5 ms·

The thing about Carmack and Linux is, that everything he says is based mostly on the QuakeLive port id did a while back (edit: he says this here http://youtu.be

by adamors 14y ago

The thing about Carmack and Linux is, that everything he says is based mostly on the QuakeLive port id did a while back (edit: he says this here http://youtu.be/wt-iVFxgFWk?t=45m26s http://youtu.be/wt-iVFxgFWk?t=45m26s). The port was released as an afterthought and quite a while after the Windows version), it wasn't publicized anywhere so naturally, people ignored it. From this experience he concluded that Linux isn't financially viable and/or there are no people interested in gaming on the platform. Now I'm not saying that Linux is financially viable, I don't know that. I just think that - a lot of people do pay for games on Linux (look at Humble Indie Bundles, look at the indie titles or the recent titles on Steam) - I know people who pay for games but are stuck on Windows because they play games. My guess is that these people would ditch Windows in a heartbeat if their games were playable under Linux.

mtgx 14y ago
Are you referring to this quakelive.com? He said it's a failure as a free 2 play game online. What does that have to do with Linux? I don't think it even works on Linux, actually.
- danielweber 14y ago
  Quakelive worked under both Windows and Linux last time I checked.
- adamors 14y ago
  There is an offical, native Linux client that no one knows about. It was released in 2009. And because no one actually bothered with it, he concluded that the WHOLE platform is disinterested. http://youtu.be/wt-iVFxgFWk?t=45m26s http://youtu.be/wt-iVFxgFWk?t=45m26s
  - cma 14y ago
    That isn't all he based it on. id games used to be available on Linux, with ports produced by Loki or with unofficial binaries by staff. They never brought in enough money.
    - adamors 14y ago
      He says "We have made two forays into the Linux commercial market, most recently with the QuakeLive client and that platform just hasn't carried it's weight." Watch the video I linked to.
      - cma 14y ago
        That the latest foray didn't carry its weight doesn't imply the earlier foray carried its weight.
    - pekk 14y ago
      And if Loki hadn't died around 2002, there would be many excellent Linux games to sell on Steam today, which is a much better platform for promoting, updating and DRMing the games. Bad timing.
- jiggy2011 14y ago
  I can't remember the exact quote but he said something a long the lines of "we tried porting quake live to linux and nobody played it". Which I'm sure is true, but the way he said it seemed to imply that this was adequate evidence that supporting Linux was probably a waste of time.
Pent 14y ago
Well to be fair, some data is better than no data, regarding how financially viable linux is for gaming.
- adamors 14y ago
  Oh but there is data. Linux users on Humble Indie Bundles constantly pay more per head than OS X or Windows users. http://support.humblebundle.com/customer/portal/articles/281031-prior-bundle-statistics http://support.humblebundle.com/customer/portal/articles/281... My point is that Linux users are willing to pay for games, if they know about them.
  - rednukleus 14y ago
    To play devil's advocate - Linux users may pay more for the Indie Bundles, but there are only a few tens of thousand Linux users paying anything at all. The proportion of Linux users who buy the Humble Bundle is probably much much higher than the proportion who would buy a AAA game (for a number of obvious reasons). Games like CoD need to sell at least hundreds of thousands of copies for it to be worth the support costs.
    - pekk 14y ago
      I don't think it would hurt the game industry to do more projects which cost less than $50 million to produce, and sell for less than $60. Deer Hunter and Barbie type games (accounting for a huge proportion of US sales) sell for more like $20. And iOS games sell for more like $1-$5. But for some reason the latter causes people to ask where they can find the opportunities more than to sit around complaining about how iOS users are cheap and their data doesn't count because they aren't paying $60.
jiggy2011 14y ago
The dualboot issue is important here. Since most people who go out of their way to install linux on a computer are probably savvy enough to setup a dualboot it removes a lot of the economic incentive to port games to Linux. This is because they know that most serious Linux using gamers will probably dual boot anyway so a Linux port of a game is a "nice to have" but won't stop somebody buying a game.

by adamors 14y ago

mtgx 14y ago

Are you referring to this quakelive.com? He said it's a failure as a free 2 play game online. What does that have to do with Linux? I don't think it even works on Linux, actually.

danielweber 14y ago
Quakelive worked under both Windows and Linux last time I checked.
adamors 14y ago
There is an offical, native Linux client that no one knows about. It was released in 2009. And because no one actually bothered with it, he concluded that the WHOLE platform is disinterested. http://youtu.be/wt-iVFxgFWk?t=45m26s http://youtu.be/wt-iVFxgFWk?t=45m26s
- cma 14y ago
  That isn't all he based it on. id games used to be available on Linux, with ports produced by Loki or with unofficial binaries by staff. They never brought in enough money.
  - adamors 14y ago
    He says "We have made two forays into the Linux commercial market, most recently with the QuakeLive client and that platform just hasn't carried it's weight." Watch the video I linked to.
    - cma 14y ago
      That the latest foray didn't carry its weight doesn't imply the earlier foray carried its weight.
  - pekk 14y ago
    And if Loki hadn't died around 2002, there would be many excellent Linux games to sell on Steam today, which is a much better platform for promoting, updating and DRMing the games. Bad timing.
jiggy2011 14y ago
I can't remember the exact quote but he said something a long the lines of "we tried porting quake live to linux and nobody played it". Which I'm sure is true, but the way he said it seemed to imply that this was adequate evidence that supporting Linux was probably a waste of time.

Pent 14y ago

Well to be fair, some data is better than no data, regarding how financially viable linux is for gaming.

adamors 14y ago
Oh but there is data. Linux users on Humble Indie Bundles constantly pay more per head than OS X or Windows users. http://support.humblebundle.com/customer/portal/articles/281031-prior-bundle-statistics http://support.humblebundle.com/customer/portal/articles/281... My point is that Linux users are willing to pay for games, if they know about them.
- rednukleus 14y ago
  To play devil's advocate - Linux users may pay more for the Indie Bundles, but there are only a few tens of thousand Linux users paying anything at all. The proportion of Linux users who buy the Humble Bundle is probably much much higher than the proportion who would buy a AAA game (for a number of obvious reasons). Games like CoD need to sell at least hundreds of thousands of copies for it to be worth the support costs.
  - pekk 14y ago
    I don't think it would hurt the game industry to do more projects which cost less than $50 million to produce, and sell for less than $60. Deer Hunter and Barbie type games (accounting for a huge proportion of US sales) sell for more like $20. And iOS games sell for more like $1-$5. But for some reason the latter causes people to ask where they can find the opportunities more than to sit around complaining about how iOS users are cheap and their data doesn't count because they aren't paying $60.

jiggy2011 14y ago

The dualboot issue is important here. Since most people who go out of their way to install linux on a computer are probably savvy enough to setup a dualboot it removes a lot of the economic incentive to port games to Linux. This is because they know that most serious Linux using gamers will probably dual boot anyway so a Linux port of a game is a "nice to have" but won't stop somebody buying a game.