After a successful Kickstarter campaign back in 2018, developer Eggnut released their post-noir narrative adventure Backbone in June 2021. Sadly, they've decided not to go through with the official Linux support on it.
This is a crowdfunding campaign that did very clearly have Linux down as a platform from the beginning, so it's not the best of looks. Especially to get the announcement that it's no longer planned eight months after the initial launch. What's the reasoning being given? Here's what they said in the Kickstarter announcement:
We're very sorry to announce that we won't be porting Backbone to Linux in the near future. We did our best to do it in-house, but it took immeasurable amount of time and effort, and making it work properly would require creating a dev environment to work in which we don't have the resources for because we're deep in production for our next game. We are not in the financial position to hire another party to do the porting for us. We absolutely understand the frustration these news might bring, and we're ready to offer you these solutions:
For backers, they've offered a key for any other platform or a full refund if you prefer. That is at least a lot better than some, as we've seen plenty of other projects decide not to do Linux after including it in funding and not offer anything. Still, it's a frustrating situation, especially to be told they don't have a development environment set up for it — after being in development overall for multiple years and already being supported on Windows for over half a year.
What about Steam Play Proton, can you run it there? Reports seem mixed on it, although there's not many, with the big problem being cinematics not playing.
Article taken from GamingOnLinux.com.
Quoting: PhlebiacQuoting: RaabenNow I assume that if it's not a day 1 native game it's never coming.
Often true, but not always; some examples are Divinity: Original Sin, Moebius, and most recently Encased. The long delay on the first two was definitely frustrating, but they *did* follow through in the end. Still hoping that Kapia follows through...
Of course it's not a given, I just mean the way things are going lately I don't get my hopes up in that case.
Quoting: MisterPaytwickQuoting: kokoko3k
It is also funny how they admit that they won't port it to linux because they want to develop the next game instead.
Great move, keep up the good work.
Honestly, it's better for everybody if they just straight up acknowledge they can't over doing what they just did.
Thank you for answering.
The fact that something bad is better than a worst thing, doesn't make it good, at all.
It is still a bad thing.
In this case, they promised something, and then said that they wont keep the promise because they want to develop a new game instead.
I'm not inclined at all in justifying that attitude.
QuoteAnd again Wine is a bandaid, not a solution for whatever the original plan was, because it's oh so brittle and supporting it is less likely and far less sane than supporting a distro or two (Debian / Ubuntu and Fedora? Good follow up on either, they work fine).
It is not me, it is not wine, it is that they don't even bothered to use the bandaid.
Quoting: KimyrielleIt's still mindboggling how people obviously having zero Linux knowledge can go ahead and promise support for a platform they struggle to even install. What where they thinking? Like "Linux is just Windows with a penguin, it can't be so hard, right?"
Taking money for a product you don't even know if you can deliver is just unprofessional.
Because they are not (that) professionals, probably, and accessibility through abstraction is the source of that.
With all those easy-to-use pre-made engines, making games today doesn't require you to know exactly what you're doing anymore.
So that you can take someone with a story, another one who can draw graphics, a boy with some musical taste, shake it well and there you go: have a brand new indie team asking for money to make a game.
Then it happens that you make a detailed bug report to them and you see how they are having an hard time understanding what you're trying to say, as if developer and user have swapped places.
Quoting: kokoko3kThen it happens that you make a detailed bug report to them and you see how they are having an hard time understanding what you're trying to say, as if developer and user have swapped places.
Quoting: CyrilThat page only lists the ones that did deliver. It doesn't tell anything about what share they represent in the totality - how many crowdfounded projects that did not deliver on promise.Quoting: BeamboomIs it just me, or do most kickstarter projects with a promised Linux version end up like this? I feel it's happened over and over and over now...
No, see this:
https://www.gamingonlinux.com/crowdfunders/
Last edited by Beamboom on 11 February 2022 at 2:53 pm UTC
Quoting: BeamboomQuoting: CyrilThat page only lists the ones that did deliver. It doesn't tell anything about what share they represent in the totality - how many crowdfounded projects that did not deliver on promise.Quoting: BeamboomIs it just me, or do most kickstarter projects with a promised Linux version end up like this? I feel it's happened over and over and over now...
No, see this:
https://www.gamingonlinux.com/crowdfunders/
Did you even look at the page?
Quoting: BeamboomAt the top, it saysQuoting: CyrilThat page only lists the ones that did deliver. It doesn't tell anything about what share they represent in the totality - how many crowdfounded projects that did not deliver on promise.Quoting: BeamboomIs it just me, or do most kickstarter projects with a promised Linux version end up like this? I feel it's happened over and over and over now...
No, see this:
https://www.gamingonlinux.com/crowdfunders/
QuoteTotal Projects: 428 | In Development: 89 | Finished: 428 | Total Failed: 53That looks to me like it's saying 88% delivered.
Based on those finished: Success Rate: 88% | Failure rate: 12%
Last edited by Raaben on 11 February 2022 at 4:33 pm UTC
Quoting: PhlebiacQuoting: CyrilFor Backbone, did you added a key of the game in your account already?
Yes, but that's hardly relevant; it was added in anticipation of the promised Linux support - they broke that contract, not me. If they really care, I believe they can invalidate the key.
On GOG, at least, I don't think they can. On GOG if you bought any game that disappear one day, you can still download it from your library. I don't have any example that proves me wrong on that.
But I agree with you, the fault is on their side.
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