Tribes 2 For Linux Reviewed 78
lotion writes: "Tribes 2 is finally here, and not only do we have a fantastic Windows version, but folks, the Linux version is here and waiting for our official review.
So we enlisted the help of Woody Hughes, the former Senior Editor of Maximum Linux Magazine, to do the official review. Will he wax poetic on the injustice that is Tribes, or will we actually get to see the gentler and more cuddly side of the Woodman? Read the full review at Maximumlinux.org."
Re:linux needs more games (Score:1)
PS: Is anybody else bugged by retarted games where they have 3d graphics but don't need it at all?
This is not a troll™ (Score:3)
Maximum Linux? (Score:5)
- A.P.
--
Forget Napster. Why not really break the law?
Re:Barfight between John Romero and Carmack after (Score:1)
late review (Score:3)
as the site seems to be slashdotted - those interested in T2, go to any review you want. the installer and auto-updater are Loki gtk+ apps, but once you are inside the game, the windos and Linux versions look, feel and play 100% identical. unfortunately, down to the occasional crash ("unhandled exception" on windos, segfault on Linux).
Re:Whoo. That was empty. (Score:4)
all video card tuning is done in-game, exactly as in the windos version. one thing you should know is that if you want to play in 32bit (instead of 16bit), you have to start your X with 32 or 24 bit depths (startx---depth24).
32bit is heavily recommended, because you get ugly z-buffer effects ("jaggy" shorelines, for example) in 16bit.
other than that, refer to the appropriate docs for installing the drivers for your card (e.g. there are readme's inside the nvidia packages.
network play is good and performance on the same machine is about equal (some say slightly better) to the windos version. I have both installed and there is no noticeable difference.
one difference between windos and Linux is that whereas in the windos version you put scripts and other add-ons into the main game directory, in Linux you have a ~/.loki/tribes2, so different people can actually use the same machine and have different scripts, soundpacks, etc. installed. also, when it hangs (which it sometimes does, on both Linux and windos), you can ssh in an killall -9 tribes2 and almost always you get your machine back without a reboot. so in some OS specific ways, the Linux version is clearly superior to the windos one.
there should be little difference between distros, at least all loki games I've bought so far worked equally good on suse and debian and I would be surprised if T2 is any different.
Faster than on windos? (Score:1)
I notice the system requirements are listed as being the same. Has anyone else done a side-by-side comparison like this?
Re:Whoo. That was empty. (Score:1)
Much easier no?
I always knew... (Score:1)
Re:Want to find Tribes 2 games? (Score:2)
Okay, I haven't used the Tribes2 one, but the browsers in, say, Descent3 and Quake3 suck. Especially for q3, where the literally thousands of servers is impossible to sort through without the nice xqf interface.
Plus, if you use an out-of-game browser, then you can go check email while the servers refresh
A Disappointment (Score:4)
If all they're going to support is Nvidia, that's fine, but they should SAY SO on the system requirements page. The only thing it says is OpenGL card with 4 Meg video memory. Even though I meet these requirements easily, I don't consider the game playable.
On my hardware configuration described above, the framerate sometimes drops inexplicably from (subjective guess) 15 down to 2 fps for several seconds at a time at random moments during the game. That's no fun when you're in the middle of a battle.
On the default quality settings, the graphics themselves are nothing to rave about either. Chunky polygons reminiscent of pre-3d accelerated flight simulators. Abrupt and unnatural changes in shading. It reminds me of old DOS VGA games from the 386 era. (Sometimes even the immediately surrounding terrain flickers when I turn my head around. Not cool.) The graphics are that bad, yet it STILL can't hit even a fraction of the framerate of Quake3? Pathetic.
Based on what I've heard, it does run great if you have an Nvidia. Maybe one of these days, I'll go out and buy one for myself. (Based on what little I _have_ been able to do, the Tribes 2 gameplay does seem very cool.) Until then, it's just taking up space on my hard drive though.
So, to summarize, a Warning to non-Nvidia users: Unless you plan to switch video cards, don't bother with this one. Try Heavy Gear 2, or any of Loki's other cool titles instead.
On Windows only GF2 (non MX) are playable (Score:2)
Tribes2 may have the looks and gameplay, but it has the worst video card support, and highest hardware requirements.
Actually (Score:2)
show("$fps::real");
Re:tribes2 for linux, the ultimate office suite! (Score:2)
So time to load wine for mirc. (-;
Re:A Disappointment (Score:2)
For instance, when Black and White came out, a lot of dual-processor-having-folks (such as me) swamped the Matrox message boards with complaints about missing textures, texture corruption, and crashes. After a while, they admitted that the drivers are quite buggy when used in an SMP machine (and an OS that supports it).
