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Linux Unreal Tournament Files Released
[Hi, I just posted this info in the Slashdot forum elaborating on why we didn't ship the Linux executables in the Unreal Tournament box.]
The UT Linux executables will be available for download rather than being included in the box.
We don't like this either. We REALLY, REALLY wanted the Linux executables to be on the CD, we reserved space for it, and actually had it there in the directory structure during beta.
GT asked us yank it, because they were worried about tech support issues: that thousands of Linux users would have questions about installation that GT reps (who are only familiar with Windows and consoles) wouldn't be able to answer.
We obliged with their request, because GT is responsible for performing (and paying for) UT tech support, and it didn't seem fair to put the burden on them.
Here is part of a message I sent to a GT exec, advocating putting Linux on the UT CD-Rom:
---begin---
Why Linux on the Unreal Tournament box is a very good move:
First, Red Hat Linux is selling very well in retail, and there's a good chance that by word of mouth, Linux users will pick up Unreal Tournament with their Linux purchase or afterwards. I'd be very surprised if we didn't gain over 3% more sales from Linux users. Now if UT sells a million units (Tim's wild guess), that's 30,000 additional units. If we make it *very* clear that the Linux version is unsupported (no tech support calls), then surely this is a profitable move.
Second, while Linux users are far outnumbered by Windows users, the statistics don't tell the whole story. Linux users are the hardest of the hardcore. They're among the movers and shakers who are serious deathmatchers (Quake 2 and Quake 3 are available for Linux); they run major community web sites; they run servers on T1 and T3 connections. These people have far more influence on gaming than their numbers indicate.
Third, Linux is gaining an incredible amount of momentum, and sticking the Linux penguin logo on the UT box would further the Unreal franchise's position as a leading-edge product that's not afraid to push into new territories. This has always been our hallmark -- Epic shipped the first-ever DirectX game (Fire Fight, published by Electronic Arts); now the Unreal Tournament demo is the first DirectX7 release; and now we have the chance to be the first game to ship simultaneous with Windows and Linux versions in the same box.
---end---
GT considered all of this and understood the issues, but still had overriding concerns about the cost.
I can't say I blame them; I sure wouldn't want to be responsible for supporting users with 10 different versions each of 10 different Linux distributions, each with a completely different set of video drivers, x-windows shells, permissions, and possibly even recompiled kernels. Linux's approach kicks ass on the Internet with its open, user-driven community. But it doesn't seem too compatible with the mass-market distribution model, where companies pay rooms full of people to answer phones and help customers, and where one tech support call wipes out all the profit from a box sold.
Emailing companies like GT *politely* to show your support for the Linux platform is a great idea. Just keep in mind that, to publishers, the Linux thing isn't simply a popularity contest; supporting Linux needs to make sense financially, and there are some serious issues with support and compatibility they need to consider.
Tim Sweeney
Epic Games
http://unreal.epicgames.com/
So.. Why didn't they try for BeOS support? They said they would do it if they had enough BeOS user feedback. It made all the BeOS news sites. I can't imagine they didn't get any feedback. There's a lot of us out here.
But instead they just didn't do it in favor of a Linux release. If anything GT would probably have been more open to the idea of BeOS since all they had to support was one distribution, etc, etc, etc. In fact even less variations and problems than Windows would run into.
So why not try for BeOS? Why hasn't Epic released a BeOS version like this Linux one? What the hell is wrong with BeOS, anyway? Everyone wants to ignore it in favor of the popular Linux. Come on.. This is one thing BeOS has over Linux--it's proprietry. Many people seem to think that's a fault. When it comes to the rest of the software world, being closed is the next best thing to Windows. So why doesn't anyone want to support it?
If GT Interactive didn't want to play, then perhaps it's time to find a new distributor.
It's not only the consumers who get to vote with their feet - but the producers as well.
Fileplanet, unreal.epicgames.com and Slashdot are being a little misleading.
Perhaps these articles should specify that only Linux/i386 binaries have been released. Remember, when you just say "Linux" you are implying more than just Intel.
They could sell a product with a liscensing agreement that says it might not work, if it doesn't work its not their fault, and if it eats all your data and starts a global thermonuclear war, thats not their fault either
Oh wait, thats EULA!
Seriously though, it would be nice if they could toss the linux exes on the cd, and a penguin logo on the box and a pamphlet in the box that says
ATTENTION: WE DO NOT SUPPORT THE LINUX VERSION, SO DON'T CALL US ABOUT IT.
