BakaBT
Discussion Forums => General Discussions => Gaming => Topic started by: FlyinPenguin on June 24, 2012, 01:55:16 PM
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http://www.extremetech.com/gaming/127475-valve-confirms-steam-and-source-for-linux-signals-low-confidence-for-windows-8 and http://www.phoronix.com/scan.php?page=article&item=valve_linux_dampfnudeln&num=1
This isn't just some little side project they have going on. They are actively hiring new Linux programmers and putting the proverbial pedal to the metal. It looks like Valve is pretty serious about embracing Linux as a gaming platform.
This could be the beginning of a beautiful thing :-*
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Finally... all that needs to be supported is the games! Althought, I believe Linux uses OpenGL, correct? Same as Mac? But I'm sure there is way more than just the graphical software that requires the game to run (aka, the kernel).
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Finally... all that needs to be supported is the games! Althought, I believe Linux uses OpenGL, correct? Same as Mac? But I'm sure there is way more than just the graphical software that requires the game to run (aka, the kernel).
They are hiring both Linux OpenGL and kernel programmers ;D
Left4Dead2 will be one of the first games available. It will be interesting to see what other games will be available at launch. I'm hoping to see Payday: The Heist.
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Great! If Steam does it, then maybe more companies will follow. After all OpenGL is in many ways better than DX API. Also games coming out for *nix platforms will probably be the reason for me to finally jump from Windows to a Linux distro. At the moment the only thing I use a *nix OS for is to break into Windows computers (got a Knoppix 7.0 on a USB stick)
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Also games coming out for *nix platforms will probably be the reason for me to finally jump from Windows to a Linux distro.
I have read alot of comments from people who say the same thing. Gaming has been one of the things holding Linux back from going mainstream, despite the fact a vast array of games do run using Wine. It seems alot of people who don't want to run two OSs have continued to stick with Windows simply because of the gaming aspect. Throw in the fact that Windows 8 looking like a colossal disaster and this could be the opportunity Linux has been waiting for.
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If wine worked better (although I will give them credits for making it work as well as it does considering the circumstances), I would already have switched to *nix OS.
No, what I want is a native support for Linux from game developers instead of running compatibility layers like Wine or Windows emulators. If we are getting close to it being a reality, I better look into distros again... fuck, someone should make Linux distro specifically designed for gaming. That would be awesome as fuck.
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fuck, someone should make Linux distro specifically designed for gaming. That would be awesome as fuck.
That idea had crossed my mind as well. It would be interesting if Valve decided to make their own distro. Honestly, I don't think it is an unlikely possibility. There seems to be an increasing possibility Valve is getting into the console business and based on everything they have been saying, it would undoubtedly be using an open platform (hint hint Linux). All things taken into account, one doesn't have to stretch the imagination too far to see them having a distro already on the drawing board, possibly already in early development.
Think about it. They could design their own distro for their gaming console but still provide a modified version for PC users that is heavily optimized for Steam.
I'm starting to get really excited just thinking of the possibilities here.
I find it interesting that they are suddenly coming out against Windows 8 at this time with everything going on in the company in terms of Linux development. Could they be laying the groundwork to promote their new distro?
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I'm with ace here. If not for games, I'd be using *nix about now.
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Truly, truly, epic news!
[edit] I wouldn't mind having a distro made by steam, but honestly, I doubt it. If they made their own console, and it did have an embedded Linux OS, I don't think they would bother trying to "port" it to PC. The benefit just doesn't seem to be there. As for why they are moving into Linux, I think its due to Windows 8. I know I started using Linux as a direct result of Vista. XP was showing its age and the alternative for me, since my computer is custom made, was Linux (I eventually ended up with Ubuntu by the way, and am now using Mint). I think people will feel like that this time around as well with W8 looking like well dressed garbage.
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Windows 8 is irrelevant in my opinion. It is geared towards portable devices and pretty much anything that is no a desktop. Gamers are desktop users, there will be no need to get Windows 8 and those who do, will not see much difference.
I highly doubt that Microsoft will have any influence on this development. No, in fact no matter what MS does, or does not, it will be the effort and willingness of Steam and other developers to make games for *nix that will shape the future of Linux usage. Basically Linux will have to rise on it's own merit by supporting a wide variety of 3rd party applications, especially games. Gamers will not jump over to an OS that runs games poorly or is unstable, even if Win8 turns out to be an overbloated and unnecessary clusterfuck of an OS.
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Yes~! Now I can start spec'ing my PC builds to work with Linux.
I can shave away 186 dollars from the budget now, no more need for Windows Pro or Ulti.
