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Why make games for Linux if they don't sell?

theregister.com

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Re: Why make games for Linux if they don't sell?

#61

Post by doikor »

buttersbrian wrote: post #29
doikor wrote: post #10

Earlier quoted context omitted.

When making a game for Stadia you can target a very small subset of hardware and test on those on one single linux distribution/software stack (at the moment all stadia servers are identical). When you make a game that anyone can download on their machine the amount of different hardware + os/driver combinations grows a lot and requires a lot more effort for a quality product.

The success of Stadia means more developers who are comfortable with Vulkan and linux as a platform. That should give us better ports and even more Vulkan first titles. That could lead to better driver support (at least from Nvidia :| ) on 'nix, and so on and so forth.

When someone makes a game for Stadia they don't really care if it works on linux or Vulkan in general. All they care is that the game works on the custom hardware and drivers Google/AMD provides for Stadia. That is the only platform they will test that version on. (This is very similar to how console development happens. You have a fixed set of hardware so you just develop for that without a care for anything else really)

Sure the distance is smaller then starting with the Windows or Xbox/Playstation versions but there is still a lot of work to get it to work on any random pc someone builds.

Re: Why make games for Linux if they don't sell?

#63

Post by ldng »

phkahler wrote: post #51
60654 wrote: post #28

Porting games to Linux is definitely not something you do for the money. Linux sales on Steam hover in the 1%-2% area of total sales, less than even MacOS. On the plus side, if you use an engine like Unity, making a binary for Linux is no longer much of a problem (you don't have to wrangle xplatform libraries etc). On the minus side, actually testing and debugging things to make sure things work for customers who use…

>> Porting games to Linux is definitely not something you do for the money. Part of the article suggested that building Linux first is easier, because porting to Windows should mostly just work.

And Mac ! If you're doing a Mac port you may as well do a Linux one too.

Re: Why make games for Linux if they don't sell?

#65

Post by pjmlp »

buttersbrian wrote: post #29
doikor wrote: post #10

Earlier quoted context omitted.

When making a game for Stadia you can target a very small subset of hardware and test on those on one single linux distribution/software stack (at the moment all stadia servers are identical). When you make a game that anyone can download on their machine the amount of different hardware + os/driver combinations grows a lot and requires a lot more effort for a quality product.

The success of Stadia means more developers who are comfortable with Vulkan and linux as a platform. That should give us better ports and even more Vulkan first titles. That could lead to better driver support (at least from Nvidia :| ) on 'nix, and so on and so forth.

They are already comfortable with it thanks to Android NDK APIs, and you don't see those games coming to GNU/Linux.

Re: Why make games for Linux if they don't sell?

#66

Post by pjmlp »

MeinBlutIstBlau wrote: post #42
Unklejoe wrote: post #20

Earlier quoted context omitted.

For now. My guess is that one of the reasons Valve has been working so hard on the Linux gaming front is the fear of this changing.

You're saying they may take an Apple approach and attempt to further scare people from downloading trusted .exe's and such? I think Microsoft has been having a bit of a change in attitude just because they're more focused on making money in software. They don't care where you buy it so much as they get a chunk of it somewhere. But what do I know.

Windows 10X original design, which got delayed due to COVID, uses sandboxing for whole userspace applications, regardless if they are UWP or Win32 based.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ztrmrIlgbIc

Re: Why make games for Linux if they don't sell?

#67

Post by sliken »

RHSeeger wrote: post #46
pram wrote: post #5

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Hey don't forget XBill, Linux game of the year 1994

There was also a tank game, and a star trek game where you configure your ship and fight with it (and if you configured max cloaking, you regained energy while cloaked). Good times.

tank game = warzone 2100?

Re: Why make games for Linux if they don't sell?

#68

Post by issamehh »

thetanil wrote: post #33
hatchoo wrote: post #31

Earlier quoted context omitted.

You don't consider if they run using Proton?

Ultimately I want to support devs who support Linux, but if it works on Proton doesn't it also get the flag on steam for support of SteamOS/Linux. I am only going by the Steam flag.

It doesn't get marked for every game that is playable. They have a list of games that are officially supported by Proton but there are so many more that work well that you can play if you enable the option in the Steam settings

Re: Why make games for Linux if they don't sell?

#69

Post by tpoacher »

They don't sell? Eh? Says who? The article offers no backup for this claim. It's just plain wrong.

Have we already forgotten how when HumbleBundle first launched, Linux accounted for 20% of its sales? (then worth only a 1% "marketshare"). The other 20% being mac (4% marketshare) and 60% windows.

Re: Why make games for Linux if they don't sell?

#70

Post by sliken »

tpoacher wrote: post #69

They don't sell? Eh? Says who? The article offers no backup for this claim. It's just plain wrong. Have we already forgotten how when HumbleBundle first launched, Linux accounted for 20% of its sales? (then worth only a 1% "marketshare"). The other 20% being mac (4% marketshare) and 60% windows.

Heh, dunno, seems quite a few folks claim minimal sales for linux. I have noticed the finding linux support for humble bundle games is MUCH less than it used to be.

Steam seems to have pretty hard numbers and the linux number are tiny.

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