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Linux Software Entertainment Games

Linux Live Gaming Project 491

Posted by michael from the better-than-freecell dept.
Fabio writes "The mission of LLGP (Linux Live Game Project) is show to Wintendo users that also Linux can be used to game. And now a new version is out. Features: KDE 3.3 with Plastik theme and Nuvola icons, kernel 2.6.10, Nvidia drivers, TORCS, Wesnoth, SuperTux, TuxRacer and much more! It's based on Knoppix, but contains deep changes in the startup scripts. Now the hardware probing is completely based on hotplug and udev; kudzu was removed. Challenge your friends on LLGP, and convert them to Linux!"
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Linux Live Gaming Project More

Linux Live Gaming Project

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  • Convert to Linux in 12 easy steps (Score:5, Funny)

    by Anonymous Coward on Monday January 17, 2005 @01:04AM (#11382965)
    Speaking of getting Linux more popular (more games...), Finally there's a how-to guide you can get all your friends and neighbors tuned-in to using Linux.

    How to convert to Linux in 12 easy steps [olene.net].

    Check it out folks, this is very useful - as we edge ever closer to taking down Micro$loth!!!!

  • Wrong Games (Score:5, Insightful)

    by Anonymous Coward on Monday January 17, 2005 @01:05AM (#11382970)
    WHen people say that they don't use linux because they cannot game on it, they are not talking about playing tuxracer. They are talking about playing HL2, Doom, the latest RPGs, etc. This distro couldn't be further from what people want.

    • Re:Wrong Games (Score:2, Informative)

      by tepples ( 727027 )

      I'm not sure about Half-Life 2, but Linux is said to run Half-Life 1 just fine in Wine, and Doom 1 and 2 are ported. You can run the latest GBA RPGs in VisualBoyAdvance, which is ported.

      Best of all, Linux can help you get in shape, as Pydance and StepMania are ported.

      • Re:Wrong Games (Score:2, Insightful)

        by Magus424 ( 232405 )
        But even with those, your options are severely limited compared to Windows.

        The fact remains that if you really want to be able to game, and not just play a small subset of games, you can not use Linux.

        At least not entirely. Hurray for dual-booting :-)

      • Game Support on Linux is Sub-Par (Score:5, Interesting)

        by Mystic0 ( 807930 ) on Monday January 17, 2005 @02:38AM (#11383358)

        Unfortunatly, while Linux does have support for games such as Doom 3, UT2004, and Half Life 2, the quality of the support is almost always lower.

        Here is an example. In both Doom 3 and UT2004, Windows gives you tight integration with the built in editors. In the Linux versions of these, games, however, the editors are both MIA.

        In addition, while Cedega boasts a wide range of supported games, the quality of that support is even lower than the native games. For example, to get pixel shader support, you need a Geforce 5 class card or better. In Windows, you only need a Geforce 3 class card or better. And while ATI arguably has some of the best hardware, they also have the worst driver support in Linux . And while people say that they got game X, Y and Z working perfectly under Cedega, it probobly took them X number of hours to configure, hack, and crack the game before it would actually run. (Trust me, I've been there.)

        The obvious solution is to dual boot. This becomes a problem, however, for people who can't afford to buy Windows. But then again, if you can't afford Windows, maybe you shouldn't be buying games either. ;)

        The bottom line is that we won't get good game support until publishers believe that Linux is a viable consumer market. Furthermore, most developers use DirectX, which is a Windows tehnology, not an open standard.

        I enjoy Linux for it's other benifits. I don't mind that it's not the ultimate gaming platform, although it would be nice if it was. I instead enjoy that it has a stable enviorment for me to explore UNIX, program, and explore free software.

        • A key to getting games to come to Linux may be to convince game developers to use OpenGL and SDL. This will surely eliminate some of the cost of porting (YMMV). Anything that reduces the cost of a port makes a port more likely. So if any of you out in SlashLand have it in with some game developers (hey, it could happen), see if you can put in a good word for OpenGL and SDL.

          And we really need more than hot air from ATI.
          • So if any of you out in SlashLand have it in with some game developers (hey, it could happen), see if you can put in a good word for OpenGL and SDL.

            That's why! None of these developers have ever heard of OpenGL and that is why most games are written for DirectX.

            I would suggest running with your revelation and post messages on all the game dev forums you can find. Let them know about this fancy, new OpenGL and how great it is!

            And we really need more than hot air from ATI.

            They don't care enough to even

      • Re:Wrong Games (Score:3, Insightful)

        by sahonen ( 680948 )
        Great, HL1 and Doom 2. Those are *so* equivalent to HL2 and Doom 3. I mean, it's just another number up.

