Alien Isolation Is Just The Latest NVIDIA-Only Linux Game

cageymaru

cageymaru

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Alien: Isolation heading to Mac and Linux next week.
http://www.pcgamer.com/alien-isolation-heading-to-mac-and-linux-next-week/

Alien Isolation Is Just The Latest NVIDIA-Only Linux Game.
http://www.phoronix.com/scan.php?page=news_item&px=Alien-Isolation-Bench-Friendly

AMD and Intel GPUs have been listed as NOT supported for the Linux version, but fully supported for the Mac build of Alien Isolation. The simple reason is that Intel and AMD Linux drivers suck. For a comparison to the Windows version of the game please reference the [H]ardocp review where an AMD 285 could run it @1440p. These are two vendors to definitely blacklist from your SteamBox build.


The minimum system requirements for both versions are below:

Mac
2.0Ghz CPU with at least 4GB RAM
1GB or better graphics card
Mac OS 10.10.4 or later
AMD 5000 series graphics card or better, NVIDIA 600 series or better and Intel Iris Pro series graphics card or better

Linux
2.6Ghz Dual-Core CPU with at least 4GB RAM
1GB or better graphics card
Ubuntu 14.04 (64bit) or SteamOS
The game requires an NVIDIA 600 series graphics card or better running Driver version 355.11 or better. Intel AMD and GPUs are not supported
A Steam account is required
 
Yeah, AMD has definitely demonstrated no interest in Steam Machines. Maybe they think it's a dead-end venture (and maybe they're right), or maybe they want to keep the market focused on XB1 / PS4. Who knows.
 
Yeah baby, I reckon I'll get this going on my Linux rig.

As sad as it is, when it comes to gaming under Linux it's Nvidia all the way - AMD just doesn't seem at all interested.
 
Much as its fun to give AMD, crap this doesn't mean much in the grand scheme. Vulkan drivers is what AMD cannot fall asleep on once those games start appearing. Nvidia and Intel have already demo'd Vulkan drivers but nothing from AMD. Considering Mantle was their baby there's no excuse.

Back on topic it leaked a while back that Alien Isolation is getting official SteamVR support and will be a launch title for the Vive. Assuming that materializes it'll be a pant shitting experience having a VR HMD strapped with a stalking Xeno breathing on your neck.
 
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Man, I am shocked that AMD and Intel don't bother to devote resources to that surefire money-making venture known as Linux gaming.
 
Fucks given about Linux. Zero.

Also anyone waiting this long to play a game that runs about 120+ fps at 4K on any windows system since its birth is really living behind the times.
 
crusty_juggler said:
Except money.
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As stated.

There's nothing to loose by supporting diversity.
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But, if your not up for it, each to their own. I've also got a very capable Windows based gaming rig, but that's all it's used for as the OS is nothing more than a virus/malware/spyware ridden wasteland. Although I'm not complaining, as rectifying virus/malware/spyware issues on Windows based PC's earns me plenty.;)
 
VonGriffin said:
Doesnt Linus hate Nvidia ?
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Yes he does, but Linus has nothing to do with the development of linux opengl drivers, and his hate has to do with their shady market dealings and love of stamping "Proprietary" on any and every line of code, which actually is one of the reasons why basic opengl is fractured and needs the hard reset that is Vulkan more than DirectX.
 
lol, "linux gaming"

Linux will only ever be an operating system for servers.
 
thedocta45 said:
Or on phones, or thin clients, or embedded devices, or Chrome devices.
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Yeah, but the reason Android and Chrome OS are a success is because they gutted the entire thing, and just reused the kernel.

http://www.gnu.org/philosophy/android-and-users-freedom.en.html

They created their own user land, and locked certain proprietary portions of it down tight. Without the arguments of complaining geeks to slow shit down to a crawl, Android was free to succeed outside the server room.
 
AMD has been hard at work on their kernel driver for Linux. I'd imagine once that picks up steam we'll start seeing much more in the way of optimization. I'd imagine they are resource starved and most of their team is working on AMDGPU so I'd imagine catalyst at this time is an after-thought.

It's a shame to see that Intel isn't even supported as, imo, they've got the best Linux drivers even if the hardware isn't nearly as powerful as AMD/nVidia.
 
defaultluser said:
Yeah, but the reason Android and Chrome OS are a success is because they gutted the entire thing, and just reused the kernel.

http://www.gnu.org/philosophy/android-and-users-freedom.en.html

They created their own user land, and locked certain proprietary portions of it down tight. Without the arguments of complaining geeks to slow shit down to a crawl, Android was free to succeed outside the server room.
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Well that's the whole point.

Its a Linux kernel at the end of the day, just like any Steambox would be.
 
thedocta45 said:
Well that's the whole point.

Its a Linux kernel at the end of the day, just like any Steambox would be.
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Fair enough. I'm just used to people chanting "GNU/Linux or die!"

It's like they're attached at the hip or something :D
 
wizzi01 said:
Linux users think they are superior some how.
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[Looks at Windows PC sitting on desk].

