Ballistics has gone Gold- demo now available...

[niniendowarrior]

I tried the demo it and it still looks like it did 7 years ago on my AMD K6-300 / Voodoo card running 98se.

You want to bring a game that is in dire need of a linux port... Look at NWN2. The original NWN is still probably one of the most popular native linux games.

While I understand the thought process of this, whining about it now, or in the future isn't going to do anything. You could try to haggle Atari and who knows? Of course, if it has anything to do with Obsidian I might as well pass... that's of course, a different discussion altogether.

In any case, your post is counter-productive. LGP is trying to get products into Linux. They may not be my cup of tea, but we should all be at least appreciative of what they do.

[niniendowarrior]

We're going to be able to make you happier about things fairly quickly. (Yes, we've got some "newer" games in development right now- VERY "newer"... )

Hehe... Svartalf doing all the teasing here... I hope it does not disappoint!

[niniendowarrior]

I'd have to drop one in one of my machines to find out. I think it will, but you're going to need more CPU muscle to make it play nicer. It runs cleanly and smoothly enough with a GeForce3 class or better GPU. I know that much.

I've had some of the recent LGP demos not work at all with my Geforce 2 in the past... but Cold War just kept freezing my Radeon Linux box. So, I'm just going to keep using this nice old nVidia hardware. Please do tell me if it works.

Keep the great stuff coming in! Linux needs something.

[smp-freak]

Why would anyone find it useful to belittle any work being done on bringing native games to the Linux desktop? There are only two reasons I could see why... either you have something much better to offer other than an opinion (which it doesn't sound like it), or you're too blind to see that Linux gaming benefits from projects like this (even if it isn't your favorite game of the month).

I agree that it would be cool to have something similar to NWN2 run native on Linux, and I'm sure their are other games that are just as new and with just as many people (or more) playing them that would benefit from a Linux port -- for instance Jade Empire, Galactic Civilizations 2, or a native version of WoW. But that is a large step that obviously can't happen overnight. Companies like Linux Game Publishing can't just announce their intention to port a specific game to Linux... porting a game to Linux would have to be worked out with the company who released the game on Windows in the first place. I don't know the details of this process, but I'm sure that it could get complicated very easily and change with every company or game.

The best solution would be for companies like Blizzard, Bioware, Atari, NCSoft, etc. to see that there are many Linux gamers who will buy games for their chosen OS, and then these companies would factor a Linux version into the cost upfront (and possibly limit the total cost of development). While we wait for that to happen for all major developers (not just iD, Epic, etc.), Linux Game Publishing and other similar developers help to increase the size of the Linux gaming population with ports of the best games they can find at this time. This makes it more likely that your next must-buy title will have a Linux port.

If you are even remotely interested in Linux gaming then there is no way this could be seen as anything but positive. If you are frustrated at the slow pace at which the newest and most advanced games are making it to Linux, then direct your griping to the companies who are releasing those Windows-only games... not towards one of the few companies that are trying to do something about it.

Well Said man! I could not have said it better myself.

My stance is I will not buy a game unless there is a Linux Port to it

[joshuapurcell]

I tried the demo it and it still looks like it did 7 years ago on my AMD K6-300 / Voodoo card running 98se.

You want to bring a game that is in dire need of a linux port... Look at NWN2. The original NWN is still probably one of the most popular native linux games.

Why would anyone find it useful to belittle any work being done on bringing native games to the Linux desktop? There are only two reasons I could see why... either you have something much better to offer other than an opinion (which it doesn't sound like it), or you're too blind to see that Linux gaming benefits from projects like this (even if it isn't your favorite game of the month).

I agree that it would be cool to have something similar to NWN2 run native on Linux, and I'm sure their are other games that are just as new and with just as many people (or more) playing them that would benefit from a Linux port -- for instance Jade Empire, Galactic Civilizations 2, or a native version of WoW. But that is a large step that obviously can't happen overnight. Companies like Linux Game Publishing can't just announce their intention to port a specific game to Linux... porting a game to Linux would have to be worked out with the company who released the game on Windows in the first place. I don't know the details of this process, but I'm sure that it could get complicated very easily and change with every company or game.

