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Games Entertainment

Westwood Linux Petition for C&C II 79

Posted by Hemos from the heh-mail-servers-can-crash-too dept.
dr bacardi writes "A link is up on the Linux Games page that is a request for mail-in petitions to get Command & Conquer II: Tiberian Sun ported over to Linux. The reason for mail-ins is to, "ensure that no 'slashdot effects' occur." Thanks to Kevin Scruggs, a Linux geek from Westwood for doing this. " Kevin e-mailed me as well-let's see if we can crash the mail server *grin*
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Westwood Linux Petition for C&C II More

Westwood Linux Petition for C&C II

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  • Blizzard is making enough money to move into a huge new building (Just did I think?), and from what I have heard from people working there is no interest at all in porting their games to Linux. If you are going to petition Blizzard people will have to be professional, courteous, bla, bla, bla... and it will probably be an uphill battle the whole way if they don't just dump the mail, er.. whatever. I'd put my money on wine.
  • Considering that I still cannot buy one here in Finland, and the resaler says they've been 'delayed' for the second month in a row, I would guess they've sold pretty well :-) (or at least above expectations..)

    --
    Pirkka

  • ... I'd put my money in companies that do support Linux. Let's face it, some companies just will never port their products to Linux or use Linux for simple network services (namely, my last job :)). If a company shows interest, fill out these sort of surveys only if you really intend on buying it, not warezing it once it's released. If they absolutely refuse, move on to a better target.
  • Ok, so it seems Cavedog is being uncooperative. My bad for posting without doing the research. Still, if C&CII comes out for Linux, I'll buy it, if only to encourage Cavedog towards the Path of Righteousness. I know, it is important.
  • Spoken like a true Anonymous Coward. Spoken like an idiot is more like it. Oh wait! Everquest? Spoken like someone who is wasting their life away. Hello!!! Wake up!!! C&C games have always been top sellers. They aren't doing a Linux version. This is a petition to get them to do one. This game will sell just fine without a Linux version. Perhaps C&C was before your time? Go back to Neverquest.
  • Yeah, snail mail bites. Why bother wasting $.33, a sheet of paper, and an envelope. Too much work to mail a letter... Mommy and Daddy pay all the bills for me... I don't want to move from my computer. And while I'm on the subject, voting is just too much effort too. I think I'll just not care. It's so much easier to push a button... that means that I'm serious right? (All of the above is a sarcastic as it comes.)
    Seriously, if you don't aren't going to buy the game then don't mail it in. Post that instead. If you truly gave a rat's furry arse whether you'd buy it or not, you'd post an encouraging message.
  • Posted by NJViking:

    Do you have to run it as root or can you run it as a user? I've noticed the screen blacks out sometimes.

    Tom
  • I question the timing of the this campaign. While it's a good idea, it's not a good idea at the current moment. C&C II Has been delayed for SO long (I know someone who preordered it like 2 years ago and they tell me it's had about 5 different release dates) that bugging the developers for a Linux version this moment may not be such a great idea. Maybe once they actually get ANY version of it finished then we can think about it.
  • Let me get this straight. You think that a *2D* RTS like C&C2 will do well in the market of RTS games with the likes of BattleZone 2, Metal Fatigue, Force Commander, etc looming on the horizon? (I saw BZone2 at the Beatdown [planetquake.com] and it looked awesome)

    Westwood is beating a dead horse (the C&C 2D engine and interface) and trying to get as much $$$ for it while they still can.

    Why not just help the Golgotha team finish their poject? At least that's open source.

    Personally I'd rather see BattleZone 2 on Linux.
  • I was gonna yell without thinking something like "q2, q3, kingpin, and lots of other binary only software works fine with . . ." then I remembered these games work fine RedHat, and I have never tested them on a different distrobution on linux.

    For a game like quake3, it links to libMesa.so, and a lot of X libraries that just about every distro has. And glibc. Most newer distro's include all of that. The only problem would be 3d drivers. For a game like quake3, users have to do a little work getting the 3d drivers, as I don't think Voodoo, G200, or TNT drivers ship with any distros. Same for every distrobution. I guess when the next batch come out, this will no longer be a problem. I guess the main problem now is getting the drivers faster, and generally avialable.

    Including drivers, and static linking seems to not be a problem for these game makers under windows, so that is a silly excuse to not port to linux.
  • This is what I wrote.

    (Modifications to distribution...)

    Addition of voice recognition and feedback systems. Hmmm... maybe it'd be too much to ask, but saying "Unit 1, move to coordinates 40, 25!"... would be incredibly cool.

