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Wine Software Entertainment Games

TransGaming Releases Cedega 4.1 56

Posted by Zonk from the cool-now-you-can-get-a-leet-under-linux dept.
gavriels writes "Today, TransGaming released Cedega 4.1, a new update to our software that lets Windows games run on Linux systems. The new update adds support for Far Cry and Anarchy Online, and implements a completely new 3D pipeline which executes the traditional Direct3D Fixed Function rendering path using dynamically generated OpenGL vertex programs, providing great performance improvements on cards with sufficient vertex program capabilities. We also added MMX accelerated sound mixing, fixed copy protection issues in several games, and improved Pixel Shader support, among other things."
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TransGaming Releases Cedega 4.1 More

TransGaming Releases Cedega 4.1

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  • This gives me yet another reason to make sure my next machine is a Linux Box.

    Power to the geeks

  • Interesting to see how Far Cry runs (Score:5, Interesting)

    by Red Moose ( 31712 ) on Tuesday October 19, 2004 @05:55PM (#10569846)
    Interesting to see how Far Cry runs seeing as it is a resource hog on XP (I run it with a GB of RAM to get it smooth - it's not a gfx issue even on my 9700 Pro). The Doom 3 comparison isn't really a realistic comparison as legit executables are made with both linux and win32 in mind.

    So Far Cry is a good game to test - it chews RAM but is prob comparable on video cards. If only I could remember how to run lilo with initrd thing I could reboot into linux and check.....ah happy days....

  • Xinerama (Score:5, Informative)

    by Apreche ( 239272 ) on Tuesday October 19, 2004 @05:58PM (#10569878) Homepage Journal
    Still doesn't support xinerama. Neither does doom 3. All they have to do is add one lousy command line argument just like mplayer has.

    mplayer -xineramascreen 1 video.avi

    Then make the application you are running show up only on that xinerama screen. It's rather simple, but nobody does it. Even linux native games like vegastrike don't do it. It makes gaming very difficult. Windows that are supposed to open in the middle of the screen show up in the empty space between monitors. And full screen apps engulf both screens.

    I beg everyone developing linux apps to add proper support for xinerama. Please.

    • Re:Xinerama (Score:5, Informative)

      by 5E-0W2 ( 767094 ) on Tuesday October 19, 2004 @06:07PM (#10569970)
      Just run it on a separate (non-xinerama) X server on a different virtual terminal, you get the added bonus of being able to switch easily between your desktop and your game without having to resort to the games windowed/full screen function.

    • Re:Xinerama (Score:5, Informative)

      by Cthefuture ( 665326 ) on Tuesday October 19, 2004 @07:21PM (#10570528)
      Well, if you have a nVidia card you can just use TwinView with meta modes.

      For example, my normal setup is 3200x1200 but I have meta-modes that disable one screen. So when Doom3 requests a 800x600 screen it automatically turns off the other monitor.

      UT2004 is not quite so smart, but I just click my little gnome-xrandr applet and select a single screen resolution, then start UT2004. Changing back is just as simple.

      I believe randr is actually available for any set of cards. It's the extension that lets you change resolution on the fly in X. So even without a nVidia card it should be quite painless.
      • OMG! THAT'S what the meta modes are! I set them up and they work perfectly. The panning mode is especially awesome. Now everything works great!

        The best thing about twinview though is still having opengl span both screens. I wish someone would program something to take advantage of that. Maybe it will have to be me.

    • Xinerama has no OpenGL support. (Score:5, Informative)

      by reality-bytes ( 119275 ) on Tuesday October 19, 2004 @08:04PM (#10570873) Homepage

      Its not that Wine or Doom3 don't support Xinerama but that Xinerama doesn't yet support OpenGL.

      However, you *can* run multi-head without Xinerama and run as many OpenGL in-game displays as you can fit video-cards in your system.

    • Re:Xinerama (Score:4, Informative)

      by YOU LIKEWISE FAIL IT ( 651184 ) on Wednesday October 20, 2004 @02:57AM (#10573224) Homepage Journal

      Not exclusively a Linux oversight as well - many Mac games run on dual head setups take over all the screens and blank the unused ones out. This is super annoying - I should be able to play Battlefield on the lcd while watching mail and irc on the second monitor, instead of having it just sit there black.

  • implements a completely new 3D pipeline which executes the traditional Direct3D Fixed Function rendering path using dynamically generated OpenGL vertex programs

    I was sure this would exist one day... So now OpenGL and DirectX can render pictures in the same way.

    But what about the "render to texture" function, which is really really easy to do and fast in DirectX, and so painfull and so slow with OpenGL and X-window?

