Could Neowin Produce a Good Linux Singleplayer Game?

[Tin Man]

I think your aiming a bit to high, if you actually want to complete a project rather than have it in a perpetual state of 'nothing', then I think you need to set your sights much lower.

This idea was put forward 3 days ago with just an idea

Today we have a central focus, a theme and several writers who've volunteered to contribute their time and energy

We're more than on schedule :)

[Jimmy0]

This idea was put forward 3 days ago with just an idea

Today we have a central focus, a theme and several writers who've volunteered to contribute their time and energy

We're more than on schedule :)

You're trying to create a fully blown game with a bunch of people you are hoping to recruit over the Internet. I am definitely not saying its going to be impossible, I am merely saying you would, in my opinion, be better off starting with some a lot smaller.

[MR_Candyman]

Eve and Wow are MMO's which by definition are huge by any measure, the goal here is something that large. Breathe, it's okay man :)

I recall that, Duke Nukem "Whenever" has changed engines at least once in it's development.

And that's okay, I appreciate your insight.

That's why I listed how many actual developers there are, and for CCP how many people they outsource as well. CCP themselves don't do very much work on their servers. I'd say only about 100 people working for them do server work. They simply have a better system than blizzard. They do have HUNDREDS of outsourced developers though. Even Blizzard, which makes very few games has 200 developers. WHat has come out since WoW 4 years ago? Nothing but expansions (which are a lot easier and less time consuming, though they do make constant improvements). Before that I believe their last game was Diablo 2, which was in 2000. Starcraft 2 is rumored to come out september '09 and they've been working on it for a long, long time now. HL2 took 7 years to make. Prey was in the making for 11 years!

My point is that it takes these relatively large companies a lot of man hours to create the games you're seeing. It doesn't matter if it's an MMO or not, technically there's very little difference when it comes to the coding. The only way to undertake such a large project would be with a lot of money in order to hire people and keep them interested in it throughout it's production cycle, otherwise, like I said, everybody will just drop out at one point or another.

[Tin Man]

You're trying to create a fully blown game with a bunch of people you are hoping to recruit over the Internet. I am definitely not saying its going to be impossible, I am merely saying you would, in my opinion, be better off starting with some a lot smaller.

I'll keep that in mind, but as of now I'm very happy with the progress we're making. I'm grateful to each of our contributors and I look forward to fleshing out a storyline fairly soon.

That's why I listed how many actual developers there are, and for CCP how many people they outsource as well. CCP themselves don't do very much work on their servers. I'd say only about 100 people working for them do server work. They simply have a better system than blizzard. They do have HUNDREDS of outsourced developers though. Even Blizzard, which makes very few games has 200 developers. WHat has come out since WoW 4 years ago? Nothing but expansions (which are a lot easier and less time consuming, though they do make constant improvements). Before that I believe their last game was Diablo 2, which was in 2000. Starcraft 2 is rumored to come out september '09 and they've been working on it for a long, long time now. HL2 took 7 years to make. Prey was in the making for 11 years!

My point is that it takes these relatively large companies a lot of man hours to create the games you're seeing. It doesn't matter if it's an MMO or not, technically there's very little difference when it comes to the coding. The only way to undertake such a large project would be with a lot of money in order to hire people and keep them interested in it throughout it's production cycle, otherwise, like I said, everybody will just drop out at one point or another.

Ok, thanks for your insight.

[Andre S. Veteran]

Listen to MR_Candyman, he knows what he's talking about. It's not "forget about it", it's "set a realistic goal", and a fully-fledged FPS even remotely comparable to successful commercial titles is not one. Video games are often compared to movies : is it realistic for a small unpaid team to produce a 120 minutes action-adventure movie ? Unless you have a very original idea that will take very few ressources to make, like The Blair Witch Project, no. Incidentally, even The Blair Witch Project was 4 years in concepts, 8 months of production and costed 35000$.

[Zickar]

Listen to MR_Candyman, he knows what he's talking about. It's not "forget about it", it's "set a realistic goal", and a fully-fledged FPS even remotely comparable to successful commercial titles is not one. Video games are often compared to movies : is it realistic for a small unpaid team to produce a 120 minutes action-adventure movie ? Unless you have a very original idea that will take very few ressources to make, like The Blair Witch Project, no. Incidentally, even The Blair Witch Project was 4 years in concepts, 8 months of production and costed 35000$.

That's why I'm more enthusiastic about a 3D platform adventure game not a FPS ...

[Emn1ty]

You're trying to create a fully blown game with a bunch of people you are hoping to recruit over the Internet. I am definitely not saying its going to be impossible, I am merely saying you would, in my opinion, be better off starting with some a lot smaller.

Take this to heart. It is a pain in the arse to get internet acquaintances to work for more than a year on a project, let alone make alot of progress in that time. I have worked on online game projects before and it is extremely slow goings. Not that it isn't a cool experience.

[Tin Man]

Take this to heart. It is a pain in the arse to get internet acquaintances to work for more than a year on a project, let alone make alot of progress in that time. I have worked on online game projects before and it is extremely slow goings. Not that it isn't a cool experience.

