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PC Games (Games) Software Linux

42 of the Best Commercial Linux Games 158

Posted by timothy from the answer-to-everything dept.
LinuxLinks writes "It is true to say that the number of commercial games released for Linux each year remains small compared to other platforms. Nevertheless, we faced lots of difficult choices compiling a list of 42 of the best commercial Linux games. The selection we have finally chosen covers a wide range of different game genres, so hopefully there will be something here that will interest all."
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42 of the Best Commercial Linux Games More

42 of the Best Commercial Linux Games

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  • Yep (Score:4, Insightful)

    by dreamchaser ( 49529 ) on Saturday June 14, 2008 @03:53PM (#23793849) Homepage Journal
    And all five people who bought them greatly enjoy them. So do the other hundred thousand or so who downloaded them via torrent because 'all software should be free', further throttling Linux game development.

    • Re:Yep (Score:4, Insightful)

      by Anonymous Coward on Saturday June 14, 2008 @03:54PM (#23793861)
      I guess most Windows and Mac users must believe the same thing!

      • Re:Yep (Score:4, Interesting)

        by westlake ( 615356 ) on Saturday June 14, 2008 @05:29PM (#23794591)
        I guess most Windows and Mac users must believe the same thing!

        But enough are willing to pay to make PC gaming a billion dollar industry.

        The developer for Linux begins with the handicap of a 0.68% market share -- in a world where Vista has 15%, OSX on the Mac and the iPhone 8%.

        Operating System Market Share [hitslink.com]

        When your potential market is already microscopic, you can't afford to lose a significant percentage of sales to the pirate.

        • Re: (Score:3, Insightful)

          by kripkenstein ( 913150 )

          But enough [Windows and Mac users] are willing to pay to make PC gaming a billion dollar industry.

          If you design a game for both PCs and Macs, then adding Linux as a third platform shouldn't be that hard, since hopefully you're already writing using a cross-platform toolkit (in fact I am in the process of doing so myself). Note that if you're not doing so, but rather writing specifically for PCs and specifically for Macs, then you're already wasting a lot of effort over what it would take to use a cross-platform toolkit from the beginning.

          So the main reason not to support Linux is if you are PC-only,

          • Re: (Score:3, Insightful)

            by ardor ( 673957 )
            Unfortunately, its not as easy.

            First, adding Linux means adding TONS of work for support. Linux distros are much less static than Windows or OSX - the platform can vary greatly. This makes support very hard, this is why id and Epic do not give support for their ports.

            Also, OSX and Linux have many subtle differences which might catch you off-guard. Expect lots of testing and debugging.

            When we move to consoles its a different story altogether. Forget about one cross-platform toolkit, the platforms are too div

          • Re: (Score:3, Insightful)

            by westlake ( 615356 )
            If you design a game for both PCs and Macs, then adding Linux as a third platform shouldn't be that hard, since hopefully you're already writing using a cross-platform toolkit

            The second platform for the Windows developer is the XBox 360 - and the cross-platform toolkit is sitting there in front of him

            The Mac port can be outsourced.

            The OEM Linux PC is typically presented as an entry-level system with bottom feeder specs.

            The games in the CNR [cnr.com] repository make that plain enough.

            It's the rare Linux develope

          • Re: (Score:2)

            by KGIII ( 973947 )
            Didn't some people's interpretation (EFF's for one resulting in the Joomla fiasco) of GPLv3 mean that this is pretty much a failing idea? Anything released that runs on GPLv3, in any shape or form, must (as they interpreted it) also be GPLv3. So, well, if one guy buys the game for 20 bucks he's then free to distribute it so long as he also includes the GPL license and makes the source available on request. This was done, as I also understand it, to thwart the Novel and Microsoft dealings in the future thoug
            • Well first GPL2 already had the clause that when you extend a GPL2 app, you must also be GPL. That's the idea of the GPL, it isn't new to GPL3. But maybe I didn't understand you and you didn't mean to say otherwise.

              It isn't that hard to develop for Windows, Linux and Mac at the same time, if you use the right tools. For example, if you write an entire app in Python and use something like TKinter for GUI, you get cross-platformability 'for free'. Of course few games are written in Python, though. But even

        • Re: (Score:2)

          by ProppaT ( 557551 )
          The real handicap doesn't even begin at the 0.68% market share, it begins with the fact that the majority of that .68% are primarily used as servers or work machines. I would wage to bet that, disecting it even further, that the majority of installed Linux users (not counting that majority that are set up as servers) have it installed as a novelty or as a supplement to Windows.