    (Advice on porting)

    If there was just a backdoor way to provide commands, and get map and positions of units, we could write amazing macros to get planes to attack from all angles, make ground units break into perfect pincer attacks, and set up our own voice control systems...

    You have to understand, you see, that Linux is not just an OS, it's a philosophy. It's about not having pointless limitations.

    If you could bear that in mind and make more than just a bare port, you would be greatly respected.

    The main reason for Quake's popularity over other similar games was just how much it could be fiddled with and modified.
  • Redstorm's [redstorm.com] new 3D RTS Force21 looks like it was designed to be the definitive non-turn-based land war simulation (even though its set 15-20 odd years from now)... they even had a Persian Gulf General as an advisor/designer.
  • Remember that these are the same people that have taken 3+ years to come out with a sequel.
    -The Red Alert hack doesn't count.
    I don't think westwood is even ready to tackle linux.

    Wich raises the question, without directX, what do linux game devolopers use? I know DX works in WINE, but that can't be used. Should there be directX, or a wrapper library for linux?

    I loved C&C, but maybe they've just kept me waiting too long.
  • That and diablo 1 and 2
  • Jeez, I don't even own a printer. What's the deal? It seems odd a company, whose sole products are digital, won't allow electronic petitioning. Assuming the /. effect is the result of individual s responding, what is the difference between that vote and a 33 cent vote? Are we not to be trusted to get off our butts and go buy the game? Screw you Westwood. Though I enjoyed the Commie 64 games :)
  • Oh well. :)
  • This is important, it is just not a game, but linux Growing even bigger (user base). If the 15-16 year old kids realize they can play all there games on linux, they will swith. When the start college they are going to be extremely comfortable with linux. When they leave college (or before even) they will be great hackers and most likely contribrute code under the GPL for linux.

    When I was younger, I heard linux this, linux that. I didn't change, I keep running windows. They said quake is avaible for linux. I switched, have NOT used Win(anything) unless I had to (IE. customer calls and doesn't know how to install modem, etc. etc.)

    Even if you look at the kids on IRC, they use linux, but they also still use windows! The most common answer they give is "Yea I dual boot -- Just to play games though" Lets switch them over so they can free up 500-1000 megs on their hard drives.
  • Kingdoms is actually a little lame. Think Annihilation "themed". :P

    I wouldn't mind having Cavedog's NEXT game to come out on Linux... which would be Amen: The Awakening? (great, another FPS? :P)
  • I don't know about you guys, but if C&C: TS was ported to linux I would buy it in a second. I still use windows, I wish that all the games that I have would work for Linux but they don't. That is why I still have to use windows. If we can get Westwood to comit to porting linux, we can hopefully get other vendors to port there games too and that would be great.
  • I was actually gonna ask on here why AoE or RoR aren't ported on Linux... But DUH! Now I realize that this is Mirosoft we're talking about...
  • Yeah.. but games like that aren't (or shouldn't be) 2D.

    Afterall... Those games do alot of on the fly rendering for multiple heights. It's a 255 height game. Why not make it with a much better control. The units are also 3d, and would benifit. As for the rest, it would just be a display once and leave it situation. Not to mention, most video cards could easily handle this...
  • Comment removed based on user account deletion
  • Fortunately, most USPS employess "crash" just as easily.
  • I miss interpreted the comments (and got to the page after the fact) and thought e-mail was involved, not snail mail. Hmmm, wonder if this is a conspiracy to keep the USPS relevant?:)
  • like ANYONE uses regular mail these days...

    stamps? what are those?

    (see earlier article about USPS)

    -geekd
  • Well, lessee:
    someone mentioned http://www.eletter.com in the
    USPS article, which lets you send postal mail from your computer.
    Combine that with a bunch of opinionated Linux freaks and a petition that that can be only signed by snailmail...
  • It handles media like a piece of cake.

    <joke>What? Dropping crumbs all over the place?</joke>

    Actually, I have no opinion whatsoever about BeOS (other than I probably won't ever use it). This is NOT a flame, nor is it meant to be flaimbait.

  • People use regular mail less and less, even to pay bills. Now with most banks you can get all your bills taken straight out of your account, so about all I can come up with for USPS is all my wonderful junkmail.

    Once the USPS goes under I am sure the Government will find a way to tax us for email.
  • The USPS isn't run by the government (at least, not anymore). I think they became independant in 1982 or sometime around there
  • What, scared of the thundering hordes of slashdotters invading your server? Aw, diddums.

    Actually, in all seriousness, I can understand thier concern: email is much more likely to get through when the volume gets high (if the server crashes, the sending SMTP servers will retry later) and it's much easier to get a valid count from email (hmmm, 29978245 posts from baz@foo.bar? OK, he's keen, but that's still one vote).

