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Games Entertainment

Civ3 For Linux 119

Posted by CmdrTaco from the what-a-golden-day-today-is dept.
DP writes "Well, it is known known which game they will be porting. Civilization: Call to Power (CIV III, basically), will be fully ported to linux by Loki Software, all utilities and extras included. " How many hours did I lose to the original Civ? Man, this is great news.
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Civ3 For Linux More

Civ3 For Linux

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  • But they describe Linux as a freeware Unix-like OS!! Argh... I hope they really know what is free software.
  • FreeCiv is an improved clone of Civ2, except the graphics are nowhere near as good, and I'm not sure how good the AI is, cause I almost never play single player. But it has all that Civ2 has, plus it is more tunable.
  • Because (at least in this case) paying the open source developers is taking a risk (it's not sure they'll manage to get good graphics into the game) whereas buying the game is a far more limited risk - will I like the game? That can easily be answered by playing demos or pirating the game.

  • wabi! (Score:1)

    by Dave O ( 391 )
    If it runs on Win 3.1 then AFAIK it should run under wabi. Give it a shot if you cant get WINE to work

  • Civ3 (Score:1)

    by Trepidity ( 597 )
    Not to be picky, but this is Civ3 in name only. The real Civ3 is called Alpha Centauri, and is being developed by Sid Meier, the developer of the first two Civilizations games. Civ3 has a new development team, but they kept the same name, since the company, not Sid, has the rights to it. Anyway, both look like great games (though Alpha Centauri, being designed by Mr. Meier, resembles the first two Civilization games more).
  • Not EVERYTHING has to be gpl'ed for cryin' out loud, it's OK to buy commercialware when one feels like it. Quit acting like a dammed fundamentalist.

    --Loki (no relation to Loki software)

  • WinG (Score:1)

    by cduffy ( 652 )
    DirectDraw is supported but not WinG? Hmm...

    ...

    Hmm... wine/graphics/wing.c sure looks like a WinG implementation...
  • Posted by OGL:

    ...as soon as it comes out. Hopefully their next game will be something more action-oriented though...my voodoo2 is getting bored playing only Quake2.

    -W.W.

  • Civ always struck me as being exactly the right kind of game to do in the Xwindow environment.

    Lots and lots of information up in lots of little popup windows is the kind of thing X excells at. And the way it can be done interspersed with 'real' work makes it just perfect. (Play a turn of Civ while watching your 'make' out of the corner of your eye, that sort of thing). Plus, the type of audience that likes that kind of game tends to overlap a lot with the 'geek' audience, so it makes marketing sense to put something like that on Linux.

    I'll look forward to it. Other games that would be similarly sensible to have in X windows are other turn-based 'leader' perspective games, Deadlock, Star Wars Rebellion (not turn based, but should have been), that sort of thing.

  • ... now maybe I can stop having to boot to Windows to play Age of Empires and just stay in Linux.
  • Wow yet another excuse to sit at my Linux computer for days with out a bath.
  • Along the lines, Transport Tycoon was probably my favourite game of all time. It boots under DOSEMU, but alas, crashes dosemu randomly anywhere from immediately, to a minute into the game.. sigh.

  • WINE? (Score:1)

    by On Lawn ( 1073 )
    The new Civ2, gold edition doesn't use WinG. However I'm having diffuculty getting it to see whatever it is looking for on the CD to start playing.
    ^~~^~^^~~^~^~^~^^~^^~^~^~~^^^~^^~~^~~~^~ ~^~
    ABORTED effort:
    Close all that you have.
  • I've managed to compile it just fine on both Linux and Iriz, and let me tell you, it's a time sink if there ever was one! :)
  • Oh great.. That would just bring my productivity to a halt.. ;-P
  • :The reason is quite simple, I don't use Linux :because it's Linux, I use Linux because it's free :software, and even if linux will stay free and we :will bring all the commercial world to Linux, and :we will be flooded by properity software, then :what have we done?

