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Game dev: Linux users were only 0.1% of sales but 20% of crashes and tickets

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Re: Game dev: Linux users were only 0.1% of sales but 20% of crashes and tickets

#191

Post by kaybe »

halbritt wrote: post #178
fb03 wrote: post #117

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I keep a dualboot system because of the current situation. Linux for "real work" Windows for gaming (no-frills setup) and music production (much easier and less clunky low latency setup, way more availability of free synths etc) I absolutely adore Linux for everything it has done to my career but I cannot drop my Windows system yet.

I likewise run and prefer a Linux desktop and boot into Windows for the occasional gaming foray. Also, to run stuff like Fusion 360. I have to say that even on Windows, driver stability leaves much to be desired (for Nvidia in my case).

The thing is, if you only boot into Windows occasionally, you'll have to wait for updates about every time you use it. That's pretty annoying and has actually stopped me from doing it at some point.

Re: Game dev: Linux users were only 0.1% of sales but 20% of crashes and tickets

#192

Post by plq »

pjc50 wrote: post #153
plq wrote: post #127

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> And distos aren't backwards compatible. ie when libcurl4 is released, they remove libcurl3. So you can't have one binary for Ubuntu 18.04 and 16.04. If you don't want to depend on the libcurl provided by the OS, ship your own. If you don't want to depend on the glibc provided by the OS, ship your own, with your own dynamic linker. readelf -n will tell you the oldest kernel that will run your stuff. Put that in the…

This is not as easy as it sounds, because funny things happen if you ship your own libc - I remember last time I tried this there were problems with PAM and name services. But that was a number of years ago. Can you ship with your own version of GNOME different from the currently running one?

> Can you ship with your own version of GNOME different from the currently running one?

I'm confused. GNOME is a desktop environment. It implements a task bar, a control panel, a way to set your desktop wallpaper etc. Why would you ship GNOME?

Maybe you meant shipping a proprietary application that uses a GTK version that is different than the OS-provided GNOME uses?

If so, of course you can. GTK is a bunch of shared objects that generate system calls, X messages, etc. It has no reason to interfere with the OS-provided GTK as long as it's got everything it needs in your bundle.

Re: Game dev: Linux users were only 0.1% of sales but 20% of crashes and tickets

#193

Post by iforgotpassword »

simias wrote: post #128
rkido wrote: post #53

Linux is the perpetual scapegoat. They selected a middleware, Coherent UI, that didn't work properly on anything but Windows. They also didn't make proper use of the Steam runtime, a mistake that continues to cause issues. Most games don't make these mistakes, so this isn't really representative of the larger state of Linux gaming. It's worth pointing out that the devs did make a legitimately good attempt at making L…

Technically speaking I'm sure you're right. In practice it doesn't really matter though, if they did it that way it's either because it was easier or because that's the way they were used to doing it. The fact that "technically" it's not Linux's fault doesn't really matter, unless you're more interested in the moral concept of guilt rather that the practicalities of making a Linux port of a game. Why should they chan…

> Technically speaking I'm sure you're right. In practice it doesn't really matter though, if they did it that way it's either because it was easier or because that's the way they were used to doing it.

Yes but then the question is, why did they even bother? If GP is right that they picked a middleware that is known to only work properly on Windows, that pretty much means they decided to fuck themselves right from the start. I agree that generally, properly targeting Linux is harder for multiple reasons, but if you want to go multiplatform, make sure you build on a solid foundation.

Re: Game dev: Linux users were only 0.1% of sales but 20% of crashes and tickets

#194

Post by kaybe »

mikekchar wrote: post #120
NelsonMinar wrote: post #34

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Except Linux users want all their software to be free.

I'm a Linux user and supporter of free software and I certainly want source code for my software. I'm quite happy to pay for it, though (and I do believe it or not). Not a lot of games offer source code, though, which is a shame. I've bought several games simply because they offer source code and I want to encourage it. I've bought a few games that don't offer source code as well (the only such software on my compute…

I'd be happy with code escrow too, which would mean we can keep the game forever and the company gets to protect their secret as long as they exist.

I think we should talk more about code escrow, in general.

Re: Game dev: Linux users were only 0.1% of sales but 20% of crashes and tickets

#195

Post by zanny »

linuxlizard wrote: post #83

Developing software for Linux is like painting a moving train.

SDL is binary compatible on its major release (2.0) and will probably be forever at this point. libc++ only broke its ABI once when C++11 required it.

What else do you need to make games for Linux? If you are using Unity or Unreal its going to statically link all its dependencies anyway. Don't use libraries that break semver.

