Since I see a lot of confusion about where to buy Linux games from, I decided to write up some information for you on how to make sure you're counted for Linux.
I've been wanting to write about this for a while, but wasn't sure how to go about it. Thankfully our Samsai excellently covered nasty buying habits already, so my addition to his article is mostly about bundle websites.
I know people are torn on this issue, as you want to support the developer, but there are times when you see a deal that looks so good for a game you want that it's really hard to resist. I totally understand that, as money is a precious thing, but you should be aware of exactly what platforms stores and bundle websites state.
I'm going to use Bundle Stars as my main example here, as they are currently selling Shadow of Mordor with a bunch of DLC for extremely cheap. When SoM was released, this bundle was already going and many people were confused on if they could buy it there.
I would like to highlight Bundle Stars answer to me when I asked them openly about how it would count for Linux:
For people who need it cut more clearly: It's a Windows sale. Keys work differently to direct Steam purchases, as key purchases can be for a specific paid-for platform.
Feral Interactive also confirmed this directly in another of our articles here:
For those of you who don't care about counting as a Linux sale, buy away, but for those who do want to fully support our small platform should always pay careful attention to the exact list of supported operating systems. If a store or bundle website doesn't specifically state Linux, then you shouldn’t really buy from them. Even better, you could pop them a message asking first and if Linux is actually supported properly with their keys they may update their website.
Take for example all the developers I speak to personally about their sales, some developers don’t feel it’s worth it right now to support Linux, and it certainly won’t seem like it if masses of Linux gamers flock to these low-cost bundle sites that don’t get picked up as a Linux sale.
This may all sounds pretty obvious, but after seeing people repeatedly question it, I thought it should be worth mentioning properly. If only a few extra people take this to heart in future, mission complete. Article taken from GamingOnLinux.com.
I've been wanting to write about this for a while, but wasn't sure how to go about it. Thankfully our Samsai excellently covered nasty buying habits already, so my addition to his article is mostly about bundle websites.
I know people are torn on this issue, as you want to support the developer, but there are times when you see a deal that looks so good for a game you want that it's really hard to resist. I totally understand that, as money is a precious thing, but you should be aware of exactly what platforms stores and bundle websites state.
I'm going to use Bundle Stars as my main example here, as they are currently selling Shadow of Mordor with a bunch of DLC for extremely cheap. When SoM was released, this bundle was already going and many people were confused on if they could buy it there.
I would like to highlight Bundle Stars answer to me when I asked them openly about how it would count for Linux:
QuoteHi Liam, Sorry for the delay in responding over the weekend. I can confirm that we have not been sent new keys for Shadow of Mordor since the Linux release and only Windows is mentioned on the page. However, where we promote games as being available for Linux, these will all activate correctly for the platform.
For people who need it cut more clearly: It's a Windows sale. Keys work differently to direct Steam purchases, as key purchases can be for a specific paid-for platform.
Feral Interactive also confirmed this directly in another of our articles here:
QuoteIf you buy from a third party and they don't explicitly say they are selling Linux or Mac keys then you've bought a Windows key. Bundle-star for example sell Windows keys.
Doesn't matter where you play the game on third party stores the sale is based on the steam keys they have purchased. Humble Bundle for example have a set of keys tagged as Windows, Mac and Linux and hand out the correct ones based on your platform so that the correct platform sale is recorded.
For those of you who don't care about counting as a Linux sale, buy away, but for those who do want to fully support our small platform should always pay careful attention to the exact list of supported operating systems. If a store or bundle website doesn't specifically state Linux, then you shouldn’t really buy from them. Even better, you could pop them a message asking first and if Linux is actually supported properly with their keys they may update their website.
Take for example all the developers I speak to personally about their sales, some developers don’t feel it’s worth it right now to support Linux, and it certainly won’t seem like it if masses of Linux gamers flock to these low-cost bundle sites that don’t get picked up as a Linux sale.
This may all sounds pretty obvious, but after seeing people repeatedly question it, I thought it should be worth mentioning properly. If only a few extra people take this to heart in future, mission complete. Article taken from GamingOnLinux.com.
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Anyone know if GOG counts Linux purchases?
AFAIR that's one of the companies (Humble is another one), that does count them separatly.
But how?
HumbleBundle has a checkbox to select OS on purschase.
GoG.com doesn't.
