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Games Entertainment

A Loki Timeline 143

Posted by timothy from the intelligent-observation dept.
Al "Alkini" Koskelin writes: "Matt Matthews, with the help of the LinuxGames staff and some ex-employees of Loki, has put together a Loki timeline. The timeline is an attempt to document every major event in Loki's past, starting with the announcement of SDL and the Launch of the Loki Website through today, when Loki is officially ceasing operations." They're also looking for more information to make the timeline more complete.
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A Loki Timeline More

A Loki Timeline

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  • Link to timeline (Score:4, Informative)

    by prototype ( 242023 ) <bsimser@shaw.ca> on Thursday January 31, 2002 @05:13PM (#2933453) Homepage

    The link to the actual timeline is here:
    http://www.linuxgames.com/articles/lokitimeline/ [linuxgames.com]

    liB

  • January 31st, 2002 : Loki Timeline Slashdotted.

  • Good bye Loki (Score:3, Insightful)

    by chrysalis ( 50680 ) on Thursday January 31, 2002 @05:15PM (#2933476) Homepage
    And thanks a lot for your amazing work. I hope you'll be back in some years, when people will have understood that Linux != free beer.

    • Uhhh...yes it does. That's why Loki failed.
    • Perhaps the future, with regard to the previous article (Oracle jumping to Linux), the future would have been a Linux equivilent of nsnipes.

      In other news, Tom Cruise [yahoo.com] attempts to apply political pressure on Germany to accept as a religion the business that is the CoS. Maybe when he's done being zapped by his Theton-O-Meter he'll switch religions and become a promoter of the Force as a Jedi trainee. If so, good luck with getting New Zealand to accept Jedi as an official religion.

    • Loki proved that Linux really is a great platform for games. The only problems were strictly social and economical, not technical. I know many people who radically changed their opinions about Linux being a poor desktop and gaming platform, after seeing Soldier of Fortune [lokigames.com] or SimCity 3000 Unlimited [lokigames.com].

      So yes, they proved that Linux is not only a toy OS for hackers. And this means a lot.

      Loki has made Linux better, from technical point of view. We have SDL [libsdl.org] and OpenAL [openal.org]. We have a great book Programming Linux Games [nostarch.com] by Loki Software and John R. Hall. For all of these Loki deserves big thanks from all of us. We also owe them apology for not supporting them as we should. It's sad, but their economical failure is mostly our fault. We have to understand that.

      Linux community is a pretty strange market. We're used to free speech and free beer. So I guess now we have to wait for WorldForge [worldforge.org].

  • They're also looking for more information to make the timeline more complete.

    Posted by timothy on Thursday January 31, 2002 02:10PM A Loki Timeline

    I hope that about covers it.

    At least it's not another Enron

  • That is truely a shame to see Loki games go. Hopefully most of their programmers will not have too much trouble finding employment. I was hoping for a few more ports from them.

    Anyone interested in taking on any projects? :)
    • Sadly, Loki was doomed from its conception. Until the majority of Linux users recognize that some people don't get paid when they steal software, and that if they don't get paid they go work where they CAN get paid. This is the basis of Capitalism, exchanging value for labor. Yes, it can be taken too far *cough* Microsoft *cough*.

      Don't get me wrong, I think there are some wonderful things going on in the Open Source movement and Linus Torvalds and many like him are visionaries. Some of their visions are good and being made to work. Companies like Red Hat and SuSE are making money off of Linus' vision, and that's OK too.

      But as it was put earlier Linux != free beer. Not much gameing development will take place on Linux until someone can make a profit at it.

      DLR
    • Programmers probably wont have a hard time. But all I know is QA and tech support and don't have any real "skills" like the programmers. Can anyone help pay my rent? hah

  • If only (Score:2, Insightful)

    by nesneros ( 214571 )
    If only every company that tanked (no offense to the good folks at Loki, I loved your work and am sorry to see you go) kept a record of what went on during the birth, life, and death of the company. What a resource for budding entrepreneurs that would be- especially if the timeline was cross-refernced with earnings, stock price, etc.

    I'm sure much of this information can be found out there via old shareholder's reports, etc, but compiling and centralizing it is a great idea.

  • You know... (Score:3, Interesting)

    by Your_Mom ( 94238 ) <slashdot@i[ ]smir.net ['nni' in gap]> on Thursday January 31, 2002 @05:19PM (#2933530) Homepage
    Would there actually be any intrest for a volunteer group of programmers to port games? I.E. A group of people doing what Loki was doing but in non-profit status?

    I am picturing this: A group of coders being allowed by companies to port their code over to Linux. Companies takes a X% cut, programmers get paid so they can keep doing this, extra gets donated to FSF etc.

    Does this sound insane?

    • Re:You know... (Score:5, Insightful)

      by FortKnox ( 169099 ) on Thursday January 31, 2002 @05:26PM (#2933592) Homepage Journal
      Would there actually be any intrest for a volunteer group of programmers to port games? I.E. A group of people doing what Loki was doing but in non-profit status?

      I am picturing this: A group of coders being allowed by companies to port their code over to Linux. Companies takes a X% cut, programmers get paid so they can keep doing this, extra gets donated to FSF etc.

      Does this sound insane?

      Yes.
      First paragraph has the words 'volunteer' and 'non-profit'. Second has talk about companies taking cuts of profits and paying programmers.

      In two paragraphs, you've successfully said the exact opposite thing.

      However, your idea does have merit. If you can get a group of volunteers to sign NDAs and port games, then let the publishers either sell it, or release it to the Linux community.

      I don't know what game company that would have the gaul to do it, but maybe they'll let you port older games (a linux port of System Shock 2, for example, wouldn't be a bad thing!).

      I'd even volunteer my programming services for such a project.
      • Yes, my idea changed from when I started typing to when I finished, as there isn't much of a way to get companies to open their code to people and to get people to do this without $$$. 'Volunteer' was the wrong word, but the group that would be doing it would be non-profit (I think, amd I right on that definition?). The only people making money off of this would be the game companies themselves, as non-profit groups do pay people salaries, and you really can't have peopel do this full time for free.

        My bad. I think faster then I type.
        • You got me excited a bit at doing a porting project. I wonder if System Shock 2 has released its code...
          Anyway, if you are interested in jumping in on a porting job, read my journal...
      • People can be paid in a non-profit group. It's a straight salary though, not counting into the profits of the product. Still dosen't quite fit into what the original poster was suggesting though.

        In this context, the group is basically just a roving band of contractors doing porting work for various companies. Not a bad plan, but not exactly a "non-profit group"
        • It could be. Non-profit organisations are allowed to fundraise - so long as any funds raised are channelled back into the assigned purpose of the organisation. I believe the law is a bit picky about what it allows as the focus of a non-profit organisation. If "porting games to Linux" IS allowed, it's well within the law and spirit of a non-profit organisation to pay programmers on salary to port games, then channel income into paying for them, licences etc. Ideally, you would make 'profit' which would be used to salary on more programmers, etc. etc.