    • Re: (Score:3, Insightful)

      by poetmatt ( 793785 )
      Yes, because all 5 people include the thousands that all play Eve, right?
    • Hmmm... The same thing could be said about Windows games, or Mac games, I could even say the same thing about the current generation of home consoles! I could say the same thing about handheld games. Basically, you can pirate any game out there. It isn't a Linux-specific trend.

    • Re: (Score:2, Interesting)

      by WWWWolf ( 2428 )

      I think there's a small problem of distribution. Linux-only games won't sell. However, Windows games do sell, and if there's Linux binaries available, all the better.

      Of the games on the list, I have NWN, Quake 3, 4 and Doom 3... NWN, Doom 3 and Q4 on the virtue of buying the Windows version and downloading the free binary, Q3A because luckily there actually was a local book shop that had Linux games (I also bought Myth II from them, and ordered SMAC from another store). Loki was a great company, too bad t

      • Re: (Score:2)

        by Yfrwlf ( 998822 )
        Currently, I don't see many other viable modes of distribution for Linux games other than either a) Sell Windows games and let people download Linux binaries on their own or b) supply Linux binaries inconspicuously on the CD. Linux-only packages are murder.

        There's no harm in having a Linux box available for purchase on your website though. It's just a box, it's not expensive to have a pic of Tux on it and then only include the Linux version. If selling in stores though, I agree, would possibly be best t

    • Re:Yep (Score:5, Informative)

      by Teppy ( 105859 ) * on Saturday June 14, 2008 @04:25PM (#23794133) Homepage
      I designed (and run) A Tale in the Desert [atitd.com], one of the games on the list. About 3.1% of paid players currently use Linux. Also, 7.3% use OSX, and the rest use Windows.

      Of all trial accounts, 7.3% of Linux users go on to pay for at least one month of the game. Of OSX users, it's 6.9%, and of Windows users it's 11.8%.

      For some reason the Linux number has dropped significantly over the years (used to be around 10% IIRC), though the other two numbers have remained about the same.
      • I think that has to do with the idea that there's a much higher ratio of Linux users that consider themselves part of a "community", be it centred around their distribution, open source in general, or what have you. Windows users don't have the same organization, at least, not around Windows. Early on, the Linux users probably told others in their community, and when it got "good enough", told their Windows friends as well.

        • Re: (Score:3, Interesting)

          by westlake ( 615356 )
          Windows users don't have the same organization, at least, not around Windows.

          That doesn't feel quite right.

          You only have to look at CNET and Download.com to see that there are communities built around Windows. A $20 shareware product like SolSuite Solitaire [download.com] rates an editorial review, a video, and 9 million downloads.

          • Re: (Score:2, Interesting)

            by ZERO1ZERO ( 948669 )
            Hmmmm, having used Linux for a good number of years now, I still have problems deciding which software to use, eg. cd burning - i know there are a few K3b, gnomebaker, brassero, xcdroast, cdrtools, nero, etc, but I think it would be quite neat if there was a central place like cnet.com, download,com where these another linux softwares could be put up like that .

            Is there anything like that for linux?

            I'm reminded of the debian software popularity contest package, and I usually tick the box to submit the info

            • The best I've seen so far is Ice Walkers [icewalkers.com], but Linux Download [linuxdownloads.org] isn't bad either.
            • I think it would be quite neat if there was a central place like cnet.com, download.com where these another linux softwares could be put up like that.

              CNR [cnr.com]- with its roots in Linspire - has the right idea.

              But I tend to use it as a reality check and on that level it can be depressing. "The Year of Linux" software looks like a shareware catalog from 1992.

              CNR lists 23 commercial "games," only three of which are worth even passing notice: Postal 2, Flight Gear, and Bridge Construction Set.

            • In Ubuntu at least, if you use the "Add/Remove Programs" interface (which is really synaptic), it has a 5 star rating system for how popular apps are. Unfortunately, it is kinda biased toward pre-installed apps that no one bothers to remove. But it does give you a good idea of how popular some other applications are in the Ubuntu supported repos.
          • C|NET and Download.com are news and download sites, respectively. A real community they are not.

