Running Windows Games with WineX 387
GonzoJohn writes "Linux Orbit takes a look at TransGaming Technologies' WineX and puts it through its paces with eight different Windows games. In addition to reviewing: Diablo 2, Starcraft, LinksLS 1998 (Golf Simulation), Dungeon Keeper 2, Populous the Beginning, Black and White, Fallout 2 and Might and Magic 6 under WineX 2.1, we also give you some helpful tips to make your WineX gaming experience as pleasant as possible."
I don't know about anyone else's experience... (Score:3, Insightful)
Now, I wasn't using their membership-based binary release though, but still, why should I go through the hell of manually editing config files and removing the cinematics from my game when I could just reboot?
Well... (Score:2, Insightful)
Re:try vmware et al. (Score:3, Insightful)
Short Term (Score:3, Insightful)
I actually am pretty biassed towards WineX. OK, in the short term, it will help a number of people that are running Linux and want to play a particular game.
Unfortunately, WineX will in the long term halt or slow down development of games running native in Linux. Why would a gaming company put money in porting it, Linux users _can_ play their game.
The skills of the people running Linux might well be their undoing,
Mainly for this reason, I mainly buy _linux_ native games (Quake 1 and 3 and Kohan). Unfortunately, ID decided not to release a Linux version of Wolfenstein anymore, but the binary was downloadable from the net (unfortunately or fortnutely, one needed the wine to run the Windows-only installer from the CD).
Re:WINE and other PC virtual machines (Score:4, Insightful)
The maintainer of WINE refers to it as an emulator.
It is indeed an emulator. Even the kernel cousin [zork.net] for it refers to it as an emulator.
Hatin' Wine (Score:1, Insightful)
Observation: (Score:2, Insightful)
Obviously, using Windows to play Windows games lacks the cool value of using Linux to play Windows games, and it really sucks to want to play a Windows game when you're using Linux to render/compile/download, so there is added utility to having WineX besides just running Windows stuff slowly (533Mhz AMD, so I can't complain)... but until the compatibility hits that critical mass I'm going to hold off.
Re:Short Term (Score:3, Insightful)
No. I disagree. One point you've missed which dominates, which Microsoft most definitely have not missed is that a lot of people get the OS that can play their games. They won't install an OS that cannot play their games.
The more Linux can play the same games that Windows can play, the more people will install it on the desktop. The more installations there are, the more incentive there is for people to write games to run under it, or solely under it.
Besides, even if every game ever only runs under Wine, you shouldn't forget we're leaving the stage where performance is the most critical part of a system. I've seen the benchmarks with 200+ frames per second under Quake III on the current top end systems, minor percentage differences in performance are going to be far less relevant from here on in. Working/not working is always relevant though.
Re:The key sentence in the whole article (Score:5, Insightful)
What I find funny is that I can't run the original Fallout under Windows 2000, but can run it under Wine/WineX.
re: ms directx (Score:2, Insightful)
this is a commom mistake that people make.
the point isnt MS letting directx specs out, its that people continue to use this piece of shit api. use SDL [libsdl.org]
if you use sdl, your game is portable (or at least easier to emulate with things like Wine). be smart, dont use directx
why I think this hurts both linux and PC gaming.. (Score:1, Insightful)
1)
Support. Unlike something like web-serving or database software, they assume (rightly) that Joe Gamer is a computer-illiterate moron. They're already swamped with people who cant figure out 'click OK to install game'. They could just write off Linux as 'unsupported' and hang up on linux users who are having problems, which would just hurt their customer relations.
2)
Big game developers don't trust us. They work around the clock coding newer and tougher copy protection schemes. Coding stuff that wont run on what they consider an 'easily hackable' platform like Linux would be a no-brainer. Hell I'd probably pepper my code with superfluous calls to those WineX incompatible DLLS just to keep my code on the platform it was designed for.
3)
They also see the linux zealots who, although a minority, are the most vocal and color all of the Linux user base as 'anti-corporate' and unwilling to pay for anything.
More and more the development is being shifted to console only. They're sick of running charities, game publishing is a tough business, and despite all the ranting, pirating of PC games has always hurt.
Why I think it hurts linux:
Linux isnt Windows. Every attempt to make linux look/smell/act like Windows meets with more failure than success. To the Joe Users that linux needs to reach, this just makes linux look, frankly like garbage.
We need to focus on what linux is good at, not make it look like a "really crappy" version of windows, which frankly is what the common man (if they've even heard of it) sees it as.
