Cedega and Linux Games

Linux.com's Stefan Vrabie has a look at the state of Transgaming's Cedega, which some claim to be the best current offering for running Windows games under Linux. While it may be better than nothing, the author still puts this solidly under the "plug and pray" column with the biggest drawback being the amount of fiddling required to make it work. From the article: "Cedega may not be the answer to games under Linux, but it's better than not being able to play at all, until gaming companies notice Linux users as a market and release games for Linux." Linux.com and Slashdot.org are both owned by OSTG.

Well duh

[cyber-vandal]

why anyone would want to run Doom through Cedega, when ID Software offers a Linux binary for Doom (which needless to say runs better since it's native), is a good question.

If every software company was as generous as ID then Cedega wouldn't be required now would it?

Eagerly awaiting

[ZorbaTHut]

If Cedega and Wine could run all the Windows games I play, and the few apps I depend on that don't have Linux ports, I would literally switch to Linux tomorrow.

If only.

Cedega is a step in the right direction

[suparjerk]

Addressing those who say that "Cedega isn't encouraging gaming companies to develop games for Linux", as the article puts it.... you're somewhat right. It's not directly encouraging companies to make Linux games, but it is a step in the right direction.
 
I used to be constantly rebooting back and forth between Ubuntu and Windows XP as I switched between playing games (XP) and doing everything else (Ubuntu). Thanks to Cedega, I can now spend almost all of my time in Linux, as Cedega emulates nearly everything I want to play, and does so with minimal problems. I'm just about ready to give Windows a kick to the face and abandon it permanently. In my case, thanks to Cedega, there's now one more almost-purely-linux gamer and one less Windows gamer. Now that I game under linux instead of in Windows, companies do have more incentive to make linux ports of their games.

Re:No games?

[Anonymous Coward]

I've had my eye on this one and online it actually says it's 20 bucks [bestbuy.com].

Either way, it's nice to have such things that are ported directly to Linux.

In the holy wars of whether WINE benefits the Linux community or not, I think it hurts more than it harms. If you want to game with your PC, dual boot...you know, with that OS your machine came with. If you want to use Linux, convince yourself to use only native games. If you REALLY REALLY want to game, get yourself an XBox.

Re:Cedega is produced by scum

[madcow_bg]

You should not that easily mod the parent troll.
Actually, some time ago WINE was under BSD license, that permitted proprietary modifications. After WINE was forked to WineX, then renamed to Cedega and closed their source, the WINE developers changed the license to GPL so future "freeloaders" are not allowed.

Now Cedega are going backwards because they cannot use the new WINE code. While WINE is going forward in the compatibility for things like DX9, the rest of the APIs in Windows, all Cedega developers are doing is trying to make it compatible with the latest and greatest of the protection schemes for CDs like SafeCD and such... Good for games, but for how long?

Re:No games?

[Anonymous Coward]

Uhm...no games? How about, no hyperadvertised games?

Uhm...no games? How about, no contemporary games.

Every semi-serious, hell every casual PC gamer has moved beyond all your listed games games years ago. You didn't present an argument for Linux gaming, you presented one against it.

think about this from the other side

[tcc3]

Windows gaming didnt sprout fully formed from Billy G's Head you know. MS made a concerted effort to make Windows a platform conducive to gaming, Directx being one of the main developents. Anyone remember the old days of "IBM-PC compatible" gaming? Will my sound card be supported? Is my video card the right kind? Using the OS as a layer of abstraction for compatibility makes it easier for the developer. Granted, the sheer commonness of Windows accounts for the major reason developers choose windows. More users = more sales. But compatibility and ease of development counts for something to. So wheres the Linux answer to directx? Ask not what game developers can do for Linux. Ask what Linux can do for game developers (my apologies to Kennedy)

Re:No games?

[grumbel]

No games?

Well, yes, you are right there are not "no games" under Linux, the throuble is there are only very few games under Linux. All the games you list are multiple years old, sometimes even a decade, and half of them happens to be done by id which is one of the very few Linux friendly game companies around. And the rest of the games kind of got more or less crippeled on its way (NWN came out half a year late, no editor, some throuble with videos, etc. when I remember correctly).

So in the end, yes, there are games on Linux, however in five years you get as much new releases under Linux as you see in the Windows world in a week or two, which really brings the state of Linux games very close to "no games". The sad thing is that it hasn't really gotten any better, five years ago we where stuck with a few first person shooters, today we still are, just with a few updated ones.

