Interview with Transgaming

Could you tell us about yourself and TransGaming in general???

Sure. My name is Lucas Smithen and I am the Cedega Product Manager at TransGaming Technologies.

I started work for TransGaming over three and a half years ago doing Q.A.

for The Sims for Linux (TransGaming's initial launch title) and have stuck with the company ever since.

TransGaming has created a software portability technology that allows us to migrate video games to multiple platforms; faster, cheaper and better than other companies out there.

Where can we get Cedega in Canada or else where???

Cedega is available to end users globally as a downloadable product through TransGaming's subscription service,http://www.transgaming.com/create_accnt.php.

We also have a number of resellers all over the world and continue to expand our reseller network.

What are the benefits of buying Cedega instead of using Wine ???

One of the most important facets of Cedega is the fact that it is a well-tested and complete product designed to deliver the best possible user experience and performance of triple A games on Linux.

Cedega is a product developed to run games and multimedia applications on Linux.

Wine, on the other hand, is a collection of code that potentially does a variety of things but requires users to have significant experience with source code, Linux, the ability to build packages, etc.

Wine has also not focused on the gaming and multimedia aspects of what Cedega provides and does not deliver, even closely, the experience that Cedega imparts to avid gamers.

As part of subscribing to TransGaming, our users get a variety of value add services for their monthly subscription, in addition to a high quality, well tested product.

Subscribers have access to our discussion forums, tech support, and have the ability to vote on what technologies or games they would like TransGaming to work on next.

We're building a "TransGamer" community and this community plays a pivotal role in the direction of the company and the Cedega product.

Cedega is a branch of the wine program isn't it and if so do you also help with further updates to Wine (with out giving away what we pay for)???

Some of Wine was originally utilized to make the first version of Cedega more complete; this dates back many years.

However, the Cedega product forked from Wine a few years ago and is now very much separate and independent from the Wine base.

TransGaming does, however, contribute a lot of code back to Wine, where we can, and we still support the Wine community.

With out giving out any of your trade mark items could you tell us how Cedega works IE is it an emulator or something else altogether etc??

Cedega is definitely not an emulator, a misconception that we are very quick to correct.

There are essentially two main things that need to happen when running a Windows executable on Linux: the binary has to be loaded into memory on the Linux system and then dynamically linked to code that provides an implementation of the Win32 APIs that the program is using.

The APIs that Windows games are mostly built on top of are primarily based on Microsofts DirectX system. T

hese APIs include facilities for handling 3D graphics (Direct3D), mouse and keyboard input (DirectInput), audio (DirectSound), and so on.

TransGaming works to create Linux compatible versions of these APIs that work on top of the Linux equivalents such as OpenGL, X11, and the OSS and ALSA sound APIs.

Cedega is the culmination of over 4 years of effort on these APIs.

Our engineering teams knowledge of DirectX is probably second only to Microsofts own.

What kind of help do you get from the game makers themselves???

New games are being released at a greater frequency than ever before and this trend will continue.

As more games are released more frequently, we get busier and busier since we want to ensure complete support for the top titles as quickly as possible.

The interesting thing here is that many game developers who had no intentions of supporting Linux contact us and offer us their assistance.

In some cases, its because they have people internally who are already TransGamers and they know were working on supporting certain titles and want to help.

In other cases, developers just think its amazingly cool to have their new titles running on Linux without them expending any effort on their part.

Thus, they are happy to help how ever they can. T

One of our new initiatives, in light of this positive feedback from developers, is to create a game developer partnership program.

This new program will be a formalized partnership between TransGaming and developers who are interested in seeing their games supported on Linux and will encompass greater co-operation.

We are working on the details right now, and are in discussions with a broad array of developers and publishers, and expect to launch the program soon with a fair number of developers already participating in the program.

What can we do to help you improve Cedega???

What TransGaming needs most right now from our users is to have accurate information posted about their experiences in our games database.

Earlier this year TransGaming made available a new and improved games database (available at www.transgaming.org/gamesdb ).

This database allows users to search for their favorite games and find how they work on different versions of Cedega.