          It's hard for non-profit organisations to get the capital to start off large scale because they aren't able to make the money from shares that a public company would, but once they _become_ large, you don't have CEOs, Boards of Directors and Shareholders sucking the income away (as long as you limit potential CEO/Directorial abuse in your constitution).
      • I invite you to get acquainted with an ex-Loki employee named 'Icculus' located at icculus.org [icculus.org]. Among his famous Loki work is a port of Serious Sam, a port of the Build engine of 3dRealms/Duke Nukem/Shadow Warrior/... Not to mention hosting of former Loki technologies all for free.

        We love our platform. Commercial support or not, we will make happen what we want to happen... Even if that means playing games.
      • I don't know what game company that would have the gaul to do it

        I know of one. id [idsoftware.com] does... or have we forgotten the RtCW linux port? (Thanks TTimo)

    • HAHAHA

      nuff said.
    • There are many open-source game projects, such as FreeCiv, OpenTux (not sure about this; the OSS fork of TuxRacer), and Crystal Space, just to mention a few larger ones. I'm sure every Linux game project could use help, but as a /. article on FreeCiv mentioned recently, they really need help on the art (and other content). You don't need to port commercial games; if we (the Linux community) can produce good games that are free, that could be a selling point for home users. Linuz already has a number of small games that are very well done (such as LBreakout and Penguin Command), but larger games could help to attract people.

      I am currently working on a cross-platform game (currently closed, but the future is still undecided) with the goal of making a high-quality space sim. (If you want to see it, we have a small site [collapsarcreations.com]).
  • people find themselves suddenly out of a job and way too much time on their hands.
    if only they could do something cooler, like add all of their source into sourceforge for the world to build upon.

  • Last word on Loki? (Score:1, Flamebait)

    by pgpckt ( 312866 )

    Last word on Loki [slashdot.org]

    I suppose "Last word" doesn't actually mean last word. Of course, with the editors saying F*** you to /. users (see the homepage link) or abandoning the concept of for the users/by the users by allowing unlimited editor moderation (see my journal or sig link), I suppose there is no real reason to suspect anything the editors say can be taken to the bank or to trust them.
  • Hopefully last weeks report on Slashdot earned them some last sales. I know I bought 2 games when I knew I wouldn't be able to later.

  • In case it gets Slashdotted(c)... (Score:1, Informative)

