Greetings all!
I was wondering if with Sam’s new venture with Galaxy Gameworks, if this may
spawn more commercial quality games like the old Loki games. Nothing against
the homebrewed games, but I think commercial attention on SDL would be a great
thing for us all.
So any news in regards to commercial use of SDL?
Good questionOn Sat, Jan 24, 2009 at 6:24 PM, Micah Brening <micah.brening at gmail.com> wrote:
Greetings all!
I was wondering if with Sam’s new venture with Galaxy Gameworks, if this may
spawn more commercial quality games like the old Loki games. Nothing against
the homebrewed games, but I think commercial attention on SDL would be a great
thing for us all.So any news in regards to commercial use of SDL?
- Micah
SDL mailing list
SDL at lists.libsdl.org
http://lists.libsdl.org/listinfo.cgi/sdl-libsdl.org
I was wondering if with Sam’s new venture with Galaxy Gameworks, if this may
spawn more commercial quality games like the old Loki games. Nothing against
the homebrewed games, but I think commercial attention on SDL would be a great
thing for us all.
My guess is that we’d see the most action on the iPhone side of
things, due to LGPL code being just about unusable for a commercial
app. For a Windows/Mac OS X/Linux game, a commercial game could always
use SDL without any special license, just by providing a binary that
dynamically links again SDL…
Also, there’s some pretty impressive open source games out there
(not mine, hehe!) that I’d say are very close to “commercial
quality”, or even better. I’m often amazed at the screenshots I see on
Free Gamer (http://freegamer.blogspot.com/)
But we’ll see… :-)On Sat, Jan 24, 2009 at 6:24 PM, Micah Brening <micah.brening at gmail.com> wrote:
Pierre Phaneuf <pphaneuf gmail.com> writes:
…
Also, there’s some pretty impressive open source games out there
(not mine, hehe!) that I’d say are very close to “commercial
quality”, or even better. I’m often amazed at the screenshots I see on
Free Gamer (http://freegamer.blogspot.com/)But we’ll see…
Don’t get me wrong, I’m very interested in open source games. The thing that
has confused me is that the closed source games seem to have a lower system
requirement than the open source ones do. That goes for the upgrades too. I
don’t like it when I’m playing Wesnoth on one of my older computers just fine,
and then I upgrade to the next release, and it’s choppy.
Sometimes I wonder how a company would fare if they did it close to the same way
some of the open source “companies” work. Have the game open source, but the
support for the game is paid. But then it seems most game companies are the
other way around, the game costs, but the support is free.
I could have asked if there were going to be any companies PORTING commercial
games. That would be good as well. But I think it would be the best if
companies started from scratch some SDL based games. But then it seems
companies create the games, then license the game to porters who make it work on
other machines. So they get money for getting it to other machines. Would they
save or lose money by putting it to SDL from the start?> On Sat, Jan 24, 2009 at 6:24 PM, Micah Brening <micah.brening gmail.com> wrote:
Hi,
that is due to the way how the games industry works.
It got me some time to get used to it, but the hard reality is that open
source doesn’t
play any role on game development, at least on the comercial world.
A game developer has a nice idea for a game, he then goes and implements a
prototype
of it on some piece of hardware that he feels confortable with.
Then it is time to look for a producer to fund the development and release
of the game.
Here two things might happen, either the hardware that the developer used is
then one
where the game would profit better when released, or the producer has a
specific hardware
in mind as deployment platform.
The game then gets released and many times it is the producer who is then
selecting other
platforms to release the game, and mainly by outsourcing the development.
SDL is a very good media API, but except for a given set of games, it cannot
compete with
many of the commercial offerings out there, specially if you are into 3D
games development.
And this comercial license from Sam might help some companies to give a
second look to
SDL and start using it on some titles. Because they will get the perpection
that they can
pay for something and get support for it.–
Paulo
On Sun, Jan 25, 2009 at 10:47 AM, Micah Brening <micah.brening at gmail.com>wrote:
Pierre Phaneuf <pphaneuf gmail.com> writes:
On Sat, Jan 24, 2009 at 6:24 PM, Micah Brening <micah.brening gmail.com> wrote:
…
Also, there’s some pretty impressive open source games out there
(not mine, hehe!) that I’d say are very close to “commercial
quality”, or even better. I’m often amazed at the screenshots I see on
Free Gamer (http://freegamer.blogspot.com/)But we’ll see…
Don’t get me wrong, I’m very interested in open source games. The thing
that
has confused me is that the closed source games seem to have a lower system
requirement than the open source ones do. That goes for the upgrades too.