    • Re:What about render to texture? (Score:5, Informative)

      by gavriels ( 55831 ) on Tuesday October 19, 2004 @06:14PM (#10570027)
      We have supported render to texture in Cedega, for both Direct3D and OpenGL apps for quite some time. It isn't as efficient in OpenGL in Linux, due to the lack of a specific extension to support it, but it still works. We render to a pbuffer, then copy to the target texture. You can see this to good effect in Far Cry, with their water reflections, for example.

      Take care,
      -Gav
  • Just an honest Q, is this version able to run Star Wars: Battlefront ?
    That would make me buy a copy of cedega.

    • Re:Star Wars Battlefront ? (Score:5, Informative)

      by ecliptik ( 160746 ) on Tuesday October 19, 2004 @06:17PM (#10570051) Homepage

      I attempted to install it the other week, but I ran into the wonderful cd-rom locking problem and was unable to switch to the second disk during the install.

      Transgaming claims Cedega 4.0 supports switching cd's, but it's hit or miss. Jedi Knight: Jedi Academy is an example of this, as their FAQ states you need to copy the second cd's contents to your hard drive and point the installer there when it asks.

      I really wish there was a simpler way to use cd drives with a stock GNU/Linux kernel instead of hunting down supermount patches or strange hacks like Transgaming tries. It's a major issue that that's is holding back as a desktop OS.

      • If the emulator is holding a lock on the drive despite the installer requesting a disc change, perhaps TransGaming could put in a 'override' keycombo that would request the software to close anything that's currently open on the drive.

        Handling unmount/mount with a keycombo would be useful too, such as in a fullscreen CD-swap environment. I haven't used it though so maybe this kind of stuff is in there in some form already...

        • Re:Star Wars Battlefront ? (Score:4, Informative)

          by gavriels ( 55831 ) on Tuesday October 19, 2004 @10:12PM (#10571654)
          Cedega, when using the new -monitor-cdrom-eject option, does exactly this. If it detects a press of the drive's eject button, it simply closes the Linux handle for all files it has open, then calls the user-space eject program.

          The cdrom eject button monitor is only supported on CDRW or DVD drives though, so for older systems you need to use the Point2Play 'unmount / eject' button to trigger this behaviour.

          Take care,
          -Gav
      • Battlefront does not currently work, as it uses some DirectX 9.0c features that are not yet implemented. We're looking at this game, and several others that are high on our voting list for inclusion in our next release.

        That said, the eject system that was added to Cedega 4.0 should work for almost all titles. The only ones that it may have trouble with are ones where the installer requires the first CD back in the drive after the second one is done. I don't recall whether Jedi Academy is among these titl
      • "It's a major issue that's holding (Linux) back as a desktop OS."

        If that's what you meant to say, then I agree. I firmly believe that games are what drives the state of the art in a lot of areas - graphics being a big one, but gamers are usally worried about performance issues as well, and it's nice that you can eliminate a lot of bloat with Linux. I mean, seriously, who buys matched 1GB pairs of DDR3200 or $400 video cards to use office apps?

        No one, I hope.

        There's a lot of gamers who would use Linux as

  • Halo PC (Score:2, Interesting)

    by Anonymous Coward
    I am wondering how well the DX9 code is, and more specifically, for running Halo PC/CE. I know that the Mac port uses OpenGL (I doubt that Westlake/Macsoft would try and use Quickdraw 3D). However, Gearbox uses a lot of DX9 and PX2.0 exclusive stuff in the win32 version.

    Althought getting the client to run would be awesome, the real question is when it will be able to run the Dedicated server for it, as a daemon. (halod wrapper anyone?)

  • Cedega questions (Score:4, Interesting)

    by Tyrdium ( 670229 ) on Tuesday October 19, 2004 @06:29PM (#10570142) Homepage
    Since at least one person representative of Transgaming appears to be reading this thread, I'd like to ask a few questions. First, what of the plan to open-source WineX/Cedega? Is it safe to assume this is still in the works? If so, when is it estimated to happen?

    Now, for a support question... Is addition of support for FF XI currently in progress? Will it ever be in the near future? As it is, that's probably the only thing keeping me from switching to Linux (and buying a Cedega subscription, of course). Also, does the Steam version of Half-Life and its various mods (e.g., The Specialists) work under Cedega currently?

    Anywho, 4.1 looks great. Performance boosts are always a good thing. ;)

    Also, are there any benchmarks comparing between Cedega 4.0, Cedega 4.1, and native Windows performance? I'd like to see if Cedega causes a sizable framerate hit (i.e., 20% or more).

    • Opensource? Uhh.. done: transgaming.org [transgaming.org]. No binaries, but this script [linux-gamers.net] makes things a snap.
    • does the Steam version of Half-Life and its various mods (e.g., The Specialists) work under Cedega currently?

