Linux gaming refers to playing video games on a Linuxoperating system. Because many games are not natively supported for the Linux kernel, various software has been made to run Windows games, such as Wine, Cedega, and Proton, and managers such as Lutris and PlayOnLinux. The Linux gaming community has a presence on the internet with users who attempt to run games that are normally not supported on Linux.
Linux gaming started largely as an extension of the already present Unixgaming scene,[1] which dates back to that system's conception in 1969 with the game Space Travel[2][3] and the first edition in 1971,[4] with both systems sharing many similar titles.[5] These games were mostly either arcade and parlour type games or text adventures using libraries like curses.[6][7] A notable example of this are the "BSD Games", a collection of interactive fiction and other text-mode amusements.[8][9] The free software and open source methodologies which spawned the development of the operating system in general also spawned the creation of various early free games.[10][11]
Doom was one of the first major commercial games to be released for Linux.
The beginning of Linux as a gaming platform for commercial video games is widely credited to have begun in 1994 when Dave D. Taylor ported the game Doom to Linux, as well as many other systems, during his spare time.[16][17] From there he would also help found the development studio Crack dot Com, which released the video game Abuse, with the game's Linux port even being distributed by Linux vendor Red Hat.[18][19] The studio's never finished Golgotha was also slated to be released by Red Hat in box.[20]Ancient Domains of Mystery was also released for Linux in 1994 by Thomas Biskup, building on the roguelike legacy of games such as Moria and its descendent Angband, but more specifically Hack and NetHack.
id Software, the original developers of Doom, also continued to release their products for Linux. Their game Quake was ported to Linux via X11 in 1996, once again by Dave D. Taylor working in his free time.[21][22] An SVGALib version was also later produced by Greg Alexander in 1997 using recently leaked source code, but was later mainlined by id.[23] Later id products continued to be ported by Zoid Kirsch[24] and Timothee Besset,[25] a practice that continued until the studio's acquisition by ZeniMax Media in 2009.[26] The ports of Quake and Quake II were released physically by Macmillan Computer Publishing USA,[27] while Quake III was released for Linux by Loki Software.[28]
In 1991 DUX Software contracted Don Hopkins to port SimCity to Unix,[29] which he later ported to Linux and eventually released as open source for the OLPC XO Laptop.[30] Other early commercial Linux games included Hopkins FBI, an adventure game released in 1998 by MP Entertainment,[31] and Inner Worlds in 1996, which was released for and developed on Linux.[32] In 1998, two programmers from Origin ported Ultima Online to Linux.[33]The UNIX Book of Games, a 1996 publication by Janice Winsor, described various games with an accompanying CD-ROM containing executables and source code for Linux and SCO Unix.[34]
A website called The Linux Game Tome, also known as HappyPenguin after its URL, was begun by Tessa Lau in 1995 to catalogue games created for or ported to Linux from the SunSITE game directories as well as other classic X11 games for a collection of just over 100 titles. It was taken over by Bob Zimbinski in 1998 eventually growing to over 2000 entries, sponsored by retailer Penguin Computing and later LGP until it went down in 2013, although mirrors still exist.[35][36]
1998–2002
The Simple DirectMedia Layer provided platform independent abstraction
The site LinuxGames covered news and commentary from November 1998 until its host Atomicgamer went down in 2015.[37][38]
On November 9, 1998, a new software firm called Loki Software was founded by Scott Draeker, a former lawyer who became interested in porting games to Linux after being introduced to the system through his work as a software licensing attorney.[39] Loki, although a commercial failure, is credited with the birth of the modern Linux game industry. Loki developed several free software tools, such as the Loki installer (also known as Loki Setup),[40] and supported the development of the Simple DirectMedia Layer, as well as starting the OpenAL audio library project.[41][42] These are still often credited as being the cornerstones of Linux game development.[43] They were also responsible for bringing nineteen high-profile games to the platform before its closure in 2002.