    by Anonymous Coward
    A Loki Timeline
    Legend:
    Game demo release informationGame beta test informationProgrammer or staff informationDevelopment informationInformation about a game going gold and being released or shippedAnnouncement, press release, interview or web posting
    1998
    22 January
    The Simple DirectMedia Layer (SDL), on which most of Loki's games would be based, is announced by Sam Lantinga on USENET in this post. At this point, the version number is 0.3. 10 December
    A LinuxGames reader sends in note that Loki Software is now online with a website claiming they are the "first and only company dedicated to commercially porting top selling computer games to the Linux." A press release from Loki is also issued. 31 December
    Loki signs a contract with Activision to port Civilization: Call to Power to Linux. 1999
    4 January
    Coding begins on the Linux port of Civilization: Call to Power 2 March
    Loki calls for beta testers for their port of Civilization: Call to Power14 April
    Loki announces that Civilization: Call to Power for Linux has gone gold and is ready for duplication.30 April
    Archive: See Loki's webpage as of 30 April 1999 here. May
    The Loki technical support office is set up in Utah, and staffed by Nate Ashford and Brad Barton. 3 May
    Civilization: Call to Power for Linux is shipped. 10 May
    Programmer Stephane Peter begins work at Loki. His initial work was on the port of Myth II. Later he would work as the lead programmer on Heroes of Might and Magic III and SimCity 3000 Unlimited. Behind the scenes, he worked on much of the infrastructure, including SDL, SMPEG, SDL_mixer, and the installer, Loki Setup. He also assumed responsibility for Kohan, after Andrew Henderson departed, and worked on it until he left on 30 March 2001. 12 May
    The SDL MPEG Player Library source is released by Loki under the GNU LGPL. This is the first of several free software tools that Loki would release. 17 May
    Loki announces that it will port three more games: Myth II: Soulblighter by Bungie Software, Railroad Tycoon II and the expansion pak: "The Second Century" by PopTop Software and finally, Eric's Ultimate Solitaire by Delta Tao Software. 18 May
    Loki attends the LinuxExpo 1999 in Raleigh, NC and gives the first public demonstration of Civilization: Call to Power running on Linux. 1 June
    Programmer Michael K. Vance joins Loki. While at Loki Michael would work on Myth II (including all of Fear and some of Loathing) and Fenris, the bugtracking system based on Bugzilla. He would also be lead programmer on Heavy Gear II, Soldier of Fortune, and Tribes 2. In addition to games, Michael contributed to OpenAL, Mesa, Glide, and SDL. He would eventually depart from Loki on 29 January 2001. 11 June
    The first patch for a Loki game, version 1.1 of Civilization: Call to Power, is released. This is also the first release of the LinuxPPC binaries for a Loki game. 12 June
    Beta testing for Myth II begins. Karl Rollibard is the lead programmer. 19 June
    First report on LinuxGames of a sighting of Loki's version of Civilization: Call to Power in a brick-and-mortar store. 14 July
    Loki announces a parternship with Terra Soft Solutions to bring games to Linux on PowerPC hardware. 22 July
    Jake Simpson of Raven Software announces that a port of the client of their first-person shooter, Heretic II, will be handled by Loki. 30 July
    Loki releases a Myth II demo. 30 July
    The beta test for Railroad Tycoon II begins. 8 August
    Loki starts running a server with newsgroups for discussion about their games and open source projects. 12 August
    Loki wins the "Best of Show: Entertainment" award at the LinuxWorld Expo for their port of Civilization: Call to Power. 13 August
    Comments by Scott Draeker confirm that Loki will port Activision's mechanized combat game, Heavy Gear II. 18 August
    Preorders of Myth II ship to eager Linux gamers. 24 August
    A comment by Michael Vance in the Loki newsgroups removes all doubt that Heavy Gear II is being ported to Linux. 25 August
    Job openings at Loki are posted on their website. Specifically, they say they are "looking for enthusiastic game programmers with a love for Linux and a desire to contribute to the growth of Linux as a premier gaming platform." 30 August
    Archive: See Loki's 30 August 1999 site redesign here. This is the style of their website for the rest of their existence. 8 September
    Loki releases the SDL Motion JPEG Library as free software under the GNU LGPL. 9 September
    The beta test for Eric's Ultimate Solitaire begins. 17 September
    Loki announces Loki Hack '99, an event where Linux coders will be given temporary access to the Civilization: Call to Power source code so they can compete to make the coolest enhancement in 48 hours. It will be held at the Atlanta Linux Showcase on 11-13 October. 29 September
    Civilization: Call to Power 1.1 is released for Alpha machines running Linux. 5 October
    The beta test for Heretic II begins. Bernd Kreimeier and Jim Kutter are lead programmers. 11 October
    LokiHack officially begins at the Atlanta Linux Showcase. A group of 18 Linux hackers are locked away to add improvements to the Linux version of Civilization: Call to Power. The improvments will then be judged by Sam Lantinga of Loki and Jeff "Hemos" Bates of Slashdot. 11 October
    Loki and Activision announce a partnership to bring games to Linux. Civilization: Call to Power, Heavy Gear II, and Heretic II are all Activision games that Loki was known to be porting at this time. No new titles are announced. In the press release, Scott Draeker is quotes as saying, "Earlier this year, people wondered if there was a market for commercial games on Linux. We have put those doubts to rest." 11 October
    Loki announces that the program they use to install games, Loki Setup, has been released as free software under the GNU LGPL 11 October
    Andy Mecham begins part-time work handling QA at Loki. 12 October
    Loki releases a demo of Civilization: Call to Power. 15 October
    LokiHack winners are announced. Christopher Yeoh's first place hack added several units to the game as well as a modification to the existing spy unit. Other winners were Andrew Henderson, Ryan Gordon, Chris Swiedler and Joshua Shagam. Henderson and Gordon would later work as full-time Loki employees. Daniel Vogel is also a participant and would later work at Loki. 18 October
    Loki's third port, Railroad Tycoon II ships to gamers. 29 October
    Creative Labs, makers of the famous SoundBlaster and SoundBlaster Live! audio cards, announces that they will be working with Loki on 3D audio for Linux. Loki and Creative would announce OpenAL, a cross-platform audio API for Linux that includes 3D effects, on 3 March 2000 1 November
    Andy Mecham joins Loki full time as the sole member of the QA team.1 November
    Through a comment in a Slashdot post, it is made publiic that a Railroad Tycoon II demo is available from Loki. 1 November
    Rick Johnson, of Raven Software, announces that a port of their upcoming first-person shooter, Soldier of Fortune, will be available for Linux. Upon clarification, he says that Loki will be handling the port, just as they're handling Raven's Heretic II. 3 November
    Loki officially announces that they are porting the 3DO Company's popular game, Heroes of Might and Magic III, to Linux. 4 November
    The patches from LokiHack are made available to the public. 4 November
    Loki's CVS server goes online, hosting SMPEG, SMJPEG, Loki Setup, and SDL. 7 November
    The beta test for Heroes of Might and Magic III begins. 14 November
    Loki announces that Heretic II and Heroes of Might and Magic III will be going gold almost immediately. They would be available on store shelves during the Christmas shopping period. 22 November
    The Linux version of Unreal Tournament is available online. It uses Loki's Setup tool to install the binary and reads data from a Windows UT disc. In most areas, UT hasn't even hit store shelves yet. This is the first commercial game, outside of Loki's ports, to use Loki's installer. 1 December
    Loki and VA Linux partner to publish the Debian distribution, packaged with a demo version of Myth II. 2 December
    Loki announces that they will be publishing the Linux version of id Software's Quake III Arena. Of particular interest is that the Linux version will be packaged in the limited edition tin boxes that were made in limited quantities for the Windows version. Bernd Kreimeier would act as producer of the Linux Q3A and later take on the role of maintainer when Dave Kirsch left id Software in early 2000. 3 December