  • BeOS doesnt have a large as user-base though

    No, it doesn't, but that doesn't mean that it won't eventually, and having games available for it would probably help it grow. Though I myself will probably never use BeOS, I can imagine someone like my three brothers using it. One's working in a high end photography shop (for professional photographers) and the other two are musicians (mostly guitar), though I don't know how interested they are in using a computer in the first place (they're in Australia, I'm in New Zealand: communication is a little strained to say the least:).

  • As of now there are only 200 petitions generated! Come on you slackers, get your ass over there, generate the form, and mail it off! Don't you want a Linux version of the greatest strategy game of the next millenium?? We need to petition Blizzard for a port of Starcraft too. Listen fellows, the only reason I boot up into Windows is because I spend half my time at home playing Starcraft (at work I use DebianPPC). PLEASE PLEASE go fill out this petition, you will save me a alot of headache not having to boot into Win98SR2 that crashes every fricking day!
  • My hatred for snail mail outweighs said love. :

    There is no reason the Internet can't be used in this case. If Id Software can distribute Q3A these guys can take a few thousand emails/web hits.

  • Great, but pleeeeeeeeease be civil (Score:4)

    by grappler ( 14976 ) on Wednesday July 21, 1999 @07:13PM (#1790868) Homepage
    By all means, go and petition them, but when you write your email, keep some things in mind:

    - They are being very kind to this community as a whole by taking requests like this at all.
    - They do not _have_ to do anything. They are a company, and they sell games. Make a good arguement by telling them that demand is there and this would be in their interests.
    - Nobody likes hate mail. If you get hate mail, when was the last time you paid more attention to a letter because it insulted/threatned you?
    - Give the message at least one once-over. If it is full of spelling/grammar errors, the reader's respect for the writer will go down. Messages full of errors make us all look bad.

    That's about it.
  • I could be an idiot, but don't/didn't people use the same argument in reference to Linux as well?

    "Not as as large a user base."

    Who knows.

    ken kaniff..

    from connecticut.
    kaniff -- Ralph Hart Jr
  • The only thing is: they don't want flames, or the /. effect. They probably figure that if you are serious about it (like I am, I'm going to send mine off today), you will probably get the game, and not just pirate it or something.

    I know I would buy it in a second. Come on, Westwood! There IS a market out there!
  • W[h]ich raises the question, without directX, what do linux game dev[e]lopers use? I know DX works in WINE, but that can't be used.

    Why not? Even if you don't want to require the program be set up, there's the WineLib library, and I believe it's BSD licensed. Apparently Corel is putting resources into getting Wine/WineLib improved from pre-Alpha quality. Still, it's not a perfect emulation yet by any means.
  • Quick FYI:
    SuSE includes drivers (and Glide support) for 3DFX cards since at least version 5.3.
  • hehe... I got the Linux Q3Test working beutifully on my k6-266 with a TNT2 card :)

    Btw... I'm using FreeBSD too...
  • With support in XFree86 for the 3D stuff, and support in both Linuxies, and FreeBSD for full fledged OpenGL acceleration...

    Why not write stuff in OpenGL?

    (xracer rules btw!)
  • Kingpin, Quake III, and C&C II are your idea of computer gaming nervana? Wow.... This is a list of three computer games I'd never buy (Windows, MacOS, Linux, BeOS, or console).
  • Well, you're not sending an email. You have to actually mail it in, I believe. This is to cut down on such things as you warn against. Any flamers here going to go to the trouble of getting a stamp?

    And what is there to be possibly mad about anyway?
  • How about Microprose's Original M1 Tank Platoon? :) (No German tanks though) Hey, at least you won't have to worry about a 3d card.
  • Check out the Close Combat series. Hellishly accurate. Great fun.
  • Anyone know how many copies of CivCTP/Linux have actually been sold?

  • Mac has always been dead except for a few zealots.

    Sorry to say that, but it's true.

    Beos? What Bee? What OS?

    Good luck to them though!
  • I just saw RH6 for $59 at Costco. Right next to it was Mandrake 6 for $25.

    And right next to that was Win98 SE. *EACH* of the Linux distros had more boxes than Win98!!! :-)
  • is too...isn't it?
    IIRC, it started out independently, but then the government took in it to insure quality of service (i.e., so the postal company wouldn't just stuff and resell it or smash it up or something)
    Sort of like gambling...darn mafia was stealing all the citizen's money that *belonged* to the government, to the gov took over gambling...it's now called "the lottery", and makes the gov rich instead of the mafia...
  • That's because people actually buy Win98, ergo, fewer boxes on the shelf.

