Tactical FPS on Linux

[Cpt.Grok]

I've been a huge fan of tactical shooters focused on realism since Infiltration on Unreal and Unreal Tournament in the early 2000s. Insurgency is still at the top of my games profile with 768 hours. Unfortunately since switching from Windows to Linux full time, modern games like Insurgency Sandstorm no longer work due to the anti cheat software.

Will this project support Linux or will there at least be anti cheat software that is more friendly to other platforms?

[Goomes]

The main focus right now is developing for Windows, however, once development gets to a point where making a Linux version is more realistic then it will be strongly considered and likely will be done—we want the game to be as accessible to people as we can, we just have to focus on getting the core game and systems out on Windows first.

[MissNurseXochi]

Originally posted by Goomes:

The main focus right now is developing for Windows, however, once development gets to a point where making a Linux version is more realistic then it will be strongly considered and likely will be done—we want the game to be as accessible to people as we can, we just have to focus on getting the core game and systems out on Windows first.

omg awesome!

what about Mac OS? lmao

[Strelok4570]

Originally posted by Goomes:

The main focus right now is developing for Windows, however, once development gets to a point where making a Linux version is more realistic then it will be strongly considered and likely will be done—we want the game to be as accessible to people as we can, we just have to focus on getting the core game and systems out on Windows first.

Realistically you could just make it work for Proton and that would be good enough for 99% of Linux users, it doesn't even need true native support.

[Bloo Alien]

Originally posted by Goomes:

The main focus right now is developing for Windows, however, once development gets to a point where making a Linux version is more realistic then it will be strongly considered and likely will be done—we want the game to be as accessible to people as we can, we just have to focus on getting the core game and systems out on Windows first.

Oh god; please, please don't be yet another developer to make this massive mistake if you really do (currently) have intentions to eventually publish cross-platform. If you intend to release Linux (or Mac, or console, or anything else) versions down the road, then the absolutely best and most realistic time to focus on that goal is as early in the development process as you possibly can.

If you "focus on Windows" and try to "monkey patch" support for other platforms after the fact, you are choosing to create a painful situation for yourself right out of the gate. I promise you that if you aren't considering cross-platform from the beginning, you're sooner or later going to paint yourself into a corner with some Windows-exclusive technology that you didn't realize was designed for purposes of "vendor lock-in" and purposely does not exist on other platforms.

When it comes time then to release for other platforms, you'll either have to re-write/rebuild large portions of your game, or you'll be forced to rely on translation layers like WINE or Valve's Proton (which are never really truly as good as native releases). In addition, you're depriving yourself of one of the greatest free resources the Linux community has to offer a game developer. Good solid bug reporting…

As noted in this article on GamingOnLinux[www.gamingonlinux.com], if you are developing cross-platform, and you allow Linux users to assist in testing from an early stage, your finished product will have less bugs across all platforms, due (at least in part) to the superior bug reports we'll surely provide you.

Truth be told, if you stick to your guns on the "Windows first" thinking, then I expect that this will end up being just another of those games that I simply won't be playing at all, because I expect it'll end up encumbered with some anti-cheat that doesn't support Linux, or you'll "hem and haw" around enabling it's support for Linux for some silly reason, like the Back 4 Blood devs are doing. In the meanwhile, my friends will have moved on to other games, some of which I can play with them, leaving me no reason to play this game at all.

Having said all that, I'm 100% certain this thread will now be overrun with "WinTrolls" who are 1000% anti-Linux, and who are certain to try to give you a million reasons why they think I'm wrong about every single word I've said. Please feel free to read what they have to say if you like, but do understand that these people have zero clue how cross-platform development (or even any software development in some cases) works at any level. Their only joy in life is harassing any comment thread on Steam that even mentions the word Linux, and they truly appear to believe that a Linux version of anything will somehow harm them. It won't harm them in the slightest of course, and it even actually helps them despite their total refusal to understand that fact, but that doesn't stop their ongoing campaign to try for some unknowable reason to convince developers to refuse to develop for Linux (and/or sometimes even for Mac).

So, to sum-up, please consider changing your stance on the idea of concentrating on one platform at a time, when the truth is that if you start thinking cross-platform early on, you'll save yourself (and everyone else) so much hassle down the road.