I
don’t like it when I’m playing Wesnoth on one of my older computers just
fine,
and then I upgrade to the next release, and it’s choppy.Sometimes I wonder how a company would fare if they did it close to the
same way
some of the open source “companies” work. Have the game open source, but
the
support for the game is paid. But then it seems most game companies are
the
other way around, the game costs, but the support is free.I could have asked if there were going to be any companies PORTING
commercial
games. That would be good as well. But I think it would be the best if
companies started from scratch some SDL based games. But then it seems
companies create the games, then license the game to porters who make it
work on
other machines. So they get money for getting it to other machines. Would
they
save or lose money by putting it to SDL from the start?
SDL mailing list
SDL at lists.libsdl.org
http://lists.libsdl.org/listinfo.cgi/sdl-libsdl.org
SDL is a very good media API, but except for a given set of games, it cannot
compete with
many of the commercial offerings out there, specially if you are into 3D
games development.
SDL is not a 3D API. It helps you create an OpenGL context, if
that’s what you’re into. But SDL cannot change OpenGL.
And this comercial license from Sam might help some companies to give a
second look to
SDL and start using it on some titles. Because they will get the perpection
that they can
pay for something and get support for it.
I think it will be more the other way around.
If SDL were an attractive option to commercial game companies, they
would already be using it. Offering libsdl.org’s SDL under a
proprietary license does not change whether or not a proprietary game
can use SDL, just read SDL’s license. What libsdl.org’s SDL is unable
to provide is non-open-source code. libsdl.org SDL cannot contain
proprietary code, it’s open source. The reason this is a problem is
because in order to “protect” their revenues, many companies feel
compelled to sell products to customers which can only do what the
company expressly allows them to do. Keeping out hackers means only
sharing documentation and source code for those “protected” platforms
with hackers that have been evaluated and have made certain
agreements, including those regarding non-disclosure, and that means
not giving out source code which might be construed as helping anyone
reverse engineer information about the platform.
It seems to me that if anyone wrote a proprietary implementation of
SDL for a locked-down platform, it would mean that they could license
it to FOSS game developers in order to be able to sell their game on
that platform, game code/content copyright permitting.
Yes, this is very contrary to the spirit of FOSS.
However, suppose the platform we’re talking about is iPhone, and
you’ve thought about selling your open source game in the iPhone
store. Anyone who might buy your game from there has already shown
their disregard for freedom and source code access, but that doesn’t
in any way mean that they don’t want to pay for your game.
But you can’t sell your game on the iPhone store yet, because it
doesn’t use an API that works for the iPhone even though the API you
use is a programming abstraction meant to deliver
platform-independence to your application, because Apple is
"protecting" their revenue stream by keeping the platform locked down
so that it’s easier for dumb users to just pay for things instead of
having to figure out how to hack their phones. Yes, you are taking
advantage of that “protection” if you also sell your games on the
iPhone store.
It is with a heavy spirit that I say this, but: take that money and
reinvest it in something noble, even in FOSS evangelism. You can
continue to make your game free and open source for all users who
actually appreciate freedom, but those people aren’t playing it on
iPhone.
So the issue here almost might have had nothing to do with libsdl.org
SDL at all. The catch is that the copyright owner for a lot of SDL
seeks to be the aforementioned author of a proprietary SDL
implementation. Instead of writing from scratch, he can just use the
existing code base, but keep some of his NDA-encumbered improvements
private.
Again with a heavy spirit, I admit that these “improvements” are no
imposition on you, as your software can still be free and open source.
If you profit from an iPhone App Store sale, you’ll only be accepting
money from people who don’t have the same ideals you do. Are you
taking advantage of them? Are you selling out? I don’t know. It seems
like a complex issue to me. Personally I would feel okay selling my
game on the iPhone store if it taught them something about FOSS.
Anyhow Micah, my point is this: If you want to see commercial games on
SDL, write your own proprietary SDL implementation with a special move
that SDL users might need in order to turn a profit, then seduce them
into wanting to share profits with a company like Apple that butters
its bread by locking down cellphones.On Sun, Jan 25, 2009 at 5:55 AM, Paulo Pinto wrote:
Oh, yikes, I misread part of this:On Sun, Jan 25, 2009 at 5:55 AM, Paulo Pinto wrote:
And this comercial license from Sam might help some companies to give a
second look to
SDL and start using it on some titles. Because they will get the perpection
that they can
pay for something and get support for it.
Are you suggesting Sam trick customers into thinking they’re buying
support and then not give it to them?
Are you saying there’s some reason Sam can’t sell support for it now?
As I see things, anybody can sell support for SDL.
Not at all.
What I say is that there are companies that won’t even think about using
open-source
products, if they don’t see the tradicional model there. They don’t even try
to understand
the concept.
For example, when I have a problem developing for a specific platform, lets
say the PS3,
I get to call Sony. Then depending on the support level I am paying for, I
might even get
a hands-on support case for the problem at hand.