        Besides, maybe they work for some people, but for me, Wine won't run anything more complicated than Notepad. It might work better if I put some time into configuring it, but that's going back to "Linux is free if your time is worth nothing," and my time (and sanity) is worth far too much to me to be spending all of it trying to get all of the disparate components that make up a Linux distribution to ac

        • Re:Wrong Games (Score:3, Informative)

          by Joe Tie. ( 567096 )
          It might not be relevent to your situation anymore, but for anyone else who's had bad luck with wine, Sidenet [sidenet.ddo.jp] might help after wine's installed. It sets up the config file for some of the more tricky installs beforehand, installs some stuff from reactos, manages menus, and some other nice tricks. Though, on the other hand, I've never understood how people can have such different results from wine. I hear about people all the time not being able to run anything but notepad, but I've always had pretty good r

        • Re:Wrong Games (Score:4, Informative)

          by Mold ( 136317 ) on Monday January 17, 2005 @04:17AM (#11383633)
          HL2 works fine under Cedega with no configuration, and Doom 3 has native Linux support.

          So while the poster mentioned the wrong games, HL2 and Doom3 work just fine. And HL2 and Doom3 ARE "*so* equivalent to HL2 and Doom 3", interestingly enough.

    • Re:Wrong Games (Score:2, Informative)

      by nukem996 ( 624036 )
      Doom3 there is a native port which runs great. HL2 runs just as well through cedega. The latest games are being added to cedega support or being ported to Linux.

      • Wrong genres? (Score:4, Informative)

        by tepples ( 727027 ) <tepplesNO@SPAMgmail.com> on Monday January 17, 2005 @01:24AM (#11383078) Homepage Journal

        Yeah, the first-person shooters get ported to GNU/Linux rather quickly, but what about things other than FPS? Yes, other game genres exist, even though someone who took his/her nick from the name of the hero of a popular FPS may consider such an idea blasphemous.

      • Re:Wrong Games (Score:3, Informative)

        by thedustbustr ( 848311 )

        "HL2 runs just as well through cedega"

        LOL! Your definition of "just as well" is apparently 20 minute level loads, with a solid 5 fps (my GF4Ti4200 / 1.6Ghz / 512 DDR ram runs it at a playable 25 fps on windows). Read this review [linux-gamers.net] of halflife 2 under cedega. I'll post a quick excerpt that summarizes it for you:

        The graphic looked pretty raw and 'edgy', gameplay wasn't smooth, the sound skipped every now and then. I opened the options again and reduced averything to 'low' or 'medium' were available. After a

    • Re:Wrong Games (Score:2, Interesting)

      by Tarqwak ( 599548 )
      What if the user could extract for example Unreal Tournament 2004 demo for Linux installation binary in Windows. Then boot the LLGP with all the 3D hardware detected like a charm, and run the demo from a readonly mounted NTFS/FAT32 partition...

    • Re:Wrong Games (Score:4, Interesting)

      by Deliveranc3 ( 629997 ) <deliverance@level4 . o rg> on Monday January 17, 2005 @02:10AM (#11383268) Journal
      There are lots of people complaining that too many games focus on eye-candy.

      Linux could do fine in terms of RTS Turn based strategy, adventure, etc.

      The awsome multiple window features gives great possibility for hotseat gaming.

      Why is Linux trying to be an FPS platform, that's just silly.
    • This distro couldn't be further from what people want.
      Wouldn't having no games at all be further from what people want?
    • Never mind the obsurdity in creating an entire distribution to play video games.
    • I've been playing the linux-native version of Neverwinter Nights all afternoon. I don't play FPS, though I did try out the Doom III linux demo (which is also native). The games you list that people want are never going to be included in a distro because they are *commercial* games. Having games like tuxracer and supertux is a huge improvement over the linux gaming situation 3 years ago, and they are necessary to prove to people that yes, games *can* be written for linux, which is necessary before big game

      • Wrong question (Score:3, Interesting)

        by Osty ( 16825 )

        Having games like tuxracer and supertux is a huge improvement over the linux gaming situation 3 years ago, and they are necessary to prove to people that yes, games *can* be written for linux, which is necessary before big games will be.

        Games can be written for linux, just as games can be written for pretty any computer ever made. Hell, Spacewar was written on a PDP-11, and there are numerous games for handheld calculators and the like. The question here is can commercial games be profitable on linux.

    • Re:Wrong Games (Score:4, Interesting)

      by Jace of Fuse! ( 72042 ) on Monday January 17, 2005 @03:19AM (#11383476) Homepage
      Linux might be fine if you like the top of the top First Person Shooters (and occassionally a port of something popular over a year later), but what if you like something less than mainstream?

      For instance while all of my friends were getting absorbed in Half-Life 2 or World of Warcraft I was left out because everytime I went to the store to pick up a copy of WoW (and to a lesser degree, HL2) the stores were out of stock.

