Chance Of Running Penumbra?

[Sugar_Kane]

Couldn't find any reference to this...

I'm sure a few of you are aware of Frictional Games' lo-fi first person adventure games: Penumbra: Overture & Penumbra: Black Plague. They also have a new game due for release in August called Amnesia: The Dark Descent.

Anyway, the point is that all of these games are available for linux, and can run on relatively low-spec pc's. I was wondering if any of you handsome sods could conceive of a reason why they may not work well on the Pandora? They would be an awesome addition to the Pandora store if this was possible.

 

[r00tw00t]

have they released the source code ? is there an arm port?

edit: never heard of the game, but my first reaction to this is simply "no, you will not be able play this game on the pandora"

 

[Sugar_Kane]

of course, how could I forget about arm vs x86... *forehead slap*

Still, perhaps they could be convinced to port it if EvilDragon sends them photographs of himself in various states of undress.

 

[r00tw00t]

yeah, it would be great though if it was easy as, 'if it runs in linux the pandora can run it', but what I understand there is that big gap of different architectures that makes it impossible.

Still, perhaps they could be convinced to port it if EvilDragon sends them photographs of himself in various states of undress.

Good idea! Either they like the pics and make us a port, or they don't and then we're back here with no loss but maybe EDs pride

 

[kuru]

I'd be all for that. Looks like a moody 1st person horror survival thingy with physics engine. E-Mail the Devs and ask them for interest in ARM, someone? All three games seem to be available for 20 USD.

 

[Sugar_Kane]

It is very very atmospheric. The controls are unique too, you move objects and open doors by grabbing them with the mouse and then swinging them open etc, it actually makes it feel like you're dragging open a heavy door and adds a nice level of realism.

 

[renwils]

Awesome games. Maybe they'd be more responsive to the idea if someone in the community would volunteer to do an ARM/OpenGLES port, along with an NDA, etc.

 

[BWoodson]

I absolutely love the entire Penumbra trilogy and will definately be pre-ordering Amnesia soon. Considering the system requirements though I'm not sure it would be feasible to port the game. Don't get me wrong, I'd LOVE for it to happen!

I bet the Frictional team would be able to come up with something really awesome and special if they were convinced it would be financially beneficial to create something for the platform.

 

[WizardStan]

keep in mind their business model: buying the Linux version doesn't give you the Windows version, you have to buy both if you want to play it on the two platforms. I'd imagine they'd want the same for the Pandora if such a port were created.

 

[BWoodson]

keep in mind their business model: buying the Linux version doesn't give you the Windows version, you have to buy both if you want to play it on the two platforms. I'd imagine they'd want the same for the Pandora if such a port were created.

If they ported Penumbra to Pandora I would buy the entire series again just to play it on my soon to be favorite handheld system.

 

[fiori_musicali]

Too bad the Penumbra games are unplayable. I have Penumbra Overture and I tried to play it, but I panic quit after being brutally devoured by the first encounter.

 

[rick0815]

The controls are unique too, you move objects and open doors by grabbing them with the mouse and then swinging them open etc, it actually makes it feel like you're dragging open a heavy door and adds a nice level of realism.

The screenshots I found looks great! I'd love to see those games on the Pandora and would happily pay 20$ for each. But to make the above described feeling of the controls happen on the Pandora sounds very difficult.

 

[alucart1984]

The controls are unique too, you move objects and open doors by grabbing them with the mouse and then swinging them open etc, it actually makes it feel like you're dragging open a heavy door and adds a nice level of realism.

The screenshots I found looks great! I'd love to see those games on the Pandora and would happily pay 20$ for each. But to make the above described feeling of the controls happen on the Pandora sounds very difficult.

From looking at the specs requirements I don't think these games will run very well on the Pandora without major changes. I would love to see these on the Pandora though.

 

[WizardStan]

Too bad the Penumbra games are unplayable. I have Penumbra Overture and I tried to play it, but I panic quit after being brutally devoured by the first encounter.

Drop them a line. I'm sure they'd be more than happy to help troubleshoot with you. The experience I had with them was that they want to expand the Linux gaming community, prove that Linux can be a worthwhile (profitable) market, and every bug they squash brings them that much closer to that goal. That's why I think they may be interested in an ARM build, to extend that goal even further.

 

[fischju2000]

The Palm Pre is pushing for games, as is the N900, adding possibly the iPhone to that group, plus of course the Pandora and an ARM version coded for the OMAP3 makes a lot more sense. It might have to be redesigned completely though, the physics engine is good and lighting engine is impressive but OpenGL ES 2.0 might not be up to it.

 

[Sugar_Kane]

Hey guys, just to add a bit of spice to this, I had contacted the guys behind it and they replied tonight. Here's what they had to say:

Hi James,

Yeah we know about the Pandora! Have not followed the project in the last couple of months, but did check in every now and then before.

Not sure about if it is possible or what it would take to get Penumbra up and running, but we are looking into it now! As for Amnesia it has a better design when it comes to portability that might requier larger modifications of the render, so there is a possibility there as well. But at the moment no idea really, but we will investigate a bit!

Regards,
Jens

Pretty exciting!

 

[gaterooze]

That's cool - I think I would certainly buy it for Pandora. I played the demo on PC and seems a great game.

 

[Illuminerdi]

To be honest, this one looks doubtful to me. While it's really cool that the Frictional guys replied, a Pandora port of the game would be *seriously* scaled back, which would involve a lot of time and money to lower poly counts, port the engine, optimize for ARM, etc - and until the Pandora has a large install base, it would be a hard sell to convince a small dev to invest considerable time and money in a platform with a limited install base.

I've played the entire Penumbra series on my PC, and they're surprisingly robust graphically. Overture is a bit weak, but Black Plague and Requiem both have some pretty high-end graphics in parts, including a lot of pixel shaders and postprocessing effects, so any ports would be pretty stripped.

I'd love to be wrong, as the point-and-click nature of these games would work pretty well on the Pandora, but I just don't see this happening

Which is a shame, because I for one would love to play them on the go and yelp with fright in public places when the giant worms attack...

And yes, I know I'm jaded - years of working in the games industry has taught me the reality of things like install bases. It makes me a very sad panda.

 

[Vorporeal]

The computation required to run a pixel shader scales with screen resolution. The Pandora has a much smaller screen than your average machine (especially nowadays), so less processing power would be required to run the same pixel shaders. I'm not saying that it's possible, it's just something to keep in mind.

 

[Masterfurbix]

The graphics are one problem, but wouldn't the physics have to be scaled back to almost unplayability?

I know it doesn't LOOK that visually impressive, but it seems far beyond the capability of the pandora


Incidentally, I have the first game open right now :lol: