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General discussionlinuxvangog - Fantastic Linux & Mac Guy and Where To Find Him(25 posts)(25 posts)
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This is my favourite topic
Posted December 07, 2017
high rated
Hello everyone!

For those who don't know me yet: I am Linux Tech Specialist, member of Product UNIX Team, responsible for technical part of Mac & Linux releases here at GOG. I've worked here since we announced Linux back in 2014 :) Some of the daily duties my team fulfills are:

- packaging (creating installers for on-going game releases/updates)
- quality assurance (game tests and reporting bugs back to the developer)
- games fixing (but mostly in case of classic releases)
- development and maintenance of in-house solutions (e.g. installer and build scripts)

Recently I started being a bit more active in various places on the internet. I want to be closer to our Mac and Linux communities and any feedback regarding our work is welcome! You will be able to find me here:

- @linuxvangog on Twitter
- /u/linuxvangog on Reddit
- linuxvangog on GamingOnLinux

If you have any ideas for the content you would like to see from me, e.g. more insight into our work or technical tips, let me know!

See you around, Linux and Mac gamers! :)

Edit (17 Jan 2018):
I've created some gogmixes you might want to take a look at!

Mac & Linux recommendations for low end machines:
https://www.gog.com/mix/linuxvangogs_list_for_low_end_linux_mac_computers

Mac & Linux recommendations with local multiplayer:
https://www.gog.com/mix/linuxvangogs_list_of_local_multi_linux_mac_games
Post edited January 17, 2018 by linuxvangog
Posted December 07, 2017
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Matruchus: Its nice to see that gog is finally starting to notice the underdog communities aka Linux/Mac.
Of course! I am a Linux user myself.
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Matruchus: I think we are all mostly interested in when gog is going to start working on Linux version of the Galaxy Client again. You stated on gamingonlinux sometime ago that development was stopped (or as you said its not actively developed) since its not a priority thing.
That is correct and I'm afraid that for now, nothing changed in that matter.
Posted December 08, 2017
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shmerl: Some job positions in GOG (like this one) are listing Galaxy and Linux. Is that just a hypothetical position? Or to put it differently, if the project isn't active now, why is that position open? Or will it get unblocked if you hired people?
There is more Galaxy-related projects than just the client itself, like SDK or services ;) Like I mentioned before, the reason GOG isn't working on Linux client right now is because we have other features in the project roadmap that we want to take care of.
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Matruchus: Thank you for your answer. If I may ask. How is the status of Linux ports for Metro games and what are the problems with getting them to work in a drm-free fashion.
They are not gonna be released on GOG anytime soon. I am not allowed to disclose any details, I'm sorry.
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Ganni1987: I've noticed a nice improvement from GOG towards Linux support lately. Updates are faster and many more games are getting their Linux versions here.

There is much work left but for now I can say I'm a happy GOG Penguineer.

PS: Really enjoying Hand of Fate 2 :-)
Thank you a lot! Your support is flattering!

And Hand of Fate 2 is hell of a game :)
Posted December 11, 2017
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vv221: The only nitpick I have with them is about the naming scheme : 'game_1_2_3_789.sh' is a bit less easy to understand than 'game_1.2.3_789.sh' would be.
(...)
Only alphanumeric characters and underscores are allowed in my book ;)

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vv221: By the way, is there a good way to report issues related with Linux version of games? Is a direct ticket with support the best way?
It depends. If the game still has active developers, you're better off contacting the game developer or publisher directly. In such cases, it's pretty rare to add our own fixes to such titles, so if we learn about the issue, we need to wait for an update from the original developer anyway.

In case of games we maintain directly (most of DOSBox, Wine and ScummVM wrappers), a support ticket is the best way.

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vv221: Less related to your job, but still interesting for me (and probably others): how do you feel about projects like Adamhm’s, Ganni1987’s or mine that provide alternative installation methods for some games? I‘ve always had good feedback from developers/editors (usually on the line of "We won’t endorse it officially but what you’re doing is nice, please keep going on."), but I don’t think I already asked their opinion to a redistributor…
Obviously that's just my personal opinion here :)

I like adamhm's work, because by using Wine they add a relatively easy way to install games that are unlikely to get an official release from the publisher.

As for repackaging games into distro native packages, flatpaks or snaps... Frankly I don't see much benefit coming from these, but if it makes someone's life easier, then sure, why not?
Posted December 11, 2017
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hollunder: So you and Judas are the Product UNIX Team?
There are 4-5 of us, programmers and QA. @JudasIscariot is not a part of our team but we work with him closely :)

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hollunder: You are the person to pester about missing Linux ports or missing features like multiplayer?
Yes, and no. I don't make business decisions - I only provide technical expertise. See my answer to @tokisto in the bottom of this post.

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shmerl: My nitpick is that annoying $HOME/.gnome directory that's created every time GOG installers run. There is a bug here: https://bugs.freedesktop.org/show_bug.cgi?id=90775
But I doubt it will be fixed any time soon. GOG developers should just patch the script and drop this obsolete stuff.
This is an xdg-utils bug (or is it rather a feature?), but it doesn't have a big priority so we might or might not fix it somewhere down the road.