      Yes. With earlier versions I found it to be slower than in Windows, although you have to take into account that I am using an ATI graphics card and ATI's Linux drivers have lower performance than their Windows counterparts.

    • Re:Cedega questions (Score:5, Interesting)

      by gavriels ( 55831 ) on Tuesday October 19, 2004 @10:04PM (#10571600)

      Cedega is not Open Source software. We make no bones about this. Some of the code is available under the AFPL, and we release other portions under the X11 and LGPL licenses to share with the ReWind and Wine community occasionally, but our core technology will not be released. You can read more about some of the related issues in my column here [transgaming.com].

      As far as Final Fantasy XI goes, we have not done any work on it, and I have no idea whether or not it works. We do our work based on our users' votes, so if you're interested, subscribe and vote for it!

      Steam and Half Life both work. Half Life 2 has been consistently voted #1 on our lists for several months, but as it's not released yet, we can't really talk about support for it at this time.

      Finally, benchmarks can vary significantly depending on the application and the system. Some titles run as fast as they do in Windows, others are slower (some significantly so), and we sometimes get reports of a title running faster under Linux for some users. You can check out our forums [transgaming.org] for more info on what works well.

      Take care,

      -Gav

      • Do the apps from ProFantasy Software work under your product? http://wwwprofantasy.com/ [wwwprofantasy.com]

      • So why you claimed two year ago on the front page of transgaming.com that it will be open sourced as soon that enough user will subscrive to monthly subcriptions? So it was a lie? Also, since the source is mostly available, it's possible to use regular wine to complete the missing parts of wineX/cedega. You even offer Source tar.gz on the website. I know one project, ( I give no link here, you understand why) who already achieved a legal free software build of Cedega whithout breaking anything important. So
  • it's happened to me before, but I can't find a download link or a price link. is it free, is it shareware, is it commercial?

    there just seem to be press releases upon press releases..
    • Transgamer is done by subscription. I can't remember the exact pricing, but I used to subscribe. I'm pretty sure it was only like $5 a month and you get to use it. Basically its to pay the licensing fees for the proprietary CD-Checking software and such.

    • Re:maybe I'm an idiot (Score:3, Informative)

      by gavriels ( 55831 )
      Cedega is a commercial product, sold though our subscription system for $5 / month (3 month minimum). During your subscription, you have access to updates, support, and voting rights to tell us what games you want to see supported.

      You can still use the product even if you let your subscription expire, but you won't receive any futher updates, etc.

      You can find out more at http://www.transgaming.com
      • You can find out more at http://www.transgaming.com

        that's part of the problem. it's all very vague. I like quotes like this:

        "In simplified terms, Cedega loads a game's binary into memory on a Linux system and then dynamically links to code that provides an implementation of the Win32 APIs that the program is using."

        Wouldn't it have been simpler to say something like, I dunno, "Cedega lets you run Windows games on Linux."

        If you don't sign up, you don't actually get any useful info off the website. Who
        • that's part of the problem. it's all very vague. I like quotes like this:

          "In simplified terms, Cedega loads a game's binary into memory on a Linux system and then dynamically links to code that provides an implementation of the Win32 APIs that the program is using."

          Wouldn't it have been simpler to say something like, I dunno, "Cedega lets you run Windows games on Linux."
          The full paragraph where I found your quote is now in turn quoted. Note the first sentence.

          "Cedega allows Windows-based games to run

  • ATI support (Score:3, Informative)

    by BrookHarty ( 9119 ) on Tuesday October 19, 2004 @10:02PM (#10571589) Journal
    I just wish ATI would lend more support to the linux side. I've switched to ATI when the 9700 PRO game out, and under windows its been great. Under linux, its like pulling teeth. I never had a problem with any of my nvidia cards (tnt to geforcefx).

    Transgaming lists some the ATI issues in the release announcement.

    I really think my next card for my dual boot system is going to be Nvidia based, tired of the problems.

    Also, anyone catch the 2.6 kernel issues statement? Come on... Im not going back to 2.4.x...
  • I was trying to download WineX CVS within last weeks - but it never worked! Can you do it now? Is there no "free" version available at this moment? Is it legal?
  • Sorry d00ds, but I prefer to play my games at full speed.=) None of this emulation for me. Also, even though Doom III is written for Linux the Linux version is much much slower than the Windows version.=/ Windows is much better for games, no contest.
    • Gotta agree. When I cancelled my subscription, it was because none of the games *I* want to play are supported (and probably never will be). What good is my vote for older games like XvT going to do when masses of idiots have cemented the #1 spot with a game that isn't even OUT yet?
    • Un till game developers start coding for Linux as well, playing games through emulators can never compare to playing game on a developer supported system. Just my two cents.

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