NS2 and Linux
QuelTos
Join Date: 2003-05-14 Member: 16313Members, Constellation
Join Date: 2003-05-14 Member: 16313Members, Constellation
I would REALLY appreciate if there would be at least some serious plan for a Linux Client of NS2.
Linux-Community is and will be growing and there are not much good games for it. So i think if you develop with cross-platform-capability in mind from the beginning, this could really become an advantage without any risk. And yeah, don't forget Mac- and *BSD-users. If NS2 would run on Linux, it would be no big thing to get it running on BSD- and MAC-boxes as well.
So.. are there any plans yet?
(pls no Anti-Linux/-Windows/-anything flame - thx)
Linux-Community is and will be growing and there are not much good games for it. So i think if you develop with cross-platform-capability in mind from the beginning, this could really become an advantage without any risk. And yeah, don't forget Mac- and *BSD-users. If NS2 would run on Linux, it would be no big thing to get it running on BSD- and MAC-boxes as well.
So.. are there any plans yet?
(pls no Anti-Linux/-Windows/-anything flame - thx)
Comments
<img src="style_emoticons/<#EMO_DIR#>/wow.gif" style="vertical-align:middle" emoid=":0" border="0" alt="wow.gif" />
Unfortunately, as my understanding goes, Valve are quite aligned with Microsoft, Gabe Newell being a former employee even. First, Steam would need to be ported. Then the Source engine (which relies heavily on DirectX, a microsoft api) would have to be ported (to OpenGL instead of the DirectX). This, again, would be done by Valve. <i>Then</i> NS2 would also be made cross platform, as I assume that NS2 shall use the source engine. Now if NS2 were on the Doom3 engine on the other hand... (err wait... I think Doom3 had a linux version didn't it? ID was traditionally good for this were they not? Or am I rambling on about something else?)
I just started dabbling with Linux at home myself, and I think it would be fantastic if all this work was done, but I'm not holding my breath.
The main thing would be the engine. Yes, afaik the source engine sticks to directX, making it practically impossible to port. But it is not said that NS2 would use a source or even directX engine, is it?
And that is the main thing I am asking for: using an OpenGL engine (as all Quake engines do - and yes, Doom3 has, as all Quake engine games from id (and ET:Quake Wars will have), a native Linux client).
As I said, starting development with cross-platformness in mind will not have big drawbacks but will leave the option for adding another port for other systems later on and thereby for reaching more players. No, I don't see WINE as a very good option. I know it works pretty well in many cases, but for serious gaming I still stick to windows/native games because WINE-things just cause too many problems. WINE is not and will never be a replacement for native software.
Times are changing and nobody can say how many gamers there will be on linux in 3 years or something. Just think about the changes in the past 3 years. E.g. hardware-rendering in official ATI-drivers started to work properly about 1,5-2 years ago. Now they are really trying to catch up and to get closer to the quality of nvidia-linux-drivers (i.e. about 1 driver version is released per month). And I think this is because they are realising that they could lose a notable userbase to nvidia only because of the raising linux usage.
I run a variety of OSs (mainly Windows/Linux/Solaris), but mainly Windows for day to day use. The article makes some good points, in my opinion.
Linux-Userbase is growing and so is the Linux-Gamer-Base.
Apart from that, he only talks about Cross-Something and Cadega. That article isn't about gaming under Linux but getting some windows-things pain-in-the-######-running under Linux using third-party software (you have to pay for).
But yeah, today, if you are a gamer, you have to install win for most of the games. I have a win on my pc as well for gaming, but I'm hoping one day, I can live without it - and buy a ready-to-use-computer/laptop without any no-choice-system included.
About Source again.. who said that NS2 will use Source-Engine and where?
@TychoCelchuuu
But how many people are running windows only because they have to to play the games they want? At least from the people I know, quite a lot (but I have to admit - I study computer science and that's not so uncommon there <img src="style_emoticons/<#EMO_DIR#>/smile-fix.gif" style="vertical-align:middle" emoid=":)" border="0" alt="smile-fix.gif" />)
And I am really not sure about effort and investment. I don't think using OpenGL instead of DirectX would be a major drawback (as there are other commercial state of the art OpenGL engines). I think _leaving_the_option_ would not cost much and, in case times don't stop changing, could be usefull in some years, when NS2 releases.
The Linux market is people who have top of the line hardware that can run games, like games enough that they know about Natural Selection 2, want to purchase and play Natural Selection 2, don't want to dual boot, don't have more than one computer, and don't run Windows. That's like 4 people man. The effort it would take to port NS2 to Linux is way out of line compared to the return on the investment. There just aren't that many gamers that run exclusively an OS that barely plays games.
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The reason that there aren't too many people is because a lot of games run poorly on Linux, so how would they be able to do without Windows? At my university the amount of *nix workstations is by far more than windows and even people that hasn't touched *nix before aren't having any problems with them. If anything they prefer it as Matlab/Maple/FEMsims run a lot more smoothly there without the random crashes/slowdowns windows has when you start to chew large amount of memory. Linux will only grow, sooner or later you will have to write games for more than one OS if you want to target a wider base, there are plenty of academic people that only runs *nix because they simply don't have enough interest in games to install a secondary OS.
It should be noted that many parts of Steam have already been ported to Linux for use on servers, but none of the client-related stuff.
Considering the incredibly tiny linux gaming market compared to Windows gaming market (Is it any surprised that most linux development studios go bankrupt? Id Software's ports of their games usually have just a single employee doing the port and maintaining it, and they're already OpenGL to start with), and the huge amount of work it'd take Valve to port an engine as complex as Source to Linux, I think the chances of a Linux port of NS2 (assuming it uses Source) to be slim to none.
Seriously, though, it really isn't worth the development effort, no matter who does the port. Steam and Source apparently run rather well under WINE/Cedega, a better bet would be using those to play NS2 under Linux. It makes a lot more sense to invest time improving WINE than porting an entire engine.