Quoting: g000hOoo ooo ooo FPS deal alert....

Humble has released the Endless RPG Lands bundle [External Link] today, which includes a couple of these FPS games - The BTA bundle gets you Borderlands 2 + DLC and the Full bundle gets you Borderlands: The Pre-sequel. Also Wurm Unlimited (for Linux) is in the lowest bundle, plus there are some tasty Windows games too (if you are so inclined).

Beat me to it by an hour... If only I didn't leave sitting in front of the computer for dinner.

But I am not big on FPS... when they first came out (afaik) with Wolf3D followed by the original doom, they were great and unique. (IMHO) Then the market started flooding with knock off ever since. (admittedly some evolution) The only other ones i ever got interested in were Doom2, Duke Nukem, and Painkiller. But I'm an old fart... I remember Wolfenstein being a top down shooter on the old Apple ][ computers, and Duke Nukem used to be a side scroller on the Commodore 64.

I have considered getting the Painkiller sequel that runs on linux, but I'm not sure about how interested I would be.

I still remember the "extreme" specs needed for Doom... a 386DX... with a whopping (at the time) 1 or 2 MB of memory. :)

Edit: and the original Doom mods... Simpons Doom and Barney Doom. (Barney the purple children's dinosaur, not Barney Gumble of the Simpsons)

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Quoting: razing32Prison Architect 2 : AirportSIM :D

Sounds about right seeing how the airlines treat their passengers like criminals. :D

I'll probably get this sooner or later... I do like sims and builders. But I have too many games bought and yet to play at the moment... even though I play just a small handful right now. (Mostly sims and builders plus one tower Defense)

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Factorio... Rimworld... A little Project Highrise and Dungeon Warfare.

But I also started going a little classic too... OpenRCT2. I have both RCT Deluxe and RCT2 Triple Threat pack in my Gog account so I have a ton of content to play through. So much content that I don't think I ever played all of it even since buying the games when they were new... before they became classics on GOG. And I don't remember which pack adds the "Six Flags" content, but some of the older roller coasters are now just historical (sadly).

I have not had any problems running OpenRCT2 either... it runs quite well. The worse part is that I did have to scale up the size as 1920x1080 on content that used to run on 640x480 is a little hard on the older eyes.

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Humble Store also has a lot more on sale...
Practically everything Kalypso is on sale including the pre-release of Dungeons III is 15% off (I know, pre-release, but dungeons 2 works well on linux, and Kalypso does do a lot of linux games and I think it releases next Friday.) The recently released Sudden Strike 4 is 25% off. Project Highrise (runs on linux, no official support) is 75% off. And tropico 5 is 75% off.

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I never played Theme Park... is the game play the same as Roller Coaster Tycoon?

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Quoting: Mountain ManI don't dispute that, but how would you convince someone who isn't already vested in Linux that they should prefer Linux over Windows if their primary application is PC gaming? That's a tough argument to make, especially when the biggest argument against us is the fact that we're ignored by the vast majority of AAA developers. That may change in the future, but I'm looking at where things stand right now.

Personally, if your primary purpose for having a pc is gaming, I would push them to a console, not linux. I want linux to grow, but it is not right for everyone.

While I am happy with linux gaming, Gaming is not linux's draw. I am drawn to customizing things to my desire. No "analytics" feedback to Microsoft's marketing department. Not being subjected to major attack from worms and viruses just by being connected to the internet. No forced obsolescence and the ability to change my OS when I want to. If I was only interested in gaming, I would be on a console, not linux.

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Quoting: Mountain ManI've mentioned it before, but the choice is basically, "Do I use Windows and have access to all the games, or use Linux and have access to only a small fraction of them?" For anybody who wants to play games on the PC, Linux simply doesn't look like a viable option compared to Windows.

They use to say this about applications in general about linux. Windows has always had more software choices. However, at a certain point how many different web browsers do you need? I generally use 3, and I do a lot of web development. How many word processors do you need? I only need 1.

Obviously, you want the good pieces of software compared to shovelware. Look at the android and iphone markets... Does anyone care if one has more than the other... they both are filled with garbage and finding the good ones is the hardest part about getting software on these devices.

I have over 250 games on my steam account (232 are on Linux)... most I have not even played. Admittedly, I gained many through Humble Bundles and Humble monthly. However, even some that I bought I have not played or only played a few minutes. The number that I have played for over 1 hour is quite limited. Thousands of titles are not necessary. You only need a handful of good ones. And there are quite a few good ones on linux (hidden amongst the garbage) I would expect very few gamers to not be happy if limited to linux only. Probably only the ones that need to have the newest title and fad of the month will be disappointed. We have RTS, sims, FPS, strategy, visual novels, platformers, ... we do have quite a selection on linux now.

