Looks like Iron Gate AB and Coffee Stain Publishing did well, with the survival game Valheim doing fantastic.
After entering Early Access on February 2, it has repeatedly climbed up the top lists on Steam for players and sales hitting a fresh record of 131,153 online on Sunday February 7. Nothing is ever guaranteed to be a hit but it looks like they managed to find quite the sweet-spot and thankfully this hit has full Linux support, with the main developer even working from Linux.
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Not only is it doing well on sales and players, it's reviewing well overall too. It's gained over 8 thousand user reviews, with it already hitting an Overwhelmingly Positive status. The developer put up something of a teaser for their roadmap too, which gives the names of a few planned updates along with a confirmed new biome coming. We might also see multiplayer interactions, combat improvements, moon phases, tar pits, a sandbox mode and more "if Odin wills it".
Feature Highlight:
- Huge procedurally-generated world - explore and inhabit mystical lands, from mysteriousforests to imposing snow-topped mountain ranges and stunning meadows, complete with their own creatures of legend to battle and wildlife to hunt.
- Co-op PvE (2-10 players) - - Whether you want to brave the lands alone or venture with trusted allies, Valheim supports independent, player-hosted servers and unlimited world creation. We recommend playing co-op with 3-5 players.
- Punishing dodge & block based combat system with a wide range of weapons
- Build & sail ships - from flimsy rafts to imposing warships, build legendary vessels to conquer the seas and discover new lands.
- Summon and defeat vengeful primordial bosses of myth and legend, and collect trophies to progress and craft new powerful items
- Flexible house and base building system - raise mead halls, farms, settlements outposts, castles and more.
- Intuitive item crafting - forge the finest weapons and armour, and craft food and mead.
- Dedicated server- for players who want to run a persistent server. If you prefer not to run a server on your PC, consider renting a server at G-Portal.
If you're thinking about buying Valheim - be wary of the smoke. When building your house, you need a fire. You also need a roof for your bed and once you start containing everything with walls and a roof, things get a bit tough to breath. Smoke isn't just for show here either, so be sure to come up with some sort of fireplace with a chimney.
You can buy Valheim with Linux support on Steam.
On a side-note: the excellent LinuxGSM project just recently added support for running Valheim servers, so if you're interested in hosting your own cheaply that's probably the way to go. If you want to hook up with other Linux players, our Discord has a Game Server channel with multiple people hosting already and plenty of regulars from our community joining in on the fun.
Article taken from GamingOnLinux.com.
If you have a spare computer or server (vps, aws, etc.) somewhere it's pretty easy to set up a server for this game. Requires a bit of port forwarding (2456-2458 UDP). Here's the systemd unit I'm using for my server, now modified to properly save the server state thanks to beko.
Last edited by drlamb on 8 February 2021 at 5:01 pm UTC
Quoting: drlambSo far this game seems to perform better for me using OpenGL, a sentiment I've seen echoed in comments here as well. Framerates under vulkan will tank one second (when it was just running at 60+) and then all of a sudden recover. I've yet to have OpenGL exhibit the same behavior.
that seems to be issue with AMD GPUs... with nvidia vulkan performs amazingly. OpenGL is a bit worse, but performs ok also
Last edited by Spirimint on 9 February 2021 at 7:55 am UTC
I bought it on Release day and have played it acutally more than 30 hours.
I showed it to a friend and he bought it after about 20 minutes of watching. Now his entire family plays it :-)
So one Linux gamer gave Iron Gate 4 other Windows gamers through advertising.
Last edited by LungDrago on 9 February 2021 at 9:00 am UTC
Quoting: iskaputt
This is the polar opposite of what I've experienced and/or heard from those playing the game. It's easily the most polished early access game I've ever seen in my life. This E.A. release puts most game's regular releases to shame.
Quoting: DMG
Rafts are slow, yes, but have you tried the longboats?
I rather enjoy the progress gating this game has. It guides you towards the next goal which often requires serious resources and/or equipment. You're only limited by your creativity and the game is very much a learn-by-doing experience.
It's almost like Minecraft in this regard (getting to the ender dragon requires portal resources, etc). Experiencing this game through streams is not truly experiencing it.
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I've personally gotten 3 people to pick up the game. It's a blast with more people. The only concern of mine is what happens when the game releases? I'd imagine I'd need to restart the game for my world to include the new bosses/biomes.
Last edited by drlamb on 9 February 2021 at 2:18 pm UTC
Quoting: drlambThis is the polar opposite of what I've experienced and/or heard from those playing the game. It's easily the most polished early access game I've ever seen in my life. This E.A. release puts most game's regular releases to shame.
I can't say much about how it plays, but I found the looks and especially the UI (fonts, spacing, etc.) very early stages. The developer probably wants to iron out the gameplay first, but for me that is reason enough to wait some more months before checking it out seriously. I've actually had this game on my Steam wishlist since mid 2020, because it seems very intriguing and it is definitely not out of the world for me.
Edit: Another point that is not too serious, but to me usually a reason to sit back a little and observe, is the current hype around the game.
Last edited by iskaputt on 9 February 2021 at 2:27 pm UTC
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