      While looking for something to play I managed to stumble upon a gem that caught me totally off guard.

      I noticed Pirates! [atari.com] on the shelf. After reaading the back I realized it was a remake of the old C64, Mac, Amiga, and PC title and I had to buy it, even though I hadn't heard that they were remaking it.

      I can honestly say it was not a waste! The game captures so much of the feel of the original while still being made modern. They haven't overlaiden it with stupid features, nor have they made it full of some lame linear storyline.

      A good game, and certainly not one I'd expect to find ported to Linux, or even Mac. I just can't see it being popular enough with most people to justify it. Still, games like this are the reason I play PC games at all. As for the top first person shooters, blah. Sure I play them sometimes, but it would take more than that to get me to ditch my Windows box as my primary gaming machine.

      • Actually that _is_ the real "mainstream" (Score:4, Interesting)

        by Moraelin ( 679338 ) on Monday January 17, 2005 @04:35AM (#11383705) Journal
        That was more or less what I was thinking too.

        I would however disaggree about "mainstream". Die-hard in-your-face online FPS clansmen are a very vocal minority. But make no mistake, the keyword is: minority.

        The fact is, The Sims outsold any FPS ever made, including any Epic, Id or Valve game. Ever. (And for that matter, any other game.) Think about it.

        Or how about these quick facts: Quiz games routinely outself FPS. EA's cash cows aren't some FPS franchise, but sports games. And between the N64 which had FPS games, and the Playstation which had Final Fantasy and Grand Turismo, the Playstation won by far. And for every single online FPS player, there are tens of PS2 and GameCube systems sold _without_ the broadband addapter.

        As I've said, online FPS clansmen are awfully loud, but they're a minority. The majority of the world's gaming (or gamers) is off-line and _not_ FPS.

        Either way, you're not alone. Some of the best PC games I've played over the last year include:

        - yes, Pirates

        - The Fall - Last Days of Gaia (third person post-apocalyptic RPG)

        - Crusader Kings

        - Vampire Bloodlines (based on the HL2 engine, but a third-person RPG. Well, more like action-rpg.)

        - The Sims 2 (well, after disabling aging. Never liked that addition.)

        - Evil Genius

        None of them is a FPS or RTS. So, yeah, I'll fully aggree with you. I'd like to see more of _those_ supported on Linux, rather than yet another "but you have Doom 3 and UT2004" argument.

    • Re:Wrong Games (Score:5, Insightful)

      by Pxtl ( 151020 ) on Monday January 17, 2005 @03:20AM (#11383478) Homepage
      Yep. Many projects have taken an attempt at this meagre challenge, and they've all sucked. First of all, Super-Tux is an alpha game - their site screenshots still show the tiling grids. Not very impressive.

      Want to make Linux Gaming cool? Get some better objectives. I've seen many of these "Linux Game Distros" projects, and they all do the same half-assed crap of grab a bunch've mediocre Linux games and throw them onto the main menu.

      Here's my dream project for an Opensource team:
      FPS distro. Get one Opensource game that has tons of media available for it. That's pretty much the first 3 Id titles, plus Abuse and a handful of others. Quake and Doom are the only games to have complete media-replacement projects that turn them into standalone games, but I think there are a handful of Quake 2 and Quake 3 TC's that could be converted into standalones with a little trouble. Then, make a multi-CD package out of those games. Include all the major popular mods, models, etc. Second, take some of the configging out - Q3 and Doom were the only Id games that didn't require command-line hacking to get the mods working right.

      Did you know that there are Doom Legacy maps reimplementing the Unreal Tournament 2003 gametypes? So you can play CTF Doom and Dom Doom? Very cool.

      The key problem with these games, and Cube, is the installation and configging details. Handle that for the users with some nice Python GUI wrappers or something, similar to RedHat's config screens. Doom Legacy has this nicely nipped for Windows.

      Now, set up a Gamespy-like GUI-oriented meta-server game-browsing service. That would be the "new feature" your gaming distro brings to the scene.

      Then release a game-distro with a real featureset. Also, release win32 bundles of your game distros (like QPack and DPack) so that you can get win32 players playing with your players.

      Yes, there are tons of games out there, but only Half-Life gives you tons of mods bundled in with their game package. If a person could order a QPack distro (which uses no Id IP but the GPL'd source data) with Weapons Factory, Slide, and whatever other mods you can get the mod devs to let you grab, then you're golden.

      still, that option relies on a) getting permission to redistribute mods from the mod devs and b) what Id's exact license is for the Quake and Doom source.