The period also saw a number of commercial compilations released, such as 100 Great Linux Games by Global Star Software,[48]Linux Games by Walnut Creek CDROM,[49][50]Best Linux Games by SOT Finnish Software Engineering,[51][52][53]Linux Games & Entertainment for X Windows by Hemming,[54]Linux Spiele & Games by more software,[55]Linux Spiele by Franzis Verlag,[56] and play it! Linux: Die Spielesammlung by S.A.D. Software.[57]
After Loki's closure, the Linux game market experienced some changes.[65] Although some new firms, such as Linux Game Publishing and RuneSoft, would largely continue the role of a standard porting house, the focus began to change with Linux game proponents encouraging game developers to port their game products themselves or through individual contractors.[66] Influential to this was Ryan C. Gordon, a former Loki employee who would over the next decade port several game titles to multiple platforms, including Linux.[67]
Around this time many companies, starting with id Software, also began to release legacy source code leading to a proliferation of source ports of older games to Linux and other systems.[68] This also helped expand the already existing free and open-source gaming scene, especially with regards to the creation of free first person shooters.[69] In addition, numerous game engine recreations have been produced to varying levels of accuracy using reverse engineering or underlying engine code supporting the original game files including on Linux and other niche systems.[70][71]
The company TransGaming marketed as a monthly subscription its own proprietary fork of Wine called WineX in October 2001, later renamed Cedega in 2004 and discontinued in 2011, which aimed for greater compatibility with Microsoft Windows games. CodeWeavers also offered an enhanced version of Wine called CrossOver Games.[72][73] The reliance on such compatibility layers remains controversial with concerns that it hinders growth in native development,[74][75] although this approach was defended based on Loki's demise.[76][77]PlayOnLinux, established in 2007, provides a community implementation.[78]
The Linux gaming market also started to experience some growth towards the end of the decade with the rise of independent video game development,[81] with many "indie" developers favouring support for multiple platforms.[82] The Humble Indie Bundle initiatives inaugurated in 2010 helped to formally demonstrate this trend,[83] with Linux users representing a sizable population of their purchase base, as well as consistently being the most financially generous in terms of actual money spent.[84][85] The Humble Indie Bundle V in 2012 faced controversy for featuring a Wine-based release of Limbo prepared by CodeWeavers,[86] while a native version was later released in 2014.[87] Humble eventually began offering Windows-only games in their bundles and on their store.[88][89]
In 2009, the small indie game company Entourev LLC published Voltley to Linux which is the first commercial exclusive game for this operating system.[90][91] In the same year, LGP released Shadowgrounds which was the first commercial game for Linux using the Nvidia PhysX middleware.[92] The GamingOnLinux website was launched on July 4, 2009 and eventually succeeded LinuxGames as the main source of news and commentary.[93]
The release of a Linux version of Desura in 2011, a digital distribution platform with a primary focus on small independent developers, was heralded by several commentators as an important step to greater acknowledgement of Linux as a gaming platform.[81][94][95] Shortly before this, Canonical launched the Ubuntu Software Center which also sold digital games.[96] The digital store Gameolith also launched in 2011 focused principally on Linux before expanding in 2012 and closing in 2014.[97][98]
2012–2016
Lutris, an open source launcher for various distribution platforms
In July 2012, game developer and content distributor Valve announced a port of their Source engine for Linux as well as stating their intention to release their Steam digital distribution service for Linux.[99][100][101] The potential availability of a Linux Steam client had already attracted other developers to consider porting their titles to Linux,[95][102][103][104] including previously Mac OS only porting houses such as Aspyr Media and Feral Interactive.[105]
In November 2012, Unity Technologies ported their Unity engine and game creation system to Linux starting with version 4. All of the games created with the Unity engine can now be ported to Linux easily.[106]
In September 2013 Valve announced that they were releasing a gaming oriented Linux based operating system called SteamOS with Valve saying they had "come to the conclusion that the environment best suited to delivering value to customers is an operating system built around Steam itself."[95][107] This was used for their Steam Machine platform released on November 10, 2015 and discontinued in 2018.[108]
In March 2014 GOG.com announced they would begin to support Linux titles on their DRM free store starting the same year, after previously stating they would not be able due to too many distributions.[109] GOG.com began their initial roll out on July 24, 2014, by offering 50 Linux supporting titles, including several new to the platform.[110]
Despite previous statements, GOG have confirmed they have no plans to port their Galaxy client to Linux.[111] The free software Lutris started in 2010,[112] GameHub from 2019,[113] MiniGalaxy from 2020,[114] and the Heroic Games Launcher from 2021,[115] offer support for GOG as well as the Epic Games Store, Ubisoft Connect and Origin.
