Re: Loki...

[Chris <chris@starforge.co.uk>]

Steve Baker wrote:


> But if the practice of installing both OS's was commonplace, there would
> be no need for games companies to build a Windoze version at all.

You can only really take the "no Windows version" route when the vast 
majority of people have linux installed. Quite frankly I will be amazed if 
we ever get a 50% split of the desktop market even if everything goes 
perfectly. Not because of any inferiority in Linux, but because of the 
inertia of the market place and the fact that some people hate Linux as
much as I hate Windows. More accurately speaking, companies will only 
support Linux once it becomes economically viable to do so* and they will 
only stop supporting Windows when the loss that would result from the sales 
reduction is less than the reduction in costs created by supporting both 
platforms. Where that threshold is, I'm not sure, but I doubt we will see
it for several years, if ever (complete collapse of the Gatesian Empire 
notwithstanding of course).

*except in cases like Carmack/Id where linux is supported because they like 
it of course.


> I don't think games programmers would have too much difficulty
> with transitioning to Linux development.  Most of the game *servers*
> are written for Linux for security and improved networking reasons
> so you just know those guys are pretty familiar with the environment.


But who is to say that these companies just don't employ a couple of linux 
networking experts. They don't need to know much about how to write games, 
just how to write servers. My worry is that a lot of big software houses
have a lot of coders with very little experience beyond DirectX and
VisualC++ and not a huge number with good OpenGL/gcc experience.


> to be used by *both* industries, I think there is actually going to
> be some positive *pressure* to move artwork development over to Linux -
> especially if you need to have massive render farms to produce cut-scenes.

I'm not arguing that. For things like rendering, especially networked 
rendering, Linux has significant advantages over Windows. (I just wish 
Newtek would release a Linux version of Lightwave! :/)

Chris
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