I'd be very interested in hearing about your experience with the project!

Items such as what went right and what went wrong will help greatly in the success of this project.

[Green_Eye]

Just to let all know, I'm still on for this but I will be waiting on stand by until a more solid foundation can become clear and apparent. Just reaffirming my position.

[Andre S. Veteran]

This is the kind of game a small unpaid indie but very talented team might be able to achieve :

It looks very fun and creative, but it's not a FPS. Also, it's made with XNA (Windows + Xbox 360 only), which makes the development much easier than, say, C++ with only SDL + OpenGL, kinda stuff you would use on Linux. If you were into making that kind of thing I would definitely like to join and invest as many hours as necessary, even with my very newbie C# skills.

[Emn1ty]

I'd be very interested in hearing about your experience with the project!

Items such as what went right and what went wrong will help greatly in the success of this project.

The biggest problem with an online game project isn't the project itself but the lack of ability to make sure people get things done in a timely manner. If they are being lazy or half assed they can just log off for an extended period of time and disappear. Another really hard thing to do in a free project is find talented people to help you without pay. I recruited at least 3 artists who said they would do such a thing, and in the end all I got was one peice of concept art and three bailed artists. The only thing I ever really got out of the first project I worked on was a storyline which is one of my favorites and one that I helped write. It is alot harder to get people to remain focused than it sounds like it would.

But, personally, I am all for trying and wouldn't mind helping out on this project either. Of course, all I am really good at is interface design, 2D graphics and advertisment design. I can design MP maps for primarily FPS games but if it isn't going to be a Source mod or something along those lines and it will end up being an XNA arcade game then I'm not sure what I could do for the developement and brainstorming processes other than provide feedback.

[Tin Man]

The biggest problem with an online game project isn't the project itself but the lack of ability to make sure people get things done in a timely manner. If they are being lazy or half assed they can just log off for an extended period of time and disappear. Another really hard thing to do in a free project is find talented people to help you without pay. I recruited at least 3 artists who said they would do such a thing, and in the end all I got was one peice of concept art and three bailed artists. The only thing I ever really got out of the first project I worked on was a storyline which is one of my favorites and one that I helped write. It is alot harder to get people to remain focused than it sounds like it would.

But, personally, I am all for trying and wouldn't mind helping out on this project either. Of course, all I am really good at is interface design, 2D graphics and advertisment design. I can design MP maps for primarily FPS games but if it isn't going to be a Source mod or something along those lines and it will end up being an XNA arcade game then I'm not sure what I could do for the developement and brainstorming processes other than provide feedback.

Every hand helps! I don't know if Linux has an XNA like component ( I doubt it does but I'll have to research it and post back here on it) but if it does I guarantee we'll be using it.

This is the kind of game a small unpaid indie but very talented team might be able to achieve :

It looks very fun and creative, but it's not a FPS. Also, it's made with XNA (Windows + Xbox 360 only), which makes the development much easier than, say, C++ with only SDL + OpenGL, kinda stuff you would use on Linux. If you were into making that kind of thing I would definitely like to join and invest as many hours as necessary, even with my very newbie C# skills.

Unfortunately work blocks Youtube, I'll check this out when I get home tonight. Thanks!!!

[Andre S. Veteran]

XNA is Windows + Xbox360 + Zune only. No Linux.

That doesn't mean indie game development is necessarily much harder on Linux, I should correct that. There's Ogre3D for helping with graphics, for instance. I've no experience with it, but several indie projects have been done with it. Also, there are 3D extensions for Java, there's pyGame, which is built on top of SDL... So, it's definitely feasible, though not necessarily as streamlined and well integrated as XNA in Visual Studio 2008.

I'm not very hot about developing a game strictly for Linux because

- I don't use Linux

- Nobody uses Linux

I mean if you said we'll make cross-platform with Linux compatibility, ok, maybe it's worth it for that handful of Linux users interested in playing a game on that platform, but if you say that it's the primary target platform I think you're killing any chance of actual success or recognition right there.

Edited December 13, 2008 by Dr_Asik

[markwolfe Veteran]

^^^ If it is using any of the open source engines discussed, it would be fully cross-platform. Linux means "Linux and Windows" in this case.

The thread just started in the Linux subforums, but would be cross-platform.

[Andre S. Veteran]

^^^ If it is using any of the open source engines discussed, it would be fully cross-platform. Linux means "Linux and Windows" in this case.

The thread just started in the Linux subforums, but would be cross-platform.

Maybe in theory, but in practice, using cross-platform tools doesn't automatically make your fully working and debugged Linux game fully working and debugged on Windows, and vice-versa. You'll have to compile separate binaries for each platform and do the testing on each. XNA is cross-platform Xbox360/PC, for instance, but if you develop strictly with the PC in mind, you won't be able to run it on Xbox360, because it doesn't use the same controls, it doesn't use the same file system, it doesn't run the same version of .NET Framework, the GPU works differently, it runs on TVs instead of computer monitors, etc. So developping a game for Linux and developping a cross-platform game are two different things. And from the title of this thread and the starting post it seemed the idea was to develop a game for Linux.