    To get the Linux version of Q3A to Linux gamers by Christmas, Loki says they'll ship just the CD and the CD key and ship the tin boxes and other materials later. 4 December
    Loki's Linux port of Heretic II ships. 7 December
    Loki announces that the Linux port of Quake III Arena has been approved by id Software and is being sent for duplication. 7 December
    SDL, used extensively in almost all Loki ports, reaches version 1.0. Many Loki programmers contributed to SDL and the use of SDL in Loki's games pushed the API more quickly towards maturity. 7 December
    A LinuxGames reader sends a report that the Linux version of Quake III Arena had arrived by FedEx. The game had been officially reported to be in duplication only hours before. It is made public that initially a Matrox or 3dfx card will be required for the hardware OpenGL acceleration on which the game depends. 20 December
    Loki reports that their port of Heroes of Might and Magic III is shipping. 22 December
    Programmer Joe Valenzuela joins Loki and starts working on OpenAL immediately. In addition to his critical work on OpenAL, Valenzuela contributed code to Heavy Gear II, Soldier of Fortune, SimCity 3000 Unlimited, Rune, Unreal Tournament, Tribes 2, and the unreleased Deus Ex. He also worked on code for Kohan and Sid Meier's Alpha Centauri, but that work was never released. He would eventually depart from Loki on 29 January 2001. 25 December
    Loki programmer and SDL creator Sam Lantinga reports that he has ported the recently released Quake source code to use SDL. 30 December
    Loki programmer Michael Vance says that a port of Q3Radiant, the Quake III mapping tool, is being considered. 31 December
    The year ends with Loki shipping seven games: Civilization: Call to Power, Myth II: Soulblighter, Railroad Tycoon II, Eric's Ultimate Solitaire, Heretic II, Heroes of Might and Magic III, and id Software's Quake III Arena. 2000
    11 January
    News leaks of more Loki ports: Interstate '82, Sid Meier's Alpha Centauri, and SimCity 3000. No confirmation is received from Loki. Interstate '82 was never mentioned again. The other two were eventually ported and released by Loki. 12 January
    In an interview, Dynamix employees discuss a Linux port of their upcoming game, Tribes 2. 13 January
    Programmer Ryan Gordon begins work at Loki. While at Loki, he would head development of the Descent 3 and Heavy Metal: F.A.K.K. 2 ports and release the Heroes of Might and Magic III Map Editor. His last day was 30 March 2001, although the announcement wasn't made until April. 25 January
    Loki releases a Heroes of Might and Magic III demo. 28 January
    The beta test for Heavy Gear II begins. 7 February
    In an interview, Scott Draeker indictes that Loki will port a RTS (real-time strategy) game and a sports game to Linux in the year 2000. In total, Loki hopes to publish 16 games in 2000. 3 March
    OpenAL is released to the public. 20 March
    Heavy Gear II goes gold and is ready for duplication. 1 April
    Leonardo Zide joins Loki as a programmer. While at Loki, he would work primarily on the Quake 3 Arena SDK. He would eventually depart on 30 March 2001. 3 April
    Heavy Gear II ships to Linux gamers. 8 April
    The Heroes of Might and Magic III Map Editor is released for Linux in beta form. 14 April
    Loren Osborne departs from Loki, having worked on both Heavy Gear 2 and Civilization: Call to Power. 14 April
    The beta test for SimCity 3000 begins. 18 April
    The beta test for Soldier of Fortune begins. 18 April
    Dynamix says that they will be using OpenAL in their game Tribes 2. 17 May
    Daniel Vogel begins work at Loki as a programmer. He would handle the maintenance of the Unreal Tournament client as well as the ports of Rune and Deus Ex, until his departure at the end of December 2000. He also patched Heavy Gear II and ported the Building Architect Tool for SimCity 3000 Unlimited. In addition to heavily optimizing the OpenGL renderer for UT Linux, he added the ability for NVIDIA cards under Linux to use the high resolution textures on the second Unreal Tournament CD. This work was eventually ported to Windows, one of the few examples of Linux users getting a feature before Windows users. 17 May
    Mike Phillips joins Loki as a member of the QA team. 18 May
    The beta test for Sid Meier's Alpha Centauri begins. 18 May
    Loki announces that their SimCity 3000 port will actually be a port of the enhanced version, named SimCity 3000 Unlimited. 18 May
    Loki releases an updated Q3A SDK, including tools for building mods and maps under Linux. 2 June
    Loki announces that they will port Descent 3 to Linux. 2 June
    Loki releases a demo of Solider of Fortune for Linux. 6 June
    The beta test for Descent 3 begins. 20 June
    Loki announces that they will port Cognitoy's game MindRover to Linux. 20 June
    Loki releases a demo of their port of Heavy Gear II. 30 June
    Programmer Jim Kutter departs from Loki. While at Loki, Jim contributed to Heretic II and Soldier of Fortune. 6 July
    Loki and theKompany announce a deal to distribute a development suite known as PowerPlant. 13 July
    Loki begins to ship Solider of Fortune to Linux gamers. 13 July
    Loki releases a demo of their port of Descent 3 for Linux. 28 July
    Announces that their port of Sid Meier's Alpha Centauri is completed and ready for duplication. They also release a demo to an eager public. The game would not actually ship until 17 April 2001. 31 July
    In a GameSpy interview, Scott Draeker reveals that Loki will have a booth at E3 in the Spring of 2000. By the time of the show, Loki would be far behind schedule on some games and some key programmers would have left for employment elsewhere. Loki would never actually have a booth at any E3. 7 August
    Loki and Epic Games announce a partnership under which Loki will maintain the Linux port of Unreal Tournament. Along with maintaining parity with the Windows version of UT, this is the first time that Linux users can receive full technical support for the Linux client. Daniel Vogel is the lead programmer on UT at Loki, and uses that background to quickly port both Rune and Deus Ex to Linux in the winter of 2000. 7 August
    The beta test for MindRover begins. 9 August
    In a Slashdot post, John Carmack talks about Linux, gaming, and some points about Loki. In particular, he says he thinks Loki did a great job handling the Linux distribution. He also says that Loki has been pushing for binary only patches to Linux versions of id Software games to deter the conversion of a Windows version into a Linux version through the download of a full Linux client. Carmack say he hates binary patches because they are difficult on the end user and will not be using them. 13 August
    Descent 3 ships to eager Linux gamers everywhere. 14 August
    Reports from the floor of the Linux World Expo that Deus Ex is being shown at Loki's booth. This photo proves its existence. Loki would never ship any version of Deux Ex, although the port was ready for beta testing at the end of 2000 with only a few known bugs. 15 August
    Bernd Kriemeier and Michael Vance, two Loki programmers, hold a workshop at the Linux World Expo on the issues of porting a Windows game to Linux. 25 August
    Loki wins "Best of Show" at the Linux World Conference and Expo (LWCE). 25 August
    Sid Meier's Alpha Centauri runs under LinuxPPC, but is still not shipping. 1 September
    Loki releases a demo of SimCity 3000 Unlimited. 4 September
    Loki announces that SimCity 3000 Unlimited has gone gold and that it should ship the following week. 6 September
    Loki and TrollTech announce a strategic partnership, part of which will include Qt functionality in SDL and the Loki Setup tool. Further, the press release mentions Loki's newly formed "Applications Group", to port applications to Linux. 8 September
    Loki announces that they have signed an agreement to port TimeGate Studios' real-time strategy game Kohan: Immortal Sovereigns to Linux. 22 September
    Loki announces that QLITech will begin selling PCs, called Advanced Multimedia Workstations, that come bundled with Loki's Civilization: Call to Power, Heavy Gear II, and a Loki Games Demo CD that includes the full installation of Eric's Ultimate Solitare. 28 September
    Loki announces that SimCity 3000 Unlimited has finally shipped. 29 September
    The Tribes 2 Beacon, an online newsletter, reveals that Loki has been contracted to port Tribes 2 to Linux. October
