their last port

[Anonymous Coward]

I don't know if I am the only one having these problems so I'll post here and see what y'all think.

I bought CivCTP from the Loki booth at Linux Expo this year. I was pretty excited but the excitement ended shortly after I got the wrapping off the box.

There were no installation instructions. Oh sure I figured it out myself in short order but really there should have been some kind of sheet or card telling you how to install the product. That was problem #1.

Problem #2, nearly 400MB got copied to my hard disk. Is that really necessary? This is a CD ROM game; why can't I play it off the CD ROM?

Problem #3: The install script has a flaky parser. If you put a trailing slash on the install path, the result is that the install script tries to use a double slash (DOH)

Problem #4: None of the symbolic links placed all over my filesystem worked. They weren't flagged as executable by the script (DOH!) This was just plain sloppy of Loki, IMO.

Problem #5: Start the game up, no sound. Seems this requires OSS sound drivers to run. It says so on the fine print on the box so I can't be too mad at Loki for that. Had to recompile my kernel though.

Problem #6: I can't play the game under KDE or Gnome. Even with the panel hidden, enough of it is still there to sufficiently block a good bit of the game. I started X with no window manager in order to play the game.

Problem #7: This is the big one. After many hours of gameplay, the game burps. Segmentation fault. This has happened to me three times in a row. Seems to happen after many hours of play, but I haven't been watching memory or anything to know if there is a leak.

For reference, my system is based on a Cyrix M2 233MHz CPU, 64MB SDRAM, Adaptec AHA2940UW SCSI controller with 1.5GB of hard disk. Sound card is a Sound Blaster AWE64 "Value". Network card is Intel Etherexpress 100B. Video is S3/ViRGE PCI with 4MB. OS is Red Hat 6.0 with out-of-the-box kernel source recompiled for OSS support.

I tried going to Loki's web site to see if there were any patches to fix this but their site was dead (it was before this story was posted so it wasn't /. effect)

Re:Problems with their last port

[John Fulmer]

A lot of issues. Here's some answers (I hope):

> There were no installation instructions.

I had instructions on mine. I believe that they were on a card, and there was a README.

> nearly 400MB got copied to my hard disk.

The game is about 150MB, the other 250MB are MPEG movies, which can run off of the cd.

>The install script has a flaky parser.

Nothing wrong with a double slash. Looks ugly, but it still works.

> None of the symbolic links placed all over my
>filesystem worked

Known problem with v1.0, fixed in 1.1

>Start the game up, no sound. Seems this requires
>OSS sound drivers to run.

Well, yeah. For sound you have to have sound drivers. However OSS compatible sound drivers work too, like ALSA.

>I can't play the game under KDE or Gnome.

I play with gnome, with the panel as a corner panel and collapsed. This is a actually a problem with KDE/GNOME, where they want to be in front of EVERYTHING.

Another option is to run it in a window, with a smaller resolution as your desktop.

> After many hours of gameplay, the game burps.
> Segmentation fault.

Ahh. NOW we have a problem. This is known, and for me usually happened RIGHT after the 'Wonders' movies. I found that making the movie play in a window instead of full screen improved the stability.

This is a known problem and should be fixed (hopefully) in 1.1.

Don't forget..CTP is the FIRST shrinkwrapped game for Linux, and only the third by a well known commercial developer (next to Quake and Quake2). There are a lot of tools and utilities that Loki are developing on the fly to do their ports (like the MPEG movie player) and lots of pieces that they have to write to replace the DirectX calls.

Most of CTP's problems (I think) has to do with the bloated Windows code. What native UNIX app sucks up 70MB of RAM normally?

I think that CTP is a very good first effort by Loki (I'm holding off playing much more until 1.1, though :) and I am really looking forward to other titles.

Re:Problems with their last port

[Logan]

A few of your problems don't seem to be real problems.

Problem #3: The install script has a flaky parser. If you put a trailing slash on the install path, the result is that the install script tries to use a double slash (DOH)

I don't see how this could be a problem. I haven't seen the script in question, but in general, /usr/local//games is the same directory as /usr/local/games.

Problem #4: None of the symbolic links placed all over my filesystem worked. They weren't flagged as executable by the script (DOH!) This was just plain sloppy of Loki, IMO.

Symbolic links don't have permissions. They simply appear to take on the permissions of whatever they are linked to. Perhaps the sources of these links had improper permissions.

Problem #5: Start the game up, no sound. Seems this requires OSS sound drivers to run. It says so on the fine print on the box so I can't be too mad at Loki for that. Had to recompile my kernel though.

Well, no offense intended, but -- duh. :P

Problem #6: I can't play the game under KDE or Gnome. Even with the panel hidden, enough of it is sptill there to sufficiently block a good bit of the game. I started X with no window manager in order to play the game.

The Gnome panel, when you slide it to the side, only takes up a few pixels. Surely these can't be crucial? Why not just kill -9 the panel if you have to? Just a suggestion. Again, I haven't tried the game, so I don't really know how the panel affects the game exactly.