I'm not sure if the Xfree86 G400 drivers have the same problem exactly, but maybe they do. I don't have tribes2 on my machine, although I do reccommend Loki's other titles. SMAC, particularly, is quite good.
Want to find Tribes 2 games? (Score:1)
(+1, Funny Informative Troll) (Score:1)
Re:/.-ed (Score:1)
Back in the early days (and I was reading Slashdot for a while before registering an account) there were definitely "good" and "bad" times of day to try and access the site (timeouts etc.). After they moved backbone providers a few times and hosted on bigger boxes, the problems eventually went away... guess all that VALinux money must have done *some* good
/.-ed (Score:3)
If you're going to spam your articles onto the front page of
Re:A Disappointment (Score:2)
If Microsoft does it it's bad, but game companies can do no wrong?
I'm sorry, that's ridiculous. What's more ridiculous is that the box says "3D Accelerator." If they're going to code to specific hardware, why not tell the consumer what hardware they used?
Is the 32MB G450 I just bought too "old?" Why do I get the feeling that I would have the same problems as the G400 users?
Too bad, I was about to go for the bundle, too.
Re:A standard UI is unnecessary for games. (Score:1)
> If I can alt+tab between apps (or to my dos
> console to move files around) I tend to do it.
> If I can alt+F4 to kill a window or app, I'll do
> that. etc.
Actually, many windowmanagers have this as a default and almost all can be set to do it. I used Sawmill, WindowMaker and fvwm2 and all of them have alt-tab and alt-F4. Not to mention the virtual screens (cannot live without - does WindowsXP finally have them built in? No?).
So maybe all we need is that the distros (RH, for example) stop doing the wrong thing and install good defaults (or do they already? I wouldn't know, not using RH).
Re:Want to find Tribes 2 games? (Score:1)
filters, favourites, etc.
My filter only shows me 10 servers.
Re:A Disappointment (Score:1)
That might be becasue I have now learned I must run it as root for some stupid reason or it segfaults. No idea why.
Anyway I went and bought a 32 MB GEforce 2 MX and it works great. Even on a 366 dual celeron.
So honestly just buy the card, have fun, and bitch at loki for only makeing the game for one card.
Re:Want to find Tribes 2 games? (Score:2)
As for CStrike's browsing, it blows. Of course, there's nothing to be done for servers that insist on reserving unused slots.
Whoo. That was empty. (Score:4)
It wasn't a review, it was a damned advertisement, disguised as a review- with a brag about hacking Nvidia drivers thrown in. Great- not even links for possible newbies to figure out how to enable the various video card functions for themselves. "Of course, installation was flawless", he says. Loads of detail there. I'm underwhelmed. No comments about network play, no details on how the game performs against players using the Windows version..... no MEAT to the article at all.
It's fluff, pure and simple- if you're hungry for serious information about how this game handles under linux, or under different distros, etceteras, well..... this article simply is NOT going to deliver what you're looking for in any capacity. Unless you're looking for self-rightous babble and a few screen shots, in which case you'll get plenty of both.
But hey, he answers the important question- it runs, and it runs well. And anyone who frequents gaming sites or who's played the windows version knows the game is a blast. So from that standpoint, kudos.
A standard UI is unnecessary for games. (Score:5)
Games like Tribes don't need Gnome, or Motif, or OpenStep, or KDE or whatever as a prerequisite to run- they need the system kernel and system resources, and access to the hardware. And a way for the user to run the game. That's pretty much it. Remember all of those old DOS games you could still run on NT (without sound) or 9x with full features? Or the games that "required" Win9x but actually ran in DOS? Case in point that the UI is irrelevant- you could boot into DOS and still run Starcraft or Quake.
Digressing offtopic (to the review), I personally think that the general userbase isn't going to dick with linux until they can do the following:
1. Make it go. Easily. Linux sure as hell can't do this (Mac OS X, on the other hand, does)
2. Games, Internet, Word processing. In that order- linux has the internet thing down. Games are coming, and office suites are getting there.
3. Look at it and use it without grimacing. Face it- Mac OS took pretty to the next level with MacOS X, and Windows is tagging behind with XP and 2000. The existing window managers for linux, as fine as they may run and as pretty as you *may* be able to make them, look like complete ass in their base configuration. Apple dropped the ball on X by shifting to a new- and nasty- useability interface that put Pretty as a much higher priority than being useable, and Windows isn't going to go away for awhile. So if Linux wants users, the coders and OSS companies should start by being painless and pretty: who would you invite to the party- the 800 lb Gorilla or Liv Tyler?