I find it pointless to allow myself to be tied to any particular product, I use whatever works best for me. And for me, at this point in time, my Windows PC is the gaming PC and my Linux PC does everything else (including gaming on native titles, something that has improved in leaps and bounds in the last two years).
 
That's alright. All 3 Linux gamers probably have nvidia cards, anyway.
 
TheGamerZ said:
That's alright. All 3 Linux gamers probably have nvidia cards, anyway.
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My Windows PC runs Nvidia, what's your point?

Bit of a silly comment don't you think? Why so much hate for freedom of choice, does it affect you personally?
 
I have a few old games on my Mint install but anything newer is on my Win10 install. It's tough to make the transition to Linux full time when so many Steam and GoG classic games only run on Windows. If Win10 wasn't successful with gaming, I think linux would probably find it's way into the market eventually on the desktop more than it has in the past. Almost everything that isn't a desktop PC runs some form of linux or a unix variation.
 
jwcalla said:
Yeah, AMD has definitely demonstrated no interest in Steam Machines. Maybe they think it's a dead-end venture (and maybe they're right), or maybe they want to keep the market focused on XB1 / PS4. Who knows.
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More like triage, they have limited resources and choose to focus on where people play games, windows.
 
I hope someone at AMD (not Roy) wants to light this fuse and tell them to not bother unless it is in Vulkan ...
Might be that this game uses exclusive openGL extension which of course would not be supported on Intel or AMD.
bboynitrous said:
I have a few old games on my Mint install but anything newer is on my Win10 install. It's tough to make the transition to Linux full time when so many Steam and GoG classic games only run on Windows. If Win10 wasn't successful with gaming, I think linux would probably find it's way into the market eventually on the desktop more than it has in the past. Almost everything that isn't a desktop PC runs some form of linux or a unix variation.
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https://www.winehq.org/
 
AMD driver support on linux is weird. I really do not understand it, and it seems to be specific about what GPU cores it likes and which it doesn't.

Case in point: yesterday I actually tried installing an AMD GPU into two separate linux systems - first a Radeon HD 4890 into an OpenSUSE 13.2 based build, and then a Radeon R7 260X into a ZorinOS based build.

Updating from the OSS drivers (gallium a shit), the proprietary legacy blob for hte 4890, which in theory should be the most stable of all AMD drivers, didn't even make it into gameplay on the OpenSUSE side - it broke the entire OS so badly that I just uninstalled the whole thing.

On the ZorinOS side, the R7 260X, which is using one of their most recent, untested cores (Bonaire, which is new enough to have the TrueAudio DSP on it), ran totally fine on gallium (gallium a shit) and the proprietary blob, providing windows levels of performance in CSGO.

All in all, it was a very frustrating experience, but at the end of the day Linux got my customer a much cheaper streaming rig - with the beta build of OBS Studio installed and running fine, and LoL and Runescape running flawlessly in WINE. I would have gone with an Nvidia GPU, but I had heard that Nvidia's NVENC was the least likely of all the hardware-accelerated encoders to get support in OBS Studio when all was said and done, so I opted instead to get my customer a build with QuickSync and AMD VCE, so that he could use whichever of those two technologies became supported first.

I do wish AMD would realize that SteamBoxen are by rights in their low-end wheelhouse, and they could dominate a trifecta of gaming consoles if only they'd push good linux support for their APUs.
It can't even be that hard for them, considering that PS4 probably runs on some form of UNIX, and they have to have the drivers flawless for that platform as it is. Any remaining work would be mostly porting that initial effort over to Linux proper.
 
jwcalla said:
Yeah, AMD has definitely demonstrated no interest in Steam Machines. Maybe they think it's a dead-end venture (and maybe they're right), or maybe they want to keep the market focused on XB1 / PS4. Who knows.
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I'm not sure I'd go that far. Vulkan is sort of their baby and that seems to be the big thing for SteamOS. They also have the Nano, which seems like it would lend itself really well to ITX based consoles. You'd likely have a $1000 console, but it would be far superior to anything else in the console market.

The bigger question for SBox IMHO is how fast developers get Vulkan ports released. The big engines probably have support under NDA, so hopefully once Vulkan releases some games could patch in support.

http://mesamatrix.net/

For drivers Intel uses the open source drivers on linux and they're still missing part of OGL4.0, so they won't be able to run the game until that changes. That could very well change inside of a month at the rate they've been releasing updates. AMD seems to be pushing towards only using open drivers, but have a ways to go. If AMD didn't double down on Vulkan support they will likely have some serious issues ahead. No reason they shouldn't have viable OGL support in Catalyst if they weren't banking on Vulkan.
 
TheEschaton said:
I do wish AMD would realize that SteamBoxen are by rights in their low-end wheelhouse, and they could dominate a trifecta of gaming consoles if only they'd push good linux support for their APUs.
It can't even be that hard for them, considering that PS4 probably runs on some form of UNIX, and they have to have the drivers flawless for that platform as it is. Any remaining work would be mostly porting that initial effort over to Linux proper.
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This precisely. AMD talks a lot about DX12 because it's status quo and all the marketing noise from MS right now, but Nvidia has been on top of Vulkan from day one of the prototype spec. Casual observers are quick to write off SteamOS and Vulkan because they only know what's fed to them in headlines, but when SteamOS actually launches to retail and Vulkan NDA is lifted (both reportedly in November) AMD needs a presence on day one because Nvidia certainly will.

