Status Quo of Linux games

Status Quo of Linux games

After 14 months of beta testing, what happened to Valve's new gaming platform?

Since the advent of the Linux operating system in the 1990s s, even the most influential figures in this circle have to admit that the open-source Linux platform is indeed not competitive in the gaming field. Che Dean, the website editor for Linux game website Rootgamers, said, "Looking Back around 2010, there are only two options to play games on Linux. Play some open-source games, such as super tux kart, or use the WINE simulator to run Windows games ."

If you are an old Linux User, they can tell you the same story with tears. Ryan C. Gordon, a senior Linux programmer, said, "for a long time, I have only been porting games by myself. I have done my best, but this industry cannot be promoted by myself ." Gordon has transplanted 75 games to Linux over the past 15 years. Liam Dawe, the editor of Gaming on Linux, agrees that "over the years, there have been very few commercial games for Linux ."

About 2010, The gaming industry of The Linux operating system experienced slow changes. The Humble Indie Bundle launched released The Linux version at The same time, all versions after the game have the Linux version (and Linux users have spent a lot of money on the game ). At the same time, services such as Desura and Ubuntu Software Center have also emerged, allowing Linux gamers to access a few user-friendly stores that can purchase and manage Linux games.

However, it allows Linux users to enjoy nearly 1000 professional and commercialized platforms from Valve. Dean said, "at the end of 2013, Valve released the SteamOS test version, starting with this change. After years of development in games, we can finally see the figure of a large gaming company. It not only transplanted PC games to Linux, but also developed a Linux-based game operating system. This is an exciting moment for Linux users and a turning point for Linux games ."

Now, more than a year has passed the SteamOS internal test, and the new Linux game community remains cautious and optimistic about this gaming platform that does not require a Microsoft operating system. Despite technical and commercial operation problems, Valve has changed the Linux game industry from "basically no game" to "indeed some games, in addition, the number of games can be increased.

A large company like Valve started to support Linux games, which has a significant impact on developers in developing Linux games. "I have always thought that Linux requires a large user base to allow developers to develop games with confidence. SteamOS has made a perfect table rate," Dawe said. "For a long time, developers have been asking me how to distribute games across the platform. Now they don't need to worry about this."

"Distribution of games to Linux is a big problem because Linux and PC are different," said Carlo Jez, a programmer at Croteam. Distribution directly on Steam completely avoids this problem, because we know that necessary resource libraries are installed on all systems, and the game can run smoothly ." Croteam's CTO said the Valve's SteamOS operating system provided "key content that is sufficient for the stable operation of platform games, so that we can ensure that the games we develop can run on everyone's computers ."

Croteam has been involved in the development of Linux games since 2001 and has been transplanted to games such as hero sam I. Nowadays, almost every developer will consider developing a Linux version for a Linux user when developing a game. It took many years to achieve cross-platform development. Ladavac said that the company's software development and graphics tools rely heavily on Windows DirectX and Direct3D. But now, Ladavac says it is no longer difficult to develop computer games on the entire platform. "OpenGL is already available on Windows, and OpenGL is also available on 99% of Linux computers, so it is not a problem to develop a Linux version ."

The same is true for the Aspyr Media Team. This team is famous for porting PC games to Mac. Since the launch of SteamOS, they have released six new games, this includes the 2 K game masterpiece "no home" and "Civilization" series. Ian Bullard, a Linux engineer of Aspyr, said, "Because OpenGL is supported, developers of Mac systems have completed 90% of the work for us. The first Linux version did take a lot of effort, but the more tasks you have done, the shorter the porting time. Now it is much faster to transplant a file than before ."

Even gaming companies that don't want to spend a lot of time and energy porting can re-compile the game by using common engines. Such games are doing well on Linux. Gordon pointed out, "the development team has released many excellent Linux games, but the team does not have any Linux experts. In the Unity editor, you only need to click the 'output to Linux 'button to complete the work easily. We don't have any good Linux users, but the output Linux version runs normally ."

He also said, "it helped us a lot when mainstream game development engines Support generating Linux versions. Many gaming companies that do not care about the Linux operating system around 2005 are now willing to talk about game porting. Unity, unreal 4, Source 2, and Cryengine are all willing to provide simple porting functions for some games ."

Game performance problems

If there is a better driver and more detailed optimization work, the Linux version of survival 2 may be better than the PC version.

While SteamOS makes it easy for many games to port Linux, there are still some problems to be overcome to make the transplanted games run smoothly on SteamOS. Among the most prominent problems, even if the Valve and hardware manufacturers have spent many years to solve the problem, the driver is still a big data.

Dawe said, "AMD's closed-source driver is very poor in Linux operating systems. Their open-source drivers run very stably, but there is still some distance from the best performance. The performance of Unity engine games in Linux is also relatively low. Considering that many games use the Unity engine for development, this issue deserves attention ."

Theoretically, Linux games provide better performance than PCs under the same hardware conditions because the system consumes less resources. Valve also proves this point. Compared with the PC version of the Linux transplant version of "survival Path 2", the frame rate is 4% higher than that of the PC version. Although the increase is very small, it is a selling point for those gamers.