[Goomes]

Originally posted by Bloo Alien:

Originally posted by Goomes:

The main focus right now is developing for Windows, however, once development gets to a point where making a Linux version is more realistic then it will be strongly considered and likely will be done—we want the game to be as accessible to people as we can, we just have to focus on getting the core game and systems out on Windows first.

Oh god; please, please don't be yet another developer to make this massive mistake if you really do (currently) have intentions to eventually publish cross-platform. If you intend to release Linux (or Mac, or console, or anything else) versions down the road, then the absolutely best and most realistic time to focus on that goal is as early in the development process as you possibly can.

If you "focus on Windows" and try to "monkey patch" support for other platforms after the fact, you are choosing to create a painful situation for yourself right out of the gate. I promise you that if you aren't considering cross-platform from the beginning, you're sooner or later going to paint yourself into a corner with some Windows-exclusive technology that you didn't realize was designed for purposes of "vendor lock-in" and purposely does not exist on other platforms.

When it comes time then to release for other platforms, you'll either have to re-write/rebuild large portions of your game, or you'll be forced to rely on translation layers like WINE or Valve's Proton (which are never really truly as good as native releases). In addition, you're depriving yourself of one of the greatest free resources the Linux community has to offer a game developer. Good solid bug reporting…

As noted in this article on GamingOnLinux[www.gamingonlinux.com], if you are developing cross-platform, and you allow Linux users to assist in testing from an early stage, your finished product will have less bugs across all platforms, due (at least in part) to the superior bug reports we'll surely provide you.

Truth be told, if you stick to your guns on the "Windows first" thinking, then I expect that this will end up being just another of those games that I simply won't be playing at all, because I expect it'll end up encumbered with some anti-cheat that doesn't support Linux, or you'll "hem and haw" around enabling it's support for Linux for some silly reason, like the Back 4 Blood devs are doing. In the meanwhile, my friends will have moved on to other games, some of which I can play with them, leaving me no reason to play this game at all.

Having said all that, I'm 100% certain this thread will now be overrun with "WinTrolls" who are 1000% anti-Linux, and who are certain to try to give you a million reasons why they think I'm wrong about every single word I've said. Please feel free to read what they have to say if you like, but do understand that these people have zero clue how cross-platform development (or even any software development in some cases) works at any level. Their only joy in life is harassing any comment thread on Steam that even mentions the word Linux, and they truly appear to believe that a Linux version of anything will somehow harm them. It won't harm them in the slightest of course, and it even actually helps them despite their total refusal to understand that fact, but that doesn't stop their ongoing campaign to try for some unknowable reason to convince developers to refuse to develop for Linux (and/or sometimes even for Mac).

So, to sum-up, please consider changing your stance on the idea of concentrating on one platform at a time, when the truth is that if you start thinking cross-platform early on, you'll save yourself (and everyone else) so much hassle down the road.

I appreciate your concern and taking the time to write this up.

I think you might be making some general assumptions about what our intentions are, and what O:HD even is overall—we have no intention of locking in Windows only features, there are already people who have gotten the game to work in Linux, and the lead programmer is already taking measures to make this a reality later on down the road. I went and asked him about it so I could get a more in-depth answer for you, and here is what he said:

"Server Hosting: As far as hosting game servers goes, we have full support for Linux-based dedicated game servers right now as that is a more common scenario on the server hosting front.

Game Client: As for not being forward-looking towards native support of Linux for the game client, rest assured I set up APIs internally to be cross-platform whenever possible in addition to utilizing all of the platform-independent APIs that the engine already provides for you out of the box for the very reason of being able to write code once and have it be supported across multiple platforms without the developer explicitly having to do so. I know that support for running the game client on Linux will undoubtedly become a bigger blip on the radar once the Steam Deck releases and gets into the hands of many Steam users over time. I should also note that Proton is a major driving force for allowing all of this to happen with minimal effort needed from the development side and in some cases, the Vulkan rendering codepath provided by Proton has been observed to perform better than a UE4 instance running Vulkan natively on Linux."

In regards to anti-cheat, we have been quite clear about our stance on that, so I don't really see that being an issue relative to your concerns. Our focus will be on providing server owners with the tools they need to manage and run their own communities, and if they want to run an anti-cheat or create their own for their own community, they are welcome to do so on their own. We, however, don't really plan on just blanket layering an anti-cheat into everything and forcing people to use it because 1) no anti-cheat that isn't extremely intrusive is anywhere close to perfect (and even the intrusive ones aren't if someone cares enough to get around it), and 2) the cost is totally unrealistic for a studio of our size and budget, and is not really in line with what our objectives are for O:HD as a platform. To us, the cost benefit of most mainstream anti-cheats is absolutely not worth it on multiple fronts, so I would not be worried about this.