With some effort, a Linux distro could arise that contains all of the power and presence of the 800 lb gorilla with the yumminess of Liv Tyler. But right now, it's big, and it's ugly.
Re:A standard UI is unnecessary for games. (Score:1)
Why the dispartity in our experiences? Let me guess, you're pretty much a windows person, right? I'm a *n?x person who boots windows to play games. Have you considered that maybe windows isn't any easier to use/setup, just that you're more used to windows?
Re:Whoo. That was empty. (Score:1)
If the error and signal handler (or whatever exactly would be involved) can catch the hang in Win2k, it can probably be set up to handle the same problems in Linux without resorting to SSH and kill -9.
~Anguirel (lit. Living Star-Iron)
"Veni; Vidi; Vi C++"
Re:A Disappointment (Score:1)
~Anguirel (lit. Living Star-Iron)
"Veni; Vidi; Vi C++"
Thats because Matrox cards suck. (Score:2)
They might display your desktop across multiple monitors without a problem, but thats all they are good for.
Matrox 3D drivers are buggy, released excruciatingly late and perform badly.
After owning a 2MB Matrox Millenium (great little card, still going strong today),I was burnt with a G200, and will never buy another Matrox card again.
Re:Where's the Mac?? (Score:2)
OpenGL on MacOS previous to X was limited to third-party support, i think (correct me if i'm wrong), and MacOS X is pretty new, meaning nobody is really well established in this currently small market.
Linux is much more attractive to most programmers than the MacOS is - since it runs on their formerly Windows machines.
While Macs are on more desktops, you have much more developer mindshare in the gaming industry with Linux than with MacOS.
MacOS X has much more potential than MacOS =9, since porting games from an existing Linux version to a PPC MacOS X version should be a lot less work than going direct from Windows to MacOS X.
As PPC-based Linux gets more support (e.g. TiVO), this porting process will be even easier.
However it's pretty clear that the games industry is looking much more seriously at Linux than it is at OS X.
Apple can choose to take advantage of this fact, and look at how they can ease the transition between Linux and their BSD flavour, or they can do what they usually do, and ignore the games market entirely, leaving customers like you wondering 'Where are the games for my Mac?'
Re:Why do reviewers list... (Score:2)
Re:Why do reviewers list... (Score:2)
Re:Whoo. That was empty. (Score:2)
>>>>>>>>>>>>
I really which the UNIX weenies would come up with some better way to keep per-user configs then stuffing crap into my home directory!
Re:What if... (Score:2)
PS> creat just sounds stupid, not efficient. Once, when asked what he would do differently with UNIX, Ritchie (I think) replied that he would spell creat properly this time.
Re:A standard UI is unnecessary for games. (Score:2)
You see, when a man and women love each other, and think they are ready... they, well...
Re:A standard UI is unnecessary for games. (Score:2)
Re:Whoo. That was empty. (Score:2)
T2 is qute fun... (Score:2)
The only problem that I've noticed is that it really seems to get slow after playing for a while... must have memory leaks...
Re:A standard UI is unnecessary for games. (Score:1)
I recently installed Linux-Mandrake 8.0 and I have yet to get my burner working properly, though I haven't had time to research that yet; with Win2K though, it just works.
---
G400 will not run T2 nicely (Score:2)
I have friends who had Voodoo3 cards, and the game was too choppy for them. They all got GeForce 2 cards, and no problems.
So you will need to upgrade the video card (bottle neck) in order to play T2. I will eventually upgrade my video card soon.
Re:A standard UI is unnecessary for games. (Score:2)
Point 1: ease of use. Macs have had this down since day 1. MS has had the market.
Point 2: Games, Internet, Word Processing. Games, not the whole game market, but a lot of good titles made their way to the Mac in the past. Internet, always had decent stuff, especially with IE 5 for the Mac (great browser!). Word Processing. Can't beat MS Word.
Point 3: Make it pretty. Always was prettier than windows, and is now way way prettier. Still not beating MS. Granted, the interface is different now, but the consistent one over 15 years didn't save them before.
This whole post isn't to say that I don't like Macs (I used to love them actually, and I still work with them all the time) but the fact is that with a strong user base like Windows to take over you need a hell of a lot of factors, and the ones you list are only a few of the important ones. No one is going to even buy the system without a fairly consistent UI, among other things.
Personally, I think people would love a free system (free beer, although explaining how the speech thing will benefit them would be an extra bonus) and underestimating the factor of cost is making the exact same mistake that Apple themselves made for so many years. We just have to get Linux on to people's desktops pre-installed so they don't have to dick around so much.
"I may not have morals, but I have standards."