    I use Linux. Not because it's Linux, not because it's free but because it works. You could be potentially seen as someone that just wants a free ride on all software because it presents less of a burden on your finances.

    Well, games just aren't all going to be that way. Feel lucky that any commercial game companies release any source code. If all you're going to do is whine then why not write to the companies that make these decisions rather than sitting in this forum doing little to help what you see as a problem.

    I don't care if software is free. I don't care if it has source. I do care that it allows me to get my work done or, in the case of games, entertain me to the level I expect of a particular game. I have no problem supporting those that provide me with my requirements. :This is what i think is the mistake of KDE for :example, and let's ignore the fact that QT is :going to be free, in the days that QT was not :free, what's the taste to free the world from :Microsoft if you bring them to the control of :some other properity software company(Troll :Tech)?

    KDE was a mistake in your eyes. I've never seen a problem with KDE and have been quite happy with it for some time now. I couldn't really care less if QT is free or not. It makes no difference as long as it works.

  • .

    www.freeciv.org [freeciv.org]

    Freeciv, as you might expect, is a GPL Civilization clone. It's quite good, in both multiplayer and single player modes. You really don't have an excuse for booting Windows to play Civ any more, unless you really like those annoying little songs that get played over and over...
    --
    The Linux Game Tome [happypenguin.org]

  • Press release claims that it's the first commercial game for Linux. First shrink-wrap, maybe, but Doom, Quake....?

  • Hmmm. BeOS is really nothing like Linux/X (in terms of the API), so there's no particular technical reason why it would be natural to port it. But it's reassuring that they pay attention to alternate OSes, so perhaps they could be convinced.

    In fact, they used to be very Mac-oriented, and for a long time their games would come out for the Mac first, with the DOS/Windows version following by a few months if it ever got ported at all.

  • The company I work at used to have an official quake server for employees. "Used to" being the key phrase. (Unfortunately this was before I got here.)

    Now, there is a mistake!

  • But you didn't answer my question.

    To restate: if you're paying, why not pay open source developers instead of developers who only give you limited rights to use what you're paying for?

  • WINE? (Score:1)

    by wampus ( 1932 )
    Any one ever get Civ2 to run under wine? The CD sits here taunting me, but I refuse to reboot to use it.
  • Most games are going to stay propritary, at least when they come out, so learn to live with it. The Open Source model just doesn't work for games, where stability and bug-free code are less important that a coherent and unique vision. Too many cooks spoil the broth, you know that.

    Thankfully, a few enlightened developers such as id release the source code after they have milked the games.
  • Well, it could also be that Open Source in a game (or at least in some kinds of games) is just a rotten idea.

    Basically, what Open Source gives you is unlimited peer reviewing, and (if the project is cool), free bug fixes. This happens because the difference between an application working and an application not working is self evident and clear, and subjective elements of taste have nothing to do with it.

    On the other hand, in an Open Source environment, how would you go around fixing, say, Quake2's AI? What is OK for somebody is way too agressive for somebody else, or too wimpy for somebody else yet. How do you choose what is a good ending and what isn't? There is just too many variables and too much subjectivity involved.

    On the other hand, I agree that the community should have Open Source game **engines**, and luckily, there are a few of those out. But as far as the end user is concerned, he benefits more from giving the money to Activision for the game he wants to play than from giving it to a group of developers for their own project.

    Consider this... Why are so many more people working on conversions of Quake and Quake2 than there are working on entirely new games based off the (free now) Doom engine?
  • I read that there are quite some guys out here, who are not that happy.
    Could you explain your position, as I can not follow you?

    Whats the danger of an app you simply dont need to buy?
    *I* will buy one if it is native linux port.
  • And I've never even TOUCHED the game... Just talking about it with people or watching them play... Oh boy, there goes my productivity...

