So we now have Precinct up on Kickstarter, this is from the original creator of Police Quest and it promises to be a good one, that's unless you're on Linux, we clear up why it's not so bad though after a first look.
Linux is a $200,000 Stretch Goal, let me give you a moment....got your breath back? Confusing I know as they are using Unity3D which has a Linux export option! Thankfully we are here as always to try to walk through the smoke and mirrors and find out why. We are ahead of consoles at least.
I had a chat with Precinct Executive Producer, Robert Lindsley
QuoteHello, It's Liam from www.GamingOnLinux.com I am wondering why Linux is set at a 200k Stretch Goal if you wouldn't mind filling us in for a moment before the net explodes about your project.
This article by Cheeseness is a good one for Stretch Goals and Linux support: http://cheesetalks.twolofbees.com/linuxStretchGoals.php
To which Robert first replied with
QuoteHi Liam,
It's great to meet you. My name is Robert Lindsley. I personally run Linux myself (Linux Mint "Olivia") and I am a HUGE fan!
We built the stretch goals the way we did in order of what we thought people would be most passionate about. We believe that providing hours of additional content for the PC/Mac platforms as well as more detail in the art would resonate more than Linux support.
Plus, getting anything running on a new platform takes work as well so we had to account for that as well.
That said, we are absolutely committed to Linux, and if we can hit our stretch goal we are going to provide an amazing experience for that platform!
Also thanks for sending the link. It's good to know that a lot of momentum is building on Linux for gaming -- as I said, I run "Olivia" myself so every new game that comes out on it is exciting.
Thanks,
Robert.
Didn't really give us the info, so I talked on...
QuoteHi Robert thanks for touching base with me!
You say you are absolutely commited to Linux, so will it be done without a stretch goal, is the stretch goal more of a "same day release for Linux" type of goal? Or is it that you actually won't do Linux unless you hit that goal?
I understand you use Unity3D as well, that has a Linux export option which is supposed to work the same for Linux as it does Mac and Windows, what extra work would you have to do for Linux?
Robert again responds...
QuoteHi Liam,
If we hit the stretch goal, the game will release on the same day as the other SKUs. Otherwise we may simply not have the funds to do the work.
Without getting into technical details, it's not as simple as hitting 'save-as.' Even though Unity3D makes it much easier for your project to run on Linux, there are always problems and hiccups that require engineering, testing and art time.
Thanks!
Robert.
So at least if it's hit, it will be a same day release, that's decent, so we are getting there!
QuoteHi again Robert sorry to talk you ear off with stuff.
The problem is the Linux folk tend to dislike being in a stretch goal and it's usually for a good reason (I hope that article I linked to helped).
The big problem I see here is if you just say "technical details" towards Linux as to why it's in a 200 thousand dollar stretch goal when it's using a multiplatform exporter it doesn't look too good unless you explain why, does that make sense?
Can you give me any info at all as to why, as yet you haven't explained any reason behind it other than "Without getting into technical details, it's not as simple as hitting 'save-as.' Even though Unity3D makes it much easier for your project to run on Linux, there are always problems and hiccups that require engineering, testing and art time.".
Now we get the response we needed:
QuoteHi Liam,
No worries -- happy to chat.
When we were building our stretch goals, we tried to prioritize what fans wanted and build those items into the stretch goals. We simply can't do everything for everybody at the $500K level.
With that, we decided that we first wanted to build out our content. Giving people more content and gameplay we felt was priority number one. From there we decided to look at other platforms, which is why Linux is in the second stretch goal.
If we hit our goals we're going to want to dedicate an engineer, a tester and an art person to Linux. This will make sure we don't have any configuration issues, and that the game looks and runs smoothly on the platforms. The worst place we can be is releasing a product that isn't functional or doesn't look or play well, regardless of the platform.
Thanks,
Robert.
Linux would get 3 dedicated members on it, an engineer, a tester and an art person.
Robert has said he will update the page to make this clearer as currently it's as clear as mud!
Now onto the Kickstarter...
About the game
Precinct takes players on a police adventure as officer Maxwell Jones in the corrupt town of Fraser Canyon, CA. Starting out as a rookie and then moving up the ranks, players face adrenaline charged scenarios and conduct real police procedures while solving crimes and arresting perpetrators.
Sounds like it could be pretty awesome, will you be backing this one?
But using Unity and pushing for Mac but not Linux seems foolish. It's the same amount of effort, since the same bugs will happen on both platforms.
At least this isn't a multiplayer game, some communities have died before the Linux version was released.
Eador, Interstellar Marines, and I could name a few who managed to get our money because they said that Linux was going to be supported, and we are still waiting to see this happen.
Mark my word, I still find it admirable that developers are even thinking aboutreleasing on what is, we have to face it, a niche platform. And apparently, none of them have yet "abandonned" the idea officially, we will have to settle for later releases. I just hope projects don't get abandoned.
I have my fingers crossed for wastelands 2, one of the first projects I supported, for a simultaneous release on all platforms.
I like how the windows art cant work with Linux, so they need to hire a "Linux art person".
If you want to make a proper Linux port, you need to replace the main character with Tux and rename the game as Tux-Whatever. An option for a console/ASCII interface is desired but not mandatory nowadays.
As they stated on their Kickstarter page, they are using proprietary tools above Unity 3D, so, they probably need a person to make this conversion, but I think they are asking too much, I hope they succed and the native port for Linux happen, the way they put Linux in second place really made me lose my interest.
All these kickstarters with Linux promises make me a bit wary.
Eador, Interstellar Marines, and I could name a few who managed to get our money because they said that Linux was going to be supported, and we are still waiting to see this happen.
Mark my word, I still find it admirable that developers are even thinking about releasing on what is, we have to face it, a niche platform. And apparently, none of them have yet "abandonned" the idea officially, we will have to settle for later releases. I just hope projects don't get abandoned.
I have my fingers crossed for wastelands 2, one of the first projects I supported, for a simultaneous release on all platforms.
So far so good on the projects I've funded, starting with Legends of Aetherus who put in some work to fix linux-specific mouse grabbing and fglrx issues in the early betas. Now Spaceventure just released a demo level to backers, and that one appears to have no linux-specific issues at all, so maybe Unity has matured since LoA started releasing Linux betas. Planetary Annihilation beta is coming this fall, and that also sounds very promising given the lack of complaints in the recent GoL article on the alpha.
I admit I did pledge for the unsuccessful kickstarter on Interstellar Marines, but if they had managed to get all that funding then it might have been easier for them to justify doing cross-platform work to begin with -- probably they really need the Steam funds rolling in from windows gamers ASAP to support further work after their reasonable budget went down in flames. Of course it's easier for me to cut them some slack, since I didn't go through with the pre-order on their own site after the kickstarter failed... but they never promised simultaneous release based on a slim budget of pre-order funds and whatever investment they could scrape together. In fact any other investors would likely try to discourage investing time to work on the Linux port prior to Steam release.
Stretch Goals should be done away with. Replaced by a Poll for Kickstarter backers as to what to add next AFTER the games release.
The new Spaceventure demo level is built on Unity, and is running just fine on linux. Dev said so far they didn't need to do much beyond selecting the build output. LoA team had to do more work, but like I mentioned they were releasing betas when Unity 4 was still quite new.
On the stretch goal topic, I agree that Linux stretch goals are normally problematic, as explained in Cheeseness' fine article. However leaving all the extra funds open to a backer poll would not inspire me to pledge above the base goal; I keep getting voted against on all the Worlds of Magic polls :P
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