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Latest Comments by ElectricPrism
GTX 760 Vs R7 370 4GB In Dirt Showdown
18 August 2015 at 8:15 pm UTC Likes: 2

Phoenix put out a article on this too
nVidia vs AMD Linux Gaming DIRT

Thanks for sharing the data :)

DiRT Showdown Released For Linux Thanks To Virtual Programming, Some Thoughts
17 August 2015 at 6:12 pm UTC Likes: 6

Quoting: Linas
Quoting: aristoriasit is really sad to see the linux world completely focus on nvidia/intel.
We already have an intel monopoly and the same will happen with nvidia.
Everybody has some kind of responsibility, especially reporters - free or not.
Why? Free enterprise! Just saying ...

AMD brought this on themselves. I used to be an AMD user, both CPU and GPU. But with every release fglrx driver was getting worse and worse. Crashing, not being able to change screen brightness. Then they dropped the card from the driver altogether while the open source driver had no 3D support yet. That was the last straw -- my next machine was Intel / NVIDIA.

He speaks the truth. We built only AMD ATI for many years until their product become inferior and their drivers mere duck-tape and barely functional. I would rather shell out the extra $300 on CPU+GPU than waste weeks rooting for the underdog products of a dysfunctional corporation and only receive subpar performance.

My suggestion to you - go sell your AMD on ebay or local and buy a nVidia card if you want the "best" linux gaming experience. It's sad, and it's not the way it should be - but it's the way it is right now. Maybe the future will be different - that's up to AMD, in the meantime I won't suffer from their bad choices.

--

This video looks great! I can't wait to buy this and hopefully it's "most excellent", party on linux dudes.

Sid Meier’s Civilization: Beyond Earth Expansion Rising Tide New Trailer, Still A Day-1 Linux Release
16 August 2015 at 4:20 am UTC

I'm not a Civ player like my girl is, so my girl tried CivBE Linux earlier today and she said she can tell why people don't like it.

It sounded like they reversed the HUD, over simplified some Civ5 mechanics and added in confusing resources. Also other things were annoying like how every couple turns it would show you a new nation single tile off in some random black distance of the map - she said that she liked being able to ignore the other CPU players in 5 better.

I really felt a StarCraft-esk feel from the game having little Civ background. That mechanic sounded dumb in the same way that in StarCraft 2 when a enemy doesn't have a main base the game will show your enemies all your buildings - In SC1 you could run and build a pylon somewhere in the dark to prolong death or give yourself a chance at rebooting your base quickly.

Also, she expressed extreme disappointment over having to play as Humans - playing as Aliens would be so much more fun.

Testing The Latest Unreal Tournament On Linux
16 August 2015 at 1:24 am UTC

Quoting: GuestHello,
I just wanted to share my experiences.

First some people complain about the bad graphics. The graphics option that lead to bad visuals for me was the "Screen Percentage" which computes low-res images and scales up afterwards. Setting this to 100% was a big improvement for me.

Second, somebody asked about the ATI performance. I use a R9 280X with proprietary drivers (Ubuntu 15.04) and the game runs just fine. No crashes.

Additionally, setting to OpenGL3 can improve performance for many as seen in the exec line of my Launcher.

There are many other parameters that can be fed to UE4 engine games.

Testing The Latest Unreal Tournament On Linux
15 August 2015 at 7:31 pm UTC

Here's my launcher incase anyone wants to make it easier to launch the game.

~/.local/share/applications/UE4.desktop
[Desktop Entry]
Name=Unreal Tournament 4
Comment=Unreal 4 Alpha
GenericName=FPS
Exec="/home/electricprism/Apps/Unreal Engine 4 2532759/LinuxNoEditor/Engine/Binaries/Linux/UE4Game" UnrealTournament -resx=1920 -resy=1080 -vsync -opengl3
Icon=applications-games-symbolic
Type=Application
StartupNotify=true
Categories=GNOME;Games;
MimeType=text/plain;


The version number 2532759 will need to be updated to reflect the current version.

Introducing the Latest Addition To GOL Cast Hardware: Radeon R7 370 [Updated]
14 August 2015 at 12:49 am UTC

Quoting: GuestI know I'm wasting words, but for those saying they think AMD should fix it - no, at least not entirely. A driver team pumping man-hours into workarounds and such is trying to cure the symptom, not the cause: shitty code in the first place.
There are reasons that games suddenly get patched and work just fine on AMD cards, without driver updates. The bulk of the effort is actually in getting developers writing the games properly in the first place - that's where the most gains will be seen.

I think this comment relates to a recent benchmark on Phoronix about OpenGL Benchmarks.

I specifically wanted to hilight Xonotic performance on Ubuntu as doing terrible.


The reason this is interesting is because the "writing proper code" issues certainly plague both proprietary and open source as seen in that result.

In a open source world a developer could either fix the app or the driver, but in a closed as it's put "workarounds" become common place even breaking spec.

Introducing the Latest Addition To GOL Cast Hardware: Radeon R7 370 [Updated]
13 August 2015 at 8:40 pm UTC

Not bad for $180 Card

I'm glad GOL is getting into Linux GPU Benchmarks and I find this information extremely illuminating as this is the kind of info I've been keeping a eye out for.

We all love to support the underdog, Linux itself has always been the underdog in the gaming market until Steam showed up. I really hope AMD gives us reasons to love them with our wallets, and I hope they love us back with improving the Linux AMD Drivers.

This Friday will be illuminating aswell.

HTC Vive Plans Linux/SteamOS Support For Day 1
12 August 2015 at 9:20 pm UTC

How much can we expect it to cost? I'm unsure if this kind of device is pure luxary or really complimentary to Linux Gaming.

Also, I wonder if it has negative health effects on the eyes.

BOMB: Who let the dogfight? Exits Early Access & Released For Linux, It’s Terrible
12 August 2015 at 9:17 pm UTC

Looks interesting, I would love to also hear about "what it feels like to play" and "what it's like" - my first question is "is it like StarFox 64 Multiplayer?"

I'm on the fence about this - too bad it's unplayable like you said @Liam :\

The Ubuntu Guys Have Already Worked Out A More Official PPA For Nvidia Driver Updates
12 August 2015 at 9:16 pm UTC

I dont really see this move as "deserving praise" as I feel that since Ubuntu is one of 2 supported Steam distros. I feel that having proper nVidia drivers is their duty to their users. Still it's good news, but it's like praising an employee for doing the job they were hired to do.