Towards the end 2014 the game host itch.io announced that Linux would be supported with their developing open source game client.[118] This was fully launched simultaneously on Windows, Mac OS X and Linux on December 15, 2015.[119] The service had supported Linux since it was first unveiled on March 3, 2013, with creator Leaf Corcoran personally a Linux user.[120] The similar Game Jolt service also supports Linux and has an open source client released on January 13, 2016.[121][122]GamersGate also sells games for Linux.[123][124]
2017-present
Steam Deck, a handheld game console running Linux-based operating system
On August 22, 2018, Valve released their fork of Wine called Proton, aimed at gaming.[125] It features some improvements over the vanilla Wine such as Vulkan-based DirectX 11 implementation, Steam integration, better full screen and game controller support and improved performance for multi-threaded games.[126] It has since grown to include support for DirectX 9[127] and DirectX 12[128] over Vulkan. The itch.io app added its own Wine integration in June 2020,[129] while Lutris and PlayOnLinux are long-standing independent solutions for compatibility wrappers.[130][131]
As with Wine and Cedega in the past, concerns have been raised over whether Proton hinders native development more than it encourages use of the platform,[132][133] with Prodeus dropping native support in favour of Proton shortly before final release.[134] Valve has expressed no preference over Proton or native ports among developers.[135]
The Steam Hardware Survey reports that as of July 2021, 1% of users are using some form of Linux as their platform's primary operating system.[140] The Unitygame engine used to[141] make their statistics available and in March 2016 reported that Linux users accounted for 0.4% of players.[142] In 2010, in the first Humble Bundle sales, Linux accounted for 18% of purchases.[143]
Linux as a gaming platform can also refer to operating systems based on the Linux kernel and specifically designed for the sole purpose of gaming. Examples are SteamOS, which is an operating system for Steam Machines, Steam Deck and general computers, video game consoles built from components found in the classical home computer, (embedded) operating systems like Tizen and Pandora, and handheld game consoles like GP2X, and Neo Geo X. The Nvidia Shield runs Android as an operating system, which is based on a modified Linux kernel.[citation needed]
In 2013, tests by Phoronix showed real-world performance of games on Linux with proprietary Nvidia and AMD drivers were mostly comparable to results on Windows 8.1.[144]Phoronix found similar results in 2015,[145] though Ars Technica described a 20% performance drop with Linux drivers.[146]
Software architecture
An operating system based on the Linux kernel and customized specifically for gaming, could adopt the vanilla Linux kernel with only little changes, or—like the Android operating system—be based on a relative extensively modified Linux kernel. It could adopt GNU C Library or Bionic or something like it. The entire middleware or parts of it, could very well be closed-source and proprietary software; the same is true for the video games. There are free and open-source video games available for the Linux operating system, as well as proprietary ones.[citation needed]
Linux kernel
The subsystems already mainlined and available in the Linux kernel are most probably performant enough so to not impede the gaming experience in any way,[citation needed] however additional software is available, such as e.g. the Brain Fuck Scheduler (a process scheduler) or the Budget Fair Queueing (BFQ) scheduler (an I/O scheduler).[147]
Similar to the way the Linux kernel can be, for example, adapted to run better on supercomputers, there are adaptations targeted at improving the performance of games. A project concerning itself with this issue is called Liquorix.[148][149]
Several game development tools have been available for Linux, including GNU Debugger, LLDB, Valgrind, glslang and others. VOGL, a debugger for OpenGL was released on 12 March 2014. An open-source, cross-platform clone of Enterbrain's RPG Maker (2000, 2003, XP, VX), called OpenRPG Maker, is currently in development.[150]
Available interfaces and SDKs
There are multiple interfaces and Software Development Kits available for Linux, and almost all of them are cross-platform. Most are free and open-source software subject to the terms of the zlib License, making it possible to static link against them from fully closed-source proprietary software. One difficulty due to this abundance of interfaces, is the difficulty for programmers to choose the best suitable audio API for their purpose. The main developer of the PulseAudio project, Lennart Poettering, commented on this issue.[151]
Physics engines, audio libraries, that are available as modules for game engines, have been available for Linux for a long time.[time needed][citation needed]
As the result of their cooperation with Valve, Nvidia announced a Linux port of GameWorks.[152] As of June 2014, PhysX, and OptiX have been available for Linux for some time.
Beside majority of the software which acts as an interface to various subsystems of the operating system, there is also software which can be simply described as middleware. A multitude of companies exist worldwide, whose main or only product is software that is meant to be licensed and integrated into a game engine. Their primary target is the video game industry, but the film industry also utilizes such software for special effects. Some very few well known examples are
The specifications of the Mumble protocol are freely available and there are BSD-licensed implementations for both servers and clients. The positional audio API of Mumble is supported by e.g. Cube 2: Sauerbraten.