Re: Game dev: Linux users were only 0.1% of sales but 20% of crashes and tickets

#196

Post by balls187 »

fb03 wrote: post #117
wheelerwj wrote: post #103

Earlier quoted context omitted.

100% this. source: - am a business person - am a developer - am a linux users - am a linux gamer I love the idea of being able to game and work/dev on the same machine. But its not the current reality and its not the reality of the near future. Ive recently settled for macos because even though it doesn't offer optimal solutions for anything, it offers the really nice solutions for everything. I tried linux gaming fo…

I keep a dualboot system because of the current situation. Linux for "real work" Windows for gaming (no-frills setup) and music production (much easier and less clunky low latency setup, way more availability of free synths etc) I absolutely adore Linux for everything it has done to my career but I cannot drop my Windows system yet.

Take a look at cloud9 for your real work :)

Re: Game dev: Linux users were only 0.1% of sales but 20% of crashes and tickets

#197

Post by [deleted] »

zanny wrote: post #165
ShakataGaNai wrote: post #13

While I love Linux, I think this is a totally fair "state of the union". At the end of the day, gaming or kickstarters or similar... are a business. You need to figure out your ROI (Return On Investment). It doesn't many any logical sense to spend a huge amount of time on a platform that nets you tiny amounts of sales (and gains you a huge amount of support costs). This is why gaming on the Mac is only now starting t…

Is it really fragmented? You support Ubuntu (in either its flatpak runtime or the Steam runtime) and you let everyone else figure it out on their own. Distros like Arch have been very good about providing the Steam Native Runtime and Ubuntu flatpak runtime in its own package system for just that reason. The support burden for developers is proportional to the operating systems you officially say you support. If you s…

[deleted]

Re: Game dev: Linux users were only 0.1% of sales but 20% of crashes and tickets

#198

Post by madez »

jcastro wrote: post #180
madez wrote: post #147

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Why except video drivers? Both AMD's and Intel's drivers are free and open, as is mesa. The other closed drivers are alien to a free software system anyways.

What was your expectation? That they would find a bug and submit/fix it to Debian and then walk through the contribution process so it makes it into the next stable Debian release?

No. I expected them to compile their game for the system and try to run it. If it didn't, it would be immediately obvious because the issues were so obvious.

The next step would be to upgrade the system to Debian testing, and then check again. If it still doesn't work, upgrade to Debian Sid, and then check again.

If it worked on any of those, report that and everybody knows in what version the issues will be fixed. If it doesn't work in any of those, go over your marketing and remove claims about linux compatibility. The engineering side of this is less than one work day of one developer. It's literally installing, compiling, starting, upgrading, compiling, starting, upgrading, compiling, starting.

The next step is to figure out in what component an error is, and get the latest upstream version of that component. Then, if the problem still persists, file a bug report against upstream, not against Debian. At that point, you are mostly done, and can at least claim to having done your part.

This isn't magic, nor is it difficult nor time-consuming. Heck, I would do it for free on some weekend if I were given access.

Re: Game dev: Linux users were only 0.1% of sales but 20% of crashes and tickets

#199

Post by WAthrowaway »

mscasts wrote: post #152
jimmy1 wrote: post #133

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> Why should they change the way they develop games for 0.1% of their sales? Have you seen how tight the gaming market has become? You need a niche to get any attention. Coming out with a truly cross platform game that has Linux as a first class citizen would buy tremendous free publicity. It would be on the front page here a lone, a site with an enormous audience at minimum once a quarter. It would appear in countle…

I have seen this claim many times, but wonder about it's validity. It's easy to think that a truly cross platform game that has Linux as a first class citizen would make a lot of stir. But I used to play Heroes of Newerth years ago when Linux support were way worse than today. I also read HN then. I never saw any special treatment for that even tho I loved the game and it worked really, really good on linux. Searchin…

>daily struggle that is desktop Linux

lol what year is this? 1999?

but I agree with the rest of your points

Re: Game dev: Linux users were only 0.1% of sales but 20% of crashes and tickets

#200

Post by jcelerier »

FigBug wrote: post #62

I work for a small company that produces a DAW and VST plugins. Supporting Linux is a huge amount of work compared to Windows and Mac. The main issue is that 'Linux' is not a thing you can support. You have to pick the distros you want to support, and then once you've picked a distro, what versions you want to support. And you need to use the C++ version that ships with that distro, so if you want to support old vers…

I am developing an open-source DAW with Qt (https://ossia.io), to solve the problem you mentioned I used AppImage with great success - of course you have to ship all your libs, but that's what you have to do on macOS and Windows too anyways.
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