However, without optimized drivers and development tools, the gaming industry developed by General developers cannot see this small improvement. "If gaming companies optimize their games in both Windows and SteamOS, I believe the number of frames on SteamOS is higher, but I think this requires a change of thinking," said Bullard of Aspyr ."

Croteam's Ladavac distance describes the Linux game performance problems caused by driver problems. "At first we encountered a high-resolution problem. We thought it was incredible. How could the resolution affect different drivers? The problem may be caused by OpenGL. the OpenGL compiler in the Linux graphics card driver is less optimized than the compiler in DirectX. The progress has been slow for so many years. After all, this kind of thing is very complicated, with a large amount of engineering, and different hardware needs to be supported ...... It takes a long time for Linux drivers to catch up with DirectX performance ."

Small user groups in small markets

Even if Valve and other companies make a lot of efforts, the number of games in Linux has also exploded, and the gaming community in Linux is still very small. Linux game industry insiders said that the Linux game market is about 1-2% of the Windows game market. This is from the previous 0, after years of development to 1-2%, but from the business perspective, there is great potential.

Aspyr Vice President Elizabeth Howard said sales of games transplanted to Linux are about half of sales of transplanted Mac games. This is enough to make them confident to continue developing the Linux version. She said, "If developers think that developing a game for Mac is not worthwhile, then no one may develop a game for Linux ."

Howard said she tried to promote the Linux business to the manufacturers who transplanted Mac games. She said that the Linux game porting business has already performed well. "Porting to Linux won't cause a decline in sales, nor can it be sold out in one copy. When I am marketing, I will say, 'Who knows about the future? It's better to take the market first. '"

However, some major developers in the gaming industry are still reluctant to transplant their masterpiece to Linux, because there are too few users in Linux. This means that if gaming players want to play a game, they must stick to the Windows platform, and developers also get attention and sales on the Windows platform.

Croteam's Ladavac believes that if the game manufacturer first develops the host version and then releases the PC version, there is no doubt that the priority of Linux is placed at the end. "After developing the Windows version, the manufacturer will consider the Linux version. It also gives the manufacturer reason not to develop the Linux version. Linux sales may be 10% of PC sales, and PC sales may be 10% or less of host sales ."

"Unfortunately, this won't change unless Valve releases the full version of SteamOS and high-quality Steam games," Dean said. "I doubt whether developers decide whether to develop the Linux version depends on the market sales, rather than the difficulty of game porting ."

For SteamOS, how long will beta take?

Valve Problems

There is no doubt that Valve makes the originally gloomy Linux game community a little dynamic. However, the slow development progress of Valve may make the Linux game market not go backwards. Last year, the internal beta test of SteamOS gave the Valve Time development community a boost.

SteamOS also makes the Steam Machines game box useful. This Linux game host is as easy to use and can be upgraded as a PC. After the spark flashed at CES last year, Steam Machine had no news. Some hardware manufacturers cannot wait, so they have to release their own Windows game boxes. The innovative Steam Controller game Controller developed by Valve can provide users with a live room gaming experience without a keyboard or mouse, but the design has been being changed during the beta test.

Valve declined to comment, but said it was discussing "new living room game devices" and will be released together with the SteamVR virtual display helmet at the March game developer conference. In any case, the silence of Valve for a few months makes people wonder if they are giving up the SteamOS and Linux gaming markets.

Ladavac said, "from the outside world, it seems like this, but in my opinion, their pace has not stopped. Not only is Steam itself, but it also needs to constantly modify the driver. It also needs to consider the game distribution aspect. When the official SteamOS version is released, the game inventory must be ready for use. There are still many things that have not been solved and the progress is slow, but the results can be seen while waiting ."

Everyone is following Valve, and many people are willing to give Valve more time to improve the system. Aspyr's Blair said, "we also have a deep respect for Valve's intention to make the products ready. We fully believe that the release was postponed for good intentions. Any product must take the first step. As a game player, we admire Valve's practices ."

Dawe said, "the Steam Machine cannot be successful in an instant, and Valve knows this very well. If you want to launch the Linux game market, you have to start the first shot, and you need more games. Valve has always been very supportive of products (early half-life games are still updated), so I think it is slow but stable ."

If Valve can solve the technical and commercial sales problems of SteamOS and Steam Machine, many gamers can "occasionally play Linux Games ". However, the above people told me that these players are unlikely to give up on the Windows gaming platform.

"My attitude is that the best desktop gaming platform can run all applications and games," Gordon said. Many Linux have not been able to find easy-to-use email, text processing, and instant messaging applications until now. To play games, they switch to Windows. Therefore, it is unlikely that Windows gamers can switch to Linux to play games ."

But for those who Linux is the main machine, they can finally play some games on this platform with the help of Valve. "The worst case has passed, and the problem of having a chicken or an egg is also solved," Gordon said. The platform must have other players to play the game, but the premise is that someone wants to play the game on the platform. Valve gives developers clear confidence that Linux games are worth mentioning ."