http://www.swtor.com/community/showthread.php?p=10607352
Well this was an amusing thread to read through. I ended up changing from reading to skimming because it just got to ridiculous. There are so many trolls and ignorant derps sprouting crap. People are failing at basics like:
- What is Linux?
- Who uses Linux?
- What is a Linux distribution?
- What does "running on Linux" mean?
- What does it take to make a game "run on Linux"? (or use OpenGL)
- What is "Wine"?
- What does it take to make a game "run via Wine"?
- How many potential sales are there if this game were targeted towards Wine, or to native Linux?
- What are the political ramifications for officially releasing a Linux client? What about for "unofficially" or (plausible deniability) "unintentionally" supporting Wine?
- What are the community ramifications for the above.
If you, the reader, don't have reasonable answers to all of the above, then don't post. Don't have an answer? At least turn to a search engine before posting derp questions.
Many assumptions, numbers and sources cited are unreliable, to say the least. They make you look amazingly stupid.
It's also quite easy to admit that there aren't actual reliable sources and numbers to answer certain questions. It's either very hard and perhaps impossible to get certain kinds of information, or nobody has gone so far out of their way to get unbiased and demonstrably-reliable information.
Here's an example of strange info.. You can get some info, like "the number of Linux users" via understanding servers on the internet.. but even if correct.. that's not information that actually matters to us here.
Here is how things stand with this game on Linux, and why:
It won't happen. It can't happen.
- The underlying technology decisions were made a long time ago. They had to have been made a long time ago for the actual coding to get done.. for us to have a beta right now.
- The investors, budgeting, planning, etc.. is already over. We know it's over because the game is nearing release.
Some revival of a sort may be upcoming for future major patches or expansions, but I'd bet that's a little ways off.
- With the possible revival of resources for a patch/expansion, it does become possible to get a major idea like this done. So the only reasonable possibility exists during the development time for a major patch or expansion. Ok, maybe doable then.
- There are political ramifications for a collection of major companies, investors.. and people to support Linux, which is a direct enemy to the very foundation of what they have to get in bed with to release their game.
A small company has a small number of people.. a community / culture which can easily exchange ideas and can learn.
A large company, like the collection of large companies collaborating on this game, does not have a culture which can change very quickly. fud sticks to them. If their company cultures already understood the values of the underlying gratis and libre of the Free software culture we would have already seen steps towards native Linux support. Steps right from the beginning.
We don't see any steps, so we know the culture is stone (at least for now).
- For the swtor team to actually say they're not supporting a native OSX client (by omitting it from system requirements) is definitely saying a lot. A lot which also includes saying no to Linux support.
So where are Linux users left? Wine, and commercial variants of it.
At best there could be a kind of plausible-deniability-support, when they build a game to work as well as possible on earlier technologies and solid standards, programming techniques, etc. All of that just happens to work well with Wine.
Maybe specific issues which happen on Wine magically "go away" on patch day because some of "our people" (e.g. "members" of the Linux subculture who happen to be coders/whatever on swtor) are quietly fixing things.
Maybe specific issues which happen on Wine are specifically patched-for. A version of Wine could quite easily be made just for swtor.
At worst, specific poor coding practices, like using any number of intentionally-undocumented stuff in Windows (a classic), could be introduced which works just fine on Windows but is aimed to break Wine and maybe also whatever OSX equivalent(s).
Actually, at worst can get a whole lot worse.. but let's all be happy and think hopeful thoughts! =)
I "support" the idea. For whatever that's worth.
How about this though: If I can't get swtor working on Linux, via Wine at least, and preferably during this weekend's beta, I'm not buying it.
You could give me Windows. You could give me a new computer with Windows. Flat no. I've tasted just a little bit of Freedom.