    Like many others, I'd LOVE a SC3k port as well. Or a way to get it under Wine. Or SVGAlib. Or ANYTHING... (Yes I know about LinCity, don't like it much...)
  • If there's one game I DON'T want ported to Linux, it has to be CIV!!!!

    I blew almost a whole year of school because of that bloody game!
  • That clinches it! I'm formatting my remaining
    FAT partition to make room for Civ3, baby!
  • I mean that. I don't want to hear any more whimpering about "I don't like first person shooters" or "What kind of a name is BFRIS?" - this is a game that any right-thinking human being will agree must be purchased, must be played, and must be played under Linux. A year from today, the Linux (not counting Wine) games situation could be Id Software, or it could be a number of widely varied games with more jumping on the bandwagon; the success of these people (a commercial Linux-game-porting crew!) is going to be a decisive factor. If you don't like non-GPL'ed apps, suck it up and realize you're acting for the greater good. If you don't play computer games, isn't now a good time to start? And if you don't like Civilization, lie down immediately and drink plenty of liquids until the fever breaks, then go out and buy this game when you come to your senses. You know you want to.
  • It never worked for me. Yes it did run but I could never get a game started. Didn't exactly sell me over.
  • Not that I could do anything with it, I've got the Civ2 sources basically. I'm working on the PAL/European versions of the game.(Don't blame me if it's screwed up!)
  • If there was a single game I would want run on Linux, it would be one of the Civilizations. I don't know anything about 3, but I play CivNet and Civ2 so much I want to buy another machine to dedicate just to them! This is great news!!!

    noah

  • SOLD! (Score:1)

    by ComStar ( 4616 )
    Well, well... they've already sold a copy to me! And I know a few of my friends will buy it as well... even if only to promote gaming in the Linux sector.
    -Philip
  • Now that they are doing a Mac port of RRT-II, perhaps a Linux port is not out of the question? I would really love that!
  • Mmm, today was a good day. Now if i could only find a version of util-linux that's not on win.tue and not possibly trojan-ridden.
    (have they gotten rid of the util-linux trojan yet?)
  • And which liblaries will be linked to it. I think we should start a campaign to convince the companies producing commercial software for linux to use and support the linux's package formats (all of them), and produce at least two (libc5 and libc6) versions of their product. I mean it is insane that they put a whole lot of work to create a software and don't bother to spend one more day to compile it against two libcs and to package it in rpm and deb and so on.
    There were counterexamples (SO, wp8, oracle etc.) and it was really annoying.
    Let's make those companies to play the linux game by the rules of the community!

    Szo


  • Come on, linking and packaging not that hard. I think its much better solution than every ISV picks it's random format and library and for example makes it impossible to use civ and wp on the same machine. It is not as hard as making a gtk and a qt version. They could include all the versions on one CD.

    Szo
  • Linux does not need more commerical software, i will prefer to see more development of freeciv so it will outform his commercial competitor
  • why not?first, people said you can't get a good
    free software.then they said you can't get a good free OS, and now they say you can't have good free games.
  • the communism was a bad thing, free software is
    a socialist/anarchistic ideal, intends to free people,
    not to put them in a cage like happend in russia that was controlled
    by the communist party, or like happening today in the
    western world, specificly in the U.S, where the capitalists control.
  • i strongly disagree, the quality of opens source
    games improve slowly, look at lincity and freeciv,
    they are not perfect, but they are quite good.
    it's just like a few years ago people said that the
    desktop is going to stay properity, and now look at KDE and GNOME.
    it's all a matter of time, you just have to believe
  • As OSS was for years in the desktop, but now look what KDE and GNOME did.

    If you don't buy these games, than the companies will have no choice other than releasing the source code,
    and when they do, those games will become even better
  • Newer versions of XFree support the mouse wheel. Most apps do not, not out of the box anyhow. Since Linux does not have a standard toolkit, it does not have a standard "scroll" event, so you'll never see a general-purpose scroller. Best you can do is hope Qt and GTK recognize z-axis movement over scrollable components.
  • Fair? If a mac app makes money, it makes money. Some companies don't recoup their investment if they port though. Mac users aren't OWED a damn thing, and it's an insult to mac fans to suggest that they need charity. Because that's what taking a loss is, charity.