Quoting: Mountain ManThose of us who were already vested in Linux are thrilled with the improved game support we've seen over the past several years, but Valve has done an exceptionally poor job making the argument that anybody else should prefer Linux as a gaming platform.

This I agree with. I think the best force for marketing linux is Microsoft. They have the market and I think linux grows mostly with people getting annoyed with windows. But Valve does make money either way... Their investment in linux is solely to have a future if Microsoft tries to lock them out.

Another thing about linux gaining share... no one will come here just because of the games. I'm here because linux does everything... my web browsing, email, office suites, development, AND gaming. If I wanted a computer only for games, chances are that I would be on a console. Consequently, if linux didn't do everything I need done on a computer, and do it to my satisfaction, I would be on a different OS. Everyone has different needs and games alone will not bring everyone to any single platform.

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Don't look at Valve doing work in linux as benevolence, charitable, or in any other way as a way for them to embrace linux. They are a business and they are acting as such for their own profit. This is true even if they are not making a profit off of linux.

It is obvious that Valve's most feared competitor is Microsoft. Steam started as a way to make users have an easy way to install games and keep them updated. Most people that use computers really are idiots. While I have a very good knowledge of what I am doing, I know some other technical people, devs, that barely know how to install things. All people had to do was get one program, Steam, installed and it would allow you purchase, install, play, and update games with ease. (And lets face it, while it is easier now than it was in the past, Steam makes it much easier to install games on linux too.)

Once the iphone and androids hit the market about 10 years ago they caught on like wildfire. Microsoft was jealous... not because of the phone dominance, even though it wasn't happy that its existing phones at the time were trounced (and windows phones did exist back before the iphone and android), it was really jealous of the revenues from itunes, and the android play store. Here are software stores on the devices where apple and google get a percentage of everything sold for doing nothing except having a store front. Even though it is easy to bypass the store on Android (and possible, but not so easy on apple) very few people do this at all. It does not require much though to realize how much money Apple and Google are making off of this arrangement for very little investment.

Now here is Valve... It basically has a store that does the same thing as itunes and google play. Microsoft wants to do the same on the desktop. It has with the windows store. Also, if Microsoft wants to, they can require their own store to be required... (Microsoft's only problem is with anti-trust law; which is not likely to be enforced with the current administration, it doesn't mean it wouldn't be enforced with the next.)

That is why Valve supports linux. The more viable linux becomes, the more people have an option other than windows. The more choice people have, the less draconian windows will become (in theory.) While the majority of people will not be leaving windows for linux, the worse windows becomes the more people that will leave. If Microsoft goes nuclear and forces the use of windows store only, the relatively small mac and linux markets will be all valve has left. Apple already has a Mac store... Hence linux is the only safe choice for Valve. Even if there would be a way to bypass a windows store only, most users will never do it, just like on the phones. Even if anti-trust laws are enforced against Microsoft, any settlement would be years away. Linux is the only way Valve can survive at all in a worse case scenario. In a less than worse case problem, linux is still helpful for Valve's finances.

That is why Valve will continue to support linux and SteamOS. It is a saftey measure and will always be one. The more they update it, the better linux gets, the easier tools make it to port games, the larger market valve will have if and when all hell breaks loose. And trust me... Microsoft will do this as soon as they think they can get away with it.

As for a Half-Life 3 exclusive on Linux... it isn't going to happen. Valve is a corporation seeking profit. While the numbers of linux users is increasing, it is dwarfed by windows gamers. They will not annoy the majority of their market by making them wait even longer.

TL: DR... Valve will continue to update, support, and improve SteamOS/Linux as long as the Windows Marketplace exists... it is why they started SteamOS support, and why they will not let it die.

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Maybe if they counted WINE users as linux the numbers would be better. I'm sure they check the environment and can tell when their client is using WINE. These are people who obviously don't want to run windows, after all, as good as WINE is, it is more difficult to get things running properly with it than with native windows.

That being said, all the numbers are a blind crapshoot and really only represent trends. No one knows the actual numbers. Liam mentions some good points, and it doesn't even include people that avoid steam due to DRM or people that run distros that don't work well with steam.

Just make sure that if you dual boot to buy anything off of steam only on linux... otherwise it will count as a windows sale. I remember a long time ago Aspyr mentioning that they get paid based on linux buyers and that is how it was determined, so I am sure every developer gets a report with sales per OS. (I want to say that I saw that Aspyr note after the port of Civ V, so it has been a while.)

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Wow... that looks really good.

I think finaldest is right... this may be a successor to railroad tycoon.

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