If Gaming companies made games that worked flawlessly with wine with an easy deployment (that installs their wine hack separately if necessary) and if they guaranteed patch and corrections and a good framerate and immediate releases.. then I wouldn't mind if the game is native or "Wined" ... and would pay for a good gaming experience.
But I wouldn't pay if I had to hack my wine install to play ...
But as already mentioned before : Opengl is already used in games ported to Mac, IOS.. So it shouldn't be so difficult to port the games to Linux (not to mention that lot's of games use "3d engines" that are for some already available on Linux) ...
Id software did create a version of rage on Ipad and ported rage on the Mac... So they thought it was good for them to port games on other platform than win pc... for Linux they perhaps don't think it is worth the costs .. that is their view after their previous trials and "errors".
For games and apps It has always been a problem of market size and distribution ... if you don't provide a sufficient market, they won't make apps or games .. if you don't provide apps and games, not enough users will come to make a potential market ... it will be a niche market.
Even if Carmack made commercial games available on Linux years ago before the other guys, it was not "as easy as steam or Ubuntu store", for the gamers to find or install them .. And it was a different time with low bandwidth, less 'inline' payments and less Linux users ...
Today with Steam, games are easy to find, buy and install (but there are just a very small number of games compared to windows and Mac markets)..
Ubuntu software center should have helped game companies to port games long ago (with a "kickstarter like page" with "pre-purchase" in their store to port games or "Wine enabled them" for example - I understand that companies wouldn't want to do it for free)...
According to steam Stats : "Ubuntu" has now 1.12 % usage of the steam platform during January 2013 (+ other distros ('other' = unidentified platforms in steam) have a part of 0.76% of steam usage) ..
That is between +1/4 and -1/2 (if you count all the "other") of the mac usage (4.41%) on steam.. That means if not everyone, a large portion of Linux users wants to play on Linux... and Gamers are ready to pay for it. And regarding the "market share" attributed to Linux VS Mac it is in proportion a LOT of people ...
If you care and give a good product for the users and easy access to the product, they will probably come ... Steam decided not only to port games but to "make/build the market" ... Will they succeed ? Is it a problem if the market is not big enough ? At least they have tried and they have given the linux gamers "a tool" to make their voice and money count ... If after that companies are able to make money they will surelly come like they came to embrace the MAC and IOS market...
So "wined" or "not wined" is probably not relevant - easy access, easy deployment and good user experience are the only things that matters for games and for apps (in fact the goal of any OS should be that everything is totally transparent and works as designed) ...
So let's think about "the future of gaming on Linux platform" ... If a steam box comes out with Linux system, what would the best option to sell it ? If I were Valve I would sell it "bundled with games" for a limited period ex: "A steam box with the whole 'half life' package (Half Life 3 included) [Half Life 3 won't be a real exclusivity but the box would be the first platform to "deliver the game" .. That would make gamers consider the box or Linux as a viable gaming option.. but that is just a "wish"
But I wouldn't pay if I had to hack my wine install to play ...
But as already mentioned before : Opengl is already used in games ported to Mac, IOS.. So it shouldn't be so difficult to port the games to Linux (not to mention that lot's of games use "3d engines" that are for some already available on Linux) ...
Id software did create a version of rage on Ipad and ported rage on the Mac... So they thought it was good for them to port games on other platform than win pc... for Linux they perhaps don't think it is worth the costs .. that is their view after their previous trials and "errors".
For games and apps It has always been a problem of market size and distribution ... if you don't provide a sufficient market, they won't make apps or games .. if you don't provide apps and games, not enough users will come to make a potential market ... it will be a niche market.
Even if Carmack made commercial games available on Linux years ago before the other guys, it was not "as easy as steam or Ubuntu store", for the gamers to find or install them .. And it was a different time with low bandwidth, less 'inline' payments and less Linux users ...
Today with Steam, games are easy to find, buy and install (but there are just a very small number of games compared to windows and Mac markets)..
Ubuntu software center should have helped game companies to port games long ago (with a "kickstarter like page" with "pre-purchase" in their store to port games or "Wine enabled them" for example - I understand that companies wouldn't want to do it for free)...
According to steam Stats : "Ubuntu" has now 1.12 % usage of the steam platform during January 2013 (+ other distros ('other' = unidentified platforms in steam) have a part of 0.76% of steam usage) ..
That is between +1/4 and -1/2 (if you count all the "other") of the mac usage (4.41%) on steam.. That means if not everyone, a large portion of Linux users wants to play on Linux... and Gamers are ready to pay for it. And regarding the "market share" attributed to Linux VS Mac it is in proportion a LOT of people ...
If you care and give a good product for the users and easy access to the product, they will probably come ... Steam decided not only to port games but to "make/build the market" ... Will they succeed ? Is it a problem if the market is not big enough ? At least they have tried and they have given the linux gamers "a tool" to make their voice and money count ... If after that companies are able to make money they will surelly come like they came to embrace the MAC and IOS market...
So "wined" or "not wined" is probably not relevant - easy access, easy deployment and good user experience are the only things that matters for games and for apps (in fact the goal of any OS should be that everything is totally transparent and works as designed) ...
So let's think about "the future of gaming on Linux platform" ... If a steam box comes out with Linux system, what would the best option to sell it ? If I were Valve I would sell it "bundled with games" for a limited period ex: "A steam box with the whole 'half life' package (Half Life 3 included) [Half Life 3 won't be a real exclusivity but the box would be the first platform to "deliver the game" .. That would make gamers consider the box or Linux as a viable gaming option.. but that is just a "wish"
Comment