Need a Catering Connection
The Linux-specific parts of Unreal Tournament will be open sourced. (Credit to Blue's News where I saw this - I thought it would be relevant here.)
.plan:
From Brandon "GreenMarine" Reinhart's
I have permission from Tim to open source certain parts of the engine for the purposes of improving Linux support. What I would like to do is make available the code I have written for Glide, Mesa, input, and audio. I would appreciate Linux programmers taking the time to submit improvements to me at brandon@epicgames.com. I will look into putting up a webpage for this and perhaps a discussion forum. Please email me your input or ideas.
I'm leaving to go home for Thanksgiving tomorrow, so I may not be able to start on this until I get back on Friday. Right now I'm working on the Mesa renderer, because I would like to release that soon, if possible.
The code that I open source will not allow you to really dig very deep into the engine, but it will let you do a lot of stuff to the renderer and X windows interface.
Since my time is split between non-Linux related projects, the Linux port could no doubt be improved if it gets some attention from experienced Linux programmers.
This is excellent - it might also help other people porting games to Linux. An obvious question is, what open source license? The released code will have to be linked against the proprietary game engine. So I guess the GPL wouldn't work, right?
Azog
Torrey Hoffman (Azog)
"HTML needs a rant tag" - Alan Cox
GT, seeing there is a market, albiet, small, would be encouraged to release more linux games. A la Loki.
If Loki can survive on Linux games, then other companies can as well. All the software houses moving into Linux software, being applications or games, will likely see profitability while Linux is growing fast. This is the time to establish yourself in a linux market, not two years down the road when its common practice.
Also, such companies will gain respect (if they release good software, not duff), as Loki have found. Respect from consumers means > sales > money.
It does need companies to take a risk, if the risk pays off, companies will do well. Linux has been growing for too long (year plus) for interest to suddenly die away. If linux was a fad, Linux would have faded away by now.
Also, people will see more Linux games on the shelves, and will see linux as a mainstream OS where you can do wordprocessing etc, and also, play games.. The linux image of geeks, and nerds will disappear, which will encourage "non-techies" to try linux out.
If I buy your windows product and then download the linux bins, then I'm supporting GT's linux ignorance. No thanks.
If you read Tim Sweeney's letter and comments posted below the headline, you'd know that it's not exactly "ignorance" on GT's part not to package the Linux binaries on the CD. I would have loved to have seen them put the Linux version on there myself, but like Tim said, GT would be taking a financial risk in doing this. GT's main goal is making a profit, just like every other company, and they stood to lose more money on tech support calls than they would gain from the added sales to Linux users.
Reading what Tim said, it's at least a step in the right dirrection. With people like Tim and John Carmack are doing in the game industry and with the ever increasing software/hardware support Linux is getting, we'll be seeing many more mainstream games come out with boxed Linux versions. Carmack said it himself when he talked about how other game developers and producers will be watching the sales of Q3A for Linux to decided whether or not it's worth it for them to go that route with their games. Right now they're all letting Id take the first big step and watching to see if works out. IMO, had Unreal Tournament come out after Q3A for Linux had been in stores for a month or more and the sales had proven to be good, I'm sure GT would have taken Tim Sweeney's advice. Until then we're just gonna have to wait and see. Companies will start jumping on the Linux bandwagon once a major game sells well. We can all do our parts by buying the Linux Q3A when it comes out, but until then, we'll just have to keep waiting.
Sub-Zero
Check out justen.org .
We need to remember that Linux is still a New Thing(tm) to a lot of management people, and if the first few companies that experiment with providing a Linux version get a lot of angry emails from people demanding a box with a penguin on it (Or any more rallying cries of "You've lost yourself another sale", no offense), it certainly won't help to encourage other people to port to Linux.
It's a good game (a lot prettier than Q3, imho, and a hell of a lot easier to get running on a Voodoo 3) and if you want it, and want to support game companies who release Linux versions of their software, be a good penguin p1mp and just buy it, download the executable, and send a friendly email and/or registration card to the company with your opinions regarding the packaging.
If we're not mean to them, maybe they won't be afraid to put it in the box next time. ;-)
I'm not thrilled with lack of Linux support in the box, but I understand it;
3D acclerator support under Linux is not good. It's getting better - but setting it up is a real pain and yeilds inconsistant results from program to program. I wouldn't want to support any Linux 3D-aware program till XFree v.4 with improved 3D and DRI support is released.
Lack of in-the-box Linux support won't prevent me from buying Unreal Tournament one bit...but I have to admit that Quake III Arena is ahead of UT on my shopping list. If UT did have Linux support in the box, I might have picked it up out of curiosity and to show support for future games. As of now, I'll wait till I use Q3A for a while and see if I want another FPS.