The best solution would be for companies like Blizzard, Bioware, Atari, NCSoft, etc. to see that there are many Linux gamers who will buy games for their chosen OS, and then these companies would factor a Linux version into the cost upfront (and possibly limit the total cost of development). While we wait for that to happen for all major developers (not just iD, Epic, etc.), Linux Game Publishing and other similar developers help to increase the size of the Linux gaming population with ports of the best games they can find at this time. This makes it more likely that your next must-buy title will have a Linux port.

If you are even remotely interested in Linux gaming then there is no way this could be seen as anything but positive. If you are frustrated at the slow pace at which the newest and most advanced games are making it to Linux, then direct your griping to the companies who are releasing those Windows-only games... not towards one of the few companies that are trying to do something about it.

[joshuapurcell]

Heh... It's the driver. Doesn't make it less of an issue, but the driver doesn't always play nice with 32-bit apps in 64-bit mode. NVidia's driver does a better job of this than AMD's right at the moment (and I've no earthly idea yet about the Intel drivers- yet...) but it still has some issues from version to version on things. Do me a favor, log the bug over at Linux Game Publishing and I'll get to checking into it in a couple of days when I can get back in front of my 64-bit machine.

I sent in a message with all the information provided here to the support address about this possible issue with the Nvidia driver. Thanks for helping out in what would be needed to correct this issue.

[Svartalf]

I tried the demo it and it still looks like it did 7 years ago on my AMD K6-300 / Voodoo card running 98se.

You want to bring a game that is in dire need of a linux port... Look at NWN2. The original NWN is still probably one of the most popular native linux games.

You know what... I'm not going to debate it with you further- it's very, very clear you've got your own ideas about things and there's not going to be any sense in discussing it with you.

[falko]

Downloaded the demo last night and tried it out. Never played it before, but I like it. It may be a little older, but it was nice to play. Reminded me of a game I used to play called MegaRace.

I would love to see NWN2 on Linux, but I think Linux Game Publishing is doing a good thing with these titles, and I hope they keep up the good work. Plus with a teaser of "newer" who can argue with that!

[deanjo]

You know, if I had a dollar for each and every time I heard that line...

The reality is, it's not 7 years old for Linux- only for Windows. Now, if you're a Windows user, that might be a big deal, but if it plays well, looks good, who honestly cares how old it is? I'm playing it. If I wasn't one of LGP's consultants, I'd be buying it.

Heh... Try the demo, buy it if you like it. If not, it's just not your cup of tea- I'm not going to twist your arm to buy it.

We're going to be able to make you happier about things fairly quickly. (Yes, we've got some "newer" games in development right now- VERY "newer"... )

I tried the demo it and it still looks like it did 7 years ago on my AMD K6-300 / Voodoo card running 98se.

You want to bring a game that is in dire need of a linux port... Look at NWN2. The original NWN is still probably one of the most popular native linux games.

[Svartalf]

Back the running the game though... I'm having problems running this game on my desktop (full details in my sig). I have a feeling it's due to the fact that my OS is 64-bit, but I'm not entirely sure and haven't looked up the messages very much yet. Here are the messages returned after attempting to start the game:

joshua@desktop:~/programs/ballistics_demo$ ./ballistics_demo
X Error of failed request:  BadMatch (invalid parameter attributes)
  Major opcode of failed request:  142 (GLX)
  Minor opcode of failed request:  5 (X_GLXMakeCurrent)
  Serial number of failed request:  47
  Current serial number in output stream:  47

I'm able to run the game fine on my laptop (which is a Thinkpad T40 with 32-bit Ubuntu), and from the looks of the above message I have to think it's related to my 3D drivers. I'm using the Nvidia 100.14.03 driver with desktop effects disabled. I'll look into these messages later on and post if I find anything, but if anyone knows what this is it would be helpful.

Heh... It's the driver. Doesn't make it less of an issue, but the driver doesn't always play nice with 32-bit apps in 64-bit mode. NVidia's driver does a better job of this than AMD's right at the moment (and I've no earthly idea yet about the Intel drivers- yet...) but it still has some issues from version to version on things. Do me a favor, log the bug over at Linux Game Publishing and I'll get to checking into it in a couple of days when I can get back in front of my 64-bit machine.