All Vulkan development is under NDA right now, and according to LunarG who manages the SDK and developer portal, there are over 200 developers on there. Granted thats not all game or engine developers but anyone working with it including IHV's, mobile devs, etc

Fortunately it seems AMD does have a clue and realize the potential since they do have a Vulkan prototype driver that will be closed source initially. I'd like to see them step up and really own this potentially explosive new market. I'd sure dump my NV cards in a second if AMD is able to get ahead of Nvidia here and demonstrate an advantage with their architecture. You would hope they would be able to leverage the experience and wisdom gained from Mantle here.
 
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TheGamerZ said:
I wasn't hating on anything. The butthurt is real, huh?
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In two years the gaming scene on Linux has literally exploded compared to what was available previously, why would I be butthurt?

Once again, pointless trolling comment.
 
flu!d said:
In two years the gaming scene on Linux has literally exploded compared to what was available previously, why would I be butthurt?

Once again, pointless trolling comment.
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If anyone is trolling it's you. I guess it is hard to see that through all the tears from the butthurt.
 
flu!d said:
Pointless comment from an ill informed Windows user.
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Hardly. I work in IT so I am very familiar with Linux. It is shit for anything besides tasks like server administration. This is certainly not an operating system for leisurely activities like playing video games.

I would never be insane enough to try and bring that operating system into my home and deal with the ugly interface I'd have to spend countless hours working on to bring closer to being as aesthetically pleasing as Windows 10 is out of the box, not to mention having to deal with the endless numbers of incompatible applications and games. And for what reward? Windows has always been a free operating system, easily obtained via the free upgrade offer for Windows 10, programs like DreamSpark, Bing Rewards, piracy, etc. Even if I had ever actually had to pay for a Windows license in my life I'd rather drop a hundred bucks than spend endless hours of my time trying to customize a Linux install to suit all the eccentricities of my personal setup at home. I can't think of a single thing I want to do at home that Windows can't achieve much easier without jumping through the endless hoops that Linux requires to get it configured for that particular activity.

PRIME1 said:
AMD dropped to 18% of the video card market. I guess we should just ignore AMD now because of their low market share.
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Most of us are doing that already xD

AMD is pretty much irrelevant outside of the console market these days. PC developers and PC gamers alike don't care about them.
 
Linux is perfect for stuff that requires a solid base and has a custom UI built on top of it. That's why it's popular for embedded devices. Linux on the desktop is somewhat horrible because it still has a lot of "designed by engineers for engineers" baggage to it. The average user should not have to deal with dependency management or crawl forums for lengthy command lines to perform something that should have a GUI for it. These two issues seem to be still a factor in all Linux distros I've tried.

That said, for Steam Machines you shouldn't have to worry about any of that crap as there is an UI hiding all of it and simple update management. Ideally it would be simply a PC console and I'm all for it. The only reason why I use Windows is because it's the best platform for gaming. I run OSX on my PC and use a Macbook Pro for work and it is a far more pleasant experience than Windows 10 (which still feels like a mash of legacy and new). So if I had a Steam "console" running PC games with mod support and all I would be quite content.

Hopefully Steam machines become a hit and AMD takes an interest when they have to. Right now they are probably spread pretty thin for driver support so it's no wonder they have little interest in catering to what is a marginal demographic.
 
wizzi01 said:
If anyone is trolling it's you. I guess it is hard to see that through all the tears from the butthurt.
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Theres no reason for me to be trolling, I'm actually quite enthusiastic about the thread topic and I find it no surprise whatsoever that AMD and Intel are not supported in the upcoming release.

Quite obviously the trolling is, as usual, coming from the Windows crowd that act like they've been personally insulted by the prospect of Linux gaining gaming suupport. Honestly that's the only butthurt I'm seeing here - Butthurt, what a retarded term?

Not only that, but judging by most of the Windows crowd's comments regarding Linux as a desktop OS its quite obvious that they have either never tried a modern Linux distro for any reasonable period of time, or they haven't tried a modern Linux distro at all...

....Because if my 65 year old mother can run Linux Mint full time and love it than she must be a downright genius judging by some of the blatently incorrect rubbish being thrown around in this thread.

Why are the Windows crowd so negative any time a thread starts that relates to Linux? Even when I used Windows full time, I couldn't give a rats ass if people chose to use an alternate operating system, I certainty had no desire to throw around insults at those that were over Windows and found that something else suited their needs better.
 
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flu!d said:
Why are the Windows crowd so negative any time a thread starts that relates to Linux? Even when I used Windows full time, I couldn't give a rats ass if people chose to use an alternate operating system, I certainty had no desire to throw around insults at those that were over Windows and found that something else suited their needs better.
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I wouldn't generalize, the issue it is just a few people which haven't been raised well enough and it is showing when there trying to communicate ...
 
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