Volca on 18/9/2008 at 10:37
Quote Posted by Yakoob
Took advantage of it being open source? How exactly do you take advantage of it being open source? By recognizing that cheaters in online games can hack their own kernel for an advantage and there isn't damn thing you can do about it? Introduce your own kernel changes with your game which will majorly piss every single user off? Or rely on any GPL systems of linux which will, in turn, make their game GPL and require them to release their source code which, for any commercial product, is suicide.
Now let me react to this. I would not want anyone to think of me as a biased person to one or the other side, I personally think commercial games could take off on linux if the devs weren't so loaded with content work, focused on the results rather than the path. Win32 games are estabilished, and that's it, nothing more.
So, I think your reaction is a dangerous simplification. Yes, GPL is viral, that is the reason there are other licenses in the world of GNU/Linux - LGPL used for glib and other basic libraries for example. This means there is no reason to fear linux, it's not something that will lead you to court releasing for. This is what I think some clueless suits are afraid of (someone told them so).
Coding a MMORPG or other kind of multiplayer, pay as you play games requires a stable, unhackable server code with a cheat detection systems. Thinking it would help someone to hack kernel seems weird to me, after all anyone would start by hacking the game itself, and realising the server is not as stupid as they hoped. I'd not be surprised if some big MMORPG project had their servers running on some kind of *nix system.
Sure, there would be a wide amount of problems PORTING some games to *nix systems, as coders widely rely on DirectX, win32 api, etc. , but if you look at Quake3 source code for example, that thing can be compiled on linux with make, make install combo right away, because Carmack isn't stupid and cares about portability of the code.
I don't think portability makes writing the games anywhere harder. After all modern games are ported to PS3, XBOX, sometimes Wii, so not porting to Linux is all about economical aspects of doing so (small target group). The hard part is of course testing the stability of the result.
As an offtopic example, let me just comment on the stupid expectations the developers of Macromedia Flash had. They are promissing to release 64bit version of the flash player for about four years now. If the code was written with some more forehandedness the code would compile using some default rendering paths on 64bit right away, and all the work then would be about optimization.
raevol on 18/9/2008 at 11:30
Quote Posted by dethtoll
Linux is fine for running a server or a database or whathaveyou, but it continues to be a user-unfriendly OS that largely relies on the user being able to do things himself. I like Windows (XP) precisely because I don't have to do fuckall.
I'm curious if you've used Ubuntu. It does have issues, but I'd be interested in how long it takes you to get shit working on it compared to WinXP.
mothra on 18/9/2008 at 13:41
I'm a ubuntu user as well and find the 8.04 desktop very intuitive.
my mother could use it !!!! test passed.
Phatose on 18/9/2008 at 17:31
Porting to Linux isn't even close to equivalent to porting to a console, for the same reason porting to the PC isn't - varied hardware requirements. And it's lacking in APIs as well, unless linux has a direct X equivalent that no one talks about. OpenGL for gaming seems essentially dead.
All that trouble, and it doesn't even have the user base of Windows. Why would they bother?
Volca on 18/9/2008 at 17:35
There is PSGL (kind of OpenGL ES) in PS3, Wii uses a system close to the OpenGL as well, DirectX is only on X360 and Windows. Your statement about dead OpenGL is far from truth, I believe.
june gloom on 18/9/2008 at 18:30
Quote Posted by raevol
I'm curious if you've used Ubuntu. It does have issues, but I'd be interested in how long it takes you to get shit working on it compared to WinXP.
I'd give it a try if I cared enough.
Yakoob on 19/9/2008 at 03:31
Quote Posted by Glimpse
This was the sweeping statement to which I was responding, and the examples I gave were simply to show that open source is much more than a buzz word and can be used in many ways to make money.
Yes, and I replied that the ways to make money are far and few between, and often laughable compared to proprietary software.
Quote:
So, I think your reaction is a dangerous simplification. Yes, GPL is viral, that is the reason there are other licenses in the world of GNU/Linux - LGPL used for glib and other basic libraries for example. This means there is no reason to fear linux, it's not something that will lead you to court releasing for. This is what I think some clueless suits are afraid of (someone told them so).
