Blue Mars in Linux: I'd keep it, but...

After reading a tweet my friend Zauber put up a few hours ago, I decided to download and attempt to play Blue Mars in Linux via a beta of Wine v1.2. After the quick registration and activation, I downloaded and ran the Blue Mars installer.

The install went without a hitch. I launched the desktop link to Blue Mars, halfway expecting it to bomb out, like when I tried to run the There.com client a while back. To my surprise, I got the login screen working great.

I login, choose to download Caledonia, restarted the client as instructed, clicked go and then...

It works pretty well, as you can see, but there's a big problem here: it's too damn glowy for me to use. It's like Windlight on crack.

To be sure, the glow is due to Wine's DirectX incompleteness, but it's enough of a turn-off to keep me away from Blue Mars unless they make a Linux client, or the Wine developers work to make Blue Mars visually comfortable for my eyes.

Note: Before anyone suggests it, let me state for the record that buying a copy of Windows 7 at $200 USD just to play a game is incredibly stupid, IMHO. Between SL, my XBox 360 and soon a PlayStation 3, I'm perfectly sorted in the gaming department.

Quite a shame. Blue Mars, you almost had me.