Valve Rolls Out Wine-based "Proton" For Running Windows Games On Linux

[phoronix]

Phoronix: Valve Rolls Out Wine-based "Proton" For Running Windows Games On Linux

Valve has today announced a new version of Steam Play that allows Linux gamers to enjoy Windows games on Linux via their new Wine-based Proton project...

http://www.phoronix.com/scan.php?page=news_item&px=Valve-Steam-Play-Proton-Linux

[moilami]

Well, interesting, quite surprised to see Valve pushing something like this.

[Brophen]

Chicken and Egg problem? Both are in a breakfast burrito now

[Zoll]

This is huge. I am not sure how I feel about this. Will this make developers now unwilling to work on the Linux port since the "compatibility layer" would take care of this job? Would this end up hurting gaming on Linux?

[Grim85]

This is huge. I am not sure how I feel about this. Will this make developers now unwilling to work on the Linux port since the "compatibility layer" would take care of this job? Would this end up hurting gaming on Linux?

With the compatibility layer there and they don't have to do anything, they may add that as part of their testing.

It's still not ideal, they should be opting for native ports

[Templar82]

Windows games with no Linux version currently available can now be installed and run directly from the Linux Steam client

This sounds might impressive and in theory could work really well, hope they can pull it off.

[Flaburgan]

Wow. This is big indeed. I'm happy to see it though. I was wondering why they weren't doing something like that for a long time. It could indeed have a negative impact on the number of native Linux games, but it should definitely have a positive impact on the number of gamers using Linux. So mainly a good news imo.

[moilami]

This is huge. I am not sure how I feel about this. Will this make developers now unwilling to work on the Linux port since the "compatibility layer" would take care of this job? Would this end up hurting gaming on Linux?

I feel positively surprised of this. Valve can increase their Linux gaming catalog with this, which is good for gaming on Linux. Companies will still port their games to Linux if they think it is worth it, that is, they wont wait if and when Valve port their game. If Linux gaming market share grow, then companies will be more eager to make ports themselves instead of waiting if and when Valve make a wrapper for their game.

GoG is already doing this kind of thing with their Wine wrappings to many games. Nobody has been worried of it, though, many GoG games are like abandon ware used to be, and hence not such a threat regarding companies unwillingness to port games because of wrappers.

Now Feral et all make ports, which really are not that great. In conclusion of that can be evaluated ports to be overrated.

Emulators and wrappers are technology which works, and which can be used to take business advantage. Wii U and 3DS had emulators too, none complained. What matter is that the game work on a given platform. Ultimately wrappers and emulator make sure the game works 20 years and more after being released.

[Brophen]

This is huge. I am not sure how I feel about this. Will this make developers now unwilling to work on the Linux port since the "compatibility layer" would take care of this job? Would this end up hurting gaming on Linux?

gotta show developers there is value. No games, no downloads, no proof of value, no games. Something like that

[peppercats]

With the compatibility layer there and they don't have to do anything, they may add that as part of their testing.

It's still not ideal, they should be opting for native ports

nobody is stopping you from paying developers to port their game to linux