      Alternate plan: go for the oldschool people. Make the Linux Game Console for casual party gamers. There are an innumerate number of players out there who just want to grab a joystick and play Gauntlet again with their buds over a few beers. Just go for these basics: multiple joystick support, good graphics and sound configuration, TV out, and every multiplayer hotseat game you can cram onto the damn thing, even if you have to code them yourself (how freakin' hard would 8-player Spacewar be to make in PyGame?).

      No, its not Halo, but neither is Mario Party, and people play the hell out of that.

  • Reboot? (Score:3, Insightful)

    by tepples ( 727027 ) <tepplesNO@SPAMgmail.com> on Monday January 17, 2005 @01:07AM (#11382985) Homepage Journal

    A big problem with live CDs is that because few residential users can justify spending money for vmware, it takes a reboot to use a live CD. A lot of users leave their PCs on all the time, and many just minimize apps instead of closing them before they start a game. How will they get used to 3-minute task switch times, with mandatory closing of all applications?

    • Re:Reboot? (Score:4, Insightful)

      by thenefariousone ( 710805 ) on Monday January 17, 2005 @01:53AM (#11383213) Homepage
      Nein! A lot of people on slashdot leave their PCs on all the time.

      Regular people shut off their computers once they're done with them. Just like they turn off the light when they leave the room.

      They're not running servers. Uptime doesn't mean anything to them.

      And those are the people you need - like it or not.
    • If you have VMware, you can always boot a VM using the live CD :-)

  • Vendetta (Score:5, Interesting)

    by MouseR ( 3264 ) on Monday January 17, 2005 @01:08AM (#11382990) Homepage
    I've been playing Vendetta (vendetta-online.com) for a while now and it's superb.

    I've been playing it on a Mac, but there's also a Linux and Windows version wich is equally beautiful.

    No one doubts Linux could be used as a gaming platform. You guys simply have to sell the idea to game developers.

    • Re:Vendetta (Score:3, Interesting)

      by dave420 ( 699308 )
      And the Mona Lisa could be used as a doorstop - doesn't mean it's financially viable.

      Linux on the home desktop (where games are predominantly played) is a tiny, tiny, TINY percentage of all users out there. Even Macs have a hard time getting good games, and their market share is much highers, with less open source and fewer companies involved (so production is easier/more efficient).

      Expecting a tiny share of the market to dictate what the major players do is arrogant. I'm not being rude, but why would a

  • And the official Torrent: (Score:3, Informative)

    by chadw17 ( 308037 ) on Monday January 17, 2005 @01:09AM (#11382992)
    http://www.tlm-project.org/torrents/llgp/llgp-0.1p re0.iso.torrent

  • Thats all well and good (Score:5, Insightful)

    by tuxter ( 809927 ) on Monday January 17, 2005 @01:09AM (#11382995) Journal
    But I want to play half life. I understand that OS projects take a huge deal of time to get off the ground, but lets face facts, PS2/Cube/Xbox/PC are all gaming platforms. Linux is not, it was never designed as a gaming platform and probably never will be as long as video card manufacturers refuse to open source their drivers. What is the point of porting games to a platform if the likelyhood of them working is minimal. I fully support the idea of trying to make linux a gaming platform, and would dearly love to see it. But IMHO it's not going to happen.
    • Correct me if I'm wrong (and, as this is Slashdot, I have no doubt someone will), but I don't believe Windows was *designed* as a gaming platform. Rather, as it became obvious that PC users desired the ability to do more graphic-based applications, often meaning games, Windows tools such as DirectX became available.

      There is no reason something similar can't happen under Linux. I agree, video card manufacturers keeping closed-source drivers and the ever-present 'which came first' issue of companies not publ

      • Re:Thats all well and good (Score:5, Insightful)

        by WIAKywbfatw ( 307557 ) on Monday January 17, 2005 @03:46AM (#11383548) Journal
        Windows may not have been designed to be a gaming platform, any more than it was designed to be any other kind of platform, but gaming has been around on PCs since way before Windows was around.

        We've evolved past the point where you needed to know how to configure autoexec.bat, config.sys and QEMM to get a DOS-based game to run properly and we've now progressed to the point where you install a game, it self detects your hardware, tells you if it needs updated Windows components (requires DirectX version x, installs that other software once you give it the go-ahead, and is ready to run.

        From hours of messing around to a few simple clicks: don't underestimate the amount of credit that sort of simplicity deserves for the PC gaming market being so big today. Even so, that's a heck of a lot more interaction than is involved in getting a PS2 or other console game up and running.

        Yet compare that to the situation under Linux. If you're an expert, have plenty of time on your hands and enjoy a challenge then I'm sure you've got no problem trying to get games to work. But if you're not an expert, or don't have the time or don't enjoy hitting your head against a brick wall a few dozen times then Linux is not the gaming platform for you.