I would highly recommend that you look into some of the other content we have put out in past devblogs that discusses some of these topics, because our approach and motivations as a studio are completely different than most other studios you may be familiar with (like Back 4 Blood—there is literally no comparison there tbh). We aren't here to sell you copies of a game, push you into in-game microtransactions/monetary schemes, or try to control the community, we are just focused on creating this platform and supporting what the community wants to do with it. The platoon based game portion of O:HD is a part of a much larger picture and goal that we have.

I hope that answers some of your concerns!

[Bloo Alien]

Originally posted by Goomes:

… developer reply found above …

Well thank you so very much for the detailed reply. Sounds like great news, and I'm glad to hear it. It's nice to know that you're not like so many other devs who've made that "we're concentrating on Windows first" statement. In almost 100% of cases I've seen in the past, that statement has always meant "We're developing it exclusively for Windows and nobody else, even if we don't know it or intend it that way yet." As you're actively planning to avoid painting yourself into unexpected/unintended corners like that, I'll be absolutely interested in playin' this game. If ever you do get around to a native Linux release, don't hesitate to let the Linux community know early on, as the vast majority of 'em tend to be a really helpful bunch of folk and will generally offer help testing, debugging, giving hints and suggestions, etc, etc. Most of us are accustomed to helping out the developers of our favorite softwares any way we're able. ;)

[Goomes]

Originally posted by Bloo Alien:

Originally posted by Goomes:

… developer reply found above …

Well thank you so very much for the detailed reply. Sounds like great news, and I'm glad to hear it. It's nice to know that you're not like so many other devs who've made that "we're concentrating on Windows first" statement. In almost 100% of cases I've seen in the past, that statement has always meant "We're developing it exclusively for Windows and nobody else, even if we don't know it or intend it that way yet." As you're actively planning to avoid painting yourself into unexpected/unintended corners like that, I'll be absolutely interested in playin' this game. If ever you do get around to a native Linux release, don't hesitate to let the Linux community know early on, as the vast majority of 'em tend to be a really helpful bunch of folk and will generally offer help testing, debugging, giving hints and suggestions, etc, etc. Most of us are accustomed to helping out the developers of our favorite softwares any way we're able. ;)

My pleasure, glad I could provide some insight into that!

[Cpt.Grok]

OHD looks more stunning by the day. I'm glad you're at least considering which things make it more difficult for players to participate. I'm less concerned with a native client, though that would be nice, and concerned(not in a negative sense) simply that you aren't going out of your way to make it harder for me to get your game working on my machine. I've got plenty of Unreal games running just fine. Sandstorm runs great but it kicks me from every server because the EAC or battleeye or whatever can't load.
Well, good enough for me and very much looking forward to a more public release. I've found Ground Branch having a lot of potential but fundamentally underwhelming. January could be a big deal.

[Goomes]

Originally posted by Cpt.Grok:

OHD looks more stunning by the day. I'm glad you're at least considering which things make it more difficult for players to participate. I'm less concerned with a native client, though that would be nice, and concerned(not in a negative sense) simply that you aren't going out of your way to make it harder for me to get your game working on my machine. I've got plenty of Unreal games running just fine. Sandstorm runs great but it kicks me from every server because the EAC or battleeye or whatever can't load.
Well, good enough for me and very much looking forward to a more public release. I've found Ground Branch having a lot of potential but fundamentally underwhelming. January could be a big deal.

Glad you are enjoying what you are seeing.

Yeah accessibility is important to us, so the more we can do to help increase that the better for sure.

As for January, just to be clear that is not when we plan on releasing into early access, that is when we plan on starting our larger playtest sessions (just so that there is no confusion because I do see people mistaking this often). This does mean a wider pool of people will gain access, but yeah that is not early access release yet technically.

[♂BOSS♂OF♂THIS♂GYM♂]

I heard about this game after the bad news that Insurgency Sandstorm devs aren't considering Linux/Proton support. Looking forward to trying this on Linux.