    Now that Macs are becoming more popular, and have the graphic toolkits (like glide) to target, I imagine you'll see more ports. I just don't want to see Mac support to turn into another affirmative action debate.
  • Whu whoah huh, one would think that would be the EASIEST thing to port to a unix environment, but maybe I'm mistaken. Perhaps some kind soul familiar with DirectPlay could post an overview of how it works (no code, someone might want to do a cleanroom implementation)
  • I guess they they haven't gotten to posting it yet, but we have an interview with Loki on linuxpower.org here [linuxpower.org]
  • Now if I could just get simcity 3000 ported to linux.....
  • I'm definitely buying a copy! :)
  • It's great to see games getting ported to alternative platforms now! I love games, but I'm sure they will be even better on OS's that don't crash every 10 minutes.

    It's too bad Linux, BeOS, etc. aren't quite mainstream enough to get some of the other games, too... I'm right in the middle of Grim Fandango at the moment, but I hate having to boot to Windows to play it.

    - Slarty
  • Heck, they only need one format and still get in trouble. Has anyone been able to upgrade a library in Linux without having to recompile a bunch of programs because the damn library is not backward compatible?
  • I actually agree with on this one. The best thing would be if you could get the source *with* the game/application when you bought it, BUT...

    What is the economic insentive for the companies to spend maybe millions to develop an app or a game, and then *give* away the product?

    Some products don't lend itself well to the open-source model of making money (selling support).

    And where would I get the money to make those games, if I didn't charge for it? Doubt McDonalds pays enough for me to buy that 3D card which would give my game the edge I need...

    Economics...
  • Civ2 is the only thing between me and a record uptime, and Civ3 looks just yummy. This is the greatest thing i've heard in almost forever :) I'll shell out just about anything for this...
  • "send a lot louder and a much more effective message by developing a petition campaign for the good games."

    Hey, if someone got up a petition for Linux Starcraft, you can bet I'd sign it! :)
  • Has anyone ever noticed this? Whenever another proprietary program gets ported over to Linux, everyone starts bitching and moaning about, "Oh, no, it's not free, we'll have to pay for it! They should be giving it away, waaaaah!"

    While part of the crowd making these complaints might have semi-legitimate ideological reasons for it, sometimes I get the feeling that a lot of Linux users are just so used to getting stuff for free that they think all software for free systems, whether "free software" or not, should be "free as in beer" as well as (or instead of) "free as in speech." I wouldn't be surprised if one of the major reasons that Linux had a dearth of software is due to that very notion, the perception that Linux-users wouldn't pay for the software they used.

    If you want more games to come to Linux, email the game companies and tell them you would buy the games. Help Linux shed the cheapskate image.
  • Everything in this world costs something. There's no such thing as a free lunch.

    I honestly don't care about the ideology. If OSS is so superior, as everyone believes it is, then it will win out naturally--look at the strides Linux has taken. In the mean time, I'm going to buy whatever I want to buy.
  • 100 Turns to develop Basic funtionality. 10 Turns to become advanced. Unlimited use for free thereafter.

    Excellent defensive capabilities.

    I'd build it...
  • It's great that we finally have commercial games under Linux. It was about time. There's only a few reasons I still maintain a Windows partition and games has been one the major ones.

    Thanks LokiSoft

    PS: I don't quite care at this point if Civilization: Call To Power is written by the original author or not if gets me hooked in the same way the first two did.
  • If you so much are upset by the fact that Sid Meiers and team had opinions, biases, and limited information, go do him one better. The value of the game is in the gameplay and strategy, not in the ideological or philosophical values of a government, religion, unit, or system. I may just be feeding trolls by replying, but I've seen some twisted(in my eyes) conversions by people who truly wanted a fanatic government, or a Nazi Regime, some Santa Claus units, and other oddities. Sigh. Some people...
    -Twinkie
  • *Shudder*
    Imagine M$ trying to gain a foothold somehow in the Linux OS/market by releasing quality products and games on the Linux OS? Imagine! Competing fairly and on the merit of quality and value! What is wrong with the world.