    • Re:Thats all well and good (Score:4, Insightful)

      by k98sven ( 324383 ) on Monday January 17, 2005 @01:57AM (#11383223) Journal
      PS2/Cube/Xbox/PC are all gaming platforms. Linux is not, it was never designed as a gaming platform and probably never will be as long as video card manufacturers refuse to open source their drivers. What is the point of porting games to a platform if the likelyhood of them working is minimal.

      Being 'designed' as a gaming platform doesn't mean anything. Windows was not designed as a gaming platform either. In fact, games were the last of the old DOS programs to make the shift to windows. That happened because Microsoft cleared the way for them by creating DirectX.

      The open-or-closed status of drivers has relatively little to do with it. It's not a big problem for the graphics card people to recompile their drivers for the major distros. Games are a mass-market thing. So only mass-market Linux (i.e. major distros) are really relevant there anyway. You don't see them releasing drivers for NT 4 either.

      The issue is the API:s. While Direct3D and OpenGL are pretty much on par, DirectX provides quite a lot of other stuff which OpenGL does not. And in those areas, the alternatives like SDL just aren't good enough.

      So what are the options? Develop for DirectX, and you have Windows and the Xbox covered. Develop for OpenGL and you'll probably need to write your own code for networking, keyboard/mouse/joysticks and so on. And rewrite it if you want to support other platforms.

      What the world would really need is a gaming API which could compete with (or be better than) DirectX in every respect, and which is cross-platform. Ideally, you would have a collaboration between Red Hat, SuSE, Apple and Sony. An API supporting Windows and Linux and Apple and the PS2 would certainly be a DirectX-killer. You could develop for four platforms for the price of one.

      Given that scenario, who wouldn't put out a Linux port (even an unsupported one)? It's certainly technically possible. I'm just waiting for someone important to 'get it'.
    • Linux is not, it was never designed as a gaming platform and probably never will be as long as video card manufacturers refuse to open source their drivers.

      WTF are you talking about? nVidia supports their cards on Linux and these cards work perfectly.

  • so... (Score:5, Funny)

    by ltwally ( 313043 ) on Monday January 17, 2005 @01:09AM (#11382996) Homepage Journal
    So, judging from this article, we're supposed to convert people to linux for the games?!
    "Challenge your friends on LLGP, and convert them to Linux!"
    What... was the author of this article making some sort of sick joke? Converting people to linux for the games. Right. What mental asylum did you break out of, pal?

    Next thing, this guy will be telling us to steal OSX users 'cause linux is easier to use...

  • We've got the gaming distros. (Score:4, Interesting)

    by desplesda ( 742182 ) * on Monday January 17, 2005 @01:09AM (#11382997) Homepage
    What the community needs in order to show that 'Linux has game' is to have a group create and publish a full game that people would buy in the shops.

    We have plenty of 'game distro' CDs that contain Neverball, Wesnoth, SuperTux, et al, but we don't have anything that you could get attached to like people get attached to Half-Life, Deus Ex, Diablo.

    Give me a singleplayer game with a plot for Linux! Yes, sir, I am willing to contribute.

    • we don't have anything that you could get attached to like people get attached to Half-Life, Deus Ex, Diablo.

      You could put a whole bunch of DivX porn on a CD, put some sort of plot around it like the crappy Sega CD FMV games did, and call it "Deus Sex".

      Or more seriously, you could make a new DDR mix based on the StepMania engine if you manage to score some song licenses. Roxor Games is doing this with In The Groove, an arcade version of StepMania.

      • you're mixing up deus ex 2 and deus ex 1.

        deus ex 1 was an awesome fps shooter that throwed in some choices and bunch of truly alternative ways through the levels.

        deus ex 2 tried to be the same, but for consoles and dumbed down - WHILE BEING A FUCKING SLIDESHOW ON ANY FUCKING CARD AVAILABLE.

    • Re:We've got the gaming distros. (Score:4, Insightful)

      by nomadic ( 141991 ) <`nomadicworld' `at' `gmail.com'> on Monday January 17, 2005 @01:24AM (#11383080) Homepage
      Give me a singleplayer game with a plot for Linux!

      And make it CHALLENGING. I can't believe how much they've dumbed down games. I remember back in the day where if you didn't solve the damn puzzle, you didn't go any further. And they were HARD. And if you talked to someone in the game you had to use the keyboard; none of this pre-selected sentences to choose.

      Yes, sir, I am willing to contribute.

      I'd definitely contribute to a nice, long, mind-numbingly hard single player game, maybe a System Shock/Deus Ex type FPS. Wouldn't even be that hard, there are available open source 3d engines, not cutting edge anymore but who cares if the game is good.

      The problem, of course, is the same one you always run into in OS projects; the art. Just not enough artistic talent available in the OS world.
      • Give me a singleplayer game with a plot for Linux!