Wine is a compatibility layer that provides binary compatibility and makes it possible to run software, that was written and compiled for Microsoft Windows, on Linux. The Wine project hosts a user-submitted application database (known as Wine AppDB) that lists programs and games along with ratings and reviews which detail how well they run with Wine. Wine AppDB also has a commenting system, which often includes instructions on how to modify a system to run a certain game which cannot run on a normal or default configuration. Many games are rated as running flawlessly, and there are also many other games that can be run with varying degrees of success. The use of Wine for gaming has proved controversial in the Linux community as some feel it is preventing, or at least hindering, the further growth of native gaming on the platform.[155][156]
The game engine is important for players and developers alike. The development-kit is built around it, game editors use it to build levels. Tools such as Blender or 3ds Max are employed to create the geometry of object and/or animations of those. Game data has reached enormous amounts. While game engines are sometimes released under some free software license, instead or additionally to licensing them, the game data is usually not.
The game engine is the software solely responsible for the game mechanics, or rules defining game play. There are different game engines for first-person shooters, strategy video games, etc. Besides the game mechanics, software is also needed to handle graphics, audio, physics, input handling, and networking.
Game engines that are used by many video games and run on top of Linux include:
There are many free and open-source video games as well as commercially distributed proprietary video games that run natively on Linux. Some independent companies have also begun porting prominent video games from Microsoft Windows to Linux.
Warzone 2100 is a real-time strategy and real-time tactics hybrid computer game. Originally published by Eidos Interactive and later released as open source.
Bill Kendrick has developed many free software games, most inspired by games for the Atari 8-bit and other classic systems.
Proprietary games
Available on Steam
Steam is the leading distributor of games for Linux
Valve officially released Steam for Linux on February 14, 2013. As of June 2020[update] the number of Linux-compatible games on Steam exceeds 6,500.[166] With the launch of SteamOS, a distribution of Linux made by Valve intended to be used for HTPC gaming, that number is quickly growing. Listed below are some notable games available on Steam for Linux:
Half-Life 2, a launch title for Steam, was ported to Linux for the service's expansion in 2013
Hemisphere Games has released a Linux version of Osmos. Koonsolo has released a Linux version of Mystic Mine. Amanita Design released Linux versions of Machinarium and Samorost 2. Irrgheist released a Linux version of their futuristic racing game H-Craft Championship before later releasing the source code. Gamerizon released a Linux version of QuantZ. InterAction Studios ported several titles mostly in the Chicken Invaders series. GridWars was released for Linux by Canadian developer Marco Inciti.
UNIGINE Company developed Oil Rush using its Unigine engine technology that works on Linux. Unigine Corp was also developing a "shooter-type game" that would have been released for Linux, but development was later frozen while OilRush developed.[168] The MMORPG game Syndicates of Arkon was also supposed to come to Linux.[169] The game Dilogus: The Winds of War was also being developed with Unigine and was planned to have a Linux client.[170]Cradle was released for Linux in 2015, as was Sumoman in 2017.
Visual novels based on Ren'Py have forged a niche on Linux
The Java-based sandbox game Minecraft by then indie developer Mojang is available on Linux, as are any other video games compiled for the Java virtual machine. Linux support was maintained even following Mojang's purchase by Microsoft in November 2014.
Dwarf Fortress, a sandbox management simulator / roguelike, has been made available for Linux by Tarn Adams.[citation needed]
The voxel-based space sandbox game, ScrumbleShip by indie developer Dirkson was under development for Linux, Mac OS X, and Windows.[citation needed]
The realistic replay baseball simulation Out of the Park Baseball by OOTP Developments was made available for Linux, Mac OS X, and Windows, for single player and multiplayer online leagues.[citation needed]
MP Entertainment released Hopkins FBI and Crack dot com released Abuse for Linux, becoming one of the first developers to release a native port. Inner Worlds, another early commercial Linux title, was released for and developed on Linux. Philos Laboratories released a Linux version of Theocracy on the retail disk. Absolutist has supported Linux for a number of years.[181] GLAMUS GmbH released a Linux version of their game Mobility. Vicarious Visions ported the space-flight game Terminus to Linux.
