GOG.com To Add Linux Support 55
jones_supa writes "More great news for Linux gamers: following the footsteps of Steam, GOG.com is preparing delivery of Linux games. They expect to start doing so this autumn. The officially supported distributions will be Ubuntu and Mint. Right now, they are performing testing on various configurations, training up their teams on Linux-speak, and generally preparing for the rollout of at least 100 titles — DRM-free, as usual. This will update some of the catalog's existing games with a Linux port and bring new ones to the collection. Further information on specific games is yet not known, but GOG invites fans and customers to their community wishlist for discussion."
Re:Kudos to them, but... (Score:5, Interesting)
The old DOS games is for starters. The DX stuff is simply using the Linux port of games that are coming out now for many games. Except instead of relying on the developer to test their Linux builds somehow, they test on Ubuntu and Mint to make sure it at least works there (heaven forbid some game developers merely recompile and ship, or use some oddball Linux config and "works for me!").
It's really an extension of what they did for OS X - DOSbox games are inherently supported, other games are on a case-by-case basis on whether or not a port exists.
This should rope in literally a handful of crotche (Score:4, Interesting)
This should rope in literally a handful of crotchety old nerds. I almost decided not to buy stuff from GOG because they didn't already package for Linux, and I imagined that it would sometimes be a pain in the ass to make the games work even though it should be easy because I've written dosbox configs before, etc. And lo, I was right. The dosbox configs for example have no consistency in the style department, so you actually have to understand them in order to write the new one. That's just a waste of space in my brain that I could be using for something useful, like Firefly trivia. So I wound up only buying the games I really felt I needed, or games which were a buck, because I would then run them in a XP VM. So huzzah, GOG. I am likely to spend more money with you in the future.
Re:Kudos to them, but... (Score:5, Interesting)
Not very hard technologically for them if its only the old dos games which they already distribute with dosbox to run properly even on windows.
This closes an even sillier gap to be honest; because GoG has for quite some time expanded beyond old games to embrace indie games, and it was a bit of a goof to not support linux versions of games that were already natively available on Linux.
I ended up, for example, choosing to buy FTL via the HumbleStore (back before there even was a humble store, and there were just those wierd 'secret' links you could use.) because although GoG has FTL, they only had the Mac and PC; and I wanted to buy something that gave me access to all 3 platforms.
So while it will be great to see what progress GoG can make on on the old DOS (and old windows catalogs) its just great news that we'll be able to get the native linux release of any indies we buy there now. This is a real boost to their indie catalog, much of which is already linux native, and all they have to do is add the downloads.
Steam Machine? (Score:4, Interesting)
I wonder how hard it will be to play these games on a Steam Machine. The quantity of Linux games available will make a big difference in the success or failure of that project.
Re:It's A Shame (Score:2, Interesting)
Anyway, it's not a shame that they support a specific distro, as there is no such thing as a "generic linux". Different libc versions, different set of patch for the same version of some libraries, different config locations, different way to handle very simple stuff... Although there is some "standardization", mainly for the visible stuff (standard way to add menu in every desktop environment...).
And officially supporting one distribution doesn't mean it won't work almost anywhere. Back when steam started by supporting only Ubuntu, it was relatively painless to launch it on almost anything (as long as it was x86). It just mean that they focus on *support* in a relatively well-known environment.