        And make it CHALLENGING. I can't believe how much they've dumbed down games. I remember back in the day where if you didn't solve the damn puzzle, you didn't go any further. And they were HARD. And if you talked to someone in the game you had to use the keyboard; none of this pre-selected sentences to choose.

        You know, you have pretty well described Wesnoth. It is open source too.

        I am not sure how they handle the art collaboration problem but I know the
      • **And make it CHALLENGING. I can't believe how much they've dumbed down games. I remember back in the day where if you didn't solve the damn puzzle, you didn't go any further. And they were HARD. And if you talked to someone in the game you had to use the keyboard; none of this pre-selected sentences to choose.**

        skipped nethack? (if you want eyecandy use the falcons eye version)
      • *I'd definitely contribute to a nice, long, mind-numbingly hard single player game, maybe a System Shock/Deus Ex type FPS. Wouldn't even be that hard, there are available open source 3d engines, not cutting edge anymore but who cares if the game is good. *

        replying again because thought of something....

        a pre-written plot adventure is no fun to develope for several years, if you do it just for fun. it gets a bit old after you've played the bits through for the 20th time. but something like nethack gets over
    • However, I must say that I have changed my mind.

      The game that changed my mind was Wesnoth. It is a superb game and one which has challenged my ideas of on the limits of what open source can accomplish in content-rich areas such as games. Wesnoth is an *awsome* game as far as turn-based strategy games go. The competition doesn't even come close. If Wesnoth was sold in stores, people would buy it. Only thing is-- it is not even 1.0....

      Wesnoth offers days of game play or more. And each release sees new

  • Not a winner (Score:5, Insightful)

    by Staplerh ( 806722 ) on Monday January 17, 2005 @01:10AM (#11383000) Homepage
    Hmm, I think Linux should be promoted as much as possible, but this avenue will probably be a dead end. I dug around on the website, and found this list of supported games... admittedly it is the 'old' list, but still apparently rather accurate. Here is the URL: http://tuxgamers.altervista.org/llgp/games-0.0.1.p hp [altervista.org]

    Now, the simple fact remains that this is insufficient, and Linux can simple not be promoted as a gaming platform at this time. This may be promising news for software developers who may elect to use the Linux platform, but I don't think I'll be able to 'convert my friends to Linux'.

    Although, I must admit such samplings as 'Penguin Solitaire', 'Penguin Minesweeper', 'Galaga' and 'Pingus - Enhanced Lemmings' do sound tempting.. especially the last. I just don't see it as a show stopper, or anything special.
    • though, it can be promoted as a "lots of hassle free old arcade game clones for FREE" platform.

      that's *Exactly* what a lot of people are looking for - and finding the good/playable(non-annoyware) from the thousand or so windows offerings for one genre is hard.

  • Commercial Linux Games (Score:2, Insightful)

    by Anonymous Coward
    The mission of LLGP (Linux Live Game Project) is show to Wintendo users that also Linux can be used to game.
    Many of these open source games for Linux are really great, but what we really need is to attract more commercial companies to develop games for Linux. All jokes aside Doom 3 has great graphics and shows what OpenGL is capable of; So the only exuse companies have to not develop for Linux is sales. Hopefully they would do better then Loki this time around...
    • My understanding of why Loki failed is most (if not all) people are (understandably, I certainly am) unwilling to pay twice to play a game. Stories of management corruption and finantial bungling are more symptoms of Loki's impending doom rather than the cause of their demise.

      My point: for a commercial game to succeed in Linux, the developer has to somehow provide Linux support at no extra cost. A separate download (as per id Software) is acceptable, but bundled in the box (my understanding of how UT2004

  • Tux Racer (Score:4, Interesting)

    by dicepackage ( 526497 ) * <dicepackageNO@SPAMgmail.com> on Monday January 17, 2005 @01:11AM (#11383009) Homepage
    I have tried out tux racer on both Windows and linux and I have noticed that the Windows version runs significantly better. I have a computer with a AMD 3.2 Ghz processor and a Nvidia 6800 GT. When I run Tux Racer on Windows it runs very smoothly. I then tried it in Fedora and it was unbearable. I had the updated drivers for my card installed and all the packages were up to date but it still ran horribly. I wanted to confirm that this was a fluke so I tried this out on my laptop (which runs Mandrake) and got similar results. If people want linux gaming taken seriously then the games will have to be built more reliably. I have also noticed that in order to get anything with 3D support there are often several packages that need to be installed and these aren't always included with most distributions.
    • If people want linux gaming taken seriously then the games will have to be built more reliably.

      It is not the games that need to be "built more reliable". It is the drivers for the video cards from Nvidia and ATI that need to be fixed.

      I use a Radeon 9000 Pro with DRI drivers and Tux Racer runs fine on a 1600x1200 flat panel.