      • Re: (Score:2)

        by stubear ( 130454 )
        Perhaps the lack of any real competition on Linux/OS X made it far more attractive a purchase (if I don't play A Tale in the Desert, what am I going to play?) On Windows you have FAR more competition for users dollars and they felt the game just wasn't worth the money. time, and/or effort.

      • Re: (Score:2)

        by Trogre ( 513942 )
        I suspect that number is about to rise somewhat.

        Well done.

  • I knew it! (Score:5, Funny)

    by Anonymous Coward on Saturday June 14, 2008 @03:55PM (#23793869)
    The ultimate question:

    How many commercial games can you play on Linux?

    • Re: (Score:3, Insightful)

      by Darkness404 ( 1287218 )

      How many commercial games can you play on Linux?


      A lot. Many require WINE or similar to run though. In fact though with a VM you could say you can run every single commercial game in existence on Linux. Just because a game doesn't run natively on Linux doesn't mean that you can't play it using WINE, and many of the more prominent games even have specific steps to play the game perfectly or better then on Windows.

      • Re:I knew it! (Score:5, Informative)

        by MK_CSGuy ( 953563 ) on Saturday June 14, 2008 @04:18PM (#23794067)
        Correct me if I'm wrong, but AFAIK there is no VM that allows native access to the graphics card.
        All the VMs I worked with (Virtual PC, VMWare and QEMU in the past, VirtualBox today) emulate a card on par with an S3 Trident or some other limited card.
        You can change the video memory size (and remember that this means regular memory speeds! no GDDR3!) but no pixel shaders and other "modern" technologies.

        • Comment removed (Score:5, Informative)

          by account_deleted ( 4530225 ) on Saturday June 14, 2008 @05:05PM (#23794401)
          Comment removed based on user account deletion

        • Well, sorta (Score:5, Informative)

          by Sycraft-fu ( 314770 ) on Saturday June 14, 2008 @06:24PM (#23795057)
          VMWare has some limited 3D support you can enable in version 6. It isn't that complete, but 3DMark 2001 does run and gets a respectable score, for older hardware. VMWare 6.5 has much more complete 3D support. It is still in beta and I've not tried it (I use VMWare in a production environment) but I've no reason to believe they are lying. It claims to be DX8, more or less, as in Pixel shaders up to v2.0 and actually makes use of the hardware in your system.

          You are still going to get slowdown, of course, but I imagine they may make it workable. When it goes final, I'll get the upgrade and see what happens.

          • VMWare 6.5 has much more complete 3D support

            I assume that would be VMware Workstation 6.5. We (I currently work for a large unnamed virtualization provider) generally like to version our products, not the company itself ;)

            I've seen a demo of 3D graphics from a virtual machine. It worked. I haven't seen the final version, obviously, but it comes in a shrink-wrapped box with a manual, so it can't possibly have any bugs :D

            (Kudos if you know who I'm quoting; hint: he's had rank in the FSF).

        • I am testing out the beta version of VMWare Workstation 6.5

          This version does still buffer the video card, but it seems on par with DirectX 9.x and pixel Shader 2.0

          I started testing with older games so far, such as Diablo II, which work fine. Soon I will try newer games. However, since it does not yet report the actual physical video card, some games will not work with it.

          This is improved greatly over the past version, for use with Direct3D games.

          Also, it seems WINE has improved greatly as well.

          However, if

      • Re: (Score:1, Redundant)

        by McGiraf ( 196030 )
        Whoooooooooooooooooooosh ....

    • Re: (Score:2)

      by Sark666 ( 756464 )
      Well, the 43rd one kinda sucked.
    • How about the existential answer to that question? I stopped buying games because content protection / DRM crap has become such a nightmare, and ever since I switched to Linux long ago, I really don't games so much anymore. Not in a traditional sense. This may sound stupid, but building a virtual machine and setting up a perfect LAMP server is more fun than a lot of games out there. Or of recent I made a stand-alone browser for youtube / imeem that gets me videos and music more conveniently.

      My personal fee

  • EVE doesn't require Wine? (Score:5, Interesting)

    by Lane.exe ( 672783 ) on Saturday June 14, 2008 @03:56PM (#23793893) Homepage
    I didn't know EVE Online had a native client. Hm.
  • Or is this a more comprehensive list than they're letting on?