Re:Speaking as a Game Marketer and Linux User...

[nukem996]

Ive done a little game programming and what ive always wondered is why game developers cannt develop their games with OpenGL, OpenAL, and SDL to allow maximum portability. If coded using these libraries then its very simple to port to Linux Mac, Windows, PS 1, PS 2, Gamecube, and many more platforms. By having your game availible on Win Mac and Linux you'll not only make your customers happy but more people will buy. I know I for one am much more likly to buy a game if there is a native Linux port then if there isnt. As for paying for support why not just do what id software does and release the game binaries for Linux but say that there is no support availible, only bug reports.

Re:think about this from the other side

[sinewalker]

I agree with you, but I think the big difference between OpenGL/OpenAL/SDL and DirectX, is that DirectX is the XBox platform. So writing for Windows DirectX is not a lot different to writing for XBox.

So it's not a technical problem, it's a matter of market forces and games developers only having a finite budget for porting.

When/if Sony release a development suit for Playstation 3 that can be made to run on Linux/PC, then we'll start to see titles made available for it. I don't think that's likely though, or if it is, it won't be Free Software.

Re:No games?

[CastrTroy]

If this is the case, why don't game developers put out a Linux Live DVD with their game pre installed. This way it runs if you have one of the supported video cards, and no more having to worry about background processes getting in the way of your gaming. I think this would be a great way to deliver games on the Computer, as the way we do it no often leads to a less than stellar performance, because you have Norton Antivirus and 17 other memory resident things running that you don't really want to/know how to shut down every time you want to play a game.

Re:No games?

[NetRAVEN5000]

Define "gamer". Define "Casual". Some gamers like to play StarCraft, and that's about it. Others play Halo, WarCraft, DOOM, and a plethora of others, and still call themselves "casual gamers".

And might I ask. . . if you moved beyond all these games years ago, what did you move to? Neverwinter Nights, DOOM III, and Quake 4 are all fairly new. And if you really believe that gamers don't play old games. . . you're sorely mistaken.

Linux plays all the games I need - DOOM III, Quake 4, and with Wine, Starcraft. Not to mention a wide-range of open-source games.

Re:Cedega is a step in the right direction

[drsquare]

In my case, thanks to Cedega, there's now one more almost-purely-linux gamer and one less Windows gamer. Now that I game under linux instead of in Windows, companies do have more incentive to make linux ports of their games.

Incorrect. If Linux users can now run games written for Windows, then there is ZERO incentive to make Linux ports at all. Why make a Linux port when the Linux users can use the Windows version?

For more information see Windows vs OS/2.

Re:No games?

[labratuk]

1: If it used the nvidia or ati proprietary driver, it would be illegal to distribute it (unless it did something mad like compile the module as part of the boot process).

2: It would miss the entire point of an operating system - to have a common environment that is configured once and has to be updated once to make all your applications work. The live dvd would bring a whole new meaning to the phrase "Unreal UltraMAX Elite 2009 doesn't work with my nvidia card!"

3: Offshooting from that, a live dvd would have to contain support for all future hardware that could possibly ever be designed.

4: I think what you're looking for is called a 'console'.

Re:No games?

[blank axolotl]

Because the game usually wants to make use the operating system resources. For one, the live CD would not as aware of filesystem permissions you have set up, so could overwrite things you would not want to allow it to. In fact, telling it where to save 'save games' would be tricky in itself, since your filesystem (defined by fstab) would not be immediately available. You'd have to tell it where fstab is every time you load the program in order to make meaningful use of your filesystem. It would be a mess.

Running an OS you are not in control of and know little about on your computer does not seem like a good idea at all.

Re:Speaking as a Game Marketer and Linux User...

[Spikeles]

What? How can you justify that Direct3D beats OpenGL in development time? Have you ever programmed in DirectX? it's a bitch to program in, especially setting up all the stupid custom vertex classes.

If you are going to say something along the lines of it's easier to load textures are such, well any good self-respectable game company would have gigabytes devoted to libraries that were developed inhouse to handle those types of things in a platform independant way, that are usually better than the way Direct3D handles it because you get better control over the resources. I myself implemented a resource manager for my games simply because i didn't like the way Direct3D handled it ( plus my resource manager is platform independant)