      The DRI drivers proably wont run th Red Orchestar mod that I want to play, but I'll just play it my second Windows-gaming-only machine until the drivers for linux catch up.

    • Re:Tux Racer (Score:2, Informative)

      by theguitarizt ( 773106 )
      there's a script that you can get here [sourceforge.net] called nvcheck to see if your nvidia drivers are installed correctly. You might have to tweak it a bit to make it recognize an Xorg config file if you're using a newer distro, but it should mostly still work and may help you figure out the source of your problem. Tux racer ran fine for me back when I used a TNT2, so it should work just fine on the 6800.

  • List of games included in LLGP (Score:5, Informative)

    by cgenman ( 325138 ) on Monday January 17, 2005 @01:18AM (#11383048) Homepage
    This is from 0.0.1 [altervista.org], but the maintainers claim that it basically hasn't changed.

    [Damn lameness filter, had to re-write post]

    Arcade

    imaze, Abuse SDL, Amphetamine, Armagetron, Atomic Tanks, bomberclone, Bugsquish, Bumprace, bzflag, Chromium, Circus Linux, Egoboo, Galaga, gl-117, Heroes (SDL version), KAsteroids, KBounce,KFoulEggs, KGoldrunner, Kolf, KSirtet, KSmileTris, KSnakeRace, KSpaceDuel, KTron, lbreakout2, Mad Bomber, mangopeeler, mangoquest, Neverball, Neverputt, pinball, Powermanga, Starfighter, SuperTux, Thrust, Toppler, Trophy, Tux: A Quest for Herring, Tuxkart, TuxRacer, WING, X Abuse, Xboing, Xbreaky, Xkobo, XKoules, Xracer racing game, XScavenger, Xscorch, XSoldier, ZBlast

    Adventures

    Falcon's Eye, GGZ, GGZap, Completition Calendar, Fyrdman, Keepalive Control, KGGZ, KTicTacTux, ModSniffer

    Board games

    XBoard-ICS, Atlantik, GnuChess, GtkAtlantik, KBackgammon, KBlackBox, Kenolaba, KMahjongg, KReversi, KWin4, Muehle, Penguin Taipei, Shisen-Sho, Xboard

    Card games

    KPoker, Mah-jong, Penguin Canfield, Penguin Freecell, Penguin Golf, Penguin Solitaire, Penguin Thornq, PySol, Solitario, Tenente Skat, Xmahjongg, Xskat

    Games for children

    Potato guy

    Brain-teasers

    Codebreaker, Enigma, Gtans, Imemory, MirrorMagic, Penguin Mastermind, Penguin Merlin, Penguin Minesweeper, Penguin Pegged, Xjig

    Shooter

    Cube

    Sport

    CannonSmash, Foobiliard

    Strategy

    Freeciv, GNU Gaming Zone, Pingus - Enhanced Lemmings

    Tactics and Strategy

    Boson, Katomic, Kbattleship, KJumpingCube, Klickety, KLines, KMines, Konquest, KSokoban, SameGame

    Tetris and similar

    Cuyo, Frozen-bubble, LTris, Netris , Quadra
  • The mission of LLGP (Linux Live Game Project) is show to Wintendo users that also Linux can be used to game.

    To really cultivate games on Linux, the community first and foremost needs to convince game developers that Linux is a viable platform. Users come later, when there are must-have games they want to play.
    • And to convince game developers that Linux is a viable platform, the community needs to act more mature. Wintendo? Seriously. What is wrong with saying Windows? I doubt any company will develop a game for Linux if it will be associated with a community that refers to Windows users as Wintendo users and Bill Gates as the devil. (Oh, can't forget Micro$oft with a dollar sign!) Maturity is the first step, THEN comes the technical stuff or what have you.
  • The collective outcry from gamers clamoring for this deafens a small cricket.

    Scratch that, a *very* small cricket. About the same size as the list of games worth playing on this live CD.

  • There are good game for Linux. In particular Vega Strike and FreeDroid RPG

    But you know what? It doesn't mean a damn to the commercial industry, the General Public wants its Half Life, and its Halo. Why? Because the commercial gaming industry floods the market with them. I do wish that FOSS Would band together and work to really push the good FOSS games out there and get Linux some exposure, but it won't happen until the Linux distributors get their heads out of their asses and realize that they need to

  • Self-booting games? (Score:3, Insightful)

    by cgenman ( 325138 ) on Monday January 17, 2005 @01:34AM (#11383136) Homepage
    I've always wondered why people don't combine Knoppix with retail games. Doom 3, for example, could boot from the CD directly into itself, no matter what system or OS you ran. The interface would be dirt simple, and boot times could probably be optimized to be bearably fast. You wouldn't have to worry if your game was Longhorn or Win 98 compatible... it just would be.