Revolution System Games released their game Decadence: Home Sweet Home through Steam only for Linux for a period of time after Mac or windows release.[183]
On 12 October 2013 Lars Gustavsson, creative director at DICE, said to polygon.com[184]
We strongly want to get into Linux for a reason," Gustavsson said. "It took Halo for the first Xbox to kick off and go crazy — usually, it takes one killer app or game and then people are more than willing [to adopt it] — it is not hard to get your hands on Linux, for example, it only takes one game that motivates you to go there.
Linux Game Publishing published Candy Cruncher, Majesty Gold, NingPo MahJong and Soul Ride to Linux PowerPC. They also ported Candy Cruncher, Soul Ride to Linux SPARC and Soul Ride to Linux Alpha.[186][187]
Tibia – A 2D Medieval fantasy MMORPG game. Free-to-play with premium content. One of the oldest MMORPG, created January 1997. With Official Linux client.
Native gaming is a form of Linux gaming that emphasizes using only native games or ports and not using emulators or compatibility layers.[201][202][203]
A number of games can be played from live distributions such as Knoppix, allowing easy access for users unwilling to fully commit to Linux.[216] Certain live distros have specially targeted gamers, such as SuperGamer and Linux-Gamers.[217][218]
Cloud gaming is the streaming of games from a central server onto a desktop client.[225] This is another way to play games on Linux that are not natively supported,[226][227] although some cloud services, such as the erstwhile Google Stadia,[228][229] are hosted on Linux[230][231] and Android servers.[232] GamingAnywhere is an open source implementation.[233]
On Windows
Although less exploited than the reverse,[234] as few programs are Linux exclusive,[235] support does exist for running Linux binaries from Windows.[236][237] The Windows Subsystem for Linux allows the running of both command line[238][239] and graphical Linux applications[240][241] from Windows 10 and Windows 11.[242] An earlier implementation is Cygwin,[243] started by Cygnus Solutions and later maintained by Red Hat,[244] although it has limited hardware access[245] and required adaptation.[246] The use of Wine can even allow for the running of Windows games on Linux from Windows.[citation needed] The LibTAS library for tool assisted speedruns currently recommends WSL to run on Windows.[247]Naughty Dog meanwhile have used Cygwin to run old command-line tools for use in their game development,[248] which is a broader use for the platform.[249] As with running Windows applications on Linux, there is controversy over whether running Linux applications on Windows will dilute interest in Linux as distinct platform,[250] though it has speciality uses.[251]
^Jowitt, Tom (May 26, 2017). "Tales In Tech History: Unix". Silicon UK. Retrieved March 5, 2023. The developers wanted to play the game on a PDP-7, a minicomputer built by Digital Equipment Corp found in the corner of their building. But the game couldn't be run run on more modern (and hence costly) equipment, as computing resource was a precious commodity back then. By the summer of 1969 they had developed the new Unix OS that could run the computer game and in 1971 the first ever edition of Unix was released. A second edition of Unix arrived in December 1972 and was rewritten in the higher-level language C.
^Toomey, Warren (December 2011). "The Strange Birth and Long Life of Unix"(PDF). IEEE Spectrum. Apart from the text-processing and general system applications, the first edition of Unix included games such as blackjack, chess, and tic-tac-toe.
^Stallman, Richard. "Linux and the GNU System". GNU Project. Archived from the original on March 19, 2017. Retrieved July 20, 2022. Some of our system components, the programming tools, became popular on their own among programmers, but we wrote many components that are not tools. We even developed a chess game, GNU Chess, because a complete system needs games too.
^"Walnut Creek CDROM Catalog". Walnut Creek CDROM. December 17, 2000. Retrieved April 7, 2023. Linux Games (Linux) - Large collection of games, graphics, sound, and video applications, plus related development tools.
^ ab"The State of Linux Gaming 2011". OSNews.com. November 14, 2011. Retrieved January 12, 2012. In short: indie games are thriving on Linux. The Humble Bundles have not only helped publicize the games, but have also helped prove that there is an untapped market for games on Linux, and that Linux users have no problem paying to support the developers who support them.
^Orland, Kyle (February 28, 2011). "GDC 2011: Humble Indie Bundle Creators Talk Inspiration, Execution". Game Developer. Retrieved April 5, 2023. Linux users tended to be the most generous of these, leading Graham to suggest indie developers go after underserved markets. "If you support Mac and Linux as an independent developer you have a good chance of doubling your revenue," Graham said.
^Makuch, Eddie (September 23, 2013). "Valve reveals SteamOS". GameSpot. Archived from the original on September 26, 2013. Retrieved September 25, 2013.
