XreaL: The Most Advanced Open-Source Game Engine?

[Dragonlord]

But really, we need an engine and tools system for a way for the community to build it's own games.

It's worked on, since over three years, and it's _not_ XreaL ( as it's fully written from scratch for exactly this purpose ).

[Svartalf]

[*]There are few native commercial or commercial equivalent games for Linux.

It's not simple or easy to make "commercial equivalent" games- and the dearth of commercial games stems more from a perception that there's no market in it for the players in question. This perception stems from many differing things, including several bad decisions on the community's part (Q3:A...everyone couldn't wait 3 or so weeks and bought the Windows version and "patched" it...).

[*]Most of the open source games for linux *look* old. They might be good, fun games, but the archaic graphics give a bad first impression.

That's because many of them ARE old. They were open sourced a while back. Keep in mind something, though... Retro's something of a new movement in gaming and it's getting very popular- because the games of old were a hell of a lot more fun to play than many of the "cool" games that "look modern".

[*]Most of the quality games for Linux are also available for Windows and other platforms. Most platforms concentrate a great deal on "exclusive titles." When Loki went out of business, they said that porting was the worng strategy: Loki's Draeker: If I had to do it over, I'd create Linux native games

Heh... Loki did many things wrong- only ONE of them was not working at fostering native games for Linux that originated from the platform.

Having said this, LGP has at one time, attempted the same thing (Google for "Angry Pixels", which was to be the first studio fostered this way...) and it didn't get far. Mainly because it's not easy getting games going.

[*]Some Linux games manage to get a good community going, but there are many evolutionary dead ends in open source gaming. This is no different from the proprietary world, but the proprietary world has managed to compensate for it through various techniques for managing risk and maximizing profit on the successful titles.

If you ask me, they've not managed any better. It's just there's more people mining that space than in the FOSS world so it looks like they've managed it better. If you look at all the lurching horrors that get to the store shelves (Heh...including such stinkers as Daikatana...) they're not doing any better...they've just got more financial resources to keep people doing it in spite of it being atrocious.

[*]Most titles are very niche specific and often attempt to create an equivalent of an existing proprietary game on another platform

This is more because someone wants to play that proprietary game on Linux and can't because there's not a native version of the game in question- so they make reimplementations.

[*]A lot of games have less than AAA quality artwork, which often looks like an afterthought.

This is one of the actual problem areas out of the list of things you give. It's going to be a difficult one. How do you attract quality work of that nature for free? You'll have an uphill battle on that front, unfortunately, because Artists want to get paid at some point (Just like coders...) and they're all still mainly in the proprietary mindset in the world they operate from- they don't get the payment in kind thing like the devs do.

[dmj726]

Thank you for commenting, Svartalf, I am not attempting to place blame or say that the tremendous efforts made so far aren't valuable. I just made some observations about what might be holding Linux gaming back from its full potential. A large part of the limitation is "market share." There's a real chicken and the egg issue here, which is why Linux gaming will need to find some advantage to bootstrap itself.

It's not simple or easy to make "commercial equivalent" games- and the dearth of commercial games stems more from a perception that there's no market in it for the players in question. This perception stems from many differing things, including several bad decisions on the community's part (Q3:A...everyone couldn't wait 3 or so weeks and bought the Windows version and "patched" it...).

That's because many of them ARE old. They were open sourced a while back. Keep in mind something, though... Retro's something of a new movement in gaming and it's getting very popular- because the games of old were a hell of a lot more fun to play than many of the "cool" games that "look modern".

I completely agree; new games aren't necessarily better, and modern graphics do not a good game make. I still enjoy a good game of Starcraft, which has artwork that still holds up despite its 2D pixelated nature.

Heh... Loki did many things wrong- only ONE of them was not working at fostering native games for Linux that originated from the platform.

I wasn't even aware of Linux when Loki was still around, so I only know what I've dug up on the internet. It still seems that *just* porting can't be the solution for the same reason that WINE will never be the full solution.

Having said this, LGP has at one time, attempted the same thing (Google for "Angry Pixels", which was to be the first studio fostered this way...) and it didn't get far. Mainly because it's not easy getting games going.