    Now, you would have to keep your drivers up-to-date, which might be a pain, but it would probably be a smaller pain than supporting every OS and software combination under the sun.


  • kudzu was removed ...and there was much rejoycing.

  • Challenge your friends on LLGP, and convert them to Linux!
    ... and show how you are stuck in 1995? You may have better luck wacking them over the head with a LLGP CD...
  • Seriously, people are making console systems out of old pc's and pac-man technology games, so why not use something like this for it instead.

  • Where is Quake? (Score:3, Insightful)

    by yem ( 170316 ) on Monday January 17, 2005 @02:21AM (#11383313) Homepage
    One, Two and Three. Could probably squeeze in the UT2004 demo as well or even the Doom 3 demo. Show em something they may actually recognise.

    • I'd like a livecd that mounts all drives and starts scanning them for the common install directory of games so it could then pick up on your quake, UT, ET, D3, or any other game that has linux bins, then run it with the (hopefully faster) linux binaries.

      Maybe include the shareware versions of all quakes, but scan all disks for the full pak files and use those if it finds them
  • hahaha.
    hahahaha.
    haha.

    *wipes tears off his eyes*
  • The one unique and compelling game that I've ever played on Linux was 'Koules' [www.ucw.cz] which was a two-D 'push piece around in frame' game with great sound effects and addictive gameplay.

    Does anybody else remember playing Koules? I have tried bringing the old source tarball for it 'forward' into a modern Linux distro, and it just won't build anymore. It might even be time to take a spare machine and roll out an old Slackware, something like Slack 3.4 (with a 1.2.13 kernel) just to play that game. I remember it

  • Games, and Linux and Content of them (Score:3, Insightful)

    by Zombie Ryushu ( 803103 ) on Monday January 17, 2005 @03:44AM (#11383541)
    We are Linux users, and as Linux user we should stop complaining that the commercial industry that cares nothing for us isn't porting games.

    Games are nessessary for this OS to market itself. I really wish we had more people. As someone who has contributed time and energy to Linux gaming I know something very VERY important. We need the Human capital to pump out good games. They don't have to be masterpieces, just reasonably well done, and those of us who are able should contribute more to this OS.

    We really REALLY need Human being pumping out better quality (conservative) code.

    What I mean by conservative code is code that does more with less resources. We need artists and we need ideas. The technology exists and I honestly don't think that it is a lack of Linux's ability to be a good gaming platform, I just don't think people are taking advantage of the green and unharvested pastures that are the potential for Linux games.

    We need volunteers producing quality GPLed content to create a desireable product. Its time that the people step up to the plate and show what they are capable of when the effort is put forward.

    Stop asking the commercial gaming industry to do it for us, they won't.

  • absolutly no games run on linux (Score:3, Funny)

    by killerface ( 573659 ) on Monday January 17, 2005 @04:28AM (#11383677) Homepage
    well while all you are complaining about how you can't play games in linux im gonna go play quake 3 arena or maybe doom 3 or maybe HL2 or maybe UT2004. I dunno there are just too many choices esspecially with cedega [transgaming.com].

    No no you guys are right linux doesnt run games, dont even try. just stick to windows. please. It'll at least keep #linuxhelp clean.

  • The latest wine..... (Score:3, Interesting)

    by HogynCymraeg ( 624823 ) on Monday January 17, 2005 @04:50AM (#11383744)
    ....has been running a lot of windows OpenGL demos that I've downloaded at very good speeds. Even the Torque SDK runs over wine (Not that you need to as there is a native version, but it was amazing to see nevertheless). I know l33t users look down their nose at wine, but seeing a windows opengl demo running with music at 568fps in a linux window in X is pretty impressive.

  • But are "Wintendo" people looking for games? (Score:3, Interesting)

    by Glowing Fish ( 155236 ) on Monday January 17, 2005 @05:37AM (#11383866) Homepage

    I am a pretty hardcore Wesnoth player (I've beaten TRoW and HttT! Which probably doesn't mean much to many of you.) I've been playing TBS for ten+ years, and Wesnoth is one of the most involving and challenging games for people who like strategic concepts. (Its also a nice if somewhat cliched RPG).


    But Wesnoth is not what the average Windows or console gamer is looking for. Because for the most part, "games" are not "games" in the sense of a ruleset and concept to be mastered. Most games are not even tasks at hand eye coordination. Most "games" are interactive adventures with small aspects of both rulesets and hand-eye coordination, but mostly depending on graphics and sound to make the player feel immersed. Not that there is anything wrong with that, but for people who are looking for games that immerse them in a world, playing a game like Wesnoth, which is based around mastering a ruleset, and mostly projecting the world with your imagination, is going to be a disappointment.

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