Re:This is not a troll™ (Score:2)
How does any game that involves recompiling the kernel get a 10/10 for installation?
That isn't a property of the game install - the game will work right out of the box if you have a properly configured system(3Dwise).
Re:A standard UI is unnecessary for games. (Score:1)
Then you're not doing it right!
Re:Good To See Games (Score:1)
If you want a review on gameplay, you may as well read this [gamespot.com] review by gamespot.
Re:A standard UI is unnecessary for games. (Score:3)
These things you mention are, at least on the surface quite obviously important. But I find that even as an internet/coding only type of user, the most important reasons I have for remaining with win2k over any given *NIX are:
1. Standardized keyboard shortcuts. I spend so much time on the keyboard, any delay from reaching for and orienting the mouse can amount to hours per month. If I can alt+tab between apps (or to my dos console to move files around) I tend to do it. If I can alt+F4 to kill a window or app, I'll do that. etc. Since almost every winders app I've come across subscribes to these basic keyboardability tenets, I can usually remain on the keboard throughout an entire computing session. Not so for Gnome or KDE apps. no contest.
2. Robust mouse wheel and extra button support. I find when I am sitting at my computer purely to browse, I rely on the context menu, mouse wheel, back button and forward button (in that order) completely. Again, needing to refocus the mouse, to drag a scroll bar or click a fwd/back button consumes time and effort that really adds up over the course of a month's computing. Using a four or five button mouse relieves much of that problem. And all the mice work as soon as you plug them in. I can indeed configure an intellimouse manually under GNU/Linux, but why the hell would I want to bother?
3. Hardware Support. I don't know what to say here. It is so very obviously the strength of Windows that no comparison to *NIX is worth mentioning. Why people choose to wait months or years to gain the full use of their hardware (if ever) is completely beyond me. Why people would settle for antiquated hardware, ie. that hardware that linux sufficiently supports, is also quite beyond me, considering the prices to be found today.
These features are not just lackoing in linux, however. Anywhere you look, to *NIX, QNX, BeOS, and even MacOS fall drastically short of my personal minimum usabillity standards. Until such time as Linux and the other contenders can support all of these features, I am afraid I'm going to have to pass. I am not on this box 10 hours a day to tweak and fix the OS or reach for the mouse every 30 seconds. I am on it to accomplish some work, quickly, that I may get back to the incessant browsing that sites like slashdot have made me a junky for.
Re:A standard UI is unnecessary for games. (Score:2)
Your "entirely new system" is called (Score:4)
Eventually, I think MS might be bogged down by all the backwards compatibility. They might have to switch to an entirely new system.
Possibilities for your "entirely new system":This would mean that users would have to pick between the MS stuff without software
Microsoft would actually make some effort to have launch titles. That's what happened with NT; virtualization let all the old Win3.1 stuff and some of the DOS stuff still run.
Re:A Disappointment (Score:1)
Mathieu Pinard
Tribsoft Inc.
Re:Where's the Mac?? (Score:1)
Mathieu Pinard
Tribsoft Inc.
Good To See Games (Score:2)
Re:A Disappointment (Score:2)
Re:Where's the Mac?? (Score:1)
The question is why Loki chose Linux and not MacOS, and that is because it is a growing platform, with no real gamming support, and is enjoyable to program for.
Re:Whoo. That was empty. (Score:4)
My thoughts... (Score:2)
- Good: The graphics in T2, while not stunning, are very nice, and in fact very impressive in some areas. The game sounds are excellent, and the sound track is just incredible. Not to mention the new game modes totally rock (gotta love Bounty), and the few new items in the game add some flavor without upsetting the balance.
- Bad: Performance is a joke at times, with mysterious slow-downs on some maps. The "community" services are a nice idea, but feel like they're held together by duct tape and could break any moment (and they usually do).
I waited a year and a half for Tribes 2, and as a hard core Tribes player, I can say it was definitely worth the wait. It's not perfect, but it is a nice update to Tribes, and I love it. I do have a couple of tips for people, though:
- To see your FPS rate, bring up the console (this is bound to the ` key, in the upper left of your keyboard, by default) and type: showaudio();
- Do _not_ even consider Tribes 2 if you have anything less than a Pentium II 500mHz or equivelant. If you've got a Voodoo 3 card, I hear they work great, but V5 is supposedly total garbage with the game. Your best bet is any sort of recent Nvidia card (it works great with my GeForce 2). Make sure you have at least 128MB of RAM too.
- If you're suffering from framerate problems, here's how you can get another 10fps or so without making things ugly: go to your graphics settings and turn Terrain Detail down most of the way, and maybe lower the rendering distance a bit. Then go to the texture settings and turn the Terrain Textures to the max. This way you'll have some warping in terrain as you move, but it'll still look good, and get you some speed.
