Valve joins the Linux Foundation • Hacker News Board

Re: Valve joins the Linux Foundation

#291

Post by anoncowherd » Thu, Dec 05, 2013, 3:57 PM UTC

stonith wrote: post #288

anoncowherd wrote: post #284

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Well, I've been using a Mac exclusively for a few years now. I just think the gaming situation is still really sad, even if things may be gradually improving. It's difficult to believe that even 25% of those 121 games you mentioned are AAA quality, and that's what I was curious about. What's your estimate? Could you list a few AAA games for the Mac?

I can't speak for nekro23's library, but mine is ~150 games with 50 available for Mac. I don't purchase a lot of AAA games, but I can go through and list the ones that are/aren't on mac that I would say are of significant quality and a clearly not small titles. On Mac (49): All the Valve games - CS/TF2/Portal/HL/L4D - King's Bounty - Psychonauts - Civ 4 - Trine 2 - XCOM: Enemy Unknown - Two Worlds 2 - The Witcher - B…

Thanks for the list.

The problem is that outside of Blizz/Valve's stuff, if you browse Steam's list of Mac games, it's like 95%+ small games made by a lone developer, and that is really sad. No disrespect to those developers, but that kind of games just don't interest me.

But you think things are getting better? Do big game studios actually use Unity these days? That would be kind of.. awesome.

Re: Valve joins the Linux Foundation

#292

Post by derefr » Thu, Dec 05, 2013, 6:17 PM UTC

drzaiusapelord wrote: post #289

derefr wrote: post #283

Earlier quoted context omitted.

For the mobile products? Number one consideration is battery life. Discrete GPUs are horrible battery drains that Apple wants to eliminate any way they can, so they can get the MBP to the same kind of 12-hour-life numbers the Air has.

Well, that can be worked around. In the windows world there are lots of laptop models that switch between low power integrated graphics and a high power GPU for gaming. Its not either or anymore. Its not 1998 anymore.

That's what Apple has been doing. It's still not enough.

Re: Valve joins the Linux Foundation

#293

Post by scott_karana » Thu, Dec 05, 2013, 7:02 PM UTC

aryastark wrote: post #155

scott_karana wrote: post #147

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Does Inkscape have any raster modification capabilities? Not all "buttons" are composed solely of vectors.

You remind me of the people that use Excel to do desktop publishing, or mocking up GUI screens. God bless your special breed.

Pardon? I'm advocating Photoshop over Inkscape because, to my knowledge, only one of them excels at mixing raster and vector capabilities.

If I want a high-resolution vector button with the modified picture of a face on it, I know which program I'm choosing.

Was I that unclear?

> Gimp is for image manipulation, not drawing buttons.

> (implied) Inkscape is for drawing buttons, not image manipulation

Photoshop is used for both image manipulation and for drawing vector buttons, in its modern incarnations. That was my point.

Re: Valve joins the Linux Foundation

#294

Post by scott_karana » Thu, Dec 05, 2013, 7:06 PM UTC

phaemon wrote: post #173

scott_karana wrote: post #147

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Does Inkscape have any raster modification capabilities? Not all "buttons" are composed solely of vectors.

Yes, a few, but why not do those in something else...say, Gimp? I can't think of a decent looking button (even for very loose definitions of "decent") that couldn't have been done with vectors. Can you give me a good example?

My point is that Gimp was pointed as a Photoshop replacement, but then excused for poor vector support.

Then, Inkscape was proposed for its vector support, but it neglects raster support.

Why use two solutions when Photoshop offers both capabilities?

Re: Valve joins the Linux Foundation

#295

Post by shinratdr » Thu, Dec 05, 2013, 7:31 PM UTC

Mikeb85 wrote: post #276

shinratdr wrote: post #256

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Flipping through the Linux games section on Steam (which is 11 pages comprising 256 titles) I see exactly nine titles that support Linux but don't support OS X. Subtracting those nine from the total Linux games leaves 247 titles. Subtract those from the Mac game total of 601 titles, and you're left with 354 titles that appear on OS X but not on Linux. That arguably constitutes a trend. Not only that, but looking at t…

All that realistically matters is what came out on Linux in the last 3 months, and what's upcoming on Linux. The fact that there's going to be Linux powered Steam consoles coming out soon trumps anything that has happened up until now...

Not really. There are countless Android powered game consoles too but it hasn't exactly lead to an explosion in Android gaming.

Releasing hardware doesn't automatically lead to developers providing software. Linux still lacks 100% of triple-A titles not developed by Valve. What's upcoming is almost entirely indie ports.

Whether or not that is enough to start the cycle of shipping units, gaining more attention and seeing bigger titles dip their toes in the water remains to be seen. OS X had a decent advantage at launch, there were already smaller porting shops producing OS X ports of triple-A titles. Gaming on OS X was never popular, but it was there.

Valve is looking to pretty much single-handedly launch gaming on Linux. Nothing here is a trump card, everything is up in the air.