Marking this post down as flaimbait was a little harsh. Perhaps "overrated" would have been more appropriate, if one feels that BeOS fans are disproportionately upgrading the article's rating, but I really don't think the poster was trying to do anything but ask a question and make a polite request that their favorite OS get supported.
I agree with others that BeOS suffers from many of the disadvantages of other proprietary OSes. It is terribly vulnerable to orphaning should Be go under, it is pricy, it is much less polished in many respects than Linux, etc. etc. Still, it does do some things very nicely and, if nothing else, is a fun toy to play around with.
In any case, while I don't agree with the idea that BeOS should be getting support prior to Linux, I don't think the poster deserves getting nuked as "flaimbait," even though I do happen to agree with the resulting +1 score (but that may just be my pro-Linux bias speaking as much as anything).
The Future of Human Evolution: Autonomy
Well, technically the complaints are invalid. However, Epic Megagames did a poor job by only releasing the 3dfx renderer. If they had released the 3dfx, OpenGL/Mesa, and software renderers (and it seems they will NOT release the software renderer from the README), then there would be at least a chance to play Unreal Tournament on PowerPC, albeit in the perfectly functional, but ugly, software mode.
So, yes, there should be complaints from all LinuxPPC users, as well as the Alpha users, all 100 of them. <j/k>
Glückwünsche, haben Sie Slashdot ermordet, indem Sie zum korporativen Druck beugten und Subskriptionen einlei
To all of you that say you won't buy this game because there are no executables on the CD, I say this to you: You are being unbelievably childish. I have been preaching to all my friends that the day is coming, Linux (oh, sorry, that would be x86 Linux for those complaining about this little tidbit) will be the only OS on my drive when the games get here. Well guess what? The games are coming? Did you relinquish Quake 1 and 2 to the unwanted rubbish bin BEFORE id so graciously put out a CD with the Linux executables? Looking at the server stats, I don't think so. So what's different with UT?
Given the fact that they took the TIME to make a port for Linux, you should be gratefull, not petty. EPIC should not be made to suffer because of GT's decision. The files are AVAILABLE RIGHT NOW. Get them. Use them. Enjoy the game. If you punish Epic over this, not only will they not port again, but you are being the most vocal opponent of gaming on Linux. With every comment of "I won't buy it because of blah blah blah" you show the management of the distribution companies that you are an all or nothing group, and therefore all Linux users must be the same. Kiss any future support goodbye.
I bought the game today. I downloaded the files today. I WILL play it on Linux tonight. So sit on your high and mighty moral high ground if you will, but I'll be playing.
God forbid if Microsoft ever releases any software for Linux...
Have you seen the RT2 demo? Just detar it, cd to ./rt2_demo and type ./rt2. It's equally as easy with the myth2 demo and the Civ:CTP shrinkwrap edition.
I'm trying to teach myself to set people on fire with my mind... Is it hot in here?
So the better solution is to send a positive message to Epic by buying their game. But before you even open it, sit down and write an intelligent email to GT explaining that are dissapointed with them, and that you want the linux version in the box next time. Then download the Linux binaries from Epic's site (which informs them too, that you want Linux). This way everyone get's a pro Linux takehome message.
That is exactly why giving away tech support is a bad idea in the first place. They should charge for tech support from the get-go. Then they could charge a lower price, make more profit, and penalize the users who have wierd system configurations or aren't capable of getting it working, or just like to call tech support and harass them.
Think about it..
what percentage of users actually need tech support?
How many of those are lamers who do stupid stuff?
How many of those are people who just didn't read the manual?
How many of those are people who insisted on installing "Game blaster game acceleration software" or "registry tuning software" and so fscked up their machine that it won't work?
That probably covers most of them, and if a couple of innocents have to pay.. oh well. They will have paid less for the boxed software in the first place, it will probably about balance out.
I think it would be a much better "value-add" than free tech support to *supply* a stripped down linux distribution that they can install that definitely will work with the game software.. heck that might solve a lot of windows users problems anyway.
I think this represents a much better economic model (of course I think the software should be free too, but I realize that can be difficult to apply in the gaming world). But I wouldn't expect GT or anyone else to think that "out of the box"... uk uk.. pun intended.
Let me rehash my question that I already asked about Q3...
How does the Linux version of UT compare to the Windows when running on the same hardware?
