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TransGaming, Inc. is a company known for its software portability technologies, created to bring PC-Windows games to other platforms such as Linux and Mac. Through products like Cedega, Cider and GameTreeOnline.com, TransGaming has worked to expand the gaming experience beyond the traditional Windows environment.
In this interview, Paul Nowosad from TransGaming’s Marketing and PR team talks about the company’s products, its mission and the future of gaming on alternative platforms.
Who is the CEO of TransGaming in private life? How does he spend his free time?
No comment.
When and how did the idea for Cedega come about?
TransGaming was founded in 2001 by Gavriel State, our current CTO, with a focus on Linux portability. Cedega was born from that vision.
TransGaming has created a leading software portability technology that allows game developers to build games for a single system and then migrate them to other platforms faster, more efficiently and at a lower cost.
Our portability technology is unique because developers do not need to think about multiple platforms before starting the development of a game. Our technology allows a game to be efficiently migrated to a number of different platforms during development or even after the development process has been completed.
TransGaming’s core portability products are Cider for Mac and Cedega for Linux.
Is Linux a good platform for commercial software?
Linux is an open-source platform and, for this reason, offers many opportunities as a software platform.
Which products have been the most successful among your users and customers?
TransGaming offers a variety of products for publishers, developers and consumers.
Publishers and developers can use TransGaming’s Cider Portability Engine to bring PC-Windows video games to the Mac platform, which is a growing marketplace.
Consumers can take advantage of Cedega, which offers 6-month and 12-month membership programs. Cedega allows users to play PC-Windows video games on Linux.
GameTreeOnline.com is an online gaming portal that gives consumers the opportunity to buy, download and play Mac video games directly, without having to go to a store to purchase a traditional boxed copy of the game.
Does DirectX 10 run on Cedega? How does it work in your software?
Both Cedega for Linux and Cider for Mac act as wrappers for the existing PC-Windows code base.
They interpret graphics calls and specific game calls from Windows and translate them for either Linux or Mac OS. This preserves the publisher’s or developer’s original code base while quickly and efficiently enabling the game for a broader consumer market using Linux or Mac computers.
Why is the software called Cedega, and why is the company called TransGaming?
TransGaming, Inc. is the parent company. It is publicly listed on the TSX, the Canadian Stock Exchange, under the ticker symbol TNG.
Cedega, Cider, GameTreeOnline.com and a graphics product called SwiftShader are all branded products that TransGaming sells in the industry, either to businesses or directly to consumers.
How many people work for TransGaming?
No comment.
Cedega has become quite popular over the years. Did you expect this level of popularity?
The popularity of Cedega over the past several years has been very positive. Our recent success with Cider has also truly been a great experience.
Your company has developed several software products. Are you planning to create other products or surprises for your customers?
The four products we offer — Cedega, Cider, GameTreeOnline.com and SwiftShader — keep us very busy.
We will continue to focus on our mission of broadening the playing field for consumer entertainment.
Your software is not open source. Why did you make this choice?
No comment.
Would you like to say something to the Italian audience of TiempoLibreSite.com?
We would like to tell the Italian community that both our Cedega Linux Gaming Service and GameTreeOnline.com Mac gaming portal are filling an important need.
More and more consumers are choosing computers that are not Windows-based, and we are creating a gaming experience that is second to none in the industry.
Look for more Mac titles coming to consumers in 2008, as well as more advancements in Cedega through November and December 2008.
It will be a great year, and we hope the Italian community will join us and have fun gaming.
Editorial note
In June 2015, several years after this interview, NVIDIA acquired TransGaming’s cross-platform portability technology for $3.75 million. The acquisition included TransGaming’s Graphics and Portability Group, related technology assets and customer relationships, while other products such as SwiftShader were not part of the deal.