Could be done in a couple of ways. Your browser reports your platform (user agent) so they could be solely relying on that. It could also be that they base their assumptions regarding your platform of choice based on the platform versions downloaded of the games purchsed (if downloaded soonish), a combination of that and the browser platform or even your platform history/preferences from previous purchases.
I believe liam has tweeted them regarding this in the past. sadly they wouldn't reply :/
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Anyone know if GOG counts Linux purchases?
AFAIR that's one of the companies (Humble is another one), that does count them separatly.
But how?
HumbleBundle has a checkbox to select OS on purschase.
GoG.com doesn't.
Could be done in a couple of ways. Your browser reports your platform (user agent) so they could be solely relying on that. It could also be that they base their assumptions regarding your platform of choice based on the platform versions downloaded of the games purchsed (if downloaded soonish), a combination of that and the browser platform or even your platform history/preferences from previous purchases.
I believe liam has tweeted them regarding this in the past. sadly they wouldn't reply :/
I should really speak to my GOG contact about that now I have one...
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When buying games ported by Aspyr or Feral outside steam, all you have to check is the publisher. Since these companies act as the publishers of their respective ports, and at the same time the games are 'steamplay', they simply sell their keys to game stores all around and it's not rare to see "aspyr sale" or "feral sale" at a given store, where they get their share regardless of the platform (yes, even if a windows user buys the game). Examples of stores where you can buy aspyr-published games are macgamestore.com or nuuvem.com, as well as smaller stores in many countries - they will probably not count explicitly as Linux sales, but the money will go to the porter, that is for sure.
http://www.macgamestore.com/publisher/3/Aspyr-Media/
http://www.macgamestore.com/publisher/8/Feral-Interactive/
http://www.macgamestore.com/publisher/3/Aspyr-Media/
http://www.macgamestore.com/publisher/8/Feral-Interactive/
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rudeboyskunk Oct 13, 2015
Thanks Liam. I was considering buying the SoM bundle until I saw it only said "Windows" on the Bundle Stars site. Now you've confirmed it, so I'll wait for a Steam sale.
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When buying games ported by Aspyr or Feral outside steam, all you have to check is the publisher. Since these companies act as the publishers of their respective ports, and at the same time the games are 'steamplay', they simply sell their keys to game stores all around and it's not rare to see "aspyr sale" or "feral sale" at a given store, where they get their share regardless of the platform (yes, even if a windows user buys the game). Examples of stores where you can buy aspyr-published games are macgamestore.com or nuuvem.com, as well as smaller stores in many countries - they will probably not count explicitly as Linux sales, but the money will go to the porter, that is for sure.
http://www.macgamestore.com/publisher/3/Aspyr-Media/
http://www.macgamestore.com/publisher/8/Feral-Interactive/
Both Aspyr and Feral have their stores respectively. The best way to support them is to purchase their GNU/Linux ports from those stores.
https://www.gameagent.com/linux_games
https://store.feralinteractive.com/
1 Likes, Who?
as I see it, it really all doesn't matter right now. buy whatever you want where ever because there's a lot of things up in the air about how the trends will go. but as it stands linux users only make up a small minority of users as-is and Feral and Aspyr understand how their money works when it comes to being a niche company. they are looking at the possible future of gaming as much as the rest of the development community. i'm sure in the coming years they will reap the rewards.
The coolest thing about many of these linux games is that they will be backwards compatible for a long time, and people years from now will continue to buy these games. Since there is no shipping and manufacturing costs involved, Steam is the premiere platform to publish games on for the long term money flow and ease of distribution.
The coolest thing about many of these linux games is that they will be backwards compatible for a long time, and people years from now will continue to buy these games. Since there is no shipping and manufacturing costs involved, Steam is the premiere platform to publish games on for the long term money flow and ease of distribution.
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as I see it, it really all doesn't matter right now. buy whatever you want where ever because there's a lot of things up in the air about how the trends will go. but as it stands linux users only make up a small minority of users as-is and Feral and Aspyr understand how their money works when it comes to being a niche company. they are looking at the possible future of gaming as much as the rest of the development community. i'm sure in the coming years they will reap the rewards.I highly disagree here. We should ensure the devs get as much money back from their investments now (provided the ports are good enough, don't support bad products) because there is absolutely no telling how big the impact of Steam Machines will end up being. If Steam Machines end up not being all that successful for a year or two, these guys might end up reconsidering their porting efforts.
