Ryan "Icculus" Gordon, a developer who has ported tons of games to Linux has done it again. Descent 3, has been re-ported and upgraded for Linux (and macOS).
Originally released in 1999, it was later ported to Linux thanks to the defunct Loki Software in 2000 and eventually in 2014 the Windows version came to Steam. The Linux port was old, not easy to find and many people likely didn't even know it was a thing today.
Speaking on their Patreon post, Icculus gave a little history of the game and Loki and goes on to mention multiple other titles they've tried to re-port without success. So when one does come along, they obviously jumped at the chance. The new port is 64bit, built with the wonderful cross-platform SDL 2 tech and runs on modern Linux and macOS. It also handles larger screen resolutions, improved cutscenes handling and the movie files have been encoded in Ogg Theora making the install a lot smaller.
I'm thrilled to be bringing this game back to a modern Linux audience. It was the first big project at Loki that I was in charge of, and I'm super-thrilled to be in charge of it again today.
Ryan "Icculus" Gordon
Thanks to this effort, you can now pick up Descent 3 in modern form on Steam for both Linux and macOS, which comes with the Mercenary expansion. If you already had it for Windows, as usual you get access free thanks to how Steam works. Icculus mentioned that it may come to GOG later.
You can support more work from Icculus on their Patreon.
Like with the recent re-port of Little Racers STREET, it's fantastic to see developers open to someone keeping their games alive and well.
Article taken from GamingOnLinux.com.
Thank you Ryan for porting it again! (and all you other lifetime achievements for the penguin, of course!)
But this is great news! 64 bit, higher resolution, support for modern machines - yay!
Does anyone know if there's an installer for people who own the CD? Or do I have to buy it again (which means waiting until it's available on a non-steam store)?
rustybroomhandle Feb 1, 2020
Also, any chance Freespace 1&2 are next?
Last edited by jarhead_h on 2 February 2020 at 12:19 am UTC
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This is hilarious, especially if the port does come to GOG.com meaning I never have to use the disk.
Last edited by Hamish on 2 February 2020 at 7:52 am UTC
Now what I'd really like to see is this treatment done to Alpha Centauri. Every time I go back to my old Loki CD of that, it takes a bit more fiddling to get it working (and last time I still couldn't get sound). I suppose it probably works under Wine/Proton these days, but somehow I really don't want to buy a Windows copy of a game I bought for Linux just to get it to run on Linux.
Last edited by Purple Library Guy on 2 February 2020 at 6:12 pm UTC
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