- If you suck, go through the training missions. Once you've finished those, play some LAN games against bots to get a feel for the different modes. The bots do a good job of giving you some practice for the real thing, and you don't have to parade your (lack of) skill in public.
Re:In related Linux-gaming news, John Romero (Score:1)
--
GCP
Re:Where's the Mac?? (Score:1)
One good flame deserves another.
tribes2 for linux, the ultimate office suite! (Score:2)
Oh ya that game part is hella fun!
Re:A Disappointment (Score:1)
Please God... (Score:1)
- Ando
You are the weakest link, goodbye.
Re:A Disappointment (Score:2)
Non-modern? Your beautiful G400? Sorry, the product cycle in this industry is now [a well-discussed] six months. This game is not even close to six months old, meaning... current product cycle.
Even in Windows, you'll need a GeForce2 or a Voodoo5 to play Tribes2 with any degree of sincerity. Buy new hardware. If you don't want to buy new hardware, buy old games. If you won't do either, give up gaming. Don't post to Slashdot and complain about the game maker for making a great game and the game porter for making a great port.
This is just like the Myst III article the other day (a total joke) or all of the bitching from cheapskates about various recent 3D titles: "I'll be damned if the latest-greatest[TM] game doesn't crash a hell of a lot on my Voodoo Rush PCI card with 4 megabytes!"
Re:Want to find Tribes 2 games? (Score:1)
Re:Whoo. That was empty. (Score:1)
I had the same or similar problem (Score:1)
"// this is the most hacked, evil, bastardized thing I've ever seen. kjb"
Re:/.-ed (Score:1)
Where's the Mac?? (Score:2)
I'd love to support Loki, but ... (Score:1)
I leave in Australia and I can't seem to find ny Loki distributors around here.
Anyone (Aussies that is) know of any local Loki distributors?
Re:Not a troll but... (Score:1)
Woah, I guessed his configuration. That reviewer is using a 700 mhz Athlon with a 64mb GeForce 2. Who would have guessed?
Not a troll but... (Score:2)
And don't come back and tell me that I should upgrade my hardware to be able to play a game where I'm on their (higher up) supported list. And they claim my configuration "should work fine with Tribes 2."
Sorry, it doesn't. And I would hate to see how that game runs on Linux (though it does look fun if you have a fast enough machine.)
For those of you that are sick of MySQL errors... (Score:3)
Re:linux needs more games (Score:1)
"iD Software has decided that their new game Doom3 will only be release under the Linux operatingsystem. A Linux distibution and instructions on how to uninstall windows will be included in the box"
Re:Whoo. That was empty. (Score:2)
If it hangs in Windows (2000) you just hit ctrl-alt-delete and then have the task manager kill it's process, and get your box back. For those that don't know Windows 2000 does a very good job of keeping errant apps from messing with the system. If an app freezes, you can call up the task manager and kill it off. About the only time it truly goes down so hard as to be unrecoverable is when a buggy driver is installed (since they have system level access).
Not really (Score:2)
Re:A Disappointment (Score:4)
Re:A Disappointment (Score:1)
Dynamix seem to be making a habit of courting a particular graphics card with each of their Tribes releases. For Tribes I, it was designed to run well on Voodoo chipset cards and crash and burn on other cards. I never played Tribes on my old Riva TNT based system - it sucked even after they'd released OpenGL drivers. My friends with Voodoo IIs - no problem.
This time, I've got a GeForce II, so no probs. for me. For the Voodoo users out there, check the readme file with Tribes II - it gives the URL of a site with the voodoo drivers Dynamix recommends for running Tribes II.
--t ml
If I was an evil overlord, I would not tell my Legions of Terror "And he must be taken alive!"
The command will be "And try to take him alive if it is reasonably practical."
http://minievil.eviloverlord.com/lists/overlord.h
Re:A standard UI is unnecessary for games. (Score:1)
3. Hardware Support. I don't know what to say here. It is so very obviously the strength of Windows that no comparison to *NIX is worth mentioning. Why people choose to wait months or years to gain the full use of their hardware (if ever) is completely beyond me. Why people would settle for antiquated hardware, ie. that hardware that linux sufficiently supports, is also quite beyond me, considering the prices to be found today.
Cobblers. The hardware support under Windows 2000, if it is better, is only marginally so. So many things don't work. That's why there is a compatibility list [microsoft.com].
EverythingLinux.com.au (Score:1)
Re:A standard UI is unnecessary for games. (Score:1)