The Big GNU/Linux Gamer Survey

[thatgui]

It is about Linux Gaming. (check the subtitles on the site!) - BoilingSteam does not cover anything windows-related.

Never said that

ALl questions revolve around Steam/Linux and not Steam in general.

Thats why I would like to have that distinction in place. 95% of your last 15 news entries on that site revolve mainly about games or hardware "tied" to Steam. Which isn't a problem for me as you approach the whole thing from a more "AAA categorie games" angle. But you just don't make a destinction which plattform (and I do not think about pc,xbox, etc. when I use that specific term in this context) the games are on you are writing about. Thus your site is useless for me as Steam simply is not an option for me. And just to be sure, I am totally fine with you and thousands of other not sharing that opinion.

 

[ekianjo]

But you just don't make a destinction which plattform (and I do not think about pc,xbox, etc. when I use that specific term in this context) the games are on you are writing about.  

 

So the big "Linux gaming" at the top, as well as the multiple references to Linux across articles and links on the right are not enough to understand this Site is about Linux as a gaming platform (on PC)? Really? 

 

[ekianjo]

Thus your site is useless for me as Steam simply is not an option for me. And just to be sure, I am totally fine with you and thousands of other not sharing that opinion.

Well if you play on Linux and don't use Steam, the choice of games you can play is going to be very limited. It's fine if that's what you want, but most people indeed have no problem with Steam. Even Linux gamers. Based on the survey results so far, I think there are less than 9% who refuse DRM completely when it comes to buying Games online. 

 

[benoitb]

I answered your survey. I appreciate that Valve coming to Linux is positive to get more games and better drivers.

That being said, I am not a Steam user/customer myself.

 

[Klumpen]

It's not the only current DRM Free OS. You never heard of Haiku, FreeBSD, OpenBSD, AROS ?

I have, but do people really use those for gaming?

Linux gaming would have never exploded in the way it has in the past 2 years without Valve. Let's give credit where it is due. 

I did in this thread but will never use Steam anyway and don't want it to be the Linux gaming monopoly as well and you make it look like this is necessary.

Well if you play on Linux and don't use Steam, the choice of games you can play is going to be very limited. It's fine if that's what you want, but most people indeed have no problem with Steam. Even Linux gamers. Based on the survey results so far, I think there are less than 9% who refuse DRM completely when it comes to buying Games online. 

I have 123 Linux games from GoG, 226 Linux games from Humble and 65 from IndieRoyale.

Maybe the choice is smaller but it's still not bad in my book, especcially if you take all the possibilities of DosBox, ScummVM, KeeperFX, Whatevergameenginerecreation into account.

Do you get sponsored by Steam all of a sudden or are you just thankful for their Linux support?

Maybe you should thank Google as well, although Android is an abomination it sure pushed multiplatform development (especially Linux).

 

[ekianjo]

I have, but do people really use those for gaming?

Maybe - After all there are many Open sourced games that you can play on these systems as well. So Why not ? 

I did in this thread but will never use Steam anyway and don't want it to be the Linux gaming monopoly as well and you make it look like this is necessary.

It's not a monopoly since GOG exists. But GOG's support for Linux sucks completely.  

Maybe the choice is smaller but it's still not bad in my book

You have 1200 games on steam, and most AAA games are not available on GOG and HB. I don;t want to get stuck to 1990s graphics when playing games - If that was the case I would never even buy a dedicated GPU card in the first place. 

Do you get sponsored by Steam all of a sudden or are you just thankful for their Linux support?

Do you know how to read ?

http://boilingsteam.com/about-boiling-steam/

> Note that Boiling Steam is NOT affiliated in any way with Valve Software’s Steam platform.

 

[Klumpen]

I did in this thread but will never use Steam anyway and don't want it to be the Linux gaming monopoly as well and you make it look like this is necessary.

It's not a monopoly since GOG exists. But GOG's support for Linux sucks completely.

I won't disaggree here, but the DRM free choices on HB aren't as bad.

Besides GoG expands this list slowly but at least they do.

 

[ekianjo]

although Android is an abomination it sure pushed multiplatform development (especially Linux).

Android is actually hurting Linux more than it helping it. Maybe kernel wise, it's helping, but now they try to make it into a desktop/tablet OS and I would rather see Linux there instead of Android. 

 

[ekianjo]

Besides GoG expands this list slowly but at least they do.

My main gripes with GOG is that:

- I want to buy DRM-free games if they are available.

