World of Goo 2 launches in May on the Epic Store - but Linux support from their website

This is, without a doubt, the weirdest way to provide Linux support... But I'm glad they thought of us???

This is, without a doubt, the weirdest way to provide Linux support... But I'm glad they thought of us???

It seems their stance is "Although we made an Epic deal, we still want to support Linux users!", and well... Thanks!


Last edited by Eike on 21 Feb 2024 at 8:12 pm UTC

This is, without a doubt, the weirdest way to provide Linux support... But I'm glad they thought of us???

Well, if you take an Epic Exclusive deal you can't put it on other stores but they do allow you to still sell it direct. So it was their only choice. As a smaller outfit, the epic exclusive money no doubt helped development.

Well, if you take an Epic Exclusive deal you can't put it on other stores but they do allow you to still sell it direct. So it was their only choice. As a smaller outfit, the epic exclusive money no doubt helped development.

Huh, I guess that makes sense. Still quite weird but it makes sense.

So taking an Epic deal (which doesn't support Linux) for many developers means that they don't bother having a Linux build at release. So 12 months later or whatever, when they're preparing their build for a store which does support Linux, Linux support is way harder - as we've discussed here before; they might need to rip out and redo a bunch of single-platform stuff, and they're quite likely to not bother then, either.

They've managed to avoid that by having a Linux build available from the outset, which is commendable. And World Of Goo was one of the games that kicked off mainstream Linux gaming pre-Steam with the Humble Bundles, which is commendable, too.

But I'll still probably only pick it up when it's on Steam. For full price though, since it'll have a native build.

I hope they thought about the Steam Deck integration even if they are not releasing on Steam yet.


Last edited by Spyker on 21 Feb 2024 at 4:44 pm UTC

My priority is DRM free so even if the game was on Steam if there was a DRM free version on their site i'd pick that. I'd prefer Itch.io or GOG but I never was going to touch the Epic store.

Yuck.

Interested, but I'll definitely wait for a store release that supports both Windows and Linux with the same purchase. GOG or Steam probably.

I refuse to buy anything on this joke of a store as long as Epic continue their BS... I will buy the game DRM-free on 2DBoy website like it's 2009 (I give them a pass for the exclusivity deal considering their size and the continued support for Linux and DRM-free ), and probably Steam/GOG/Itch/Humble later on...

Edit: Ohhh... and please, no EOS integration, thank you XD


Last edited by BloodScourge on 21 Feb 2024 at 5:32 pm UTC

As I did with every other Epic exclusives, I'll wait for the Steam release and then decide.

This strategy saved me from buying bad games, a couple of times.


Last edited by Mohandevir on 21 Feb 2024 at 5:28 pm UTC

Mixed messaging for sure. I get that Epic money helps, and I hope it works out for the devs, but I'm not terribly interested in supporting Epic if I can avoid it. For Alan Wake 2 I don't think that's possible. World of Goo 2? See you in a year on a better, more forward-looking platform.

This will be a day-one purchase for me, from their website.

I find it weird that people find it weird that a company supports our platform of choice. I wish more devs had an option to bypass the bullshit stores. Why is it so necessary to put the game on these stores?

I will definitely be buying this day one from their page. I get wanting it available on a store like GOG, so all your games are in one place instead of all over, but this works for me as well and should give the developer more of the profit.

I will buy World of Goo 2 for Linux from their website if they release it.
Of course, I would prefer to buy the DRM-free version from Humble Store or at least from GOG. On the other hand, I can understand that you don't have a choice.

Thank you for supporting Linux.

And World Of Goo was one of the games that kicked off mainstream Linux gaming pre-Steam with the Humble Bundles, which is commendable, too.

The mainstream Linux gaming?

No. We had the big titles on Linux and many indie games before HIB. Unfortunately, Linux users didn't have one or two online stores where you could buy most of these games. It was too fragmented for average users.

Before 2010, companies were selling games for Linux mainly directly from the websites. It wasn't easy to track all promotions. HIB fixed this issue by focusing on advertising bundles with Linux games for a few bucks. That allowed them to make more money in this way than other companies before them.

Later, many of these companies decided to sell their games for Linux only on Desura, Humble Store, or Steam.


Last edited by gbudny on 21 Feb 2024 at 6:56 pm UTC

As I did with every other Epic exclusives, I'll wait for the Steam release and then decide.

This strategy saved me from buying bad games, a couple of times.

Yes, I also appreciate the work of Year 1 betatesters, a.k.a. Epic users.

I have the original DRM-free game one of my old hard drives somewhere. I think it's perfectly fine for a game like this, as long as it doesn't have anything that would prevent it from working in the future if the developer disappears.

I find it weird that people find it weird that a company supports our platform of choice. I wish more devs had an option to bypass the bullshit stores. Why is it so necessary to put the game on these stores?

Because Proton, which is only usable by most people on Steam, provides a better experience in most cases than a native Linux version.

That's not necessarily my experience, although I recently had to install old libraries to get Loop Hero from GOG to work again, but a lot of Linux users do say as much. I also had to manually patch a library for another native Linux game from Itch. And delete some old bundled libraries for a Ren'Py game from Itch...

But I do support devs releasing their games wherever they want. It's just, supporting Linux natively long-term, even with open source engines, seems far more challenging than other platforms.

welp time to wait for it to release on steam.