Also two other important things... Firstly, that avoiding Wine, in favour of native ports, is a company policy, and one which Gabe claims is good for the future sustainability of Linux as a gaming platform. I agree with him, and am pleased to see that he and his team are paying attention.

Secondly, there will be no SteamOS exclusives, as many (myself included) predicted based on Valve's history. He wants his Windows userbase to look favourably on SteamOS as a service extension into their living rooms, not as a heavy-handed push onto something unfamiliar (as MS has done with it's own customers, vis a vis Windows 8's Metro).

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Pretty sure I only bought Portal 1. Maybe I'm losing my mind :dizzy:

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Wut.

Does this mean (effectively) all Linux folks get P2 for free?! At least beta quality?

Downloading.

Confused...

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Bravo to IGS for this! I'm pretty happy to support IGS, and that sentiment is growing rapidly as time passes.

Thanks for bringing this up, Liam... I may not have noticed this, as the news comes from slightly outside of the Linux dev community. IGS has become an important part of our ecosystem, though. I find this piece pertinent as well as topical.

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Awesome, this is real good news.  I saw some nice statements in their Steam forums, but it was hardly a confirmation.  This report is precisely that!  I wonder if it will have an impact on bundle sales for Linux folks, now that we have a solid promise that the last non-Linux game is to come to us.

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Looks great!  Owlchemy seem like good folks.  I was happy to support their Kickstarter campaign :)

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Quoting: Quote from SamsaiIf you've ever listened to Stallman, he always states there is difference between the two terms.

Yes, a very important distinction. Both are very useful, but free software (as you rightly state) has greater advantages for the community, while openness has (arguably) more advantages for the creator, by limiting the freedoms of those sharing in the sources.

The reason it's "arguable" is that there are numerous cases in which community benefits have exceeded others. Stallman sadly has a difficult time articulating that ideal without alienating broad groups of contributors.

Either way, however, I enjoy reading through the sources of game projects, despite their licensing quirks, especially code from commercial games (ASYLUM's Dagon Engine, Shadowgrounds, Penumbra, Gish, Introversion's source code, etc). I don't always understand all of what they're doing, but it has benefited my understanding of games programming, and I appreciate the courage of devs who share the sausage-making with us. :)

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I'm glad that a way was found for GOL to support this effort!  The Linux community is still pretty small, and any way that the various individual communities can come together to do something interesting is a win in my book.

May the best project win!!

(as long as it's 0 A.D. ;))

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One of my favorite TBS games of all-time.  The sprite art (with the stylized cartoon busts) belies deep strategic gameplay, and a bastard of an AI (which is what you want;  trust me).  Hard-core wargamers will want counters instead of sprites, but there are far more beginner and intermediate wargamers out there, and this is a great introduction to the harder side of the genre.

The right complexity blends perfectly with those elements the team chose to streamline.  In particular, the supply mechanic is inspired.  To achieve "Brilliant" victories, one does require a healthy dose of luck, which is at once a slight annoyance as it is also brutally realistic.  Achieving "Decisive" victories is possible through skill alone on all scenarios that I've played.  It is possible that a smarter man than I could score "Brilliant" victories without a lucky roll of the die, but I don't believe that it can be done on all of the campaign scenarios.

I can't comment on multi-player, as I feel that I'm still mastering the game myself, and haven't even played the Red Turn DLC yet (which I do also have).  The completionist tactician in me refuses to move on until I crack "Brilliant" on all of the original scenarios :P  As an aside, it should be mentioned that the Black Turn DLC is longer than the original campaign.  Community scenarios are also available, should the official content run dry.

UoC is hands down (in my opinion) Linux's most severely underrated indie TBS title of 2012 (really 2013 for most people).  I look forward to seeing more from these devs!

I should note, the game can be ever-so-slightly cheaper on sale from the dev directly, and does come with Steam keys for those folks inclined to care about that.  Basically, the sale prices on their site for the DLCs are sometimes a lie;  a lie in your favor.  For example, should you go Red Turn to your cart (as of now) it will sometimes show up as costing $2.24 instead of the $2.99 advertised, which is the price on Steam.  Other times, it will be the Black Turn which is on sale for $7.49.  I have no explanation for this, to be honest.  It's either a bug, or 2x2 Games randomly tosses additional discounts out to direct-buyers.  Either way, I was tempted to mention that in the sales page until I noticed that this "magic" doesn't reliably happen.

At any rate, any turn-based wargamers out there can pick up the original campaign and two DLCs

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Hm.  Wonder if I can convert my Kickstarter backer version (DRM-free download off the dev's website) into a Humble key.  Doesn't matter too much to me, but would be a minor convenience.

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