Re: Free: Game Drift Linux (Ubuntu for gamers)

On 2011-07-18 21:57, sid wrote:
On 18/07/11 19:58, Jimmy Thomsen wrote:
On 2011-07-18 04:03, sid wrote:
On 17/07/11 01:13, Jimmy Thomsen wrote:
On 2011-07-17 00:34, Robert W wrote:
On 07/16/2011 03:51 PM, Christoph Schmees wrote:

at gamedrift.org I see only a black background, no content at all.
Yes,
I use Firefox with NoScript. And *no* I am not going to allow JS for
this site. A website that can only be seen with JS enabled? *NO
THANKS!*
No way. Make the site barrier free and I may consider visiting it.

Thank goodness for VMs! I did go to the website and the site itself
looks pretty decent. However, I saw NOTHING whatsoever about a free
version. Only a light and a pro version ... both of which you still
have to pay for.

I would like to see what CodeWeavers has to say about the inclusion
and resale of the full version of their product in the professional
version of Game Drift Linux. Has anyone heard a peep out of them on
this? And perhaps if this is a legal distribution of CodeWeavers'
product, then someone should come out with an "Office Drift Linux" so
Windows people can use that with CodeWeavers CrossOver Office Pro :)

Usually Game Drift Linux is not free due to bandwidth expenses (hosting
ISOs and games for the Game Store) - but today we made an exception with
the Lite version, and just gave it away.

Natually Codeweavers know about all this - they have been very
cooperative, making it possible for us to provide Game Drift Linux +
Cross Over Games at a very low price.

Enjoy :-)

The lite version seems to be ubuntu with codeweavers presintalled (and
virtually nothing else), a wallpaper knocked up in 2 minutes, and an
icon taking me to a website with a 'gamestore' that is full of linux
games already available in the repositories, and windows games that
say "buy on amazon".

I fail to see how you expect people to pay for this, when everything
there is already available for free download elsewhere.

You've added nothing to ubuntu except the wallpaper (which isn't even
very good) and the link to the website, and codeweavers.

Codeweavers may be worth buying, but you didn't make it, and if I was
going to use it I'd be installing it into my existing linux, not
changing my whole OS just to add one package/group of packages. It
would even be less hassle to just install ubuntu 10.10 and add
codeweavers myself, since it has lots of other things preinstalled I
won't have to sit there installing.

It seems to me the whole thing is an exercise in generating revenue
from referrals to either codeweavers and/or amazon.

Why do you think people will pay to download gamedrift when it
provides less than ubuntu (which is free)?






Game Drift Linux comes with CrossOver Games at half the price - that
alone makes it worth the price (do the math :-)
On top of that we added patches to make it work on Ubuntu (go ahead and
install it on regular Ubuntu, and install a game from a CD/DVD which is
required while running the game - it won't work).
The compatibility list is only there to make it easy for people to find
and buy supported games - we are not making money from Amazon - just
another nice feature.

The Game Store mainly many games not part of the ordinary repository -
e.g. Amnesia, Zero Ballistics, Regnum, Second Life, Auteria, Enemy
Territory etc. The Game Store contains high quality games only, which is
also a major plus - all the best games right in front of you - no need
to look elsewhere. And you get the most recent version - go ahead and
install e.g. Assault Cube from Ubuntu - you won't be able to connect to
a lot of servers because its out-dated.

With Game Drift Linux you will see that things just work.

Finally, you get support. Obviously you're an intelligent guy, but other
people might need help with something. That's included.

Jimmy

That is the part I was wondering about, just how much support are you giving to people when a game does not work properly, that is potentially a huge undertaking, given the different hardware that just will not work right with linux easily, ATI GPUs for example.

The compatibility list is a good thing, yes, but why is that not available on the codeweavers website, because there certainly is a similar thing on the WINE website?

I noticed ET on the list, I had that on windows many moons ago. A good game even if it is old, a failed commercial project to follow up RTCW which also works well on linux, I assumed you didn't include RTCW because it's too old?

I have installed assault cube and it did connect, although this was last year. How outdated could it be?

The patches preinstalled are a good added value feature, for windows type people. What I wonder though is how many windows type people will be reading this NG looking for linux + games. It's hard enough to convince them linux will even play movies and mp3s properly.

I still think charging for the download of the .iso is a no go, you will not get many linux users wanting to do that, if any at all.

Charging to activate it, with the codeweavers installed + support (which really is the biggest added value you are offering IMO, because tech support is expensive) might be value for money if as you say it's half the price, but paying for the .iso... I just can't see people doing that.

Why did you provide such a basic ubuntu, with virutally nothing added, not even any games? Most people will want to install a new OS and play with it, there is very little there to play with, in fact if your already used to ubuntu there is nothing new at all and very little else. It's very cut down, there are hardly any packages preinstalled.

It needs more wow factor, when people try a new OS, they want to be impressed in the first few minutes of using it. It does not have that yet, although I appreciate if as you say it's had so much work with patches and games testing that's where the value is, people cannot really see that, linux people will be underwhelmed and windows people will just shrug and wonder what the point is.

I'm all for getting windows gamers into linux, but I can't see this quite swaying them, yet.








Hello again.

I appreciate how this conversation turned into pretty constructive criticism. I absolutely agree that the users would want more wow effects, but at some point the product needs to be released in order to get some feedback - this is the very first version which has been under development for almost half a year.

Game Drift Linux is what I personally wanted Ubuntu to be - a cleaner operating system allowing the user to pick the software he og she wants. It's all available in the repository.

"when people try a new OS, they want to be impressed in the first few minutes of using it"
- I seriously consider printing this on a huge banner to keep us focused on exactly that in the next version.

Jimmy
.

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