Desura Game Platform Goes Into Beta On Linux

[phoronix]

Phoronix: Desura Game Platform Goes Into Beta On Linux

The Desura Game Client, which is a similar service to Valve's Steam game distribution platform for e-delivery, is now in beta on Linux...

http://www.phoronix.com/vr.php?view=OTkyOA

[ChemicalBrother]

Today we are hearing that the Desura Linux client is ready and is now out in the wild for beta testing.

It's news from last week. For a website, that covers gaming news in Linux, you are really slow.

[christian_frank]

oh man, michale is at the octoberfest in munic, so don't expect light speed these days ;-)

[benmoran]

The closed beta was only released on the 19th/20th, so Michael's article is not out of date.

I'm actually in the closed beta myself, and have been testing it out. So far this is looking really promising. There are some quirks with installing some games, and other little bugs, but it pretty much works as it's supposed to. The client installation is pretty distribution agnostic. It's a single executable that builds up it's own directory and downloads dependencies when run. It also takes care of making/updating system menu links.

Desura is pretty cool because in addition to a fairly large selection of indie games, they also have open source games on there. Having Desura keep them up to date is a lot better than the 10 year old versions that show up in system repositories. This is especially useful for stuff that is under rapid development, like Xonotic.

[BlackStar]

Yet another closed-source distribution platform? That's great, who doesn't love running Steam, Origin, (now) Desura all at the same time for the same purpose? Advice to indie developers: Ubuntu Software Center + tarballs is a better investment for Linux deployment.

Anyway, good luck to them. They'll need it.

[benmoran]

Seeing as though Steam and Origin don't exist on Linux, this is the only closed-source distribution platform there is. It's also fairly benign compared to Steam and Origin, since it's completely DRM free. All games can be run without the client running.

It also seems to be running OK on most distributions, unlike Ubuntu Software Center. I use Ubuntu myself, but there is no way I would purchase anything from the USC. Ubuntu is the dominant OS now, but it may not be forever. Desura runs on any distro, so I think it's a much better solution.

Tarballs are fine, but a pain in the ass to keep updated. Give it an honest try before you dismiss it. I agree that they don't stand much of a chance on Windows, but sure fills a needed void on Linux.

[mirv]

Yet another closed-source distribution platform? That's great, who doesn't love running Steam, Origin, (now) Desura all at the same time for the same purpose? Advice to indie developers: Ubuntu Software Center + tarballs is a better investment for Linux deployment.

Anyway, good luck to them. They'll need it.

You seem to think that everybody is using Ubuntu. They're not.
Desura runs on Linux, can be used to keep all your games up to date easily, and doesn't look to try take over the rest of your system. If you have a problem with that being closed source, I guess you'll have a problem with any game that's closed source too and so it's not meant for you anyway.

[Desti]

Seeing as though Steam and Origin don't exist on Linux, this is the only closed-source distribution platform there is. It's also fairly benign compared to Steam and Origin, since it's completely DRM free. All games can be run without the client running.

It also seems to be running OK on most distributions, unlike Ubuntu Software Center. I use Ubuntu myself, but there is no way I would purchase anything from the USC. Ubuntu is the dominant OS now, but it may not be forever. Desura runs on any distro, so I think it's a much better solution.

Tarballs are fine, but a pain in the ass to keep updated. Give it an honest try before you dismiss it. I agree that they don't stand much of a chance on Windows, but sure fills a needed void on Linux.

Most games have in-game update functions, so even a simple tarball would be easy to update for the user. The point of Desura is not the software system, it is the one place shop system, which is important for the game developers to easy sell Linux games to customers international and have a good place to advertise their new games. No one will buy a Linux game, if he doesn't know that it even exist.

[Cheeseness]

I agree that they don't stand much of a chance on Windows, but sure fills a needed void on Linux.

Actually, they claim to be filling a niche on Windows for independent developers who can't get attention from Steam. Mod support has been a big thing and they've brought quite a community across from ModDB (which has been around for a decade or so now) by the looks of things.


I recently did an interview with Desura's Linux Games Lead about the development of the Linux client, what it's like to scout for native and Open Source games, and what impact the native client might have on the Desura and Free Software communities.

Part one and part two are live and part three should be up soon.

[benmoran]

I just read the first two parts of your article. Pretty interesting read.