    • Re: (Score:2, Funny)

      by Anonymous Coward
      no, but 42 is the answer.

    • Technically, yes (Score:5, Insightful)

      by Moraelin ( 679338 ) on Saturday June 14, 2008 @07:52PM (#23795599) Journal
      Well, technically, yes, there have been more games ported to Linux, back in the Loki Games days. Stuff like IIRC Call To Power or Railroad Tycoon (IIRC) 2. Well, those are the two I actually own. There probably are a few more.

      That said, do note that the list is already containing some... rather... "classic" ones. Gorky 17, for example is a 1999 games for example, so it's rapidly approaching a decade old. So is Creatures 3. Knights and Merchants is from 1998. (And even back then it was a crap game, with some of the worst pathfinding (among other sins) I've seen in a RTS. And not very popular either. So it's... unsettling to see that as one of the best games for Linux.)

      Quake 3 was a good game, back then, but it's from 1999 too. Ok, they have Quake 3 Arena there, which is from 2000.

      Don't get me wrong, there's newer stuff in that list too, and some good stuff too. But, nevertheless, it's basically 42 games spread across 10 bloody years. Yeah, so some would be closer to one end than others, but that doesn't invalidate the point much. You're probably better off trying to use Wine than waiting for those commercial Linux games to trickle in.
      • No, the worst pathfinding was in Command and Conquer 95. Damn harvesters would go through an enemy base to get to the most remote tiberium on the map. And then of course, it would fill first, and then the harvester next to the refinery would have to wait for 10 minutes for his brother to traverse 300 miles back to the base.

        Of course, I did love how the AI didn't have any wall attacking scripts. Thus, you could build a wall straight over to the enemy and lock them into their base because they woul
        • Heh. Duly noted, but... in Knights and Merchants you'd command some troops to go from here to there, say, a longer distance. Like mass them diagonally across the map. And they'd not just run through enemies. They'd run to a completely different edge of the map, and try to run in place against it.

          I'm not just talking AI there, as in, not calculating the best path to avoid fire. I'm talking as in, it couldn't get from point X to point Y, when told exactly where to go, and it had a clear way between them. I'm

  • Better idea: (Score:2, Informative)

    by Anonymous Coward
    List the best [linuxlinks.com] free [linuxlinks.com] games. We're all well aware of the proprietary ones.

    • Re: (Score:2)

      by Rycross ( 836649 )
      Lets see... Clones of proprietary games, games that look five to ten years old (at best), games flirting with trademark and copyright violations... ok, looks like the "free" game scene still hasn't progressed much.

  • How many... (Score:2, Interesting)

    by Anonymous Coward
    ...were released in the last year? Last two years? Three?

    • Re: (Score:3, Informative)

      by Cheapy ( 809643 )
      Enemy Territory: Quake Wars was released last year. So there's at least one. Amazingly fun game too!

  • The only 42 Commercial Linux Games (Score:5, Funny)

    by phantomcircuit ( 938963 ) on Saturday June 14, 2008 @04:08PM (#23793973) Homepage
    42? why not 43? or how about 50? because there are only 42 commercial linux games

    • Douglas Adams. (Score:5, Funny)

      by DrYak ( 748999 ) on Saturday June 14, 2008 @04:12PM (#23794017) Homepage

      42? why not 43? or how about 50?
      There is a theory which states that if you ever discovers exactly why it is 42, the Life, Universe And Everything will instantly disappear and be replaced by something even more bizarre and inexplicable. There is another theory which states that this has already happened.
      • It could have been 43, since X3: Reunion also has a Linux client. However I don't know if they didn't include it because they didn't realize as such (it wasn't released until last fall I believe) or they are counting it as a "Best" of.

        Anyway, cool list. There are games on there I didn't know about. Will have to check them out.
        • X3:The Reunion is still in BETA, but very close to being done now as the last release is super stable without any noticeable differences with the windows client. X2:The Threat wasn't as great of a game in my opinion, but it still deserves to be on the list.

    • Re: (Score:2)

      by cp.tar ( 871488 )

      42? why not 43? or how about 50? because there are only 42 commercial linux games

      No.

      As everyone may well know, 42 is a very meaningful number.

      Six times nine, and all.