Yes, It's not an easy task making a quality game from scratch. (By the way, the angry-pixels site no longer exists.) In fact, most games, even commercial ones die without getting far because it's such a monumental task to even get something that looks like a game at all.

If you ask me, they've not managed any better. It's just there's more people mining that space than in the FOSS world so it looks like they've managed it better. If you look at all the lurching horrors that get to the store shelves (Heh...including such stinkers as Daikatana...) they're not doing any better...they've just got more financial resources to keep people doing it in spite of it being atrocious.

By managed better, I meant had deeper pockets and combined into huge corporations that could afford to release a some duds. Indy developers and FOSS games don't have that option, so the problems appear in a more pronounced form. Marketing also gets people to pre-order it so they don't get a chance to know if it's good before sinking dozens of dollars.

This is more because someone wants to play that proprietary game on Linux and can't because there's not a native version of the game in question- so they make reimplementations.

Nothing wrong with reimplementations for this purpose. Linux itself began as a reimplementation. You might argue that a lot of commercial games are proprietary reimplementations of other commecial games...with new graphics and a single added gameplay element.

This is one of the actual problem areas out of the list of things you give. It's going to be a difficult one. How do you attract quality work of that nature for free? You'll have an uphill battle on that front, unfortunately, because Artists want to get paid at some point (Just like coders...) and they're all still mainly in the proprietary mindset in the world they operate from- they don't get the payment in kind thing like the devs do.

There is good artistry available for free. Look at all the mods available for commercial games like Warcraft III or particularly Black Mesa Source. There's even a free community-made art pack that makes Half-Life 2 look graphically impressive. However, the majority of artists do not necessarily get the open source mindset yet. Of course, you might be able to begin attracting enough artists if you can show an artistic equivalent of "plausible promise". That is, the tools need to be good enough for artists to just plug the art in, and it needs to seem like there's a good audience for the artist. It may never be practical to get all artwork for free, but many artists would be willing to "freelance" for set royalty-free amounts if payment was needed--not really much different from working at a big game studio really.
In practice, getting the artwork will be a huge challenge. That's why I suggested that the games share a good amount of their artwork to reduce the impact of the lack of artist involvement. That way the art can evolve over time like the Linux kernel.

[grantek]

(Q3:A...everyone couldn't wait 3 or so weeks and bought the Windows version and "patched" it...).

Wait, what? I'm sure I've dragged this argument out for later id games, but didn't Q3:A have a phone-home cd-key check? Automatic update management? Everything you need to identify who's playing it on Linux.

[Aradreth]

Wait, what? I'm sure I've dragged this argument out for later id games, but didn't Q3:A have a phone-home cd-key check? Automatic update management? Everything you need to identify who's playing it on Linux.

But Loki didn't get any money from people using the patched version contributing to their fall (which scared off a fair few publishers I'm sure) as they ended up with lots of "useless" stock as everyone had bought a windows version and weren't buying the Linux version, that's a lot of money (if they made 5000 copies that's ~ ?150000, admittedly some of that would have been profit) lost which a start up company just can't afford.

[LordHavoc]

Great post Svartalf, I agree on all points, there's simply more money in the proprietary Windows game market, more games (stinkers and gems alike) come out on Windows than on Linux, and it's entirely because of funding.

There are few traditional publishers who would be willing to "risk" an investment in a Linux only game, and so far there hasn't even been a compelling argument from the user community regarding the market-ability of such a game even if it was made.

So all we get is cross-platform games to avoid "risk", because it's easy to convince investers that there is a market for Windows games.

So without funding, most games simply choose another platform.

This funding issue is at the heart of the problem for all zero-cost games such as Nexuiz - it's hard to find any artist (or experienced game programmer) willing to work without pay on a game "for the community", it's like being voluntarily unemployed and voluntarily starving.

[Svartalf]

But Loki didn't get any money from people using the patched version contributing to their fall (which scared off a fair few publishers I'm sure) as they ended up with lots of "useless" stock as everyone had bought a windows version and weren't buying the Linux version, that's a lot of money (if they made 5000 copies that's ~ ?150000, admittedly some of that would have been profit) lost which a start up company just can't afford.

