Okay 505, Holiday's over. Time for some answers. (Linux/Mac)

And yet you still do not have any actual technical problem to talk about or can even name.

How was a Mac or Linux user to know the guys behind this Kickstarter we're going to pull this two years? Please tell us how we were to know they're garbage programmers, liers or dreamers?

It has been nearly a month since 505 cancelled my reward without explanation or any evidence of good-faith effort to produce it, and you're clearly not interested in actually producing anything, so I consider my money stolen. While you're "noting" things Question, maybe you should note to your team that what goes around comes around. If my "Windows only" copy of the game doesn't run under Wine on launch day, I will instead spend the time making sure that it works on EVERY emulator that can play it.

I'm not using Linux for gaming, but maybe there is hope for those, who do: www.phoronix.com/scan.php?page=news_item&px=Wine-4.0-Feature-Overview

I'm posting this because it just released linux.slashdot.org/story/19/01/23/0124236/wine-40-released-with-vulkan-support-initial-direct3d-12-and-better-hidpi

That's the whole problem man, ONLY other backers have actually engaged me on it. 505 and Question haven't actually answered me, ever.

Let's get a few things straight:
#2 - It's not the OS that's the problem.

The game currently RUNS AS IS WITH WINE ON LINUX, with the Windows code handled with Proton (Steam's built in WINE support). Assuming that this board allows off-site pictures, here's some screenshots from the demo running on my laptop:

(picture link)
(picture link)

This proves that it is NOT THE PLATFORM - at least on Linux - that's the problem. If Windows functions can be replaced with their equivalents and the game works, then 505 could at least try to take those parts and build them directly into their game. (It's called winelib, look it up.) There should be no reason for that being necessary, though, because UE4 supports both Linux and Mac directly. Here's UE4's editor running:

(picture link)

(Note also that side-scrolling game is one of the damn game templates. Did it really take this long to do yet another side-scroller, when the editor GIVES you the basic framework?)

So, there is NO problem with Linux running the game, or developing for it. There's a problem with 505 being unable to figure out how to do it, or more likely, they just don't want to bother, because

#3 - It's a profit issue.

505 have already admitted that they don't want to spend the time or money to release on Mac or Linux, despite having promised support for those platforms, and they admit they've already spent the kickstarter money so they can't "afford" refunds. Let's analyze this a little:

- They have not expressed ANY troubles with Linux or Mac before this
- They can't name any technical problem at all, not even vaguely describe one
- They did not say they were dropping support for these platforms when they ran out of kickstarter money, but waited months, or years, for no stated reason


They're looking at a great release, given the polled interest levels, and lots of "sheep" sales, as it was put elsewhere; Joe Consumer buying a Switch cart at Target doesn't care at all how the game was made, they just drop their money and go home. Of course, if I behaved like 505 has, and sold Joe MY copy of the game and walked away without giving him anything, I'd get arrested for theft.

#4 - There were other choices they could have made but didn't:
- After release, if the game doesn't run on a Linux or Mac user's system, refund it then, as a return
- Commit to spending part of the game sales on fulfilling their obligations to Linux and Mac users, after release
- Ask for additional funding for these ports
- Sell porting rights to yet another third party (Feral???)
- Hire additional help for Linux and Mac
- Get free help from the Linux, Mac, and UE communities to work through their "middleware issues"

I think a main factor in the change regarding update content, teases and so on from Angel and Iga himself was the change in release timeline. They had plotted out everything they wanted to say up to a 2018 release date, and more beyond that pushes into things they didn't want to be known until the game was released and/or have to come up with new things to talk about while maintaining the controlled release of information on both not spoiling things and not showing what they can't or shouldn't reveal yet (i.e. things that are in an unfinished state).

I believe that's the primary difference between 2016-early 2018 updates and now - when all of this was figured out very much in advance, latter 2018 and 2019 updates weren't in the playbook. They still very much sort them out in advance now, but only being able to say smaller/less meaty things until the big drop of finalized content when the release date and all is given.

Re: Linux, that's great to see the demo works in WINE. Someone earlier had reported that it didn't.

This point isn't how it runs (native, proton, wine, winelib, etc.), it's that Artplay made the promise therefor they need to be responsible for a solution and support it. Otherwise you will forever have the situation where when it doesn't work right they'll say not my problem. Please also remember that AFAIK wine/proton as a solution is much more limited on Mac which is also a promised target.

Maybe I missed this in another thread, but how much of your own money are we talking about here?

Cale is spot on as usual. Doesn't matter whether you backed 30 or 3000, they said Linux/Mac is a plaform, now it's not.