    MindRover gold master is signed and approved. It would not ship until 24 May 2001, almost 7 months later. 4 October
    Loki announces that Scott Draeker appear at a conference on the subject of Free Speech. 25 October
    Raven announces that version 1.07 of Soldier of Fortune will incorporate client authentication and server browsing through GameSpy and drop the connection to WON. The Linux client, which Loki ported, is never updated to adapt to this change. 26 October
    Loki releases a trailer (in MPEG format) for their upcoming port of Kohan. 9 November
    Loki officially announces that they will be porting the Tribes 2 client to Linux. 17 November
    The beta test for the Loki DemoCD begins. Sam Lantinga is the lead programmer. 27 November
    Loki posts the news that their port of Soldier of Fortune has been chosen by Linux Journal to receive the year's Best Game Editor's Choice Award. 1 December
    Loki issues a call for beta testers for the Linux version of Deus Ex. Subsequently, no beta test is ever held. 31 December
    The year ends with only 4 games published by Loki. In February, Scott Draeker had commented that Loki would publish 16 titles by the end of 2000. 2001
    4 January
    Loki announces a partnership with Gathering of Developers (GOD) to port and publish Heavy Metal: F.A.K.K. 2 from Ritual and Rune by Human Head. Loki asks for beta testers for these two games. 5 January
    Loki Vice-President Lance Colvin leaves Loki. 16 January
    New projects from Loki are released to make getting demos and updates even easier: Loki Update, Loki Uninstall and the Loki Demo Tool. 17 January
    Another tool, Loki Patch is released for making binary patches in conjunction with Loki Update. 19 January
    The public is informed that Daniel Vogel has left Loki and is employed at Epic Games. 21 January
    A demo of the Linux version of MindRover is released. 29 January
    Programmers Joe Valenzuela and Michael K. Vance depart for Treyarch, a company specializing in console games. 1 February
    The beta test for Rune begins. 9 February
    Programmer Andrew Henderson announces his departure from Loki to take a position as an embedded systems engineer in Irvine, California. Development of Kohan is handed over to Stephane Peter. 18 February
    Tribes 2 for Linux goes back into beta testing after a hiatus. 27 March
    Loki releases a port of the Tribes 2 dedicated server for bringing up a Tribes 2 server with the Win32 CD. 28 March
    Andy Mecham departs Loki after running the QA team since late 1999. He begins work at NVIDIA shortly afterwards. 30 March
    Programmer Stephane Peter and sysadmin Rafael Barrero leave Loki to work at Codehost, Inc.. Ryan Gordon also leaves, although this would not be announced until 13 April. Programmer Leonardo Zide leaves as well, and begins work for Treyarch. Programmer Bernd Kreimeier had left a couple of days earlier. While at Loki, Bernd led development on Heretic II and Quake III Arena. He also contributed to Heavy Metal: F.A.K.K. 2, Descent 3, and was the main architect of the OpenAL specification, among other projects. 11 April
    Loki announces they will soon ship Sid Meier's Alpha Centauri and Tribes 2. The port of SMAC had been completed on 28 July 2000, over eight months before. 13 April
    LinuxGames posts a farewell notice by programmer Ryan Gordon. 17 April
    Sid Meier's Alpha Centauri actually ships to gamers and resellers. 18 April
    Tribes 2 for Linux begins shipping. 19 April
    An interview by Linux Weekly News with Loki's Scott Draeker reveals that they've been hit hard by a lack of funding. This has led to several staff departing but they are now in a position to continue work off of existing revenue. 21 April
    In an interview with IT World, Scott Draeker explains Loki's past and current situation: "We had scaled up to a point, anticipating a certain level of growth, and anticipating a lot of new products coming out. The slowdown caught us by surprise. Now what we've done to address that is we've scaled down through attrition, we've hunkered down. Now we're ready to start releasing products again." 16 May
    Loki announces that they will provide games for Nokia's Linux-based Media Terminal, a set-top box. 19 May
    A reader sends in an email they received from Loki stating that Loki is not currently involved in maintenance of the Quake 3 Arena client for Linux. 22 May
    Timothee Besset announces that he has taken over the responsibilities for the Linux portion of Quake 3 Arena that had been maintained by Loki. 24 May
    Loki ships MindRover, almost 7 months after the gold master was approved. 18 June
    The beta test for Kohan begins. Sam Lantinga is the lead programmer. 21 June
    Loki ships Rune to Linux gamers and resellers. 21 June
    Loki releases a demo of Rune. 29 June
    No Starch Press and Loki announce the release of PROGRAMMING LINUX GAMES: LEARN TO WRITE THE GAMES LINUX PEOPLE PLAY, authored Loki's John Hall. July
    Programmer John Allensworth begins working at Loki. While at Loki, John ported Postal Plus in addition to patching Heroes of Might and Magic (1.3.1a), Tribes 2 (24834), and Kohan (1.3.1). Left incomplete were patches for Descent 3 and Sid Meier's Alpha Centauri. He would eventually depart from Loki on 18 January 2002, shortly before Loki ceases operations. 27 July
    Mike Phillips departs Loki after just over a year of hard work for the QA team. 31 July
    Sam Lantinga sends an email to the SDL mailing list in which he uses a signature including "Software Engineer, Blizzard Entertainment". This announces his departure from Loki. 3 August
    Loki announces that Kohan and Halls of Valhalla (a stand-alone expansion of Rune) are both gold and should begin shipping on 15 August. 6 August
    The beta test for FAKK2 begins. 10 August
    Loki releases a Kohan demo. 13 August
    A report surfaces that Loki has filed for Chapter 11 bankruptcy to receive protection from their creditors. 17 August
    Scott Draeker clarfies Loki's position. They are seeking protection from their creditors so they may continue operations until such time as they can emerge from bankruptcy and satisfy their creditors. 20 August
    Loki announces that Kohan and Halls of Valhalla will ship on 24 August. 20 August
    In a Slashdot posting, John Carmack reveals that "the linux market is not viable for game developers to pursue" and that "Linux ports will be done out of good will, not profit motives". A later post explains that "All linux games sales EVER don't add up to one medium selling windows title. We are one of the creditors that aren't likely to see money that Loki owes us, so we have some idea just how grim it is." 27 August
    Loki programmer Dan Olson gives notice that, unlike the Windows version, the Rune expansion Halls of Valhalla does require the full version of Rune to run. 28 August
    Tux Games, a Loki reseller, reports that stock of Kohan has arrived and will be shipping shortly. 4 October
    Ximian's Red Carpet service is reported to feature a Loki Demo channel. 5 October
    The beta test for Postal Plus begins. 8 October
    Loki announces their port of Postal Plus by Running With Scissors. 25 October
    Scott Draeker comments on TransGaming, WineX and the business of porting games to Linux. 30 October
    Loki announces that Postal Plus is now shipping to gamers and resellers. 30 October
    Loki announces that the retail version of Red Hat 7.2 includes a Loki Demo disc. 14 November
    Heavy Metal: F.A.K.K. 2 ships from Loki to gamers and resellers. 30 November
    QLI Tech announces that they will include a free copy of Kohan with every multimedia system and laptop that they sell until 12 December 2001. 11 December
    SuSE Germany states that they will no longer sell games for Linux, including Loki's past and new titles. 31 December
    The year ends with Loki releasing 7 games total: Sid Meier's Alpha Centauri (with Alien Crossfire expansion), MindRover, Rune, Kohan: Immortal Sovereigns, Heavy Metal: F.A.K.K. 2, Rune: Halls of Valhalla, and Postal Plus. 2002
    18 January
    Programmer John Allensworth departs from Loki. 23 January
    A leaked memo appears on FuckedCompany.com revealing that Loki will cease operations on 31 January 2001, just over three years after work on their first Linux port began. 31 January
    Loki ceases operations and closes its doors. By: Matt Matthews, with assistance from John Allensworth, Lance Colvin, Ryan C. Gordon, Al Koskelin, Bernd Kreimeier, Andy Mecham, Stéphane Peter, Mike Phillips, Daniel Vogel, Joe Valenzuela, Michael K. Vance, Leonardo Zide,