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tokisto: A broad question: Why games with linux versions elsewhere don not get them released here?
You might want to take a look at my Reddit reply on this subject.
Posted December 11, 2017
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jcoa: Will Star Wars KOTOR 2 get the Aspyr update anytime soon, or will GOG have to make their own Mac and Linux updates for both games like they did when GOG Galaxy gave both KOTORs cloud saves?
I am afraid that for now GOG release of both KOTOR games will be available only for Windows. Sorry for the inconvenience.
Posted December 12, 2017
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linuxvangog: There are 4-5 of us, programmers and QA. @JudasIscariot is not a part of our team but we work with him closely :)
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HunchBluntley: You're not sure how many? What, do your overlords keep half the team locked in a windowless [no pun intended] room in the basement, separate from the rest? =P
EDIT: Oh, I get it...someone's about to be fired, huh? Well, the secret's safe with me. [winks]
:D

One of our team members is technically "borrowed" from another team! :)
Posted December 14, 2017
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Alm888: However, sometimes there are unfortunate mistakes. For example, "Pillars of Eternity: Deafire Pack" DLC for Linux is now just a dummy: it has only 2 legal files and one zero-byte "game resources" file and that's it. It seems that package was not tested at all. :(

Please, can you see to this issue?
Hello Alm888,

The most important question here is: does the DLC install correctly for you?

GOG cannot decide upon the way game developers structure of their games. That said, I will look into this issue to make sure that DLC is accessible and can be installed. Thank you for bringing my attention to that issue!
Posted December 28, 2017
high rated
Hi folks!

Thank you everyone for such great insight into your opinions and ideas on our Mac and Linux support. Keep them coming!

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Lin545: Hai! Can I ask you to look up the game-breaking bug in Quest for Infamy? The developer doesn't seem to care at all. The game is on sale and the only thing that he makes is:
a) asks to patch each individual SAVE GAME
b) tells that he'll "look into it" (TM)

Thank you, LVG!
Since the developer was already notified about the problem, there is not much more that we can do. It's their product after all. If you are not satisfied with your purchase, please contact our customer support: https://support.gog.com

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Maou-san: I personally like and use Flatpak.

But what do you think, about Snaps and Flatpaks ?

I think these formats can help solve various problems regarding "outdated" or "missing" libraries, specially for us using (Arch Linux, openSUSE Tumbleweed, etc).

Btw, I'm using Tumbleweed. :)
I'll quote myself here:
"(...) Snap, flatpak and Appimage are all cool ideas, however I believe they are not yet mature enough on Linux desktop to put them to game-related uses.

They also introduce additional user experience risks and for now they just don't offer that much to consider them superior to our currently used solution."

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Themken: Link to a post clearly addressed to GOG's Linux staff: https://www.gog.com/forum/divinity_series/where_is_chinese_for_linux_user
Thanks! I will look into that.
Post edited December 28, 2017 by linuxvangog
Posted January 08, 2018
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shmerl: I just bought Slime Rancher, and it has a nasty bug with fullscreen mode (it basically hangs on startup with flickering screen). There is a known workaround to pass -screen-fullscreen 0 to the binary, which will force Unity to start in Windowed mode. I decided to tweak start.sh to do that, and noticed something strange.
(...)
Another workaround for this game is to edit the prefs file in "$HOME/.config/unity3d/Monomi Park/Slime Rancher", disable fullscreen mode and set the desired resolution manually. Works also for other affected games using Unity engine.

For user-side fixes you can also put the command using game binary and parameters directly, without using gog_com.shlib functions. Thank you for your feedback!

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WinterSnowfall: (...) I am a teletypewriter entity living in an 80-character wide world. (...)
Holy shit, I shouldn't have drunk all this caffeine and stayed so long at work.

(simple tar archives with game files are not coming back, EOF)

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Pangaea666: (...) march over to their offices in a big penguin suite and run around the place pretending to be one for a few hours. At least they should notice the penguin in the room.
And then I should start shouting like this! ;)
Post edited January 08, 2018 by linuxvangog
Posted January 17, 2018
high rated
I've created some gogmixes you might want to take a look at!

Mac & Linux recommendations for low end machines:
https://www.gog.com/mix/linuxvangogs_list_for_low_end_linux_mac_computers

Mac & Linux recommendations with local multiplayer:
https://www.gog.com/mix/linuxvangogs_list_of_local_multi_linux_mac_games
Posted January 18, 2018
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Alm888: What does it mean? Is it not only just a Windows version in disguise, but not even containing a bundled (and guaranteed to work) WINE version, instead relying on system WINE (prone to breaking with updates)? How does it work? Is it just an ordinary Windows game packaged into MojoSetup and called "Linux Version"? Or, perhaps, an error in description took place and in reality ther is no need to install WINE system-wide?
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vv221: My guess is that it is recommended to install your system-provided WINE just to get sure that all its dependencies are installed too.
Hello there!

vv221 is right here. Wine is included with the copy of the game, however it has a lot of 32 bit dependencies, and the only way to satisfy all of them is to install your local Wine package.
Post edited January 18, 2018 by linuxvangog
Posted January 18, 2018
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Ganni1987: I tried Septerra Core a few weeks ago, have to say the packaging is really good for a Wine wrapped game. I didn't have to install any additional dependancies, simply ran start.sh and it ran as well as a native game.

Must say I'm impressed :-)
This one wasn't wrapped by us, it was made by our partner and the game publisher - TopWare.
Posted March 14, 2018
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linuxvangog: …
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Alm888: So, apparently, Linux version removal at launch is OK now… Good job! Not.
There were technical issues with the build sent by the developer & we're currently waiting for fixes. Sorry for the inconvenience!
Posted March 16, 2018
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linuxvangog: There were technical issues with the build sent by the developer & we're currently waiting for fixes. Sorry for the inconvenience!
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Alm888: Thanks for the clarification!

Sadly, this did not make it into the news…
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General discussionlinuxvangog - Fantastic Linux & Mac Guy and Where To Find Him(25 posts)(25 posts)
(25 posts)