We need our users to visit the games database and fill in their experiences so other users can have access to that information and TransGaming can better know which games to focus development on.

We, of course, want to grow our subscriber community as well.

The more users we have the more effectively we can support a broad range of titles.

Thus, if you aren't already a "TransGamer", please subscribe at http://www.transgaming.com/create_accnt.php and begin enjoying your favorite titles on Linux.

Does TransGaming also help out with native Linux games???

We are very open to working with developers in supporting their native Linux gaming endeavors.

Given our thorough knowledge of video games and Linux, we're obviously very well suited for such collaboration.

As Linux continues to become more pervasive, we do anticipate native Linux gaming to increase and expect to be working more closely and broadly with developers.

Do you use open beta testing or closed???

We have a closed beta testing team and TransGaming is very fortunate to have an extremely dedicated community of testers to help us test our products.

These people come from all walks of life, all over the world and have at least one thing in common; a love for Linux and video games.

We really can't thank these hard working individuals enough for all their efforts towards making Cedega the best it can be.

We really couldn't do it all without them.

What other items can we expect to see from TransGaming???

TransGaming is very excited about some of our upcoming ventures.

The relaunch of our web store, the redesign of our voting system and improved user interface are all in the works.

We think 2005 is going to be a big year for TransGaming, the Linux community and gaming as a whole.

Would you be willing to work with a windows gaming company to get their game to work under Cedega???

Absolutely! TransGamings developer partnership program is open to all game developers and we have already begun working with a number of Windows game developers.

Will there ever be a Cedega like distro???

I personally don't see the need for Cedega to become its own distribution; however, I don't like to use words like never.

I would much rather see TransGaming focus on making Cedega the best it can be and let the distribution makers continue their excellent work and license our technology to make their own systems more complete for the end user.

I would really like to see a tighter integration of Cedega with the current distributions allowing a more seamless gaming experience for every Linux user on any distribution.

Will you offer or partner up with a distro of choice ever ???

TransGaming is already engaged in many distribution partnerships around the world.

Cedega has been packaged OEM with several Linux distributions and made available worldwide through various other associations with popular Linux and gaming companies and publications.

is there any problems with crossover office and Cedega on the same system???

I don't personally run Crossover Office but we have many users that do and there should be no issues running Crossover and Cedega on the same system.

Will you make Cedega available in places like Walmart,K-mart etc???

TransGaming is currently viewing possible markets for Cedega both for further online distribution as well as for a boxed copy.

In most cases, we'll try and work through our partnership channels.

Do you take checks, money orders etc for payment(and Canadian funds) ???

Payment for subscription services is available in USD, Euros and British Pounds.

Fees are payable through secure online payment using a variety of international credit and debit cards.

Subscribers can also pay using TransGaming Gift Certificates.

At this time we do not accept cheques or money orders.

Will you open a Canadian version of your page/company???

TransGaming Technologies is based out of Canada with offices in both Toronto and Ottawa and we also have employees in the U.S.

The boundaries between Canada and the U.S. are becoming more blurred and we see ourselves as a company with a strong North American presence with a great global community of customers.

What distro do you run to do product testing???

I personally change distributions every month or two and am currently using Fedora Core 3.

We do both testing and development on all major distros that we can.

We encourage our developers to use different distributions and try to ensure that we have coverage of different distros with our beta team as well.

What are your favourite games???

My current addiction is World of WarCraft.

I can always play Civilization though.

I am also getting back into Sid Meier's Pirates, this was one of my favorite games in high school and I am very excited to see it come back now.

What do you see as the one flaw of the X windows system and Linux as a whole???

In my estimation the biggest problem with Linux is a current lack of standards.

For example why on 5 different distros are there 5 different locations where I could put icons that would appear in the start menu?

Linux is all about power and diversity but from the point of an application developer it is extremely difficult to make a single product that works across all different flavours of Linux.

What do you want companies to do to aid you in getting them to run in Cedega???

Well this one depends on the company.

Game publishers could send us copies of their games that we could test with.

Game developers could open lines of communications for when we run into issues with certain titles.

Distribution makers could give us easier access to beta versions of their products.