    Oh well, we can dream, right?
    M$ Flight simulator would be nice, on Linux, while I'm dreaming. Anyone else with a wish? Support for their Wheel Intellimouse? Their Freestyle Pro? DirectX for Linux?
    -Twinkie
  • I pay for a good game, period; if your Open Source friends can make a better game than Activision, Microprose, iD, etc, for 50 dollars, I would pay them the 50 dollars, no questions asked. If they charged only 30, I would pay 30. I have no value for an Open Source game just because it is open source. What's the difference in feeding the Open Sourcers or Activision? If you're saying the FreeCiv group can give us a better product than Civ:CtP for a 50 dollar donation, then it would seem that would be a 50 dollars well spent. However, spending the money on Civ2:MGE for example, which is an Open Engine game, rathern than Open Source, we can compile our own scenarios, our own units, our own graphics, our own rules... So where is the advantage in 'buying' FreeCiv over Civ2:MGE?

    Lets say we give the money to the FreeCiv guys and they produce something, say Civ2:MGE edition... except that MGE is already out; so we would choose to buy MGE instead. How about we be generous? Give them the money, and expect a better product from them than from Microprose, who would no doubt use the money from MGE to produce Civ3 or some future successor... Like CtP! So, Tim, if you're still reading, or someone else who likes to argue =), what is the value in supporting FreeCiv when we can get Microprose, Activision, and Firaxis to jump flaming hoops for us because we buy their games and vote with our wallets? I'm curious, because while I value the Open Source model for its flexibility, innovation, and stability, I don't know that it is the perfect or superior model in any situation.
    -Twinkie
  • So game companies, heck, any company with a limited lifespan product would probably not release their source; you can point to Id as an example of releasing source, but they darn well made sure they obsoleted their own products (Wolf3d->Doom->Quake->Quake3) before releasing any of their source... I would like to buy a Civ:CtP CD with binaries for Linux, Win32, Mac, Alpha, etc, and only buy one game, regardless of which machine I may run it on. So something Loki could do is sell for 5 dollars the binaries for Civ:CtP on a floppy (Heh, a use for floppies!) so I can play with any machine my 1 copie of Civ:CtP.

    I would like that Option for Quake3:Arena, especially since they plan to support Mac, Win32, and Linux all at once, as well as various SGIs, VisualPCs, Alphas, and such. There are thus several overlapping but distinct ideologies involved...
    Open Source -> No company lock on the product
    Open Engine -> Pay for the game, not the technology, akin to buying a CD player for cheap and then picking and choosing your music
    Cross-Platform/Portable -> Game is not machine bound, nor OS bound

    Linux is obviously Open Source and Cross Platform
    Civ2:MGE is not Open Source, is not Cross Platform, but is Open Engine, as you can modify the rules, graphics, landscape, and units to suit any taste.
    Quake2 is Open Engine and Cross Platform, allowing anyone with hardware acceleration(almost) to play almost any game with its open set of rules and rendering.

    I guess jumping through flaming hoops is an exageration... But in a real sense, the only way to sell a game in a competative market is to sell something people want to play, and if we want to play Civ games, companies will produce Civ games... If we want to play Id games(ugh), companies will produce FPS...

    But we do and can vote with our wallets; games that are no good, we don't buy, and games that are fun are snapped off the shelves (See Baldur's Gate and Final Fantasy VIII as examples =)

    Twinkie

  • Freeciv (Score:1)

    by seeS ( 81505 )
    It has an AI now? Excellent. Excellent news about Civ 3 too; one less reason to reboot into windows (if it is as good as Civ 2)

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