  • Shame (Score:1, Offtopic)

    by .sig ( 180877 )
    It really is a shame they didn't survive. Loki was responsible for pretty much the only good games out there for linux.

    Since computer games are such a big part of the personal computer industry, then actually having a variety of games on a given OS is almost essential for it's success in the home. If Loki had been more successfull, we might have seen more other companies start porting games. As it is I'll just have to go back to xpilot...

    • As it is I'll just have to go back to xpilot...


      For slashdotters, I heartily recommend xbill. I believe it's in every distro out there.

  • Is it just me? Every time I go to the timeline, instant crash.
  • They came, they saw, they CONQUERED.

    Short, sweet and bullshit.

  • nice... (Score:1, Offtopic)

    by dghcasp ( 459766 )
    Clicking on the link crashes Netscape 4.61 on RedHat 6.2...

    perhaps that's why they went out of business..

  • Market research would have solved a lot. (Score:5, Insightful)

    by SlashChick ( 544252 ) <erica@noSpam.erica.biz> on Thursday January 31, 2002 @05:36PM (#2933669) Homepage Journal
    It seems to me that Loki had the same business model as a lot of dot-coms, namely "Hey! Look! We can do this!", rather than "Hey! Look! We can do this and make a lot of money doing it."

    I notice a lot of entries in the timeline that state, "Loki released xxx for LinuxPPC." Did Loki do any market research determining that LinuxPPC was a large market that could support them? I doubt it. Look, if Linux is 0.24% of the desktop market share (and it was probably less in 1998-1999), how much of that is LinuxPPC? 0.1% of 0.24%? How many of that handful of people are willing to buy games for $50 each?

    Did Loki do any cost/benefit analysis? Probably not, because it was 1999 and hey, there were certainly dumber ideas [pets.com] than porting games. But the fact remains that Loki's business model wasn't sound, and that they could have possibly prevented bankruptcy had they done some simple market research (even a poll asking people which games they would most like to see on Linux.) The fact that they didn't do that says to me that they were more interested in proving they could do something than they were interested in making money by doing something. That's not a strategy with which to start a company, and Loki just found that out the hard way.
    • If I recall correctly, the PPC ports were done mostly for fun after hours, and the Alpha port of Civ:CTP was done on contract with a volunteer.

      -John
    • If you have a game that uses the same source for Windows and Macintosh, and you port it to Linux APIs, then the Mac port means it's already endian-agnostic, and so the LinuxPPC port is basically a matter of "copy source to LinuxPPC machine, run make". How much effort is being wasted there?
    • Did Loki do any cost/benefit analysis?
      I seem to recall web polls asking people if they would buy particular games. The tricky thing would be to work out how many of the people that say yes would wait long enough for the game and actually buy the thing.

      The thing that impressed me the most about Loki was the continuing work that was done after the products were released. I bought "Myth II", which was released with only Voodoo fullscreen 3D support, then grabbed the patch and it gave me full OpenGL support on the game. The same thing happened with "Rail Tycoon Gold" - playable with the release, but fantastic with the patch to bring it up to date with newer hardware. The thing that will annoy people the most in the future is that linux distribution updates are likely to break their working Loki games as old libraries are automaticly deleted by package management software

      • Curious.. Why would a package manager fry libraries required by the item?

        portupgrade yells at me whenever I try to upgrade beyond a programs dependencies. Since most Loki games are in ports (ones I play anyway) this holds.

        Is this not the same with apt and rpm? Or are Loki games simply not packaged for those package managers?
        • Curious.. Why would a package manager fry libraries required by the item?
          Simply because the package manager has no idea that anything is dependant upon those libraries. For instance rpm keeps a list of depenancies of files that have been installed from rpm packages. If nothing has told it that there are dependancies how is it going to know?

          Each time I've upgraded Redhat it has taken a few days to find and fix all the bits that have been removed. I haven't installed everything as rpm, I have binaries I still use dating back to 1996 (which won't recompile for the new libraries without work, which I won't do while I still have the old libraries backed up), and have lots of stuff compiled from source (I have never really used source rpms). There are still bits of Slackware 2.0 lurking in the corners. If I take the windows idea of re-format and re-install I would lose a lot of functionality - and it still wouldn't tell rpm what StarOffice, Wordperfect or any of the Loki games uses.

          Loki updated their code as glibc was updated - you can't run an old Loki binary on Redhat 7.1 without manually re-installing old libraries. Now that Loki has gone no-one will be updating the software, and successive versions of glibc are likely to break the games, and most linux distributions delete old versions of libraries when they install new ones.

          Or are Loki games simply not packaged for those package managers?
          Why should they be available as every package known? All that is really needed is an install script to make sure the right libraries exist and that the files get put in the correct spots.

  • Loki was a good shot, but... (Score:4, Insightful)

    by BTWR ( 540147 ) <americangibor3NO@SPAMyahoo.com> on Thursday January 31, 2002 @05:37PM (#2933684) Homepage Journal
    ...but they alienated their retailers.

    I was involved with a videogame website (handeye.com - don't worry, not a plug... the company's gone...) in spring 1999 that was launching a major advertising campaign centering around the release of Loki's Linux port of Civilization: CTP. What this "timeline" fails to mention is the CONSTANT, REPEATED, and UNEXPLAINED delays for Civ:CTP's shipment. We lost a lot of customers because of pre-orders and repeated emails by us that we had to delay shipment because of "distributor's delays."

    Loki was a fine experiment, but Linux games wasn't the problem. Some blame has to be left with management. It can't be good when a company's first release is delayed half a dozen times...
    • What this "timeline" fails to mention is the CONSTANT, REPEATED, and UNEXPLAINED delays for Civ:CTP's shipment.

      Whilst it's extremely annoying and frustrating this is hardly a new thing in the games industry and certainly not unique to Loki.

  • umm (Score:1)

    by Chundra ( 189402 )
    I certainly bought my share of loki ports and it sucks they had to fold, but is this really necessary? It seems like a complete waste of time, not to mention being pretty fucking boring and pathetic. What's next, we lower our penguin flags to half mast and have a moment of silence?
  • Loki is name of character played by Matt Damon in "Dogma". Matt Damon is leader of FreeBSD team.

    oh well.. just kidding.
  • Comment removed based on user account deletion
  • wasn't the last article on Loki "The last word on Loki"?

  • Piracy issues (Score:1, Insightful)

    by Anonymous Coward
    I think that it can be safe to say that we have a clssic case of Linux Uses shooting themselves in the foot. Why else would he be moved to say:
    1. Don't pirate software. Yes, there is truth to James Sellman's statement . Lots of Linux users want everything for free, and lots of Linux users are filthy pirates when they can't just get software for free. GNU and Linux were never excuses to leech everything. That was never Stallman's point. I should also say, "Don't pirate ANY software, Linux or Windows, or whatever." Realize that every dime you take from Microsoft through piracy is NOTHING in comparison to the hurt that you put on Loki when you burned an ISO.

    [...]

