Steam Survey Results Start 2023 With Linux Marketshare Flat

[mSparks]

You can order one without a problem. Your only issue is that they may not deliver it to you directly but you could use reshipping services. In the SteamDeck Reddit are multiple Users that did that without any problems. From China, Australia, New Zealand, Russia, Iran or Iraq (don't remember), Swiss and Brazil.
There is not even a Region Lock, you can create a new account or change the store region to one where they deliver them and order one.

They simply are not sat on a shelf next to a switch. So people shopping for handheld devices are still buying nintendo switches, not decks.
I'm not talking about mail order, for devices like the deck they are still a tiny fraction of sales, mums and dads do still want to go into a store and try before they buy and have an assistant help them.

[nranger]

I wonder if steam deck is a bit of a niche thing in the end. Well executed but not mainstream enough?

If HP or Dell shipped over a million units of one specific laptop SKU in 11 months, it would be considered a rousing success.

So SteamDeck as a gaming PC is incredibly successful. Compared to a Playstation or a Switch, it may sound disappointing, but if Valve ships another 2 or 3 million units in the next year, then it will actually be a force in the gaming market. Developers won't ignore it, competitors will flock to the space, and Valve will continue to invest in it.

[nranger]

They simply are not sat on a shelf next to a switch. So people shopping for handheld devices are still buying nintendo switches, not decks.
I'm not talking about mail order, for devices like the deck they are still a tiny fraction of sales, mums and dads do still want to go into a store and try before they buy and have an assistant help them.

I'm curious if we'll actually see Deck's on store shelves though. Valve is selling them near cost directly through Steam. Having them in a store is way more logistics, plus the retailer is going to want some not insignificant profit, probably at least 20%.

Plus your local GameStop/Best Buy/Microcenter can sell a PS5 or an Xbox next to a shelf of extra controllers, memory cards, and a glass cabinet full of boxed games that all make them more money. A SteamDeck meanwhile pushes customers towards... buying games on Steam?

[mSparks]

I'm curious if we'll actually see Deck's on store shelves though. Valve is selling them near cost directly through Steam. Having them in a store is way more logistics, plus the retailer is going to want some not insignificant profit, probably at least 20%.

Plus your local GameStop/Best Buy/Microcenter can sell a PS5 or an Xbox next to a shelf of extra controllers, memory cards, and a glass cabinet full of boxed games that all make them more money. A SteamDeck meanwhile pushes customers towards... buying games on Steam?

Id hope so, it seems a significant amount of purchases at the moment were already linux users, and I dont mind at all paying a bit more for personal service and a place to take it if there is any kind of fault, I very rarely buy expensive hardware online simply because the post is so unreliable.

Still very early days I guess, PS4 had been out for 2 or 3 years before I switched from PS3, right now looking to replace the PS4 with a deck as soon as I can walk into a shop and buy it, but if they wait to long Ill get a PS5 instead.

[mdedetrich]

Apparently AYANEO is also building its own Linux OS: (AYANEO OS)

https://www.gamingonlinux.com/2023/0...ves-this-year/

So Valve will have a more direct SteamOS competitor in the Linux space if this materializes at retail.

If I was to buy an AYANEO I would be much more tempted to install SteamOS on it then use their own Linux OS.

[slalomsk8er]

I'm curious if we'll actually see Deck's on store shelves though. Valve is selling them near cost directly through Steam. Having them in a store is way more logistics, plus the retailer is going to want some not insignificant profit, probably at least 20%.

Plus your local GameStop/Best Buy/Microcenter can sell a PS5 or an Xbox next to a shelf of extra controllers, memory cards, and a glass cabinet full of boxed games that all make them more money. A SteamDeck meanwhile pushes customers towards... buying games on Steam?

I hope that now ROI for R&D is done and with economy of scale the cost of production comes down and allows for some margin for Valve in the Steam and Resellers if Valve sells to them at cost as do most consoles when new.

[mdedetrich]

I agree. Foundationally Fedora is just much better, but I agree that the RPMFusion situation is not the best. I've suffered from this myself too. I just wait until they get synced again and their versions match. It's a minor issue at the end of the day, but something that gives it an underserved bad image that I don't like either.

Still, having up to date packages is a blessing, and DNF is simply much more powerful than apt (though slower too).

Fedora and Arch are in stark contrast here. As a base system when only using official packages, Fedora is strong however the minute you need to use RPM packages outside of their supported channels (RPMFusion) you get into lots of issues. Arch on the other hand, both to the design of their package manager being much simpler and the fact that their community much more frequently uses packages outside of the supported channel (i.e. AUR)

[Almindor]

If HP or Dell shipped over a million units of one specific laptop SKU in 11 months, it would be considered a rousing success.

So SteamDeck as a gaming PC is incredibly successful. Compared to a Playstation or a Switch, it may sound disappointing, but if Valve ships another 2 or 3 million units in the next year, then it will actually be a force in the gaming market. Developers won't ignore it, competitors will flock to the space, and Valve will continue to invest in it.

You compare apples to oranges and come to conclusion that in the orange market, our apple sales would be wonderful.

Of course it would be great if Dell sold a single laptop SKU in those numbers, but SteamDeck is not a laptop. It's a gaming handheld competing directly with the likes of Nintendo Switch and the comparison there tells a story of a niche market success.

I'm afraid SteamDeck will end up a slightly more successful version of the SteamMachine. Better vision, centralized execution, good hardware and fair software but it just didn't penetrate the market deep enough.

I really hope I'm wrong as I use Linux for gaming exclusively now and Valve has made great strides there due to their focus on the SteamDeck.

[bernstein]

Of course it would be great if Dell sold a single laptop SKU in those numbers, but SteamDeck is not a laptop. It's a gaming handheld competing directly with the likes of Nintendo Switch and the comparison there tells a story of a niche market success.

Currently it’s neither. Valve may want to make it into a console competitor, but currently it’s a) a means to attract/bind more customers to steam b) something they personally want. Also don’t forget it’s the same hardware as the ps5/xbx, just for 720p instead of 4k.

I'm afraid SteamDeck will end up a slightly more successful version of the SteamMachine. Better vision, centralized execution, good hardware and fair software but it just didn't penetrate the market deep enough.

Depends on when valve brings it to store shelves. Just selling through steam limits it to hardcore gamers & those already on steam.

For me, it just kills all other storefronts on pc. Well, except GoG. I’ve been slowly creeping on to other storefronts like Epic, Ubi & Xbgpu. But this (steam proton) instantly kills them off. Sure proton&deck can be made to work with others. But even as a programmer-/linux-veteran i’ve no intention whatsoever of getting though that hassle. The magic lies in, it just works like a console, with the freedom of a linux pc. So i finally can “have that cake and eat it too”.