The only real problems I see from your list are the lack of install instructions (of the physical variety) and the segmentation faults. All this speculation reminds me that I still need to buy this game. :P

logan

system requirements

[irishmex]

Even though linux is in many ways more efficient than Windows or MacOS, keep in mind that the system requirements for any of these games that are being worked on will be very similar to the originals. MythII, or any new game for that matter, won't run on a 68k machine.

If you want to play an immersive 3D game (which is about all that's being made anymore) make sure you're running a relatively new system with plenty of RAM and preferably a 3D accelerator. I, for one, have always thought that it was great that linux runs so well on older platforms. They make great file servers, firewalls, workstations, etc., but don't expect to be able to run everything you want unless the harware's up to the task.

from the faq

[pneuma_66]

Will you be offering support for PPC and Alpha platforms?

The release CD contains i386 binaries and data files. In the next few weeks we will post PPC and Alpha binaries for download from our website. Those binaries will work with the data files on the release CD.

The PPC version will remain 'beta' and unsupported until LinuxPPC reaches version 5.0, as 5.0 is required for thread support. To play Civ:CTP on a Mac, you'll need to buy the Linux version of the game, download the PPC binary (about 8MB right now) and install LinuxPPC 5.0 beta.


cristiana

I want my patch!

[Hallow]

Dagnabbit, they don't even have their long over announced patch for Civ:CTP out. I'd like to be able to play network games with glibc 2.1 as well as play with windows users.

Re:I want my patch!

[luge]

More power to them for holding out until the patch works. I certainly wouldn't want to complain if that is the hold-up. However, considering how many nights of sleep I plan on losing to this game, I think they should lose a couple for my benefit :)
~luge
P.S. It's also going to be the first piece of software I've actually bought in nearly three years. That should count for something, shouldn't it?

Re:I want my patch!

[Highlander]

Couple things:

We received the 1.1 patch code from Activision on Monday, May 24 and had a patch uploaded for testing the next day. It hasn't been released because it broke several parts of the game.

The problems we are hearing about have proven very difficult to duplicate, even with 4 of our people working on it together with a number of tremendous testers on the outside. Our guys are really good, so I'm confident the patch will be ready for prime time shortly.

The PPC version (including the 1.1 patch) is also nearly ready--several people are beta testing it now.

For future projects, we have bugzilla up and running, and will be making it available to customers. We think that sharing support/bug information with people is a Good Thing. After all, we're counting on you all to keep us honest!

SD
President
Loki Entertainment Software

Re:That was quick!

[MEGASTeP]

I am one of the programmers working on the Myth II port here at Loki, so I can tell you the game is pretty much fully playable right now. We have it working in a X11 window and full 3D acceleration using Glide, all the sound and I hope to get the multiplayer support to work by the end of the week.

It was already cross-platform so it was quite easy to get it to compile and run on Linux. That's why we're already able to play the game after only about 3 weeks of work. ;-)

There is no sign-up...

[Steelehead]

From the Main Page:

We are selecting 50 from the list of users whom we were unable to use for Civilization: Call to Power, and adding a few of the testers who contributed many reports and sleepless nights to that cause.

Read the details, people.

Re:That was quick!

[Fizgig]

I know Myth I (and I think the sequel) were released for Macs too. That means that Bungie had to have it at least somewhat abstracted, unless they're masochists.

Stop announcing, start coding

[dmorin]

I'm highly disappointed in Loki that I still can't get Civ:CTP on the shelf. I don't want to hear the excuses. Quake for Linux is on the shelf right now. Loki is getting into the bad habit of announcing things way too early so that they get the press, and then when they end up having problems releasing, we're expected to say "Oh, hey, we understand, you were rushed." You rushed it yourselves, Loki. Don't, next time.

Re:It's not vaporware, as you imply

[dmorin]

First off, I implied nothing about vaporware. If I didn't make it clear that I was referring to the retail availability of the game, I apologize. But I intended to imply nothing about vaporware. I know the game is available. I read slashdot, linuxgames and all the others just like the rest of us.

Second, if I can't be bothered to order it online? How dare thee, sir. I don't know about everybody else, but I'm tired of Linux being a geeks OS. I'm tired of explaining to people "Oh, the best stuff is 'out there', but you have to go find it, you can't buy it on the shelf." For months now we've said that one of the inroads to making Linux a desktop OS is the availability of games. To me, that doesn't imply games that you can order online, it implies games that you can go to the store and buy. If we all go off and be geeks and order our game online, CompUSA will have that many fewer sales of the retail game, and how will that look to them? Will they bother to carry the next one that comes out? I would love to be playing Civ:CTP right now. Hell, I already had Quake and QuakeII, but I went out and bought them when they hit the shelf. I am attempting to wait patiently for Civ to hit the shelves, so that I can "vote with my dollars" and do my part to let the retail world know that there is a market for Linux games.

Can't be bothered indeed. Sheeesh!