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Another thing I just thought of is Canonical shouldn't have had EA at their conference this year. They should have had Valve!
I wonder if we can expect some sort of a Valve/Canonical partnership. I imagine Canonical would love to advertise that Ubuntu now comes with Steam pre-installed and is able to play high end commercial games.
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Yes~! Now I can start spec'ing my PC builds to work with Linux.
I can shave away 186 dollars from the budget now, no more need for Windows Pro or Ulti.
Exactly... so that extra money can be divided up nicely between the CPU and GPU.. XD
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Huh, there are people here who actually pay for an OS?
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Yes, not everyone uses OEM Windows here.
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Dude, this is a torrent tracker site and all you could think of as an alternative to a full priced OS is an OEM? Hell that implies that I bought a complete pc instead of building my own. I almost feel insulted.
If I remember correctly, the last time I used a legal version is back in the win 98 era. Even when an OEM comes with a laptop, I still always install Win7 Ultimate on all computers that my family has.
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Windows isn't even worth my time to pirate anymore tbh :P
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I pay for my games but not for my Windows? Not happening.
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Dude, this is a torrent tracker site and all you could think of as an alternative to a full priced OS is an OEM? Hell that implies that I bought a complete pc instead of building my own. I almost feel insulted.
If I remember correctly, the last time I used a legal version is back in the win 98 era. Even when an OEM comes with a laptop, I still always install Win7 Ultimate on all computers that my family has.
I have an use a 100% legal copy of Windows. They had a promotional thing for my unversity where they sold Windows 7 Pro for $25 and it cost an estra $15 for a disc.
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Dude, this is a torrent tracker site and all you could think of as an alternative to a full priced OS is an OEM? Hell that implies that I bought a complete pc instead of building my own. I almost feel insulted.
If I remember correctly, the last time I used a legal version is back in the win 98 era. Even when an OEM comes with a laptop, I still always install Win7 Ultimate on all computers that my family has.
I have an use a 100% legal copy of Windows. They had a promotional thing for my unversity where they sold Windows 7 Pro for $25 and it cost an estra $15 for a disc.
I on the other hand got mine without charge, legally :D.
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Dude, this is a torrent tracker site and all you could think of as an alternative to a full priced OS is an OEM? Hell that implies that I bought a complete pc instead of building my own. I almost feel insulted.
If I remember correctly, the last time I used a legal version is back in the win 98 era. Even when an OEM comes with a laptop, I still always install Win7 Ultimate on all computers that my family has.
I have an use a 100% legal copy of Windows. They had a promotional thing for my unversity where they sold Windows 7 Pro for $25 and it cost an estra $15 for a disc.
I on the other hand got mine without charge, legally :D.
How? Please, do share (work? MSDN?)!
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The wonders of MSDNAA.
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What matters is that MS thinks I have a fully legal Windows, so I get all updates and all benefits as the legal users. It's indistinguishable from legal version, so I don't see why I shouldn't pirate it. (No moral excuses from me: I do it because I can)
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How? Please, do share (work? MSDN?)!
The wonders of MSDNAA.
^That: part of my university program. Although, my tuition is so high that I'm essentially be paying for it anyway >_>.
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After all OpenGL is in many ways better than DX API.
Name those many ways, please.
Even a long time OpenGL guru Carmack, who long time ago said "we don't need no stinkin' Direct-X", now admits that "Direct3D is now better than OpenGL" (http://www.bit-tech.net/news/gaming/2011/03/11/carmack-directx-better-opengl/).
Also you do realize that Direct-X not only handles rendering like OpenGL, but also sound, input and such?
I think that you're just another Linux zealot.
Speaking of Linux - no one bloody cares, despite 2007, 2008, 2009, 2010, 2011 and now 2012 being "the year of linux on desktop" and Android on a wave, Linux is still a non factor.
As a user, I don't care about Linux.
As a developer, I hate Linux. Such a mess. No consistency. Everything gets deprecated after 2 years. Sound API - non existant. There was OSS, then there was ALSA, then OSS again, now I see some hack called PulseAudio. Low latency audio? JACK sucks.
Three or four years I ported one application to Linux. Half of the users refused to use because of Qt3 dependencies (qq think about my pure GTK desktop), other half - because it wasn't open source. Fine. Enjoy <1% market share.
Nowadays it doesn't even compile. Old binaries run, segfault on several now deprecated functions/libraries. Meanwhile on Windows, over a decade old VB apps run without problems... Yeah, who needs consistency and backwards compatibility and support for more than 2 years? Again, enjoy <1% market share.
