Steam On Linux Usage Climbs Higher Thanks To The Steam Deck

[Weasel]

It's easier to test your game compatibility with DXVK than to have a native Linux port which can break spectacularly at any time.

Linux fans continue to show their complete lack of knowledge of the gaming (and software in general to be honest) industry and an insane amount of wishful thinking.

What's wrong with Wine/Proton and DXVK? It's still Linux. As long as it runs, who cares.

As for "it's not Linux desktop", well, how many people use "desktop" Windows? For everyone who doesn't touch the Linux command line I can say, they don't touch the Windows registry either, or fiddle with group policies, or all the other "Windows-specific desktop stuff".

I'm perfectly happy if things work in Wine. I don't consider Wine non-Linux. For me it's Linux just like "native" Linux games. And as you said, Win API platform is much more stable and less prone to break at any time, so to me it's even better.

Proton devs share this viewpoint: https://blog.hiler.eu/win32-the-only-stable-abi/

In the end, it's still Linux you're using.


Just to be clear: I couldn't care less about native ports as long as game devs are incentivized to make it work under Wine or Proton. That's all that matters.

[marios]

Sinepgib here is getting close to one of the issues.

There are, actually, two separate issues on which microkernels provide a substantial advantage for desktop experience.

The first issue exerts a smaller force, but it is much longer in time (a duration of decades).

The second issue has something to do with backwards compatibility and other things that sinepgib mentioned. This issue exerts a much stronger force, but the duration is shorter in time (a duration of years).

Using microkernels will not fix most backwards compatibility issues. The cause of most backwards compatibility issues is breaking changes in userspace libraries. There is a chance that some old hardware will not have its driver ported to newer kernels, but this is not what people have in mind about backwards compatibility.

PS. Intel's GPU security bug could not be solved with a microkernel and the performance penalty of microkernels is not negligible.

[mdedetrich]

Where are the Linux-based Steam Deck competitors, I wonder? I am one the fence about the 1st generation Steam Deck. But the relatively short battery life and mediocre screen make me wait for the Nintendo Switch successor, which may end up being the more worry-free package.

If you factor in price you likely wont find one, Valve is selling the deck at cost (or even at a loss) with the main profit coming from the steam store. Its the same business model used by other consoles (PS5/Xbox). Other competitors don't have this liberty unfortunately.

[birdie]

Why would it "break spectacularly at any time"? Linux supports file system isolation (chroot, and others) and namespaces. If it is possible to collect the legacy libraries and executables which are necessary for the native Linux port to run correctly then it will run correctly, unless it is accessing no-longer-supported files in /proc or /sys. (If the native port is accessing legacy /dev files then it needs to run in some kind of virtual machine.)

Linux Proton and Proton-GE are running a Steam Windows game in a separate Windows installation that is isolated from other game's Windows installations. Basically, every Steam Windows game is in Linux running in its own separate environment. Proton-GE is applying "wine tricks" patches to the game's Windows installation. ---- Such isolation and patching would also be possible in case of native Linux [Steam] games.

Did you read the linked article for Christ's sake? Sometimes I wonder why I'm talking to people who absolutely cannot read, lack common sense and avoid using logic. Please do me a favour.

[carewolf]

Plus, you can also suspend all services your game is not using during game mode. You can't really suspend drivers with a monolithic kernel in a practical way. This means reduced latency and more resources for your game. A separate scheduler also means you can easily switch to a real time mode.

Of course you can suspend drivers in a monolithic kernel. How would how your communicate with a driver affect what functionality they can have? The most important suspension from most drivers is suspending the hardware, which incidentally requires the driver to be loaded and present since it has the hardware knowledge of how to do that.. As for the memory and CPU of the driver itself, drivers do not cost anything but virtual memory when not used, and even that that most are 100kbytes or maybe a 1 megabyte, and no CPU when the hardware isn't interrupting, but if you are really low on memory you can even unload the driver from memory and it will only take up disk space.

[Etherman]

Your sarcasm is unwarranted while people here show how they are completely out of the loop, considering comments like "there have been more Linux game publishers than ever" which is outright false.

If a publisher makes sure that the game works on wine/proton, is it a Linux game publisher then? 🤔

[birdie]

If a publisher makes sure that the game works on wine/proton, is it a Linux game publisher then? 🤔

It's a Proton publisher then

Please stop making unjustified accusations. If you are under the impression that you are constantly right and other people are idiots, then I suggest you get rid of that impression as soon as possible. Before posting, I did open the linked article and decided NOT to read it because it didn't look like it was worth my time. If you want me to read an article, please try harder next time and post a more useful link.

Sorry, dude, if you want to live in your vacuum of "Linux games compatibility is perfect and there are no issues ever" - good for you, only it makes you a cult follower/believer and I don't deal with such people. Please never reply to my further messages. I highly recommend going to https://www.phoronix.com/forums/settings/account and adding me to your personal ignore list. I just don't want to see notifications from people who consciously avoid getting smarter/more knowledgable and for whom their beliefs are above everything. That makes you worse than a bacteria though as even they try to evolve (meaning becoming "smarter") to survive better.

[Vistaus]

I was there in 2012 when the Beta for the SteamForLinux was just opened and Left 4 Dead was the first ported game. People said it would be "the year of Linux" back then and were all REALLY excited for Linux. 2013 came along, nothing. 10 years later and we're still not breaking 2%, I've seen the Linux marketshare on Steam go up to 1.5% many years ago, and it seems we're still stuck on this number even though VALVe released the SteamDeck.

What will it take for us to break 2%? And 3%? What about 5%?

You do know that the Steam survey is basically the equivalent of a political poll? i.e. it represents an average statistic, but not everyone is questioned, so the actual number might be a lot higher.

[Vistaus]

Trolling is believing Stream Deck represents Linux on the desktop.

It's a bloody gaming handheld. People don't use it as a desktop OS. Maybe they'll launch one or two native applications, but they will certainly won't go beyond that.

I agree that it's a different use-case, but the amount of opened apps doesn't represent its usage. If that was the case, then my openSUSE Tumbleweed install on my PC wouldn't count as a desktop either as I usually only have 1-3 apps opened.

[hoohoo]

Will this be the year of Linux on the desktop?