The coolest thing about many of these linux games is that they will be backwards compatible for a long time, and people years from now will continue to buy these games. Since there is no shipping and manufacturing costs involved, Steam is the premiere platform to publish games on for the long term money flow and ease of distribution.
2 Likes, Who?
This. It matters more now than ever.as I see it, it really all doesn't matter right now. buy whatever you want where ever because there's a lot of things up in the air about how the trends will go. but as it stands linux users only make up a small minority of users as-is and Feral and Aspyr understand how their money works when it comes to being a niche company. they are looking at the possible future of gaming as much as the rest of the development community. i'm sure in the coming years they will reap the rewards.I highly disagree here. We should ensure the devs get as much money back from their investments now (provided the ports are good enough, don't support bad products) because there is absolutely no telling how big the impact of Steam Machines will end up being. If Steam Machines end up not being all that successful for a year or two, these guys might end up reconsidering their porting efforts.
The coolest thing about many of these linux games is that they will be backwards compatible for a long time, and people years from now will continue to buy these games. Since there is no shipping and manufacturing costs involved, Steam is the premiere platform to publish games on for the long term money flow and ease of distribution.
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I guess there is yet another problem, with the Valve policy of sales.
Very often, when it is official that some titles are ported to Linux, Valve decides to do a sale for those games. So there is no port yet, but people would like to buy games at reasonable price and donate this way porter (but not with the full price, becuase it may be to much for someone).
Right now exactly this situation has place with Saints Row - we know that all the games from the series will be ported and there is a Sale on the Steam. One may think that it would be good idea to buy all the games from the series with reasonable price - 16,99 euro. But the problem is this money won't go to Virtual Programming. Even if all the buyers will play this game when it's ported. And from my point of view there should be a change in Valve's policy of dividing money after port was confirmed.
Very often, when it is official that some titles are ported to Linux, Valve decides to do a sale for those games. So there is no port yet, but people would like to buy games at reasonable price and donate this way porter (but not with the full price, becuase it may be to much for someone).
Right now exactly this situation has place with Saints Row - we know that all the games from the series will be ported and there is a Sale on the Steam. One may think that it would be good idea to buy all the games from the series with reasonable price - 16,99 euro. But the problem is this money won't go to Virtual Programming. Even if all the buyers will play this game when it's ported. And from my point of view there should be a change in Valve's policy of dividing money after port was confirmed.
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I guess there is yet another problem, with the Valve policy of sales.
They often did sales with the release of the Linux version.
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I highly disagree here. We should ensure the devs get as much money back from their investments now (provided the ports are good enough, don't support bad products) because there is absolutely no telling how big the impact of Steam Machines will end up being. If Steam Machines end up not being all that successful for a year or two, these guys might end up reconsidering their porting efforts.
I agree somewhat, I do try my best to purchase many of the games at a fair price so Linux is well represented. But in the long run if the Steam Machines are a flop, then we won't see much development either way, just because the sheer market share is so small. We may not see quite as many AAA titles anymore, but only certain developers that aren't greedy and see an extra ~$500k to ~$1 million as a worthwhile deal in the short term. Mostly will be indie developers like it is now. Which is fine with me, because I've found a lot of very fun indie games.
This is why I say I wouldn't worry about it, because the absolute only reason we are seeing so many games on Steam for Linux right now is all because of the work Valve has done. And like most investments it will take time before we see any real headway. And the greatest part about Steam is the games will be there for many years to come, so all the developers porting and making games for Linux right now will reap the rewards more-so in the long term.
But I digress and will remain optimistic that Steam Machines will be at least decent on sales to the point we are at the very least higher than Apple on PC market share. So companies won't have much of an argument on that front.
But other than Valve there is also Vulkan that is partly because of a push Valve has made to get Vulkan ready around the time of the Steam Machine launch. I'm guessing but I'd wager we will see a public release sometime in December maybe sooner.
I just hope we start to really see more of a AAA developer presence in Linux that way we will see some really nice advancements when it comes to Linux computing in general. Because for years I've always heard complaints about how Linux doesn't have certain nuance apps or programs... But maybe with enough developer support we may see even better applications than proprietary software. This is the era of open source and I think Epic Games understands this more-so than most other companies. Google and Android has shown people a taste of what can happen with open source software.
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