[markwolfe Veteran]

... And from the title of this thread and the starting post it seemed the idea was to develop a game for Linux.

That's where the thread started.

[Kushan]

*raises hand* I umm...have been known to make the odd game here and there (ok, one really bad commercial title that's not quite out yet) and I'd be happy to lend some insight into this:

By definition, FPSs aren't actually that hard to make, for the basics at least. You can get a decent enough FPS engine up quite quickly. I've coined up a couple within a matter of hours (Very basic, though, little more than 3d movement and a bit of collision detection), but when it comes to (good) commercial games, half the reason they take so long is the actual design and mainly the art work (in my experience, at least).

One thing I've noticed from reading this thread is that people seem to have got caught up on the idea of "cross platform" vs. Linux and that's not a good sign. Not because of the issue, but because it shows that the focus is way off and that people will get easily side-tracked by relatively minor issues, potentially missing out on important ones.

Also, although it's easy to say "Lets make a great FPS with a good singleplayer campaign, with a good story to rival a commercial game", but right away the problem I see there is that the first point was "Lets make an FPS game" and then a "good story" was tacked on. A good story depends on how the story is told, not just the story itself. It's usually better to come up with a good story, then decide how you want to tell it rather than say "Ok, lets make an FPS game" and then build the story around it.

Going back to the "Lets make a game for Linux" thing, you have to keep in mind that it takes a lot of effort to make a decent game, it takes a lot of talent working together to pull it off and there's a problem - you need to get people on-board, now how many of the possible talent on neowin do you think actually run Linux? Chances are if someone on this forum isn't running windows, it's because they have a Mac and even then, they'll likely run bootcamp. In other words, to make a game for Linux, your best bet is to aim for a cross-platform solution, so those not running Linux can still contribute to it.

And yes, using a cross-platform engine doesn't necessarily mean your application is cross-platform, but usually in that instance, you do stuff to break the cross-platform conformity of it, rather than simply not anticipating it. For example, you can use a library called "SDL" to set up the basic workings of it, i.e. create a window and attach OpenGL to it (which is also cross-platform) and it'll be pretty much certain to run on Windows, Mac, Linux and anything else that supports it (Which is quite a lot these days), but if you add a line of code to call a Wind32 MessageBox(), then it's not going to run on anything other than windows.

Edited December 14, 2008 by Kushan

[Emn1ty]

Good post Kushan. FPS games have been so done to death the basics are almost hard wired into most gamers these days. As Kushan said, the hardest part is making the game fit a good story line rather than making a good game with a story, too. I also agree with him on making a cross-platform game. Linux is less than 2% of the market, so making a game on it would be really pointless for most of the people in this forum as well as most of the rest of your potential players.

Overall, if we just want to "Make a good game", then we need to stick to arcade style games such as modifications/enhancements of pong, breakout, etc. If there is going to be a significant storyline, then an FPS or even an adventure game would be our best option. With certain dev tools we could have a really quick FPS running (Unreal Ed, Source, even Halo Custom Edition and its editor for possible Mac cross-platforming). If we do end up making an FPS game, I personally have a pretty compelling, although possibly WAY too deep, story outlined and in the process of being fleshed out. I am, in fact, going to meet the writer tomorrow so maybe I can coax him back into seriously finishing it. If it is to be an arcade game, I have something lined up for that as well.

[Kushan]

I'd throw in a vote for "open-sourceness" as much as physically possible, otherwise is sort of goes against the whole ethos of making a game for Linux.

[fhpuqrgrpgvirzhpujbj]

I could program a bit I guess depending on the languge, if this takes off.

[t0mbi]

id vote for something along the lines of Braid on XBLA.. arcade-y but a bit of depth too it. I could contribute! i could umm..make up character names!!!! main character - Ben Ana or Gun Splosion?? Lol :)

[Tin Man]

I'd throw in a vote for "open-sourceness" as much as physically possible, otherwise is sort of goes against the whole ethos of making a game for Linux.

Yes, the development plan calls for all opensource tools to be used.

[+Fulcrum Subscriber¹]

Why would it be single player? A game developed by a community, Single Player? Where the hell are your community instincts... It could be Multi-Single Player!!!!? Co-op!

[Tin Man]

Why would it be single player? A game developed by a community, Single Player? Where the hell are your community instincts... It could be Multi-Single Player!!!!? Co-op!

We're going to start off with a singleplayer, and once that's out the door... then we can expand. First things first though :)

[Andre S. Veteran]

So let's say it's feasible, as long the aims are kept realistic.

So who's the chief producer ? Time to put up a web page with clearly stated goals, participants, tentative schedule, email address at which people can write if they're interested in participating in the project. Time to start discussing technology, storyline, art direction, gameplay design. Until some basic management and conceptual work is done, the project is unlikely to go anywhere. I might very well join in the project, but no one can join a purely hypothetical project.