Just my 0.02
Re:Wine is NOT illegal (Score:5, Insightful)
Trademark? It'd be tough to show that WINE infringes on "Microsoft Windows".
Patent? I really doubt it. I can't imagine that there is any patent that could keep you from implementing an API.
Copyright? This was already tried by MS, arguing that they owned the header files, and duplicating the information in them was infringing. It didn't work.
EULA for reverse engineering? The WINE guys at least put up a pretense of clean-room engineering, and I think it'd be hard for MS to prove otherwise. You really don't need to disassemble Windows to implement the Win32 API as documented by MSDN. Finally, the right to reverse engineer is expressly granted in many locales for the purpose of ensuring compatibility. In the EU, this would make even a non-clean room impementation okay. In the US, it's a little more dicy, as I believe the laws only apply to compatibility over a network protocol between two different hosts, but there's still a general trend towards allowing people to produce compatible products.
Look-and-feel? Look-and-feel was an approach specifically shown by MS to not be a valid case for suit in the US legal system when they butted heads with Apple.
MS would have a *hell* of a time trying to prove that no one could implement a compatible product, which they'd have to do to nail the WINE guys. The antitrust guys would have a field day on MS.
Finally, WINE is not an emulator. "Emulator" has a specific meaning in the computer world -- it would reimplement the hardware that the software runs on. This would almost certainly cause a performance hit. WINE carries no such required overhead. At least in theory, WINE can run just as fast as (heck, faster) than Windows.
Given your AC nature, I'd almost say that you're trolling, but I can't quite be sure.
playing games under Wine SUPPORTS MICROSOFT!!! (Score:4, Insightful)
Seriously, though. You go out, you buy a WINDOWS game, you spend ages trying to get it running under Linux/Wine, and what happens? The developer sees huge sales for Windows-only games. Result? They keep making games for Windows, and you have to keep playing with Wine.
A much better solution would be games under Linux of course. As a useful intermediate though, how about this idea: Everyone who plays a game through Wine should write to the developer and explain to them that they'd much rather the game was written for Linux in the first place. A thousand letters (or ten thousand) is hard to completely ignore.
Re:why I think this hurts both linux and PC gaming (Score:3, Insightful)
They also see the linux zealots who, although a minority, are the most vocal and color all of the Linux user base as 'anti-corporate' and unwilling to pay for anything.
One name: Loki. They proved (as have idSoftware) that linux users ARE generally unwilling to buy games. We HAD native linux games from Loki and what happened? Some of us bought them but too many were infantile and simply could NOT delay their purchase of a game, just HAD to have it NOW - so they bought the windoze version. As for id, they tried selling a linux version and Linux users stayed away from it in droves AND BOUGHT THE DAMN WINDOZE VERSION.
I bought games from Loki and would have continued. I would have bought more id software linux games too. Fortunately, idSoftware is NICE enough to produce linux binaries anyway that linux users can download and use IF they buy the windoze version in the store. Guess what that does? Keeps the windoze game purchase numbers up, skewing the number of gamers towards windows even though a number of them will run the linux version. Other companies see this and think there is no linux game market. Thanks to linux users who refuse to A) wait a few months or B) pay for anything that is made for linux, there are no linux titles and wont be for a long time, if ever.
Re:True Linux Gaming (Score:3, Insightful)
Stop using the big words. They don't make you sound intelligent, especially when you use them incorrectly.
A socialist model would be one where a central authority taxes its citizens according to income, redistributing that wealth in the form of social services and/or employment. Nor is such a scheme utopian - quite a few practical and effective governments in Europe are overtly socialist, and even the United States has socialist leanings. However, this has nothing to do with installing Linux to play a video game.
It would also not be ironic for a game company to charge for a product marketed to a community who "largely feels that it should be distributed for free" - irony is defined as "incongruity between what might be expected and what actually occurs." It seems you did catch on, though, when you pointed out that such would be "stupidity".
What community are you talking about, anyways? I wasn't aware that there was a unified front of any sort claiming that entertainment software should be made available free of charge. The naivete seems to be yours, friend.
Providing a linux-only game would undoubtedly generate interest in the product. A company like ID probably can't afford to do it, but a small shop (similar to how Looking Glass was in its early days) could probably do so. Such a company's total operating costs would be less, and their shareholder responsibilities fewer.
Don't be so quick to dismiss a proactive idea just because it's never been done before.
Re:True Linux Gaming (Score:2, Insightful)
Well, in this specific case, it would probably mean the id software would go out of business, if you think most people would give up the ability to play every other game just to get Doom 3, you grossly mis-estimate id software's influence.