Skip to main content

Ubuntu games?

    One of the things I have been doing very little of for the last several years is PC gaming.  This is probably mostly due to a complete lack of a Windows machine in my life.  Plus with all of the great games available for Android my needs as a casual gamer are more than met.


    However, this years humble bundled has reignited my interest in PC gaming.  I got it and installed a couple of the games on my Ubuntu machine.  So far they are a lot of fun especially VVVVVV.  This got me asking "what else can I play on Ubuntu?"  Turns out there is a plethora of free open source games, some awesome, some not so much.  Many are available from the  Ubuntu Software Center and many you have to hunt down around the web.


    One thing that keeps many Windows users from Ubuntu (or any Linux OS for that matter) is a supposed lack of games.  This is simply not the case.  While yes many of the commercial PC games are only available for Windows or at best OS X, there are many free open source games that are a ton of fun.  I am convinced that the average gamer would not miss Windows if they could find a handful of awesome games on Ubuntu.  Who knows if enough gamers move to using Ubuntu maybe we will see a few major releases for Ubuntu in the future.  We have already seen this happen with many smaller commercial games like World of Goo and Minecraft.


    So, I will be trying to find great games available to play on Ubuntu and write about them here.  I'll be reviewing games with stable releases and write about upcoming games that I am excited about.  As I have mentioned before I am a casual gamer.  I at most get a handful of hours of gaming in a week.  So just to warn upfront I will be writing from the perspective of a mostly casual gamer.  As much as I am able I will try and find a wide range of game types and styles that hopefully everyone can enjoy.
Labels:

Comments

  1. JoshDecember 28, 2011 at 4:13 PM

    Most promising native Linux game I've played in a while.

    http://www.unknown-horizons.org/

    I played last spring and it was really fun but incomplete. They just did this past Summer of Code so it's a safe bet that things are better now.

    ReplyDelete
  2. Daniel PolehnDecember 28, 2011 at 4:31 PM

    Awesome thanks I'll have to check that out. I haven't even heard of Unknown Horizons, looks fun. I like city/empire building games.

    ReplyDelete

Post a Comment

Popular posts from this blog

Book Review: Tribes

 Tribes  by Seth Godin is a quick read on leadership.  I read this book because it was listed on "Books every leader needs to read" or some such similarly named list.    There are some good bits to glean out of this short book.  I'll try to condense them here:   Managers are not by nature leaders.  Managers allocate resources to accomplish a defined outcome.  Leaders change things by setting a vision and building a tribe around that vision.   Tribes are everywhere big and small.  Mega-tribes, sub-tribes, etc.   Leadership is inherent risky.  But far less risky than our minds tend to think.  This is evidenced by the many failures of several highly successful leaders.  (Think Elon Musk and the Tesla Truck presentation ).   Find people who are doing exceptionally better than average and amplify their influence on everyone else.   Leadership is about challenging the status quo.  It is s...
Post a Comment
Read more

Some Goals for 2021

I have had a lot of time by myself recently.  I'm working away from home for a few months and my family hasn't been with me for several weeks of that.  I've tried my best to use that time for some productive self reflection, contemplation, navel gazing, etc.  The product of that is a list of goals for the year.  I wanted to put (some of) these out there publicly for some positive social pressure. Recreation & Relationship To start off, I'd like a little more fun in my life.  And I'd like to have that fun with people who I cherish. Have at least one meaningful, memorable one on one experience with each of my children.  This time apart from my family has highlighted  just how valuable time spent together is.  We're pretty good at finding ways to have fun all together at home.  We play board games, read books aloud (we read the first four Harry Potter books last year), spend time outdoors, etc.  But I have not been very good at spending...
Post a Comment
Read more

Ubuntu Games: Retro Blazer demo

    Loved blasting Nazis in  Wolfenstein?  Hacking apart demons or whatever in Doom?  Just plain get nostalgic for running around inside a pseudo-3d environment, gunning down your enemies?  Me too!        Retro Blazer is a truly retro FPS based on the Darkplaces game engine .  Missed using arrow keys?  They got you covered.  Retro Blazer just released a demo/alpha test for all us FPS lovers to download and play.  It's a lot of fun and so far the alpha release seems very stable.  Don't worry about  the game crashing to much.       To play Retro Blazer on Ubuntu simply download it , unzip and execute the proper binary (probably  darkplaces-linux-x86_64-sdl and  ignore all those .exe files...).  The game is also available on Windows and OS X. Get it!     If you are a terminal junky  here is a quick how to.  Fir...
Post a Comment
Read more