Steam Linux Usage Drops During August

[Nuc!eoN]

Don't forget about the whole "The survey doesn't pop up on Linux" issue for people who have an install on both Windows and Linux.

There are several people who report the survey popping up when they log into steam on Windows several times (not filling it out) but it never once popping up on Linux, even though their "account" was selected.

*disclaimer* Just what I've heard. Don't kill the messenger...

What survey? Never saw any :s

[IanS]

Steam hardware survey is mostly useless since there are no details included as to how many people participated from month to month. It is quite possible that Linux usage is actually rising at a steady pace, but if say Windows is getting even more new users in the same time frame then that steady rise in Linux could look like a small drop instead. Something to consider along these lines is back-to-school shopping, how many gamers got a new Windows-taxed laptop in the past month to take with them to school? Considering that there is an unusual spike in Windows 8 this month it could explain why Linux appears to be falling.

There is also no recent count of how many people use Steam (at least not available to the public), It has been about a year or more since they told us they were over 54 million active users, we have no clue what that number is at now, it could easily be over 60 million at this point, but since Valve tend to be tight-lipped when it comes to hard numbers we really can't tell. It would be safe to guess though that the overall active Steam user count has risen since Steam started publishing Linux percentages. Without that information though, it is hard to gauge the value of the Steam hardware survey numbers, we are only being given some of the pieces of the stat puzzle.

[migizi]

I think it still needs work. I was running Gentoo with Steam and the performance of just using the application was horrible. I switched to Debian for various reasons and the performance is better but they built the whole thing around a single distribution. Annoying as hell that i can't minimize the thing to the system tray. Right clicking the icon in the system tray has a huge delay. if the Steam window goes below a certain size it starts to have serious display corruption issues. In a couple of years I think they will have the Linux experience they need to make a nice fluid program that is distribution neutral. For now I'll continue to avoid buying my games on there and go directly to the developer/publisher. At least then I know the game is going to work. Hell I've had better success with Desura. Steam likes to lock up my WM if I launch a full screen game that isn't part of Steam.

[curaga]

Nobody guessed back-to-school? I am disappoint.

Hypothesis: Linux Steam users mainly consist of people in school (incl. uni). Schools generally start in August. Steam Linux shows a drop in August. Hmm...

[matzipan]

I would buy and install more titles if it would let me use a different folder to install my games. My linux partition has 20GB and only 2GB free... There's no way I can fit any good titles in that

[Sverro2]

You can select the folder you like to install games in. Settings > Downloads > steam library folders. Here you can add folders you like to install games in...

[sarmad]

The biggest problem is drivers. I, for example, have a laptop with an ATI hybrid graphics but I don't run the Catalyst driver because it kills the battery and I couldn't get to configure it properly. So now with a Sandy Bridge GPU games are pretty much unplayable. If we get proper drivers support and get it working out of the box, or at least easy to configure, usage will jump.

[hoohoo]

How is that possible ?

That does not make sense to me. Or are they just looking at sales ?

Then it could be simple, because there are not many new titles ?

I think a lack of good titles is the problem.

[matzipan]

You can select the folder you like to install games in. Settings > Downloads > steam library folders. Here you can add folders you like to install games in...

My productivity hates you...

[numasan]

I use Steam more and more, since it was released for Linux, but never got any survey...Still, 1% of 50 million Steam users is a decent chunck.

I'm not a huge gamer, definitely casual, so I like the titles available, but it would be great with more choices and bigger titles. It will take time though (years).

My biggest "problem" is all the Linux titles from HiB not available in Steam... In particular I'm looking at you SuperMeatBoy