Re: Valve joins the Linux Foundation

#296

Post by stormbrew » Thu, Dec 05, 2013, 7:36 PM UTC

unsignedint wrote: post #285

stormbrew wrote: post #267

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Kind of. Turning on 64bit by default has resulted in a lot of problems for me, though. It doesn't do the search paths right, I often have 32bit things failing because they stumble on a 64bit dll while linking (or vice-versa).

I don't know if it will solve your particular problem, but I would suggest trying PlayOnLinux. It saved me from having a lot of hassle having different Wine configurations and versions side by side.

Yeah, I do use playonlinux for reasons like this, but to me it's a bit of a bandaid to the pace of patch acceptance to the wine project. Don't get me wrong, in spite of that the wine project moves at an amazing pace, but working fixes sit on their bug tracker for months and months before being integrated into the mainline.

But the mixed 32bit/64bit thing is just a fundamentally broken part of wine that got seems to have gotten turned on by default before it was ready. It makes wine look bad.

Re: Valve joins the Linux Foundation

#297

Post by phaemon » Thu, Dec 05, 2013, 8:10 PM UTC

scott_karana wrote: post #293

aryastark wrote: post #155

Earlier quoted context omitted.

You remind me of the people that use Excel to do desktop publishing, or mocking up GUI screens. God bless your special breed.

Pardon? I'm advocating Photoshop over Inkscape because, to my knowledge, only one of them excels at mixing raster and vector capabilities. If I want a high-resolution vector button with the modified picture of a face on it, I know which program I'm choosing. Was I that unclear? > Gimp is for image manipulation, not drawing buttons. > (implied) Inkscape is for drawing buttons, not image manipulation Photoshop is used…

I see. So Adobe Illustrator is useless?

Re: Valve joins the Linux Foundation

#298

Post by easy_rider » Thu, Dec 05, 2013, 10:16 PM UTC

aclevernickname wrote: post #214

easy_rider wrote: post #62

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Cool, could you hint me which version(s) of (x)ubuntu and mint are working out for you? I couldn't get passed the Mint login screen after installation. Couldn't drop to tty either. System froze over :( I'm now on ubuntu 12.04 which seems better, but still.. HDMI/dual monitor is bugging me out.

Kubuntu 13.10 (or the latest Chakra if you don't like *buntu) should work, and solve your HDMI pain.

thanks!!

Re: Valve joins the Linux Foundation

#299

Post by scott_karana » Thu, Dec 05, 2013, 11:09 PM UTC

phaemon wrote: post #297

scott_karana wrote: post #293

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Pardon? I'm advocating Photoshop over Inkscape because, to my knowledge, only one of them excels at mixing raster and vector capabilities. If I want a high-resolution vector button with the modified picture of a face on it, I know which program I'm choosing. Was I that unclear? > Gimp is for image manipulation, not drawing buttons. > (implied) Inkscape is for drawing buttons, not image manipulation Photoshop is used…

I see. So Adobe Illustrator is useless?

No, Illustrator is fantastic for its usage cases. (As I'm sure Inkscape might be)

We were talking about Photoshop replacements. Despite the name, it's very much a hybrid raster/vector tool now, unlike how the GIMP was described above.

Re: Valve joins the Linux Foundation

#300

Post by xanderstrike » Fri, Dec 06, 2013, 12:43 AM UTC

archagon wrote: post #228

xanderstrike wrote: post #221

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> we'll have the power of (current gen) desktop graphics in just a few iterations And where will desktop graphics be after those few iterations? Several iterations more advanced. Integrated graphics will never be competitive with discreet graphics, therefore systems that do not support discreet graphics will never be competitive with those that can (in gaming, of course).

Discrete graphics are expensive, noisy, hot, and suck up tons of power. Upgrading your graphics card used to make a huge impact, but each successive generation now yields less and less improvement. (Carmack himself said in the most recent keynote that there probably won't be any "wow!" moments from graphics upgrades ever again.) Furthermore, some of the best looking games of the past few years (Super Mario Galaxy) we…

You're definitely the only person I've ever heard describe Super Mario Galaxy as one of the best looking games of the past few years. I looked at some screenshots and I have no idea what you're talking about.

While there may not necessarily be more features like ambient occlusion on the horizon, increased raw processing power and memory are going to lead to higher fidelity scenes at higher resolution. You're going to have orders of magnitude more detailed props on screen, and there are going to be orders of magnitude more of them. You're going to have more animation and more flexibility. You're going to have tons more lighting and particle effects acting on those multitudes of more detailed props, and you're going to be doing all of this at 4K.

I don't know when the last time you upgraded your graphics was, but I just went from a pair of GTS250s to a GTX770, and I've had my fair share of holy shit moments looking at games like Crysis and Metro.

Saying that graphics isn't going anywhere is the same as saying 640k ought to be good enough for anybody. It's incredibly nearsighted to assume that progress is just going to stop because things are "good enough," especially in the technology field.