IF I am a very important studio, I might even have the chance of them
having someone
flying to my premisses to support me.
While in many open source projects they only get to talk to some mailing
lists or forums.
Now it depends which producer is supporting you. Some of them don’t care
what technologies
you use as long as you deliver, others like to control pretty much
everything.
Sam as creator of SDL has the right to make it available in any way he feels
like. If he sees
that making comercial licenses is a way to improve SDL’s usage then the
better.–
Paulo
On Sun, Jan 25, 2009 at 8:16 PM, Donny Viszneki <donny.viszneki at gmail.com>wrote:
Oh, yikes, I misread part of this:
On Sun, Jan 25, 2009 at 5:55 AM, Paulo Pinto <@Paulo_Pinto> wrote:
And this comercial license from Sam might help some companies to give a
second look to
SDL and start using it on some titles. Because they will get the
perpection
that they can
pay for something and get support for it.Are you suggesting Sam trick customers into thinking they’re buying
support and then not give it to them?Are you saying there’s some reason Sam can’t sell support for it now?
As I see things, anybody can sell support for SDL.
SDL mailing list
SDL at lists.libsdl.org
http://lists.libsdl.org/listinfo.cgi/sdl-libsdl.org
Don’t get me wrong, I’m very interested in open source games. The thing that
has confused me is that the closed source games seem to have a lower system
requirement than the open source ones do. That goes for the upgrades too. I
don’t like it when I’m playing Wesnoth on one of my older computers just fine,
and then I upgrade to the next release, and it’s choppy.
I’m not sure the first part is true, and I don’t think the second part
is related to the first.
The first is kind of subjective, but there isn’t anything in
particular that would make a particular game be faster (having lower
requirements) because it’s closed source. Quake 3 probably has the
exact same requirements whether you’re playing the most recent closed
source point release binary or the corresponding open source release
(of approximately same vintage). But different games, are, well,
different, so some have higher system requirements, and some are
lower. You can usually tweak the requirements a bit as part of
designing the game, and it might just be that commercial closed source
game developers make different compromises.
The second part I can relate to with Quadra. It’s got fades going from
screen to screen, implemented using palette manipulations. This made
it possible to have perfectly smooth transitions on my old 486DX4/100.
It’s also horribly choppy on my 3.06 GHz Core 2 Duo machine, because
the palette is emulated (nobody wants to run their desktop in 8 bit
PseudoColor, it seems!), and that’s very expensive when doing it
fullscreen.
Then, when I say I can make it fast again, say by using OpenGL to draw
a big black quad and manipulate it’s alpha, then it’d be ultra-fast
even on my old Pentium 225 MMX with a Voodoo card (assuming I could
get the bloody thing to work!), but my girlfriend’s laptop, which is
decently fast (1 GHz), but does not have 3D hardware at all (even the
cheapest Intel junk would be fine, but it’s got a Trident Cyberblade
XP4), wouldn’t be able to play the game at all (instead of just
having to tolerate the choppy fades).
Presumably, if I went the OpenGL way, I could add all sorts of nice
little effects, like particle effects when clearing lines and whatnot,
which would be very cool. But if I do that, it wouldn’t work anymore
for some slightly older (not super old!) machines. Meanwhile, you get
some monster machine, and a game that worked perfectly on a 486 has
choppy bits. So basically, everyone is complaining, and no matter what
I do, someone has reason to complain.
Sometimes I wonder how a company would fare if they did it close to the same way
some of the open source “companies” work. Have the game open source, but the
support for the game is paid. But then it seems most game companies are the
other way around, the game costs, but the support is free.
I think this would be horrible, as it rewards releasing buggy games
that need a lot of support.
But then, we they don’t use that model, and games like Battlefield
2142 are full of bugs anyway. 
I’d really like it if the game binaries would be open source, and we
could buy the content (levels/maps, models, expansion packs, etc)…
I could have asked if there were going to be any companies PORTING commercial
games. That would be good as well. But I think it would be the best if
companies started from scratch some SDL based games. But then it seems
companies create the games, then license the game to porters who make it work on
other machines. So they get money for getting it to other machines. Would they
save or lose money by putting it to SDL from the start?
I’d like it too if they would use SDL from the start, to make it
really easy to port to other platforms, instead of stuff like using
Cider on Mac, for example…
I’d be willing to bet that even when they license the game to a
porter, that they’re not very friendly about doing it nicely (as in
taking patches from the porters back into the main game for general
bugfixes, say). I’d bet it’s more the “here’s a giant code dump” every
one in a while…On Sun, Jan 25, 2009 at 4:47 AM, Micah Brening <micah.brening at gmail.com> wrote: