Sad news, as it seems there's just no chance of Killing Floor 2 coming to Linux any more as Tripwire can't find a developer.
Going back to February of last year, Knockout Games sneaked out before that they were working on it, but not all contracts work out of course. I assumed they had parted ways, since later in August of last year Tripwire then said it wasn't in active development. I was hoping Knockout Games (or anyone) was just quietly working on it, but I guess not.
Here's what Tripwire have now said about it:
Currently all progress on a Linux Client is indefinitely on hold. While progress was made towards getting the game client to run on the platform, we have been unable to find a person or persons to finish the work needed to make a client.
The major bottleneck has been getting the rendering system up and running (the key part of the client) as the engine now works on platform (the server is the engine minus a client and loading assets it doesn't need to render/trigger). During Killing Floor 2's development a choice was made to rewrite the DirectX rendering system. This in turn means many of the "turn key" Unreal porting solutions that existed do not apply to Killing Floor 2, as they all assume that the game is using the default Unreal 3 rendering pipeline.
So far the third parties we have talked to either do not want to undertake the creation of a new OpenGL rendering pipeline from the ground up (due to time and effort involved) or have quoted a price that makes it beyond consideration (the cost versus estimated return math does not come even close to making sense based on previous Killing Floor 1 Linux sales when charted against Killing Floor 2).
If that changes, we will be happy to re-open development of a Linux client, but until that point it is on hold.
I was really looking forward to playing Killing Floor 2 one day, but it seems like it's not going to happen. Thankfully we have a lot of other great games, but it still stings a bit to hear this.
It's genuinely sad that a developer has again locked themselves into one single closed API. The annoying thing, is that they're using the sales of the original in their considerations of Linux being worth it or not for the new game. This is after previously confirming they will do it, multiple times. The problem I have with that, is Killing Floor was released for Windows in early 2009 and released for Linux in late 2012, that's well over three years after the original release when many people will have already owned it. Heck, even I already owned it, as I knew many people already did. This is part of the problem with Linux versions coming late—you will lose sales and then you will look at it like Linux sells even less than expected.
Thankfully, with game engines now having better support for OpenGL (and Vulkan support is slowly getting better), this is less of a problem for newer games—if they use an up to date version that is.
I still hope one day either someone like Ryan "Icculus" Gordon or another Linux porting champion can take another look, but considering how much work they've made for themselves, it doesn't sound likely.
Article taken from GamingOnLinux.com.
lucifertdark Jan 11, 2018
Luke_Nukem Jan 11, 2018
Quoting: GuestYeah, them rewriting the directx backend and now saying that it's too complicated/expensive to use a 3rd party to do an OpenGL version basically means they never had any intention of porting it to GNU/Linux, or any other platform for that matter.
That's pretty much the impression I got too. You have to have your head in the sand not to realise the consequences of using a vendor locked API, and think it will be cheap to write yet another rendering back-end.
Quoting: hardpenguinVendor lock-in :) The game luckily works with Wine ...
Quoting: GuestIt’s nice to get the explanation of what’s going on behind the scenes. They could make a Wine wrapper…
This is why I gotta call bullshit on Tripwire. If they wanted to release a Linux copy, wrap it in Wine and release it already. If Linux end-users can wrap it in Wine for themselves, surely it wouldn't be hard/expensive to do so for a Steam release?
Until Tripwire decides to man-up and keep their word, I'll see if I can't find a cracked Windows version to run in Wine. I'm sure as shit not gonna buy one, unless they release it on Linux.
GustyGhost Jan 11, 2018
Quoting: NanobangUntil Tripwire decides to man-up and keep their word, I'll see if I can't find a cracked Windows version to run in Wine. I'm sure as shit not gonna buy one, unless they release it on Linux.
Maybe ping that guy who does flatpack+wine builds for some unnamed file sharing site.
The KF2 port has been such a train wreck that it's kind of hilarious at this point. I can see it now: 2021: "Tripwire begin work on OpenGL renderer, say Killing Floor 2 for Linux should be ready for release by 2025"
Last edited by GustyGhost on 11 January 2018 at 5:02 pm UTC
Quoting: kalinCan we ask Ryan C. Gordon or Ethan Lee for help :)
Ethan cant help its not built around xna, Ryan C is a good shout but i doubt his patron sub would cover the hours required to overcome that problem.
An engine is not different - it's still a piece of software.
Some years ago I have worked for a big selling platform in germany and the heads of it decided to change the source code of MySQL 4.x and failed lousy when MySQL 5.0 arrived. The many changes could not be ported to MySQL 5.x anymore.
Today this company is owned by others - what a surprise;)
I think the guy (project leader) responsible for the decision to make changes to the rendering engine was forced by the publisher to that.
I'm sure he showed a way to do things right but the publisher decided to go the cheaper and faster way.
OpenGL (before Vulkan) is much better/stronger than DiretcX when you know how to use it. Think of Id Software.
But OpenGL is more complex. You need a lot of experience to do the right thing.
OpenGL has many ways to do the same thing but not all lead to best performance.
Id Software has this experience - most developers nowadays do not.
Vulkan WILL change this. But this takes time.
Quoting: johndoeChanging/Modifing the source code of an application is always a bad idea.
An engine is not different - it's still a piece of software.
Some years ago I have worked for a big selling platform in germany and the heads of it decided to change the source code of MySQL 4.x and failed lousy when MySQL 5.0 arrived. The many changes could not be ported to MySQL 5.x anymore.
Today this company is owned by others - what a surprise;)
I think the guy (project leader) responsible for the decision to make changes to the rendering engine was forced by the publisher to that.
I'm sure he showed a way to do things right but the publisher decided to go the cheaper and faster way.
OpenGL (before Vulkan) is much better/stronger than DiretcX when you know how to use it. Think of Id Software.
But OpenGL is more complex. You need a lot of experience to do the right thing.
OpenGL has many ways to do the same thing but not all lead to best performance.
Id Software has this experience - most developers nowadays do not.
Vulkan WILL change this. But this takes time.
Do you ever use opengl? OpenGL was and still is abomination. There is a reason for people to prefer direc3d. Why opengl is so fucked up is another topic. Currently I learn vulkan and don't have opinion on it for now.
Please be informed and don't trow statements just like that. Negativism never help. The studio is free to do what ever they want to do with their products. Stop blame them for not porting game that you probably never buy anyway.
Quoting: GuestI see the usual garbage and slagging off the developers is being posted...
Why did they use Direct3D ? Simple. It's the best API for the desktop platform. Doesn't matter about "vendor lock in" when 90% of your market is on the platform where that doeesnt matter.
If they had just used Direct3D, that would be normal and fewer fusses raised. Porters are used to working from Direct3d-->OpenGL and surely have tools for doing so. The issue here is that they apparently took Direct3D and heavily modified it, resulting in a custom thing that nobody has any idea how to port from. I would be willing to bet that's caused plenty of problems besides just difficulty porting to Linux; it sounds like a really dumb move.
Further, they apparently did this while claiming quite positively that they intended to do a Linux port, even though one would think it pretty dashed obvious that those two things were unlikely to be compatible.
I think a few facepalms are quite justified. I also think one current in this discussion is very strange--there have been a couple of people saying basically, "Stop the criticism! They're engaged in moneymaking activities so they can't possibly be making mistakes!" Um, what?! Some people haven't been reading their Dilbert. People, markets are not efficient and lots of moneymaking companies make plenty of boneheaded mistakes. People do not get anointed with infallibility by the market fairy as soon as they start working for a profitable corporation.
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