^Wilson, Hamish (February 28, 2022). "Building a Retro Linux Gaming Computer - Part 13: Looks Almost Unreal". GamingOnLinux. Retrieved March 21, 2023. One of the selling points of Unreal Tournament pitched to the modding scene by Epic Games was its ability to load assets from the original Unreal into the new engine, further expanding the content base for what was already a highly modifiable game. After a few years this snowballed into a concerted community effort to make the entire Unreal singe player mode playable from within its own sequel, bringing it over to Linux in the process.
^Bisson, Marilyn (October 19, 2020). "Is Linux Good For Gaming?". Eldernode. You can also play through the terminal; Of course, it depends on your expectations and definition of the game! But if the goal is entertainment, the Linux terminal offers you funny and nostalgic choices.
^Zinoune, M. "Options for Linux Gamers". Unixmen. Retrieved March 19, 2023. The ever increasing popularity of social gaming is a definite threat to traditional forms of gaming. Social gaming comes in many forms, but an obvious example would be games that can be played on Facebook and other social networking websites where games and statistics can be viewed and shared online with a player's friends. This form of gaming is very limited as the games that can be played via social networks are usually targeted towards casual gamers and not the hardcore PC type. I don't see social gaming becoming an immediate threat to native gaming in the near future and will probably remain a casual space.
^"Hands on with WSLg: Running Linux GUI". Bleeping Computer. May 29, 2021. Retrieved March 18, 2023. While Hedgewars is not a Linux-only game, I wanted to include it to show that even games can run under WSLg. While WSLg is likely not designed for gaming, the fact that you can play games using it shows the full depth of this new feature.
^Fenton, Tom (February 8, 2017). "Running Graphical Programs on Windows Subsystem on Linux". Virtualization Review. Retrieved March 18, 2023. Blockout worked flawlessly, which surprised me as it is an extremely graphics-intensive application.
^McIntyre-Bhatty, Hamish (May 21, 2018). "Cygwin review part 1: Running Linux programs… on Windows?". Retrieved March 18, 2023. Can you run games? I have absolutely no idea, but I would guess the answer is no, because of the lack of hardware access. I did have a quick look for games like Neverball and Extreme Tux Racer, but they were nowhere to be found. When I follow this up, I'll look a bit harder, and maybe try compiling them. Really, it's kind of pointless, because you could just run the games in Windows.
^"LibTAS FAQ". Retrieved March 18, 2023. If you have Windows 10, the easiest way is to use WSL 2 (Windows Subsystem for Linux) to run libTAS. Otherwise, you can install a Linux distribution (e.g. Ubuntu) on a virtual machine (e.g. using VirtualBox).
^Bisson, Simon (April 23, 2021). "Linux on Windows: This new upgrade allows you to run graphical apps simply and effectively". Tech Republic. Retrieved March 18, 2023. Mesa3D support should help developers using WSL 2 to port games to Linux, as well as allowing complex Unix CAD applications and other design tooling to use WSLg to work on Windows, without needing a full port. If you're worried about application support, we've yet to find anything that didn't work over WSLg. We've been able to run Ubuntu desktop tools, classic Unix games like Nethack's X11 port, Linux games from Steam, a host of different editors and IDEs, the LibreOffice productivity suite, as well as Microsoft's own Edge browser (using it to stream video and audio). The experience of using Linux applications on Windows is much like running Windows applications on macOS via Parallels.
^Chalmers, Rachel (June 1999). "Sun Releases Tool To Make Linux Apps Run On Solaris". AUUGEN. Australia: AUUG. p. 29. Retrieved March 5, 2023. But the real strength of Linux over Solaris is the availability of games. Kay reveals, "If you've got a developer who's been doing heads-down coding for hours, they might want to take a break to use the latest greatest games," she chuckles. "If games are available on Linux now you can get them and use them on your new Solaris workstation. Managers like making sure that kind of thing is available to their creative end users."
^Dyer, Bill (December 28, 2022). "Getting Nostalgic With the Historical Coherent Operating System". It's FOSS. For a small package, it was remarkably complete. Not only was it a standalone operating system, but came with a big box of goodies, such as a Bourne Shell, C compiler, assembler, debugger, DOS disk support, uucp, at least three editors, some games, mail, and around 200 of the most used and useful UNIX commands.
