One Less Reason...

[techieMoe]

Last night I completed all the quests for the final guild in Elder Scrolls 4: Oblivion. I've already beaten the main quest in a previous sitting, so that basically means I've completed everything there is to do in the game. It's quite an accomplishment.

It was a very fun and very immersive game, but I'm happy to have finally completed it. Why am I posting this on a Linux forum? Because Oblivion was one of 2 reasons I still boot into Windows XP on my laptop. Once I backup my saves and uninstall the game I will have one less reason. The remaining game is Diablo 2, which honestly I've beaten the crap out of so many times I may as well retire it.

I foresee less and less reason to boot into XP in the future.

[Gtrax]

Instead of counting the remaining reasons for booting XP, you might have a nostalgic review of some of your own rants, and then set them against the increasing positive reasons for not going there. Maybe Elder Scrolls 4 will run bigger and brighter in a shiny new Vista.. not..

[ryokimball]

Did you play Morrowind (Elder Scrolls III)? I think there are ways to run it in Linux, but I personally prefer Morrowind over it's "younger brother." In fact, the only item I got for Christmas was ths game for the PC so that I could play it again (because I had lost my Xbox version over time and visits to people's houses...), and hopefully get into modding it myself.

P.S. Perhaps I shouldn't mention the Shivering Isles expansion, which adds plenty more hours of gaming to it, not to mention more accomplishments (if you use Live)....

[techieMoe]

Did you play Morrowind (Elder Scrolls III)? I think there are ways to run it in Linux, but I personally prefer Morrowind over it's "younger brother."

Yes, I still have it as a matter of fact. That was the game that pulled me into the Elder Scrolls universe. I liked how you could jump in and play it however you liked, spending as much or little time with the main storyline as you wanted. I think the first week I played it I just ran around the island fishing for pearls and raiding tombs.

I've tried running Morrowind with Cedega in the past, with varying levels of success. I might try again. I'm not sure if I could go back to Morrowind after getting used to some of the improvements in Oblivion though (fast travel for instance).

P.S. Perhaps I shouldn't mention the Shivering Isles expansion, which adds plenty more hours of gaming to it, not to mention more accomplishments (if you use Live)....

I know, I know. There's a couple of expansion packs for Oblivion but I really just would rather call this one done for the time being. I had Morrowind: GOTY which came with the two expansions (Tribunal and Bloodmoon). I thoroughly beat that one a few years back too. Very fun game.

[Cabhan]

Bah...I actually have Morrowind GOTY edition, and it's one of two games that tempts me every now and then to consider re-installing Windows to game (the other being Evil Genius), since I never beat it. My roommate was playing Oblivion on the 360 a little while back, and that also looks fantastic.

[techieMoe]

On a whim, I decided to install the latest version of WINE that was on their repositories and play around with a few things just to see where they are now. The last time I played with vanilla WINE was several years ago.

I installed Morrowind Game of the Year (with both expansions). It ran just fine, as long as I didn't try to change the default control keys. That's changeable from the config file, though. I was impressed that it ran so well otherwise.

I installed Star Wars: Knights of the Old Republic. That one wouldn't go past the opening splash screen, which was kind of annoying because that game took a solid half hour to 45 minutes to install. Oh well.

I installed the demo to Aquaria, an indie game that received some awards last year. Very neat game, and it ran perfectly with no issues whatsoever. I read on the WINEHQ application database that the developers at Bit Blot were even willing to patch the full version so it would work better in WINE. Imagine someone like EA doing that? Not a chance.

I also downloaded a handful of other indie games and all of them worked great. I'm beginning to see a pattern here. I ended up uninstalling Morrowind because honestly I've beaten the crap out of that game, much like Oblivion at this point. I'm also not keen on getting too involved in a game like that again. I got the distinct impression my significant other was getting annoyed with it.

WINE is making progress. That's a good thing. I also did some native Linux gaming this weekend in the form of Marathon: Aleph One. For those of you unfamiliar, Bungie (the company who later made Halo) got their start doing games for the Macintosh. One of those games was a first-person shooter called Marathon. It was different from Doom, in that it had a real story and some real puzzles along with the aliens you had to kill.

It was so popular on the Mac that Bungie ported it to the PC. There were 2 sequels: Marathon 2: Durandal and Marathon Infinity. Bungie decided a few years back (since by then the game was 10 years old) to release the source code for the client. Of course, the OSS community picked it up and ran with it, making graphical enhancements and such.

Soon after Bungie also decided to release the game content itself (under a closed license) so that you could play the original 3 games on whatever OS you chose. There have also been a number of fan-created total conversions and mods that offer more campaigns and new graphics.

I followed this tutorial and compiled the source that was available from Bungie and I was off and running. It's been so long since I played the games that I'm just starting from the beginning to go through the whole trilogy. Lots of fun if you're an FPS fan.

[questio verum]

Bah...I actually have Morrowind GOTY edition, and it's one of two games that tempts me every now and then to consider re-installing Windows to game (the other being Evil Genius), since I never beat it. My roommate was playing Oblivion on the 360 a little while back, and that also looks fantastic.

Morrowind... my last guilty pleasure with windoze.

If it ever reaches platinum status under wine, well... hmmm. Now if they would release a port for PS3...

[Rayek]

Hmmm. The gaming draw... Honestly, that's the reason why 90% of the people I know who use Linux don't fully switch over. Personally, I'm a huge fan of retro gaming, and most of that can be done on a Linux box anyway... My biggest setback right now is figuring out if I can run TIE-Fighter and X-Wing in Linux... After that I'll have no problem making the full switch.

[questio verum]

Hmmm. The gaming draw... Honestly, that's the reason why 90% of the people I know who use Linux don't fully switch over.
<snippage>

With the PS3 & Xbox360 libraries coming around with some solid titles, it obviated the need for that 'duh-huh' OS pretender for me. I finally just got fed up with the crap associated with running windoze enough to cut it loose. Since my employment no longer brings the 'compatibility yoke' to bear, gaming and the occasional document handling were the only reasons to keep it around. With wine I was able to keep Word and other pieces of ms office around. I'm not a real big gamer, so PS3 is more than enough to keep me happy on that front. I wish there were a PS3 port of Morrowind, but... oh well. It's not that important. I know some aren't so lucky.


qv