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You may like my a cappella music
I see a few comments here advocating "pirating" Unreal Tournament because the Linux binaries have not been included. This is not smart. For those of you who are planning this, I ask you to read the Linux-Advocacy-How-To.
I for one am quite grateful to the guys for making the effort to have a Linux port. If you want to play the game under Linux? Buy the game, but make certain you fill out and mail in the registration card! On that card of course, indicate proudly that you purchased the game for Linux, the suits will notice this.
Every copy that you "liberate for the Linux cause" (Pah!) and pirate reduces one registration card. Emailing GT (In a constructive manner!) is good, but paying for the game and making it known that you are using the Linux version is the best course of action that we have.
GT is a company, it is their job to make money. If we can show them that they can make money off of Linux products they will change. I must admit that Quake 3 Arena is higher on my want list than Unreal Tournament, but I shall buy them both.
Its simple recursion: The more Linux stuff you buy the more there is too buy. The more Linux stuff you buy the more there is to buy.........
Try to hack my 31337 firewall!
While I agree with the statement that opensource FRAGMENTS generally don't encourage the participation of outside developers and doesn't contribute back USEFUL NEW REUSABLE CODE, it is nice nonetheless because it allows us to fix, optimize, extend, and enhance UT.
Do you remember how much work everyone went through to reverse-engineer the doom wad formats? and then to write the various frontends? How many doom players *didn't* use some 3rd party frontend, level editor, etc...
Having the linux parts opensourced *DOES* give developers a lot more info FOR DEVELOPING ENHANCEMENTS TO UT . It doesn't give much to people who are trying to rip off UT and use it's game engine all that much tho.
The developers do have a right to profit from and protect their coding efforts. I don't deny them that at all. I'm happy that they're allowing us to tinker with the linux parts so that eventually we'll all have lots of great enhancements for UT that don't run under Windows.
When epic sees development and enhancement being driven by LINUX users of UT, they'll have a harder time justifying not fully supporting it (including training their support staff in linux!)
One of the main reasons Linux/Open Source Software is so lauded is because of the extensive Internet-based support available for it via mailing lists and IRC. Perhaps it would be better for them to adopt this kind of support model for their games. Hire some people, get them familiar with the Linux version of the game, and let them loose on IRC. Encourage community support from other users.
You'd still need to make it clear that phone support isn't available, but it's probably better than no support at all. Even just providing a support forum where people can ask other users questions (without having to hire anybody to give official answers) would be better than no support at all.
[Seoman] "A conclusion is simply the place where you got tired of thinking."
FWIW, I plan to d/l the Linux binaries from a few different IP addresses in order to:
1. Up their log stats and hopefully promote actual Linux "releases."
2. Make up the shortfall due to whiney gits who won't d/l.
Of course, not using this e-mail address...
This sig left unintentionally blank.
As the subject says-- I think that the fact GT fears the customer support for UT for Linux should be TELLING US SOMETHING.
.plan. Another cookie.)
UT isn't a clue-requiring program to get running under Windows. Under Linux, I'm not sure-- I'm still downloading the binaries-- but if my experience with getting any other non-distribution-targeted binary to run, I understand their fear.
GLIBC 1.x, 2.x, 2342.23423-- who expects an average gamer to know the difference?? Libraries? Support packages? Various bits and pieces not necessarily shared between distributions?
Now, I'm a Linux advocate and, games excepted, my PC staus in Linux 90% of the time. My Sony Vaio notebook got nuked the day I got it and Linux installed. When I get a binary package, and it seems to be missing some dependencies, I know how to chase them down-- i.e. through the docs, through HOW-TO's, even through Deja.com searches. Sometimes, I even chase down the source and recompile it myself by hand, and have been known to tweak Makefiles and the source itself.
This isn't a problem for me.
However, might it be a problem for less clueful Linux users? Granted, the case could be made that, currently, success in setting up Linux at all is the result of a certain cluefulness. (That's another long running criticism that I won't touch further here.)
But either way, the gamble could seem very scary to a company like GT looking to make some money off sales. The price of one service call could wipe out the profit from the purchase of the game?! OUCH! Even with a disclaimer saying, "Don't call us, you're on your own," they're not entirely clear of the problem I think.
I think this issue is more complex than, "Bad GT, no biscuit!"
In their (and our) favor: The UT team wasn't burned at the stake for making a Linux port, and allowed to release it. Good GT, here's a cookie.
Against us: Linux is not yet clue-free enough for a quick, nearly support-free installation of games.