- Most games coming out on Linux, however, are almost NEVER available at the same time on Steam and GOG. So either I wait for x months (if it ever comes out) or I get the game via Steam. For some games I don't mind waiting, for others I want to play I'm not going to wait just to make sure GOG gets my money. They need to get their act right.

- There are many games for which Linux versions exist but they don't even have them available for Linux!

- It's not as important, but GOG games are more expensive and their sales are not as good.

I wish they improved on all of this. 

 

[Klumpen]

Maybe - After all there are many Open sourced games that you can play on these systems as well. So Why not ?

Speaking of limited choice. I wonder how hard it is to make all the closed source indie games to run on those.

You have 1200 games on steam, and most AAA games are not available on GOG and HB. I don;t want to get stuck to 1990s graphics when playing games - If that was the case I would never even buy a dedicated GPU card in the first place.

If you care for AAA games that is, some people don't.

Do you know how to read ?
http://boilingsteam.com/about-boiling-steam/

> Note that Boiling Steam is NOT affiliated in any way with Valve Software’s Steam platform.

I actually don't believe everything I read on the internet.

My main gripes with GOG is that:
- I want to buy DRM-free games if they are available.

- Most games coming out on Linux, however, are almost NEVER available at the same time on Steam and GOG. So either I wait for x months (if it ever comes out) or I get the game via Steam. For some games I don't mind waiting, for others I want to play I'm not going to wait just to make sure GOG gets my money. They need to get their act right.

- There are many games for which Linux versions exist but they don't even have them available for Linux!

- It's not as important, but GOG games are more expensive and their sales are not as good.

I wish they improved on all of this.

You and me both although I don't have a problem with waiting since I've got a backlog and want all the crucial bugs eliminated already which is hardly the case on release.

Seeing that even their client (although I'll most likely never use it) isn't even available for Linux says a lot about how much they care although it really depends on who you're talking to, some people in GoG's staff are Linux lovers and others never would have supported it in the first place which is quite stupid but whatever.

For some reason Mac support is great there, it puzzles me.

 

[ekianjo]

I actually don't believe everything I read on the internet.

Wise thing to do. Well to answer your question again, no, no affiliation whatsoever, I have no friends working for Valve either and I'm just a regular gamer like everyone else. By the way none of my websites are commercial (Pandoralive and BoilingSteam make no money, have no ads, and actually cost x Euros/month to maintain on top of the time I put into them). 

So if you are looking for bias/corruption you are in the very wrong place. 

 

[ekianjo]

If you care for AAA games that is, some people don't.

Sure, I'm sure some don't. But actually many Linux gamers do, and are very happy to see AAA titles coming. Besides, AAA titles are not just good because they look better, in some cases they push gaming forward with new ideas, new possibilities that indie games cannot achieve.

I'm not a AAA-only guy, but Iike with my games, I like to be able to play various things.  

eeing that even their client (although I'll most likely never use it) isn't even available for Linux

TO be fair with GOG, they are only in beta right now, so I'm fine if they release the "final" client at the same time on all platforms. If the final client comes first for Windows, then I'll be way more disappointed.  

 

[thatgui]

So the big "Linux gaming" at the top, as well as the multiple references to Linux across articles and links on the right are not enough to understand this Site is about Linux as a gaming platform (on PC)? Really?

As it looks like I am not able to deliver my point, another approach:

My point is, that by using Steam, the operating system its working on isn't of interest anymore (if you try to see it solely from a persons point of view that just wants to buy and play games) as Steam provides the access and the framework to the game via its closed source client. In the end it just wont matter wether you would fire up Windows on a Desktop or  a dedicated "Steam Machine" or even the not so far fetched scenario if someone would hack the Steam Client onto an xbone, in order to play a game.

I noticed the links on the right (and just because you put a heading on something doesn't say anything about the content) but not far into your explanation about the ideas behind Linux you start contradicting about 95% of the rest of your sites content ("The freedom to study how the program works, and change it so it does your computing as you wish (freedom 1). Access to the source code is a precondition for this."). Which seems somewhat odd to me. And I also noticed that you actually describe, mention and link to other distributors (like gog.com). But that wasn't my point. I do not think that you are some sort of Steam apologist (or "agent of Steam"), I just think that a clear distinction should be made between gaming on Linux and Gaming via Steam that just happens on Linux - an opinion I don't expect you to share.

Well if you play on Linux and don't use Steam, the choice of games you can play is going to be very limited. It's fine if that's what you want, but most people indeed have no problem with Steam. Even Linux gamers. Based on the survey results so far, I think there are less than 9% who refuse DRM completely when it comes to buying Games online.