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And no, I'm not a Microsoft employee. I'm thinking about buying new MacBook Pro with retina display (well, they say it's better than new iPad, and iPad's screen is simply gorgeous). Also, I have this for my file storage (every computer in the house has only a 80-120 gB SSD for storage, 4 terabytes network drive comes in handy, also accessible from internet in case friend forgot to bring good music)/torrent server/VPN server (only idiots connect to public wifi hotspots and then check their stuff without using VPN):
[root@AeriePeak ~]# uname -a
FreeBSD AeriePeak 9.0-BETA2 FreeBSD 9.0-BETA2 #2: Tue Sep 13 06:02:58 EEST 2011 root@AeriePeak:/usr/obj/usr/src/sys/apkern amd64
FreeBSD is great. It isn't plagued by stupid GPL ideologists (if it's not GPL, it's not in the tree! altho yes it would benefit us very much <- LOL), they don't hestitate signing NDAs and implementing closed source drivers in the kernel. Also, it's way more organized (I mean when I went from Debian to FreeBSD, suddenly all these /bin, /usr/bin, /sbin, etc directories started making sense): they have a Base System... (http://www.over-yonder.net/~fullermd/rants/bsd4linux/03)
Peace out, hipster linux boys. :)
edit: a lot of students in my time didn't knew about https://www.dreamspark.com/ - Microsoft's software for free for educational purposes.
edit2: forgot, my main smartphone is Nokia N900 - a real Linux phone (fu android).
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Were I to start out some graphics programming I'm likely going for OpenGL unless DX has something that interests me.
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Were I to start out some graphics programming I'm likely going for OpenGL unless DX has something that interests me.
DX has more tutorials, more learning material and all your questions have been asked by someone else on some dev forums and got answered.
Yep, the way I see it, DX has a lot that should interest you. :)
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Were I to start out some graphics programming I'm likely going for OpenGL unless DX has something that interests me.
DX has more tutorials, more learning material and all your questions have been asked by someone else on some dev forums and got answered.
Yep, the way I see it, DX has a lot that should interest you. :)
Oh, really? Does OpenGL have that little community or is it simply that DX has the bulk of the developers?
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Were I to start out some graphics programming I'm likely going for OpenGL unless DX has something that interests me.
DX has more tutorials, more learning material and all your questions have been asked by someone else on some dev forums and got answered.
Yep, the way I see it, DX has a lot that should interest you. :)
Oh, really? Does OpenGL have that little community or is it simply that DX has the bulk of the developers?
Yarly.
Altho I would suggest XNA (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Microsoft_XNA) instead of Direct-X for starting writing games. Grab a book like this (http://www.amazon.com/XNA-4-0-Game-Development-Example/dp/1849690669) and you're golden (pdf ebooks suck imo, I might just be old school tho).
Also heard good things about writing games in Python (http://www.pygame.org/docs/tut/intro/intro.html).
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After all OpenGL is in many ways better than DX API.
Name those many ways, please.
Well, I can name one important one: Portability.
Also you do realize that Direct-X not only handles rendering like OpenGL, but also sound, input and such?
For that, there is SDL (http://www.libsdl.org/).
Speaking of Linux - no one bloody cares, despite 2007, 2008, 2009, 2010, 2011 and now 2012 being "the year of linux on desktop" and Android on a wave, Linux is still a non factor.
I care. That said, I don't care what you run, as long as I can run what I want on my computer.
As a developer, I hate Linux. Such a mess. No consistency. Everything gets deprecated after 2 years.
What about POSIX (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/POSIX)?
Sound API - non existant. There was OSS, then there was ALSA, then OSS again, now I see some hack called PulseAudio. Low latency audio? JACK sucks.
You should use a library like SDL to cover the implementation details. That way you don't need to care about low-level details like what kind of sound API or daemon is present on the system.
FreeBSD is great. It isn't plagued by stupid GPL ideologists (if it's not GPL, it's not in the tree! altho yes it would benefit us very much <- LOL), they don't hestitate signing NDAs and implementing closed source drivers in the kernel.
Closed source drivers part of FreeBSD, really? That's news to me, do you have a reference?
That's certainly a different path from their cousins at OpenBSD.
Check out: http://www.openbsd.org/lyrics.html#39 (http://www.openbsd.org/lyrics.html#39), and listen to the song while you're at it, it's quite catchy.
Altho I would suggest XNA (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Microsoft_XNA) instead of Direct-X for starting writing games.
I read something a while back about XNA being phased out in Windows 8. Not sure if it's still true though.
Peace out, hipster linux boys. :)
Peace.