Steam's Linux Efforts Were Influential To Microsoft, Other Companies

[mike44]

johnc your're using mac?

Personally I'm happy. I'd buy the next Tomb Raider on Vulkan for sure, but that's about it.

[edoantonioco]

so what now? are they still commited to Linux?

And is L4D2 still faster on Linux?

[johnc]

johnc your're using mac?

Why the hell would I use a Mac? Those things are useless.

[bug77]

Why the hell would I use a Mac? Those things are useless.

Not if you're selling them they're not :P

[Nille]

And is L4D2 still faster on Linux?

If you use a Nvidia card, its a bit faster.

[L_A_G]

What Valve was able to show is that PC gamers won't move to Linux. I don't think Microsoft would do anything crazy on Windows, but if they did, and somehow Valve's Steam monopoly was threatened on that platform, PC gamers won't just get up and go to Linux. They would drop Steam like a bad habit and buy their games from whatever MS was offering.

Steam is just a digital store. People don't really care that much about it. It doesn't offer anything more than an easy way to buy games. It's a glorified Google Play.

If you've paid any attention to what gamers on the Windows side are actually saying you'd know that they very much hate Microsoft's attempt at an Apple style app store and the way in which Microsoft tries to push it using games exclusive to it. If Microsoft tries to push it even further by disabling or otherwise hampering alternatives like Steam it will piss a lot of people off, driving them towards alternative OSs and older versions of Windows.

That's not going to happen. There is no momentum behind Linux gaming. The idea that people are going to make the switch "any day now" is just a fantasy.

Valve has no club over MS's head. Not anymore at least. Their experiment only proved that MS is in the driver's seat for PC gaming, and Valve is strapped into the child safety seat in the back of the car.

I never talked about "any day" or other implications of it happening in very rapid order, so you can stick your straw men where the sun doesn't shine.

Like Linux for regular desktop use, it's been a slow burn process that slowly keeps on churning. The point at which Linux as a gaming platform became something that can be described as at least halfway decent only happened in the last year to year and a half, so it's pretty clear we're only in the early days of this.

What this really showed is not that Microsoft is in the driver's seat when it comes to gaming, it showed that it is in fact Valve who is in the driver's seat, being the dominant player in online retail of PC games on all the PC platforms (Windows, OSX and Linux). Despite trying very hard and putting a lot of time, money and effort into pushing their equivalent, Microsoft is still to make any kind of real headway into the digital distribution of games and gamers in general absolutely loathe their store. Microsoft thought that by having their store pre-installed they'd be able to gain a significant market share purely by virtue of being pre-installed, just like Internet Explorer back in the day, but like with Edge, it turned out people would much rather install an alternative and use it instead.

[A-Singh]

What Valve was able to show is that PC gamers won't move to Linux. I don't think Microsoft would do anything crazy on Windows, but if they did, and somehow Valve's Steam monopoly was threatened on that platform, PC gamers won't just get up and go to Linux. They would drop Steam like a bad habit and buy their games from whatever MS was offering.

Steam is just a digital store. People don't really care that much about it. It doesn't offer anything more than an easy way to buy games. It's a glorified Google Play.



That's not going to happen. There is no momentum behind Linux gaming. The idea that people are going to make the switch "any day now" is just a fantasy.

Valve has no club over MS's head. Not anymore at least. Their experiment only proved that MS is in the driver's seat for PC gaming, and Valve is strapped into the child safety seat in the back of the car.

Well the thing is, when you've purchased hundreds of games through a store like Steam or Google Play, you are MUCH less inclined to abandon it. I doubt anybody would be dropping Steam that easily - not even MS. Imagine the backlash from the users.

[Passso]

Steam is just a digital store. People don't really care that much about it. It doesn't offer anything more than an easy way to buy games. It's a glorified Google Play.

Well I do not agree with you, more than a digital store, Steam is a whole gaming platform.
Chat systems, group systems are really good, so you can easily see your friends connected and invite them to play with you.

And do not forget they have the #1 game at the moment, Dota2, with a world record of active players...

Microsoft is offering a classical "Google Play", far from the Valve's experience, they need to create and unify their community for that (and the XBox community too)

[volca]

A lot of gamers won't switch to linux gaming simply because legacy applications/games they would lose. One great thing that would help the cause would be wine support for DX11/DX12 being good. I am still hopeful Vulkan could help in this regard.

[johnc]

Like Linux for regular desktop use, it's been a slow burn process that slowly keeps on churning. The point at which Linux as a gaming platform became something that can be described as at least halfway decent only happened in the last year to year and a half, so it's pretty clear we're only in the early days of this.

"Any day now..."