OK, that addresses one point of three I had why linux being open source means jack shit for game devs.
Quote:
Coding a MMORPG or other kind of multiplayer, pay as you play games requires a stable, unhackable server code with a cheat detection systems.
Once again, to repeat myself, there is a big difference between "running servers on linux" and "deploying client applications on linux."
Quote:
Thinking it would help someone to hack kernel seems weird to me, after all anyone would start by hacking the game itself, and realising the server is not as stupid as they hoped.
Then you clearly don't know enough about how computers work. A simple example is to hack my kernel to translate all direct x calls to draw wireframe, thus giving me instant wallhack. On windows it wont work since the game can just check the integrity of your kernel which is always consistent. On linux, there are so many distros that doing such check would mean stopping 90% of legitimate users from playing your game cause they chose a different kernel.
(note: my example is flawed because direct x is a separate DLL and not tied to kernel, but it illustrates my point)
Quote:
Sure, there would be a wide amount of problems PORTING some games to *nix systems, as coders widely rely on DirectX, win32 api, etc. , but if you look at Quake3 source code for example, that thing can be compiled on linux with make, make install combo right away, because Carmack isn't stupid and cares about portability of the code.
Also Carmack is one of the richest and most famous studios out there and can do damn well what he pleases. Most game devs do not have the time and resources to support yet another highly dynamic platform, especially one with a tiny market share that will most likely not return the money put into its development. We're lucky when we even get a windows port nowadays.
(also, Carmack's games run on linux because they use OpenGL. I don't want to start a DX vs OGL debate, but if you're writing in DX you CANNOT easily port to linux without rewriting your whole rendering (and in part, content) pipeline).
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I don't think portability makes writing the games anywhere harder.
No, of course not, it's not like it doesn't mean twice the requirements to get the same code running, twice the amount of bugs which appear on only one platform but not another, twice the code (in some areas) that can be functionally vastly different and inability to use platform-specific concepts that can vastly decrease performance. Why do you think many games today get skipped on PC ports? because, contrary to your ignorant opinion, games ARE harder to code on different platforms that have their own specifications and can require big rewrites just to get a fucking box drawn to the screen.
If you want a very simple illustration of this, try making a complex, layout-heavy website with CSS and try to get it to look exactly the same on IE and Firefox. Good luck.
Quote:
Porting to Linux isn't even close to equivalent to porting to a console, for the same reason porting to the PC isn't - varied hardware requirements. And it's lacking in APIs as well, unless linux has a direct X equivalent that no one talks about.
this.
raevol on 19/9/2008 at 05:54
This development debate is going places I didn't expect it to, but I'd like to bring up S2games. I may have kind of badmouthed their game in my original post, however, even as a tiny indie company they have managed to make linux ports of their games. With Savage 2 the port was done by (I believe) only one or two people.
Seems to me that where there's a will there's a way. Seems to me that "traditional" game developers just hire run-of-the-mill programmers who can poop out a half-assed unoptimized directx engine, and then spend the rest of their time expecting gamers to shell out for the hardware. Maybe that's just the way it seems though.
Silkworm on 21/9/2008 at 00:14
Quote Posted by Yakoob
require them to release their source code which, for any commercial product, is suicide.
Why?
Yakoob on 21/9/2008 at 03:39
Quote Posted by Silkworm
Why?
Why it requires them to release source code or why it's suicide? If first, then it's because that's how GPL works (yes, I know other GPL-derived licenses work differently). If it's the latter, it's because:
1) Anyone can take the source code, compile it and sell it at half the price.
Granted, they do not have to release assets (art, levels, music) without which the game simply wouldn't run, but it's still a big killer for business apps and the points below hold true for games.
2) Anyone can just freely use their complex code to make "next gen" games by cutting the development by 2-3 years with no benefit to original creators. ID and Epic guys would've been long gone if it wasn't for the ability to sell their tech.
3) It makes removing any sort of copy protection/anti piracy method a child's play (yes, even more so than it currently is)
4) For MP games, it opens up a whole new door for unstoppable hacks.