  • Crappy list (Score:3, Interesting)

    by Silverlancer ( 786390 ) on Saturday June 14, 2008 @04:12PM (#23794011)
    They include games with no real native client (EVE Online, which has a built-in Cedega-like engine), but they don't list The Ur-Quan Masters, possibly the best native-Linux game in history? Given how small their "Adventure" category is, they would have done well to include it...

    • Games selection (Score:5, Informative)

      by DrYak ( 748999 ) on Saturday June 14, 2008 @04:25PM (#23794131) Homepage

      They include games with no real native client (EVE Online, which has a built-in Cedega-like engine)
      Nevertheless, EVE Online is sold and supported specifically for Linux. They just happen to have chosen a different strategy - instead of paying someone like icculus to write a port, they keep the same code base and pay people at transgaming to make sure that this code runs on linux.
      It is a commercial effort, by a commercial company to be sure that their product can be used on a Linux desktop. It fits the list.

      (same story for Mac too, btw)

      , but they don't list The Ur-Quan Masters, possibly the best native-Linux game in history?
      Ur Quan is really a great game. *BUT* it an open-source project hosted on sourceforge. The whole point of the article was to point out effort from corporation making efforts in order to have their commercial product run on Linux too.
      Ur Quan however great doesn't fit into *that* criterion.

      Given how small their "Adventure" category is, they would have done well to include it...
      Their "Adventure" category seems to have only survival-horror kind of game. They have actual classical adventure games (in the point'n'click sense of the word) - the "ankh" serie - but those are sorted together with the RPGs.
      • But The Ur-Quan Masters is the port of a commercial game, Star Control II.

      • Re: (Score:3, Informative)

        by analog_line ( 465182 )
        EVE Online may be "supported" for Linux, but it's terrible support. I resubscribed to EVE Online because of the Linux and Mac clients, and I had nothing but problems, and stopped the subscription after two months. Less than half the frame rate of the Windows version on the same hardware, and the Mac client was even worse.

        • Re: (Score:3, Interesting)

          by rsmith-mac ( 639075 )

          Ditto to this. Cider does a piss poor job of supporting EVE, when the "native" clients first shipped it was slow, crash happy, and prone to graphical corruption. Even today it's slow and prone to graphical corruption, it's just less crash happy. Meanwhile Windows users get to use EVE's "premium" graphics, a series of new models and lighting system requiring Shader Model 3 while Linux and Mac users are out of luck. The situation is so bad that the remaining Linux users have gone back to playing the regular c

  • Alpha Centauri... (Score:4, Informative)

    by headkase ( 533448 ) on Saturday June 14, 2008 @04:17PM (#23794059)
    I would have nominated Sid Meier's Alpha Centauri but that one broke many a kernal ago on a glibc update. Too bad Loki is dead or they could have updated it.

    • Re: (Score:3, Interesting)

      by WWWWolf ( 2428 )

      I would have nominated Sid Meier's Alpha Centauri but that one broke many a kernal ago on a glibc update. Too bad Loki is dead or they could have updated it.

      Funny, I actually got SMAC to work on a reasonably new setup; the updater blew up (I had to patch the game manually by extracting the update and patching the files individually with xdelta), fullscreen mode doesn't work (weird video mode), and apparently I'd need to disable compositing to make it not crash when the actual game play begins, which I'm too lazy to do...

      We needs a new build or at least a competent clone! SMAC rules!

    • Re: (Score:2, Interesting)

      by MK_CSGuy ( 953563 )
      I actually returned to Alpha Centauri yesterday and played many hours in the weekend (though back in the day I bought the Windows version and I now play it on VirtualBox).
      This game surely enters my best 3 games ever list, maybe even the 1st.
      This game has the optimal mixture of reasonable graphics, great design, great story, many options and great "feeling".
      Seriously, every time I return to it the game just blows my mind away,

    • Re: (Score:3, Informative)

      by phantomlord ( 38815 )
      I'm running:
      $ uname -a
      Linux death 2.6.25-gentoo-r4 #2 SMP Thu May 22 15:42:34 EDT 2008 x86_64 AMD Athlon(tm) 64 X2 Dual Core Processor 4400+ AuthenticAMD GNU/Linux

      SMAC and SMACX work fine here if you download the libraries and follow the instructions at http://gentoo-wiki.com/HOWTO_Running_Old_Loki_Games [gentoo-wiki.com]

      I run it via a slightly different command than what they give there though
      LD_LIBRARY_PATH="/usr/lib/Loki_Compat/" /usr/lib/Loki_Compat/ld-linux.so.2 /usr/local/games/smac/smacx.dynamic

    • Re: (Score:3, Interesting)

      by FleaPlus ( 6935 )
      I would have nominated Sid Meier's Alpha Centauri but that one broke many a kernal ago on a glibc update. Too bad Loki is dead or they could have updated it.

