Slashdot Mirror
Q3A for Linux Hitting Stores Today
Matt writes "Saw over at Ars Technica that Loki Games has announced that Quake 3 Arena for Linux is hitting stores like EB and Fry's today! I will certainly have to run by EB after work to see if this is true. Man, screw the egg-nog action - I'm gonna need some fraggin' if I'm going to survive a day with the in-laws."
I mean, seriously, what is the percentage of the gaming community that runs Linux? It's going to be very interesting to see how many copies they sell for Linux vs. for Windows (and, I suppose, for the Mac). It will be a big indicator of things to come. If this sells well, expect to see more Linux games. If it doesn't... Well, we'll see.
I'm happy to see that Linux software, in general, is definitely getting more shelf space in retail stores.
This afternoon I took a stroll into the local "Software Etc" franchise store in midtown Manhattan. They had an entire shelf space stuffed with Red Hat 6.1 Deluxe boxes (plus a handful of Mandrakes and SuSE boxes).
Last time I was there was about a month ago. They did have a handful if Red Hat boxes tucked away, but that's about it. Now, they have an entire shelf up front near the entrance, which is not too shabby. Keep in mind that this is midtown Manhattan, where retail estate is pretty expensive, and stores tend to be really tiny (this Software Etc store was about as large as a medium-sized living room). Shelf space is at a premium.
--
EB Online has it here. Interestingly enough, they put the Linux version under Buissness Software!
Anonymous Hay goes in and I come out...
The Real Thing for The Rest of Us will be In Stores now! That's the big deal. Now if nVIDIA will just release those silly TNT2 drivers....
:-).
:-)
It doesn't have to do with nVidia, does it? my TNT2 works under Linux, it just doesn't work *well*. I thought this was an issue of just waiting until XFree86 4.0 comes out so the drivers can use DRI.
Although, I can't WAIT until that happens, 1 less reason to boot into NT
Top 10 reasons to boot into NT:
10) To hear that little "click" IE5 makes whenever you click on a link.
9) So I can use buttons 4 & 5 on my Intellimouse Explorer and have a truly "1-hand" porn browsing experience.
8) So I get my money's worth on my stupid expensive ssh-client rather than using the free one under Linux.
7) Streaming porn doesn't work so well under Linux.
6) When I'm getting too much work done and need my OS to hold me back a little bit.
5) To play with 3d studio, play Quake, or watch a DVD.
4) All my porn bookmarks are stored in NT's copy of Netscape and I can't figure out how to export them (where's my bookmarks.html???)
3) Streaming porn still doesn't have sound in Linux.
2) Watch South Park/Simpsons in Real Video with TV-Out.
1) I love streaming porn, don't take away my DSL line, please!!!
hehehehe... that was way too much fun
"Software is like sex- the best is for free"
-Linus Torvalds
It is truly a Good Thing(tm), partially because it's solved a domestic problem for me and my SO. I have the more powerful computer and every time my SO wanted to play Quake he'd have to reboot the machine. But I don't like that 'cause I have my X all set up and what not. Now, he just walks up to my machines, su's to himself and voila. There is peace once again. :) :) :) I'd love to see the code involving the female models though: if (object == boobs) laws_of_physics = non_applicable; How does the Lucy model _run_ with those??? :) Dana
Forgive the rant, but the Linux retail release coming out now is kind of pointless. If idsoftware really wanted to get an accurate measure of how well linux games will sell in the marketplace they should have released simultaneously across both the win32 and linux platforms.
Why, you ask? Simple. Pretty much every diehard Quake fan has already purchased the win32 release and downloaded the linux client and server binaries. Why wait for a later linux retail box when the client and server are available for free download on the web?
I know I would have bought the linux retail game if it was on the shelves when the windows version was released, but that wasn't the case. I expect to see disappointing q3a linux sales along with a questionable market value for future releases... Thumbs down idsoftware.
I was one of those who couldn't wait -- sorry to all diehard Linux fans -- and bought the Win32 version. Getting the demo to run in Win95 was a 5 month feat (mostly because it didn't work when I first tried it, and 5 months later I finally tried again..), in the meanwhile I fragged in Linux, and fragged often.
