They're known for absolutely amazing communication and insights (and insides), they're honest and open. I believe many Arcen's fans feel like being a part of their team or even a big family. They even published a full design document for AI War 2, something I've never seen before, devs used to keep such things a secret. Chris also wrote several posts about his struggles and failures, and that alone says a lot about his strength and honesty. For me it's one of the most respected developers out there, also their Linux support is always top notch. Backed the game, it seems to be doing quite well now [External Link].

I played the original AI War with a couple of friends. Out of several runs only once we've achieved victory on "very easy" difficulty. It was a game full of sweat and nerves, especially after we've defeated one of the two AIs and it only became more difficult. But we managed to hit the second AI with everything we had. I can say for sure it was the most satisfying victory I can remember (and all we've got is a big message "YOU WIN"; I'd never think such a simple victory screen can fill me with a pure joy). Was a well deserved, accomplished victory, the result of teamwork and serious efforts. The game also has an awesome OST, one of the best I've ever heard. If AI War 2 would be "more of the same but easier to manage and get into", it will be a huge success for hardcore RTS fans.

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From my perspective this looks like CS, I don't know why people like it as it feels for me just like this junk. Except this is way cheaper.

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As of writing it has 10,621 Backers giving over $2,185,770 against the $2,750,000 goal.

This is not exactly true. Backers have only given $483k as of now and $1700k come from Fig itself. This is an unusual scheme for crowdfunding.

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Quoting: GuestI'm a 44 year old man and this is one of my all time favorite games. That is all.

My faith in humanity has been restored. It's heartwarming to know that even older people from the previous generation enjoy such emotional games. I always thought that parents value way other things than their children so it's hard for them to explain to each other why some movie or a game hits them so hard. Glad that's not always the case.

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Quoting: morbiusOn the other hand, Max feels like a grown man pretending to be a teenage girl.

She's asperger's I guess as many other quiet smart people with little to no friends. They develop faster mentally, I can totally relate to that.

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I just loved Life is Strange, finished it a couple of days ago. It gave me a strange mix of creepy horror, action and nostalgia for something I've never had, for someone else's life. Like I really lived that life and now it's all in the past and that was a hell of a good time. It also helps playing it in autumn so the mood matches your own outdoors. My own feelings should be different from the author's ones as I'm a decade older but still the university days are kinda fresh in my memory, I can totally relate to that time. Again, my dorm was absolutely different (it was mixed, to start with) so it's once again that strange nostalgia for something I missed. Maybe I lived somewhere close to Max but it was in an alternative timespace that I rewound and got here? Who knows.

But the game that truly made an impact on my life is Mass Effect. I know, I know, the name of the game is overused today (and is often said as a swear word) and it's kinda full of cliches. Whatever. It combines them in a unique way that feels like a massive, galactic-scale adventure with lovely characters you care about and a great story you can change and see the result of your actions. Our generation basically got our own modern version of Star Wars that has more characters and story depth and feels fit for the present time. Not a space fantasy but more like proper sci-fi. That's only my opinion of course, I'm not trying to start holywars with SW fans.

Well, it has its flaws like the endings, even if you haven't played it you surely heard about that shitstorm. Disregard that. A game is awesome for its content and not because it has a good ending (it can't be spoiled for me by a badly done one either). ME3 also has wonderful multiplayer (horde-style with missions) I've sinked tens of hours in with my friends.

Now for the bad parts. It's not available on Linux natively and I doubt will ever be. It's Electronic Arts we're talking about so no. The good news is that it works great on Wine, first two parts are available on Steam and ME3 can be bought in Origin which should work fine, too. It has a lot of story DLCs and my full 1-3 parts playthrough with all DLCs took about 100 hours. I've completed all of them on Linux twice as I don't have a Windows partition for 8 years already.

But I would understand if you hate EA and don't want to support non-Linux gaming and mess with Wine. Totally OK, I won't judge you. But I'd go as far as saying this is the only game that's worth installing Wine. Pretty bold statement, eh? But I mean it. Any other game not available on Linux just can't make me interested enough for that, I'd either wait for a port or just forget it. Now it's your call, I've already taken too many bytes in GOL's forum database.

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Quoting: StebsThe discussions here mostly miss the point that this is about fixing the shortcomings of the UE4 Editor under Linux (compared to the Windows version).
<...>
At least everybody who is annoyed about Bugs in the Linux editor (or even can not use it because of bugs), should probably help fund this guy.

Good point. I've pledged and hope the editor becomes usable. Not that I'm into gamedev (at least for now), but I wanted to play with UE4 and it was totally unstable and crashing after simple editing of a default project. Just imagine if some time in the future it would be good enough to develop on Linux full time!

Unity is fine and I heard its editor is already working on Linux. But the problem is that it's closed source and behind the paywall. Paying to the Unity devs just isn't good enough, they spend money for what they consider important. And for me personally better Linux performance, stability and properly working shaders is the priority. But I can't do much except from whining on the forums where developers don't even answer or care (looking at you, Dreamfall Chapters).

UE4 is opensource, though not free software, and it allows us, Linux gamers, to vote with our wallets by sponsoring or hiring devs that do what WE need, not THEM Epics. The best part is that the result is available for everyone, not just Epic or some specific game developer (if they patched the engine for their own game only). I always try to invest into software improvement for everyone, not for myself only. That way the greater good in the world hugely increases and I just feel good.

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Quoting: GuestSomeone in my reddit thread said that the devs will refund your money minus the kickstarter fee. So you may only get like a 90% refund... as if you're somehow responsible for Kickstarter's cut due to Warhorse's broken promise. That's some bullshit.

Yeah, that's bullshit because I've got $40 refunded to PayPal while I asked to lower my pledge tier from £40 to £15 (in case they magically support Linux at the release). That means I should have been given £25 (which equals $33 by now) and actually got a bit more. After deducing the PayPal fee I had about $37 available.

So, as a matter of fact they're bad at fulfilling their promises but I just can't blame them for scam or anything. That's really rare among the kickstarted gamedev studios. I'm pretty sure they would refund the rest (by my request) if/when Linux support will be dropped and forgotten completely.

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I've got the survey this month and surprisingly it has one new question! That's really rare as it hasn't changed for years. This is what it looks like:

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Sadly, it's just what happened for me with No Man's Sky if I can make a comparison. Except the lack of hype, of course. From the first trailer I knew it's shallow no matter how it looks. You just can't make a good game from the material shown if you're not a pure game genius (currently their population is close to extinction anyway).

Well, maybe it'll be given some depth over the time to come. I hope their most awaited game "Stars beyond Reach" will be released eventually and become a huge success!

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