      On a related note, the other day I was really wishing I had purchased the combo pack (SMAC + SMACX) for Linux which was selling several years back. I was checking on Amazon [amazon.com], and apparently nowadays a used copy of SMACX goes for ~$110, with $150 minimum for a new copy.

  • Difficult choices (Score:5, Funny)

    by Digital Vomit ( 891734 ) on Saturday June 14, 2008 @04:26PM (#23794135) Homepage Journal

    we faced lots of difficult choices compiling a list of 42 of the best commercial Linux games.

    Foremost among these difficulties was finding 42 commercial Linux games.

  • DEFCON FTW (Score:3, Interesting)

    by fuzzyfuzzyfungus ( 1223518 ) on Saturday June 14, 2008 @04:42PM (#23794265) Journal
    I'm not familiar with many of the games on that list; but DEFCON is a game very worthy of attention. Minimalist vector graphics, ripped straight from the Big Display in every movie version of a NATO command center, minimal; but haunting, sound effects, and a disconcerting premise. That game is tougher on the nerves than anything I've played since System Shock 2. Which is pretty impressive for a third person strategy game.

  • Lesser Known Linux Games (Score:2, Interesting)

    by Anonymous Coward
    I wrote up a short review with screenshots for several fun lesser known Linux games that didn't all make the top 42 list:
    http://www.linuxgames.com/archives/10260

  • As said allready: The list isn't very good. (Score:3, Interesting)

    by Qbertino ( 265505 ) <moiraNO@SPAMmodparlor.com> on Saturday June 14, 2008 @05:45PM (#23794741)
    Eve Online has no native client. IIRC it has Cedegar tied in. So it breaks their own rules. Sort of.

    Kohan has a pure native version *and* a version that comes autobundled with it's own Wine/Cedegar offering instant one-click install and play and it isn't even mentioned.

    Where is Tribes 2?
    What about Rune or Heavy Metal?

    The last time I tested Wurm Online (given, that was a while ago) it was crappy. I mean, really crappy.

    I'm glad they mentioned Savage/Savage 2 though. The S2Games people deserve credit for a wonderfull game that runs natively on Linux since day one and was the first quality title that actually actively advertised their support for Linux.

    But some of the games on this list are far outperformed by todays FOSS counterparts. The only indie game that I didn't know of and got me curious was "H-Craft Championship". Gotta check that out.
    • Yeah where the hell is Tribes 2?! That game ran great on Linux and I absolutely loved it, and it still runs fine on latest Linux distributions like Debian. Yet they didn't list it cause it was released what seven years ago or something? I bought it from tuxgames online store back in the day and it did cost me a pretty penny (~$65 at the time w/ S&H) at the time around 2002, but then Wolfenstein: Enemy Territory came out for free sometime during the summer of 2003 and I spent more time on that for a few
    • Meh, I downloaded the demo of Savage 2 and it's unplayable due to a shader glitch between the game and ATI's fglrx drivers. The character models end up not being rendered. This is a known bug listed on their forums and there is no workaround.

      I kinda consider that a blocker against the game even being released, much less being listed as one of the best (unless the others really suck).

      Here's to hoping that they patch it to not require shaders, or that radeonhd adds support for my r600 card.

  • I'd just like to take a moment... (Score:5, Interesting)

    by The Ultimate Fartkno ( 756456 ) on Saturday June 14, 2008 @05:46PM (#23794747)
    ...to testify on behalf of "Darwinia." Beautiful, moody, atmospheric, and emotionally engaging. Oh, it's also dirt cheap and a bargain at twice the price. Lovely, glowy, primitive "TRON"-esque graphics, swirly sounds, and easy to learn.

    This is one developer that's definitely worth your time and few dollars. Skip the Starbucks for a day and try it out. Even though it's a linear-ish game, there's still replay value. Went all the way through it four or five times now and it's never the same twice.

