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Game porter and Steam Play dev Ethan Lee is running a crowdfunding campaign

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Nintendo's USB GameCube adapter for the Wii U and Switch could soon work on Linux, Mac and Windows if this crowdfunding campaign from Ethan Lee is a success.

Ethan Lee should be a well-known name to most of our readers, they're responsible for a ridiculous amount of indie games that were ported to Linux (see here). On top of that, they're also now working on Steam Play (Valve's fork of Wine that's integrated with the Steam client on Linux) with Codeweavers and Valve too.

Here's the simple version of what they're planning to do if they get the funding:

I would like to improve support for Nintendo's USB GameCube controller adapter on Windows/macOS/Linux. You may know it as the Wii U GameCube Adapter, or the Nintendo Switch GameCube Adapter. I will do this by adding a special backend to SDL, via their HIDAPI-based joystick driver.

Right now there only exist platform-specific standalone programs that make virtual joysticks (such as wii-u-gc-adapter), or programs are writing low-level device support themselves (such as Dolphin's built-in GameCube adapter support). By writing a driver in SDL, we introduce out-of-the-box support to an extremely large catalog of existing software for every major desktop platform without having to develop a driver for each one individually (some of which require expensive certificates and/or certification processes, in addition to having to install it for each user).

The campaign, now live on IndieGoGo has a small goal of only $1,500. They're not expecting it to take too long, with an estimation of around three weekends worth of work to get the bulk of it done.

The more we get working out of the box, the better. Hopefully the campaign will go well.

Article taken from GamingOnLinux.com.
Tags: Crowdfunding
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I am the owner of GamingOnLinux. After discovering Linux back in the days of Mandrake in 2003, I constantly came back to check on the progress of Linux until Ubuntu appeared on the scene and it helped me to really love it. You can reach me easily by emailing GamingOnLinux directly. Find me on Mastodon.
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8 comments

Shmerl Feb 14, 2019
Would be nice for someone to make a campaign to develop open positioning algorithms for Vive and other VR headsets, so OpenHMD could use it.


Last edited by Shmerl on 14 February 2019 at 5:23 pm UTC
GodofGrunts Feb 14, 2019
I personally will make sure it goes well. Being able to use my GC controller for everything is a dream.
Vaiski Feb 14, 2019
I can't wait to play all of my games with DK Bongos.
Fishticon Feb 14, 2019
I'd like to see this happen. The GC controller is my all-time favourite controller. And I love that Nintendo still makes them.
There are 3rd party USB ones out there that work fine on Linux, but I have one and it feels like something I would buy at the dollar store.
awesam Feb 14, 2019
I'm backing this project because I think it is important that game controller support is as good as possible on Linux. Though I personally probably would not use a GameCube controller, my controller of choice is Nintendo Switch Pro (that I hope eventually will have Linux Kernel drivers and work with rumble feedback). Not only do I think it is one of the best controllers on the market, but you are also not funding the devil like when buying an Xbox 360 controller.
sub Feb 15, 2019
Quoting: ShmerlWould be nice for someone to make a campaign to develop open positioning algorithms for Vive and other VR headsets, so OpenHMD could use it.

Btw, I'd support a project that reverse engineers the VFX (and probably others) and implements a wrapper to modern a VR systems in DOSBox.

I finally want to play Magic Carpet 1+2 on a Rift. :)
kokoko3k Feb 15, 2019
I'm using this, found it dirty cheap, supported by linux kernel with rubmle too.
http://www.hkems.com/product/ps2/TrioLinkerPlus.htm
I'm using to play dreamcast games, but it supports PS2 controllers and gC too.
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