Techland developers created this nice video on how two people ported Dying Light and Dead Island to Linux by themselves. Very interesting and informational. Note: Only the beginning is not in English.
Pretty crazy the hoops they had to jump through in order to get Linux to like the Windows files. Its amazing how a programmer could simply plan ahead and prepare so games can be ported to other platforms simpler. I would think programmers would think multi-platform when they work on projects, even if its only for one platform. Then again, habits and Windows conditions us to only think about windows.
Most of the work in getting a game to run in Linux if you're not using a wrapper is to get the engine to work with OpenGL. Now, two of the largest graphics engines in the industry is supporting OpenGL/Linux, and you have plenty of devs with in house engines that support OpenGL. Strangely, the only ones complaining about how hard it is to make Linux ports or natives are big companies. One can wonder why. If small companies can do it, if a few people can do it, why not a big company? I hope it isn't a question of competence, and seeing companies like EA and Ubisoft, which I consider to be immoral I wouldn't be surprised if they are paid by Microsoft to not make their games available on Linux.
It must be a money game. Big studios invest way more money in a single game than an indie team, so they don't see the benefit of spending more money on such a small audience. But the indie developers know they will get more exposure by mentioning all platforms. For indies its about exposure because they don't have any money in comparison.
When you have a few people who can do the port in a not so significant amount of time it kinda goes against the argument about money.
I agree, but I'm sure the big CEO's like to count the pennies When Valve is doing it for every game, none of the other big companies have an excuse anymore. If they take a risk like Valve, then we all win! Instead they are going to wait and see how well Valve does with Steam Machines. I wonder if it would be less expensive for big multi-million games if they plan Linux from the beginning? This way the 2 people doing the conversion would have a lot less work to do. Do you know what I mean? It seems like most Linux considerations happen after-the-fact when the Windows development is done. Then they give all the windows-made development to a few people and they have to pick it apart. What if all the programing, file structure and assets were already multi-platform ready... then it would be easier to port to Mac, Linux, etc
Now you remind me why I hate capitalists. I think that any company who make software/games and don't plan for multi platform are morons. If you do the planning first, and prepare for it so all is set, if you want to make it cross platform it won't be much of an issue later. But obviously, when people use engines that don't support OpenGL, that is going to be a problem.
That must be the main problem, short-sighted company owners who only see money. Windows = $$$ DirectX = $$$ They follow the money and if there isn't as much in multi-platform, then there is no reason to follow it. I'm just stating this from speculation of course. It really seems Projekt Red and Valve have real concerns for their consumers.