Never said anything different

 

[ekianjo]

but not far into your explanation about the ideas behind Linux you start contradicting about 95% of the rest of your sites content

It does not contradict anything.

1) A FOSS OS is preferable over something that's not FOSS. 

2) Games have nothing to do about security, about portability (most of them target x86 only), about information protection, about leaking data from my computer (at least on desktop PCs), so I (and many others) don't care if Games are Free Software or not. It's not vital to computing, but a FOSS OS is vital for many other reasons. Non-FOSS games will have more chance to be lost in time when hardware cannot support them anymore, and that's fine - Games are just games, most of them are not that great anyway. 

3) Most FOSS people don't care if their Microware oven is not Free Software Firmware either. I approach games the same way. They run in a closed environment, and they do not prevent me from running a FOSS OS in the first place. 

4) FOSS games that happen to be good at the same time : that's ideal. But what we see if that most FOSS games tend to be a mess, half-baked, not finished, poorly designed - that is why most people prefer commercial offering. Sure, there are exceptions - and that's why we call them exceptions. 

The fact that Steam can run on Linux is important:

- You don't need a proprietary OS to run Games anymore. Its good because it's not owned by a single company. 

- That should reduce the barrier to switch to Linux in the first place, and switchers can benefit from all the FOSS benefits offered by the system.  

- It increases the importance of Linux across the spectrum, with more focus on performance of drivers - all applications benefit from it in the end.

 

[Ziz]

Hey Ekianjo,

I am a Linux gamer. I play games. And I only use Linux. So this is obvious.

But I can't continue your survey...

When you ask me "Have you ever bought games for Linux from the following resellers?" you forgot the possibility "No". Or is "No" meant to be fit to "others"? Because you have a list, where I can check multiple entries. But no checked answer seems not to be an option. Adding "No" to "others" is like asking, "Do you want some apples?" and answering "Yes, none."...

Do you want to exclude Linux gamer, which use most of the time Free Software (especially spring rts Balanced Annihilation for me atm) and very rarely bought games and even if, not with steam? I play and played a lot of games with wine. I even played Titan quest with my gf on Linux with steam for Windows in wine. Does this not count?

Greetings, Ziz

 

[ekianjo]

Do you want to exclude Linux gamer, which use most of the time Free Software

This survey is for commercial games, not aimed at free software games - I should maybe make that clearer. I will add additional options in the next survey to clearly answer "no" there, but one of the goals of the survey is the survey is to understand where people go for buy commercial  games on Linux. 

In the meantime you can put your answer in "other" and write "no" there

 

[ekianjo]

I play and played a lot of games with wine

I am not interested in Wine in this survey at the moment. I know it;s another option to play games, but again I did not want to add another 2 pages to the survey. I will adress it in the next survey in 3 months.  

To make my point clearer: Wine is not really Linux gaming for me. It's Windows gaming through other means - just like keeping a Windows partition to boot (while WIne is not as effective as that). 

 

[Ziz]

Another thing. This doesn't count for me, but you ask

"Are you aware about the following initiatives ? Click all the ones you know about."

You asked a Yes-No-question, but there is no "No". Only options, what do know. What if a person has not heard of any of the options?

 

[ekianjo]

You asked a Yes-No-question, but there is no "No". Only options, what do know. What if a person has not heard of any of the options?

You can continue to the next question by not ticking anything. It works (i think...) - if it does not, I'll have to include such option next time.  

 

[Ziz]

I play and played a lot of games with wine

 I am not interested in Wine in this survey at the moment. I know it;s another option to play games, but again I did not want to add another 2 pages to the survey. I will adress it in the next survey in 3 months.  

To make my point clearer: Wine is not really Linux gaming for me. It's Windows gaming through other means - just like keeping a Windows partition to boot (while WIne is not as effective as that).

It is free software. You just explained, how good Free software is and that it is okay if only games are not free and now you see no difference in a Windows partition vs. Wine? Some linux ports just link against wine. So they don't count, too? Even if they are on steam?
Anyway. For you next survey, please make sure for every Yes-No-question (indicator: No question-word beginning with "w", but still a question), that "No" is a possible answer.

You asked a Yes-No-question, but there is no "No". Only options, what do know. What if a person has not heard of any of the options?

 You can continue to the next question by not ticking anything. It works (i think...) - if it does not, I'll have to include such option next time.

Ah, okay, didn't test this. I just wondered, what happens if I doesn't select anything and got a red bordering