    • Re: (Score:2)

      by lennier ( 44736 )
      Second that. Darwinia is one of a handful of games I've bought specifically to run under Linux in the last six years (also: Jedi Outcast, Starscape) and which I love to bits and consider a good investment.

      It's just beautiful. With the exception of a few wrinkles, like the gesture system (nice idea, but far harder to use than just clicking buttons), it's darn near perfect.

  • Shogo and SiN? (Score:3, Informative)

    by An Ominous Cow Erred ( 28892 ) on Saturday June 14, 2008 @05:51PM (#23794813)
    I'm surprised that Shogo at least didn't make the list. I rather liked that game back when I was messing with the beta. =)
  • Not restricted to Linux (Windows and OSX versions available too); a great game!

  • RTCW? (Score:4, Interesting)

    by antdude ( 79039 ) on Saturday June 14, 2008 @06:44PM (#23795163) Homepage Journal
    Where's Return to Castle Wolfenstein [idsoftware.com]?

  • No Descent 3? (Score:2, Interesting)

    by Jeff250 ( 986303 )
    No game is without its flaws, but Descent 3 delivered a unique gameplay experience for Linux and other operating systems:
    http://www.lokigames.com/products/descent3/ [lokigames.com]
    It deserves mention in the list, perhaps in lieu of one of the more ordinary first person shooters listed.

  • Vendetta Online (Score:5, Interesting)

    by Incarnate-VO ( 1307775 ) on Saturday June 14, 2008 @07:04PM (#23795297)
    I designed and run Vendetta Online (vendetta-online.com), another game on the above list. I don't have the cool realtime stats that Teppy does, but we have quite a few Linux people and a significant OS X population (around 30-40% of our userbase, last I checked). Our game is completely native on each platform, and includes a 64bit Linux client. We don't use any kind of portability/wrapper libraries.

    • Re:Vendetta Online (Score:4, Insightful)

      by Vskye ( 9079 ) on Saturday June 14, 2008 @07:40PM (#23795541)
      I play Vendetta and it rocks. I've been playing since Nov 2007 and it really is a cool game, and I'm running it under Ubuntu 8.04 with the 64-bit linux client. You get something like 8 hours of free time to play online to see if you like it enough to subscribe. (just a happy gamer, not associated with VO) Oh, one more thing.. take the training missions first before you start asking silly questions. ;)
  • Although the game has a surprisingly loyal fan-base, CogniToy's MindRover [mindrover.com] definitely showing its age. The original version was a product of the 90's right about the time when BattleBots and Robot Wars were starting to gain notice here in the U.S.

    What really set this game apart from the crowd though, was that you could actually construct full-fledged autonomous vehicles with fairly sophisticated AIs and weapons, all without writing any code. Instead, you were presented with a number of Lego MindStorms-like s
  • Huh? They listed Ankh 2 under Role Play but it's a classic adventure.

    By the way, if you'd like to support the development of commercial Linux games you should consider pre-ordering Jack Keane at ixsoft.de. If 200 pre-orders are reached the game will be ported to Linux. It's from the same company that's responsible for the wonderful Ankh series of which the first to games are already available for Linux.

    -nahooda
  • I may as well advertise a little here - I'm working on a multiplayer tank combat game with native Linux support, and I recently made my first Linux release. I don't really know what I'm doing regarding packaging Linux games at the moment, but I've got it wrapped up in a .deb that works on the most recent Ubuntu. Check out the Mandible Games main page [mandible-games.com], or the Mandible Games development log [mandible.net].
  • It's been said before, but I thought I'd spell it out.

    TFA has 2 requirements. one is "Not require Wine to run."

    EVE Online requires Wine/cider to run. It is a not a native client, so it shouldn't be on the list. That cuts the games down to 41. Any others that shouldn't be there?

  • s/commercial/proprietary/g (Score:3, Insightful)

    by skeeto ( 1138903 ) on Monday June 16, 2008 @12:56AM (#23806327)

    I hope I am not being overly pedantic here, but there is nothing non-commercial about the GPL or any other free software licenses. In fact, you can pay money [redhat.com] for Free softare games if you like. What they really mean is proprietary. In the article, they do however have a clearer definition,

    To be eligible for inclusion in this list each game needed to be:

    • Released under a proprietary license with a fee required either to purchase the game, or a monthly charge
    • Not require Wine to run. Wine is a compatibility layer for running Windows software

    My only complaint is with the title of the article.

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