Against them (and us): Linux is not enough of a contender enough in the gaming market for GT to invest in hiring and training Linux gurus for support. Or, for that matter, hire developers who specifically know how to work Linux to solve installation problems in the first place.
So what's my answer? Enjoy the port. Work to make Linux more uniform in basic ways. BUY THE STINKING GAME IF YOU WANT TO PLAY IT, DOWNLOAD THE BINARIES, SEND IN YOUR REGISTRATION CARD WITH GLOWING LINUX PRAISE. Piracy blows the chances of Linux EVER becoming a contender to be considered investing development of software and games for a company like GT.
(Granted a case here could also be made for Open Source game development, but that's another can of worms... but even on this GT appears to be flexible, as per Greenmarine's
You must have been looking at the download links for the Linux UT /demo/ and not the executables for the full game. Here are download links:
download UT400 executables
Granted, the online community is a much better source for help for just about anything, and I greatly appreciate that. However, I'm not going to spend the same amount of money on UT and not get what everyone else is getting. I'd like to thank Epic for making it available for linux, that's an excellent thing. I'd like to support you in that regard, but I'd rather not allow this trend of putting out a windoze version and allowing linux users to get the short end of the stick by purchasing the retail copy but not getting the whole package (meaning tech support, even if it's much less likely to occur with linux users for the most part) continue. I believe that, while at least we get the game, we don't get the same value out of the product that others get.
Thank you Epic, for trying your best and sticking up for us. I'm just disappointed that this precedent of the "unsupported" platform continues.
because it's their code, not somebody elses. UT can licences the code out to the general public under the GPL and still distribute the same code in binary for only in their game. Now, when external developers start contributing code is where things get sticky; the (legal) solution to this is what the FSF does with gnu code: to require copyright assignment to UT for any code that is to go into the actual game. That said, I'm not sure how I would feel about such a situation, but GPLing the Linux UT code would actually benefit them: they get improvements, but other game companies cannot legally use the code without making arrangements with the UT poeple.
Bill - aka taniwha
--
Leave others their otherness. -- Aratak
Does this release support non Voodoo cards? I downloaded the whole demo (50 megs on a 38400 connection!) only to find out that it wouldn't support my TNT2. I was thinking of getting UT to support the release of Linux games but if Epic isn't going to support other cards I can't justify the expense just to have a Windows only game. If I'm missing something, somebody please let me know. I know that q3 said it only supported Voodoo but I got my TNT2 to work, if something like that is in order I'll pick my UT up as soon as possible.
Joe Waters of Aegistech, developers of one of the first commercial Linux titles (BFRIS), sent in the following situation report:
-- spathi.net: My Corner of the Universe
I agree totally with your comment on portable code. I used to feel the other way, but that was back in the days of learning to program (in the first place) in dos, which is a very bad influence; I have since seen the light, and now, whereever possible, my code is portable.
Where does that quip about Scottish come into it? My grandfather was Scottish (dead, RHS), so it's got me rather curious.
Sorry I got you steamed, it was not my intention.
Bill - aka taniwha
--
Leave others their otherness. -- Aratak
Yes, I should have made that distinction, I was thinking it. And you're right, most of the value in q3 is the engine, rather than the art. Not so much for the engine itself, but rather it's extensibility and the network code. I would say that in many cases, people with by q3, throw out the pre-packaged artwork and create their own (all those add-ons:).
Bill - aka taniwha
--
Leave others their otherness. -- Aratak
What possessed you to end a mature, if fact free post with a regression to 8th grade? if you're going to say something like that without backing it up, that's fine. Just don't add a useless insult, that only reflects badly on you and I'm sure does nothing to actually hurt the feelings of the person you're trying to insult. Posting this anonymously was probably a good idea, you never know if people you know are going to read this.
To everyone that thinks that companys don't look at registration cards, think again. Those cards cost money. The bulk rate postage costs money. Mailroom workers cost money. Why would they spend all this money if they were going to ignore the cards. Sure they use the data you give them for marketing and stuff, but do a couple of pieces of junk mail really matter that much? Just don't give them your phone number (If I ever get my hands on those bastards at Interplay...). Besides, i work in advertising and sometimes I have to deal with the results of these registration cards.
Even if they don't share the info with other companies (which I'm sure they don't) they will still realize that there is a Linux market out there and probably be more supportive in the future. Then other companies will notice that someone is making money off of the Linux market. Then they will start supporting it. It's a nice little circle.
Think about it
Pete
The sole purpose of the Internet is to get porn and bomb making plans into the hands of children.
Bill - aka taniwha
--
Leave others their otherness. -- Aratak