  • Games on Linux (Score:2)

    by Anonymous Coward
    Ugg, I just went through hell and I still cant get q3test to work on my debian computer. I am not computer illiterate. Is it just me or is there like 5,000 things that can or can't come with a "standard" Linux installation. Right now ls -1|wc -l tells me there are 423 files in /usr/lib. What damn mess.

    People don't port to Linux because Linux is a kernel, there are 20 or 30 different Linuces out there most of which have different version of different librarys/compilers/configuration files/programs...etc.

    There isnt even some kind of standard packaging system, other than .tar.gz (bzip2 isnt in every distribution yet) and I would imagine that most people don't want to tar xzvf and follow installation instructions in a text file.

    I can understand why people are starting to support Red Hat Linux instead of just Linux.

    Although they could always include their own librarys for everything with their game and their own installation system. Sound familiar? Win32 maybe?

    What is with LSB? How long does it take to say, use rpm, use glibc2.0 use...etc. Don't include the extra 500megs of stuff in the main install sequence.

    It seems like someone needs to create a standard dist with only essentials so users and developer's don't have to wade through crap before trying to accomplish something.

    Anonymous Coward of course.
  • Westwood gets a million requests for a linux version of their software, fron linux zealots that want every possible piece of software for linux. Westwood then duitifully ports it over. Then, not a single Linux user buys it since it's not 'free software'.
  • I must've been confused when I read hemo's remark about 'crashing the mail server'. Obviously, I see now that that was a joke. Feelin' like an idiot...

    To answer your question: what is there to be mad about? Obviously, there is nothing to be mad about, but you might be surprised by some of the stupid things people will write. Many companies such as this will get hate mail/threatning messages. People will write them simply because they can.
  • Myth II is currently in the works from Loki. So RTS is not that far away. Plus, there is a faction that splitered off off the Altima/WorldForge project that went RTS.
  • I would really love to see this game released for Linux. It would be a nice addition to the (short) list of commercial Linux games.

    But, what we really need is programs like Quicken. Petitioning for games is somewhat of a noble cause. But, why can't we go for something useful? I dual-boot Windows 98 and Linux. The only things that I do in 98 are run Quicken and games. I think that we should focus our efforts on something other than demanding more games.

    Linux doesn't need to be labelled as a gaming only platform. These are delicate times for Linux. If we can get more "business" applications, it would help make Linux look better. We need commercial distributors to realize that Linux is a viable option rather than just a toy.
  • I used to love C&C. Then along came Red Alert, with some major improvements, and some minor regressions. Warcraft and Starcraft were good too. Then I played Total Annihilation from Cavedog [cavedog.com], and nothing will be the same again. I haven't really seen much of Cavedog's new game, Kingdoms, but if you want to petition anyone, petition the best!
  • I installed beos, it like a linux mac hybrid.
    It is harder to install drivers than under linux and widows(combined) I don't like to see icons appear on the desktop when I put a cd in. I found no use for it, its not free, and its annoying.

    The only thing I liked about be is that it boots in 2 seconds.
  • How about a petition to to port Warcraft II Battle.Net Edition to Linux?

    A bit of background: Warcraft II was an immensely entertaining real-time strategy game. It came out several years ago (1994?) and was written (as most games were at the time) for the DOS platform. For me it was the first multiplayer, non-first person shooter game that was truely enjoyable.

    At any rate, the game is such a classic that Blizzard, the game publisher, is porting it to Win32 and adding support for it's multiplayer gaming service, Battle.Net.

    IMHO, it would be the perfect test bed for porting their software to Linux. But unforunately, they have expressed no interest in Linux ports for their other games in the past. Maybe a petition would change that...
  • Ya, taking the time to fill out the petition and then print it and mail it snail-mail may seem like an effort. Good. It's supposed to be. I'm thinking the slashdot effect they wish to avoid is the one that thousands of Linux proponents will bombard them with demands for a Linux port via email, but the majority of them will not buy the product if they did. However, if you are willing to take the time to mail it in this shows more seriousness. I agree. We have to start this somewhere. Actually, it's been started by Loki with Civ:CTP, Quake(fill in the version), and Kingpin. But let's keep it up. I would encourage all to take the effort to mail this in and buy the game. It's going to be a great game. Keep this in mind. Command & Conquer games have been top sellers. Tiberian Sun will be one too. If Westwood gets enough demand to port this to Linux and it sells well enough, then they'll consider new games for Linux with much less (if any) debate. So lick that stamp and stick it. Thanks.

  • /.-ed? (Score:1)

    by thimo ( 36102 )
    I can already see the NYT headlines in front of me:

    Postman slashdotted

    The world won't ever be the same again!

    Thimo

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