    3. Don't buy Windows games. I hear how people can't justify paying full price for an "old game" that Loki ported while they can't stop themselves from running out and buying Quake3 the second it is released at full price for Windows. Dear lord, people. I know that I'm part of this insane industry, but they ARE just games. You can wait for them, and more importantly, you can do without if you really really have to. You need to tell the companies writing the software that you want that you don't want it unless it runs on Linux. The ultimate way to voice your opinion is to vote with your wallet. The sad truth is that this means sacrifice. You aren't going to get Warcraft 3 on Linux, which means that you should never BUY Warcraft 3, even though it will no doubt be a great game.

    It is good to note that he does say "Stop whining. Loki is going away, and contrary to the image I've painted, it's really not entirely you're fault as a Linux user. There's no denying that Loki made some bad mistakes, and ultimately, Loki might be responsible for her own death."

    But I can't help but think on how some folks helped push them over the edge in a twist on the tradgedy of the commons scenario. Everyone can have some free software only so long as no one gets greedy about taking advantadge of the good will of others, especially when the goodwill is provided by people whose side you are on. sort of. kinda. maybe.

  • Loki still leaves us with the SDL... (Score:1, Informative)

    by Anonymous Coward
    SDL is an awesome platform and toolkit for games graphics whatever. It makes direct X look like a nasty hack. Best part is that SDL is platform agnostic. It dont care and happily runs under windows. Anyone that is into serious game development or graphics development is using SDL. as it's faster, easier, and darn it it makes you feel good!

    I tried for months to understand Direct X, and toyed with example after example... doing the same with SDL is tons easier and allows me to code the software in a real dev os instead of windows. (ok that was a harsh jab at windows... sorry... well. at least let me take back the sorry)

  • Granted that this is offtopic but can someone please answer this?

    ""... the Mayo Clinic, named after its founder, Dr. Ted Clinic ..." -- Dave Barry ""

    was the quote at the bottom of the screen. Can you pleeeaaasee explain this. I'm failing to grasp the hidden meaning.
    • The joke is that "The Mayo Clinic" is named after someone named "Mayo", not someone named "Clinic".

      Ha ha.
  • I may have to keep that other OS for games after all ;-( I bought their games, and will continue to do so while they are still around. I hope someone picks up where they left off and continues with the good work.
  • If I learned anything in second grade, it's that a timeline consists of a long line, with two dates at either end, and has other lines splintering off it with pictures and labels and stories.

    It seems like any old joe thinks he can throw together a list of events and call it a timeline. Sheesh, they must've been eating paste that day.

    -Erik
  • I don't know much about Loki internals, but their approach to linux gaming was sub-optimal to say the least. Two examples:

    • Unreal Tournament: it's great Loki ported this to linux and offered the binary on their webpage. The port itself worked well but I doubt Loki made real money with it - despite UT being a huge success.
    • Tribes 2: How can you expect people to buy a game TWICE - one version for Windows, one for Linux? I'd rather boot up Win2k than spending another 40 just for a linux binary of probably 3 megs (especially since Tribes 2 relies heavily on patching).

    The only way I see convincing regular gamers to using Linux as their primary gaming platform is to combine Linux and Win32 versions in a box. Windows is a safe bet for gamers because the games were designed to run on it, so they stick with it.

    • Re:this couldn't work (Score:4, Informative)

      by theoddone33 ( 184581 ) on Thursday January 31, 2002 @06:50PM (#2934166)
      Tribes 2 was announced long before the Windows version was out. There was a slight delay shipping it, but if you bought the Windows version instead of the Linux one, it's your own fault.

      The real people who should be complaining about Tribes 2 are those that had to spend an extra $100 on a video card to make it even run.

      I'm not privy to information regarding the financial situation surrounding Unreal Tournament, but I believe Loki was paid by Epic for their involvement with the game. The real loss for Loki on UT was the time of support staff spent helping people get a charity product running.
      • True, but then the next problem arises: the Windows version of Tribes 2 was sold everywhere for a reasonable price, the linux version was much harder to find and usually with a hefty price tag.

        Another issue specific to Tribes 2 was that development didn't stop after the release - and Linux patches usually lag behind because Loki just needs some time (and manpower) to convert a (finished) patch. This isn't too much of an issue for single player games, but with Tribes 2 you were locked out from the servers with an outdated version.

        • True, but then the next problem arises: the Windows version of Tribes 2 was sold everywhere for a reasonable price, the linux version was much harder to find and usually with a hefty price tag.

          No computer game is sold for a "reasonable price" ever. Warez drive up game prices, then more people warez so as not to pay such unreasonable prices. Such is the PC gaming spiral of death. Lots of people point out the price differential between Windows games and Linux games, and I'm sure it was a valid reason for many people to not buy from Loki, but every birth comes labor pains. The birth of commercial Linux gaming is no exception.

          Continued patching is indeed an annoyance of simultaneous Windows and Linux development. Luckily, Dynamix had some excellent coders. In most cases, the lag you noticed was due more to communication between companies than it was to converting the patch. Loki's understaffing later in its life cycle certainly contributed some also, considering they were working on Kohan, Postal, FAKK2, Deus Ex, and various patches with a programming staff that hovered between two and three persons.

      • Re:this couldn't work (Score:2, Informative)

        by vogel ( 196253 )
        Loki was payed by Epic for maintenance and support.

      • There was a slight delay shipping it, but if you bought the Windows version instead of the Linux one, it's your own fault.



        Yep, very slight. I got my copy 5 or 6 days after the Windows version hit the hard drives of Microserfs everywhere. It sucked when I couldn't play with my friends for that week, but I had one thing keeping me going - their constant bitching about the game crashing in the middle of a round, and other Windows related annoyances. :)

      • Or upgrade your Processor. It was Laughable to play the game on a 400mhz K6-2. Now that I have a 1 ghz Ath, the game is very playable. I'd be replaying it now, but I rediscovered Starcraft.

    • it's great Loki ported this to linux and offered the binary on their webpage



      *Sigh* Loki did not port it. Epic ported it, and released the binaries online when the Windows version came to stores. Loki did some work maintaining it later, but they did not port the game.



      I doubt Loki made real money with it



      Duh. I'd be surprised if they made a penny off of UT, seeing as they didn't sell it or have anything to do with its distribution.

  • Well it's sad that these guys have to close down now, they really took one for the team.
  • You can check out the Loki site at various points in time with The Wayback Machine [archive.org].
  • here [archive.org].


    (I did a quick scan through the comments and didn't see any links to my favorite new internet contraption, The Wayback Machine [archive.org], so I thought I'd post the link.)

  • Bad business model (Score:2, Insightful)

    by Fefe ( 6964 )
    It's always easy to say "told you so" after the fact,
    but in this case it's true. I haven't bought a single Linux game. If I buy a Windows game, and it sucks, I can sell it. Also, I have the choice from which local dealership to buy it, so the price will be lower due to the competition.


    I as a user expect vendors to make the Linux binaries available as a free download, just like they make patches and bonus map packs available for free download. I will always prefer games which I know have a Linux version.