/.'s user's comments (and maybe some comments from those at Loki / Activision / id).
Now that the full version is out, I have a bigtime question. Is distributing the binaries for either platform considered Warez, even if no crack, CD Key, or PAK file is included? I can only assume that pak0.pk3 is Unchanged from the Wintel / Macintosh / Linux versions, so if I have that and my own valid CD key, am I legally entitled to download the binaries for another platform (in this case, Linux); or would it be considered illegal?
This is fuzzy ground, and I'd really like to hear some
(Please note that for now, I have no plans for pirating Q3 on any platform)
They had 3 in stock when I got mine. In the front of the store too where the latest greatest games go. Too bad I can't get it to run.
.q3a direcotry and it won't wirte a new file. Writes a new .q3a, but leaves it empty. And the it won't run from the CD even though I mounted the CD with th e-o exec option(says it can't find a binary)
It won't write a default config file for me. Have mine from the demo and it won't read it. Even deleted my
Hope someone here can tell me why, doesn't seem to be an answer on any of the forums(loki, linuxgames.com, etc.)
Wish my first experience with a retail linux game was better. But I'm sure it will work eventually.
I was rather dissapointed to discover that when I picked up my tin box edition at EB today, it didn't come with SuSE 6.3 included inside, as this article on slashdot originally mentioned.
I guess it isn't all that big of a deal for me (am downloading it right now though the cable modem) but it would have been a much better deal if the CD's for SuSE 6.3 were included. Afterall, the Windows version only cost $39.99, while my Linux edition was another $10 on top of that.
I mean come on now, re-distribution of Linux is free, even if they weren't going to include SuSE (which is admittedly quite a few CD's) they could have released the Redhat 6.1 iso or something like that.
At least that way, any kid whose parents messed up and bought them the wrong version for Xmas would at least have a chance of playing their new game on Christmas morning, and learning something new along the way...
--Steve Castellotti
"You are aware that this is the Linux ver--"
"--of course! I wouldn't buy it if it wasn't!"
(c:
Your Brain + EEG + LEGO Robots = Brainstorms
11/17/99
.plans for a couple years now. For those of you who haven't I would recommend them.
Linux version tomorrow night, if nothing horrible happens.
Some advance warning about something that is sure to stir
up some argument:
We should be handing off the masters for all three platforms
within a day or two of each other, but they aren't going to
show up in stores at the same time. Publishers, distributers,
and stores are willing to go out of their way to expedite the
arrival of the pc version, but they just won't go to the
same amount of trouble for mac and linux boxes.
THE EXECUTABLES FOR ALL PLATFORMS WILL NOT BE AVAILABLE FOR
DOWNLOAD UNTIL AFTER CHRISTMAS. This means that if you want
to play on the mac or linux, don't pick up a copy of the pc
version and expect to download the other executables.
Our first update to the game will be for all platforms, and
will allow any version to be converted into any other, but
we intend to hold that off for a little while.
We are doing this at the request of the distributors. The
fear is that everyone will just grab a windows version,
and the separate boxes will be ignored.
A lot of companies are going to be watching the sales
figures for the mac and linux versions of Q3 to see if
the platforms are actually worth supporting. If everyone
bought a windows version and the other boxes sold like crap
in comparison, that would be plenty of evidence for most
executives to can any cross platform development.
I know there are a lot of people that play in both windows
and linux, and this may be a bit of an inconvenience in
the short term, but this is an ideal time to cast a vote
as a consumer.
Its all the same to Id (I like hybrid CD's), and our continued
support of linux and mac (OS X for the next title) is basically
a foregone conclusion, but the results will probably influence
other companies.
11/18/99
--------
Linux version isn't going to make it tonight. We got
too busy with other things. Sorry. Tomorrow.
* shrink zone, grow hunk
* flush memory on an error
* fixed crash pasting from clipboard
* test all compiler optimizations -- 5% speedup
* fixed major slowdown in team games with large
numbers of players and location markers
I didn't see him specify when the linux version was actually sent to the presses. I apologize for the quoting all of this, but I felt like it was necessary for everyone to read what the man actually said instead of all the hearsay and speculation. I've been reading Carmack's
www.bluesnews.com