Got it in one...and they made quite a few more than 5k units from what I was led to believe when it all happened. There's a reason Loki ended up owing iD over 250k in royalties past what they'd gotten with the sweetheart deal they'd cut Loki on Q3:A.

Just because the titles phone home doesn't mean diddly if the publisher making the Linux version takes a bath on it. They most definitely do NOT pull any version reporting home as Linux out of the Windows proceeds pile and place it in a Linux one. When you bought Q3:A from Activision instead of Loki, you paid THEM and they don't do Linux versions period.

Just as there was a reason Loki got pasted the way they did, there's reasons why I keep telling people when you buy a Windows version of something, you're sending a message- one that I doubt many of the people in this forum would like to send.

[LordHavoc]

Just as there was a reason Loki got pasted the way they did, there's reasons why I keep telling people when you buy a Windows version of something, you're sending a message- one that I doubt many of the people in this forum would like to send.

The way I see it, multi-platform versions will always cannibalize single-platform versions, but seem easier to sell to the dual-boot crowd.

I think fundamentally the dual-boot crowd are the problem in the equation.

[Duo Maxwell]

The way I see it, multi-platform versions will always cannibalize single-platform versions, but seem easier to sell to the dual-boot crowd.

I think fundamentally the dual-boot crowd are the problem in the equation.

Dual boot crowd my ass, I know plenty of gamers that run linux as their only OS, that have pirated every linux game.

I'm usually one to side with the pirates but if the goal is to send a message to dev houses to make more linux titles then they aren't helping and only pirating for themselves.

I always try to tell them if you must game pirate just grab your windows and your windows only games that aren't going to be ported.

I used to be a Mac guy, same issue there, the ones that whined the most for more Mac games where the ones that had pirated the entire library of Mac titles. Now what do they get? non native hacks of the games using cider. They have nobody to blame but themselves as I'm all for pirating a copy of Maya or Adobe Studio for classes as even with edu discount it can still be ridiculously expensive, but don't pirate games if your chosen OS isn't windows as you're just removing any incentive from the game publishers to ever make native tittles.



As for the dificulty of making other types of games...

Have any of the potential game devs out there ever owned a console? Have they ever played 2d fighters or side scrolling beat em ups like double dragon? Thse kinds of games wth good quality graphics and a decent control scheme with capability of using a controller could prove quite interesting.

IMHO the 2D fighter is a completely untapped market these days, the last game I heard about from this genera was last year's Arcana Heart, yes, the perv game lol: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=XPVRt9Bg594 http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=XPVRt9Bg594

I think that theres a decent amount of space in the gaming market for some well done 2d games in hd quality. The best thing? since it's 2D you can pay your cousin that can draw good in beer to make some charters for you. Seriously, in a community as large as say the ubuntu forums, it probably wouldn't be hard to find people to make a few chars and draw in a few dozen animation poses for them so that they could look to be moving right.

What about 3d platformers? Wheres the open source equivalent of crash bandicoot/banjo kazooie/spyro the dragon/croc/mario/whatever

We can't have Tux and GNU team up in some epic adventure?

Can't find enough people? Try hitting the Mac users up for help, still not enough? hit every windows gaming forum. Need cash? Then see if you can get the game if small enough ported to the wii or if any size ported to the ps3, last I checked both had online game shops just like the Xbox360 has and they do have some interesting and sucessful titles.

At least as far as 2d goes theres one decent sidescoller in the same vein as the old 2d duke nukems in Metal Blob Solid, too bad the 3d versions don't seem to have that same kind of appeal.

[Aradreth]

I'm usually one to side with the pirates but if the goal is to send a message to dev houses to make more linux titles then they aren't helping and only pirating for themselves.

There is never any reason to side with the pirates. Never. If it has draconian DRM on it boycott the title entirely don't pirate it or your just proving their point. Also there was no reason to pirate Linux games, the majority use to be DRM free and if you can't afford well tough shit, save up and buy it like you would with a piece of computer hardware or a PMP. If you have to pull excuses out of your arse to justify it then don't do it.