    So, Loki's business model of trying to sell Linux ports was flawed. Most gamers will want the Windows version, if only because using it eliminates a whole class of problems: interoperability problems with the Windows version your friends are using.

  • I have no regrets that Scott tried (Score:5, Insightful)

    by Kiwi ( 5214 ) on Thursday January 31, 2002 @06:44PM (#2934144) Homepage Journal
    It is very easy to sit on the sidelines, point at Scott Draker, and say "Look, this guy was an idiot. How could he have thought that he could make money porting games to Linux?" or any of a number of possible insults.

    It is far easier to critcize what someone else is doing than to do it better oneself. I know that I could not have accomplished what Scott accomplished: the existence on Linux of games which I thought I would always have to boot in to Windows to play.

    Scott Draker and Loki entertainment have made my life just a little bit better. I have only one computer right now; an older (circa 1999) ThinkPad which only runs Linux (the hard disk is too small to fit more than one OS), which I use for open-source development.

    A good friend of mine and myself both enjoy playing Heroes of Might & Magic III together. Because of Scott Draker putting his neck on the line and making Loki games a reality, we are able to play this game together wherever I can put down my laptop (The game has a "hotseat" mode which allows multiple people to play the game on the same computer).

    For this alone, I am glad that Scott had the courage to make a dream a reality.

    I am saddened that it had to end so soon. I hope that, when the economy picks up again, we can make the dream a reality again.

    There is one thing which I am certain of: Linux will survive these hard times that we are in right now. Its open source nature means that it can survive in a time which has killed BeOS. I will continue my own open-source development; it is only proprietary software that suffers in these tough times.

    - Sam

    • I totally agree with you. And I hope we will see again commercial game development on Linux.
      You can argue ad nauseum what Loki should've done and what should not. But I have a question, I guess, to many people reading /.
      With all that scream about Linux superiority, that windows sucks and Bill Gates is evil why not to put your money where you mouth is. Why not stop supporting games on Windows?
      And there is a good example for this. Look at the Mac commuinity. People considered the system they were using was better and thought it was Ok to wait a year (iirc) for a Quake port.
      I think that double boot is evil. I got rid off it in 1997 and never looked back
  • So now that Loki's gone, what will happen to their open source projects? How about the domains that host their projects? Who will get the copyrights?

    Prehaps they should take a look at assigning the copyrights to the FSF or other holding organization if this is possible with their creditor situation. What other ogranizations are there that we can trust to hold copyrights? It would be hard to assign a copyright to the FSF and keep the project under a BSD license for example.

    I don't know about you, but I love the SDL and openAL. Lots of work has gone into these tools and it would be a shame to see them fall apart because the company supporting them went away.

    Does anyone have any past examples of projects/copyrights that were assets of companies that went under? What happened to these?

    IANAL - I don't even play one on slashdot.

    --
    Mike
    bash: fortune: command not found, stupid.

    • Re:What happens to Loki's Open Source Projects? (Score:1, Informative)

      by Anonymous Coward
      SDL [libsdl.org] has been hosted on its own site ever since Sam Lantinga, the SDL project founder, left Loki. The remaining projects have found other homes -- including OpenAL (which should continue to be available through openal.org).

  • Deus Ex? (Score:3, Interesting)

    by Sloppy ( 14984 ) on Thursday January 31, 2002 @07:15PM (#2934362) Homepage Journal

    What's the story with Deus Ex? The article says it was nearly done at the end of 2000. Why didn't it get sold?

    • Re:Deus Ex? (Score:3, Informative)

      by tjwhaynes ( 114792 )
      Rumour has that the problems lay with Ion Storm, rather than Loki. But like all rumours, facts are extremely sparse. There definitely was a working demo of Deus Ex - it was on display at one of the Linux shows. So at least the principle part of the coding was done. Then there were layoffs at Loki - maybe (probably) key personnel left. The port gets mired down, contractual problems crop up. NDAs stop anyone saying anything and we are all totally left in the dark.

      To be honest, the delays in Civ:CTP were probably similar - it must be frustrating to be a developer stuck in contractual problems with potential buyers wanting to know what is going on/ETAs and not being able to give any information out...

      Cheers,

      Toby Haynes

      And no - I don't work for Loki. I just bought their games and read their newsgroups.

  • What happens to their DNS entries when the close up shop? Loki owns a domain name, that, as far as I can tell, has nothing to do with their business.

    I'd like to buy it. (Not lokigames.com - another more obscure one) How do I go about doing this?

  • What really happened with Alpha Centauri? (Score:3, Interesting)

    by Simon Brooke ( 45012 ) <stillyet@googlemail.com> on Thursday January 31, 2002 @08:02PM (#2934638) Homepage Journal
    One of the things which clearly didn't help Loki was the Alpha Centauri launch problem, and even now I'd really like to know what happened. The Beta was out in May 2000, and it was full-featured, stable and good. On the 28th June 2000 they announced it was ready for duplication, and I ordered my copy from Amazon. In December 2000 Amazon cancelled the order saying they couldn't get it. In April 2001 it finally came out, and I bought my copy... and it's still far and away the game I play most often.

    But for nine months - nine months - poor Sam Lantinga was hanging out on the Loki newsgroups explaining that there was a problem about the artwork for the packaging.... and when the game eventually arrived, it came without the collateral that the PC version had, just a bare CD in a DVD-style wallet.

    So what really happened? Were Firaxis messing Loki around? Were Electronic Arts messing Loki around? Had Loki just not got the cash flow to print the boxes? (I can't believe this - there must have been enough pre-orders. There was a lot of interest). Judging by the quality of the beta and the demo, I see no reason at all to believe that the game was not finished in June 2000.

    Well, that's it, I suppose. Masses of Respect to Scott and to Sam and to all the troops. It was a brave effort; I'm really sorry it didn't fly.

    • Re:What really happened with Alpha Centauri? (Score:1, Informative)

      by Anonymous Coward
      "Packaging issues." No, really. There were a variety of issues which, when combined, pushed the release back drastically and resulted in a major shift in the packaging strategy.

      Licensing and licensor approval delays, negotiations on components (the strategy guide), cost of producing over-sized boxes similar to the Windows Planetary Pack, that sort of stuff. With that much going on in a cash-strapped company under pressure, well, you get the picture.

  • Did anyone else notice the crazy pop-up ads at that site? Is linuxgaming.com so desperate for cash that they have to spawn a pop-up every 15 seconds while we're on their site?

    Sorry to see Loki go; Linux gaming will be worse off without them. Their code was good, just a bad business model. Not the first, won't be the last. Where is all the valuable programming talent from Loki going?
  • ...Is that MY Slashdot ID # is TWO million less than Carmacks!!!!

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