^gameblabla (November 8, 2016). "ToaruOS - Unix-like "hobby" operating system". codewalr.us. Retrieved April 25, 2023. I ported Helicopters, one of my games, just to show you how easy you can port games to it.
^Saeki, Takaya (October 4, 2020). "How we ran a Unix-like OS (Xv6) on our home-built CPU with our home-built C compiler". Fuelled by Coffee. Retrieved April 25, 2023. However, some teams put more energy into doing fun such as running games or playing music by connecting a speaker with their CPU. Group 6, to which I belonged, was a group of such people who loved entertainment, and we decided to run an OS as our team goal.
^Pendleton, Bob. "Game Programming with the Simple DirectMedia Layer". ACM Digital Library. SDL officially supports Linux, Windows, BeOS, Mac OS, Mac OS X, FreeBSD, OpenBSD, BSD/OS, Solaris and IRIX. SDL also works with Windows CE, AmigaOS, Atari, QNX, NetBSD, AIX, Tru64 UNIX and SymbianOS. However, those OSes are not yet officially supported. This means if you write your application using SDL, you can port it with minimal rework to all those OSes. SDL provides a portable way to write games and multimedia applications on every major OS currently in use.
^Williams, Al (May 3, 2017). "Your Next Desktop… QNX?". Hackaday. Retrieved March 5, 2023. The rest of the adventure went fairly well. He managed to build SDL and port over some games.
^"FORTRAN Computer Games". The Cyber Vanguard. November 18, 2022. Remake of Battle Zone (1986) by Justin S. Revenaugh for Apollo Domain/OS, using the GPR graphics library. The game was later ported as XBZONE to X11.
^"Games/Arcade". HP-UX Porting and Archive Centre. Retrieved March 4, 2023.
^Knight, John (May 2021). "Exploring Microsoft's forgotten Unix distribution". Linux Magazine. Retrieved March 18, 2023. Thankfully XENIX users weren't all business, and there are at least a few games available for the system. Although the IMG file from Archive.org wouldn't work, we found a working disk image from YouTube user MentionedBefore, who provides a link below his XENIX 2.3.1 VirtualBox tutorial. The disk comes with Worms (not the famous DOS game!), Rogue, Hack, and Trek, plus fortune and mathrec. (And there is a terminal-based version of Tetris somewhere out there!) Once installed, the executables for the games/amusements are found under /usr/games
^Armstrong, James; Kent, Les (November 22, 1993). "32-bit desktop operating systems". InfoWorld. United States: IDG Communications, Inc. p. 75. Retrieved March 5, 2023. Once a user is logged in, a window displays a number of icons that group some standard applications: Accessories, Applications, Preferences, Disks, Games, Shutdown, System Setup, Utilities, and Folder Maps. User can open any file or folder ny double clicking on the appropriate icon.
^Magee, Mike (September 6, 1999). "1.6GHz Alpha to be fastest Quake chip on planet". The Register. Retrieved March 5, 2023. The beast is not designed for Windows - its OS preference a version of real time Tru64 using current OpenGL for the platform. Real time versions of Tru64 might be used in a high end arcade game console, with workstations using a more "normal" Tru64 Unix with OpenGL. Quake and Quake 2 are native on Alpha Linux platforms.
^Kelosky, Dan (January 3, 2020). "How to Execute Rexx Using Zowe CLI". Medium. Retrieved March 17, 2023. You can even use it make text-based games on z/OS! A talented colleague of mine, coyote time, created a Rexx Yahtzee game to help him learn the language
^"Fiddling with NeXTSTEP". posts.boy. December 29, 2011. Retrieved March 18, 2023. This screenshot shows Facebook, looking rather broken, and DOOM in the front. id Software used NeXT systems to create the famous first person shooter. Relying on the Objective-C based development environment to create most of the tools, like the level editor.
^Hills, James (June 19, 1999). "Interviews - Dave Taylor, Transmeta". GA-Source. Retrieved March 21, 2023. Anyway, so it felt almost natural to do weird things. Here was a company where hundreds of thousands of dollars changed hands depending on moods and stories, Nextstep was the development environment, and showing up to work and seeing something truly miraculous in John Carmack's office or the art room about once a week was the norm. So when I started calling various workstation vendors like IBM, Sun, SGI, and asking they send workstations in exchange for typing "make", no one was terribly surprised. It was just one more of the weekly miracles, and a lesser one at that. "Oh look. There's our game running in a window on 5 architectures and as many OS's. Huh."
