Originally posted by deanjo
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When apple users were bitching, they were simply not buying the game since there was *no* way to run it. That is at that time (yes, it was before the switch to x86 when EA started shipping eg C&C Generals for mac) they had nothing like wine. When they had no PC beside their mac, they had no way to run the apps. So they did not buy it. Some publishers saw that there is a demand, a group of players who did not buy a single copy. So they started to support it and got a raised profit from it.
For Linux it does look a little different. That is many users do bitch loud. This is identical. What is not identical is that users do buy the game since they either dualboot with Windows or run it in wine. Both were no options for Mac users in the days when they really bitched.
Since the Linux users (at least parts of them) buy the game anyway, even if there is no native binary (no matter if compiled against winelib or how it is done), why should the publishers change their view? How large are the numbers for those Linux users, who would buy the game when it is released natively for Linux and not when it is not? The studios don't see this as a too large cut in their profits, so they don't see a need to change things.
If just those who buy the games to play them using wine would *not* buy unless there is a native binary, this might already help a little. Though the publishers will then probably just say "hey, our sale figures dropped, shame on you pirates!".
The only thing that counts for the big players in the market is money. So far they have no seen that they really make more profit when supporting Linux and they just look at what they think who much they could lose by supporting it. Lose as in "hey, normal copy protection will not work, everyone will pirate it anyway" and "hmm, we have to invest money to port and later on to give support, which callcenter does also give support for Linux without charging insane prices?".
I do understand Svartalf being upset about things since with the current attitude by many players things are unlikely to change. Yes, the prices are rather high compared to windows releases of the same games since those are often in budget range when the Linux binary is out. Even if they (unintentionally) run nicely in wine, you are using a Windows product and thus support the creation of Windows products. Nowaddays PC gaming is largely Windows based. It is sad, but that's the way it is. You don't have too much choice when you want to play those AAA games from the big publishers. The only thing you as players can do is talk to indie studios to offer native ports. They are more likely to be nice to you. Some of those indie games are really nice products and often the price is affordable, too.
Unless maybe a big player like valve makes an offer for Linux and show the other big publishers that there is a big market to conquer things are unlikely to change. That is either many small studios show that they can gain a great profit from supporting those "special" platforms or one of the big players is brave enough to give it a try. I don't think that those ports of "released long ago" games will help a lot to show the big players that there is a market. It will just cater some smaller need for some core Linux users. I really appreciate this, but I do not think it will change the big picture. The players feel that the games are out too late and as such "totally outdated".
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