Gamemaker CryTek announces Linux support at GDC

in games on 2014-03-18 19:24 (#3GA)

German videogame producer Crytek had long been suggesting they would offer official Linux support for their CryENGINE game engine some day. That day is now.

According to a post on their website last week, we now know that at the GDC (Game Developers Conference) that began yesterday, attendees will be able to see this version of the engine in action. They have not mentioned which games they plan on demonstrating.

CryTek is well known for the popular games the Crysis series and Far Cry,as well as Ryse: Son of Rome. From their website:

During presentations and hands-on demos at Crytek's GDC booth, attendees can see for the first time ever full native Linux support in the new CRYENGINE. The CRYENGINE all-in-one game engine is also updated with the innovative features used to recreate the stunning Roman Empire seen in Ryse - including the brand new Physically Based Shading render pipeline, which uses real-world physics simulation to create amazingly realistic lighting and materials in CRYENGINE games.

There will also be games on offer, with the latest version of free online FPS Warface available to play.

Anyone ready for Star Citizen on Linux? And if you're in the San Francisco area, how about giving your fellow readers a word about how it looks?

Effects on Linux? (Score: 3, Interesting)

by quadrox@pipedot.org on 2014-03-19 10:04 (#P0)

I have traditionally welcomed all efforts at porting games and software in general to Linux, but recently I have started to be concerned about what effects this will have on the Linux ecosystem. Things like Steam and in general the perceived need for "trusted" computing and DRM raise the possibility of commercial products requiring locked down software/hardware platforms that may run Linux under the hood, but are not anywhere near being as open as they are supposed to be.

If all of this just ends up requiring a non-free and non-open version of Linux it would be pointless - might as well just use windows then.

Re: Effects on Linux? (Score: 2, Interesting)

by zafiro17@pipedot.org on 2014-03-19 12:21 (#P3)

I agree with that. But perhaps we'd see a split - due to community demand - for some distros that handle the games and some that remain free/unDRMed? So RedHat would decide they want in on the action and you'd get a RedHat distro knowing what you're getting into. Ubuntu would follow suit. But you'd also have niche distros that specialize in DRM-free kernels and so on, for those that prefer to give up the games than to give up freedom.

I'm hopeful anyway.

Re: Effects on Linux? (Score: 1)

by gumpish@pipedot.org on 2014-03-19 16:40 (#PF)

Although in an ideal world there would be no need to dual-boot, I'd definitely be less annoyed with a Linux / DRMLinux dual-boot system than a Linux / Windows dual-boot system. Presumably a Linux kernel with DRM baked in would still be more secure than Windows and Microsoft wouldn't be collecting money from game enthusiasts anymore.

Re: Effects on Linux? (Score: 1)

by rocks@pipedot.org on 2014-03-20 12:47 (#Q5)

Although it potentially strikes me that it is better to have the problem of too much interest in the Linux platform than too little, even if its openness gets pushed around by some.