Every month Valve put out their hardware survey, inside it shows off the market-share of operating systems and Linux has continued to decline.
For September 2017, Linux was at 0.60%. This is far from where Linux market-share on Steam was some time ago, although it has never been all that high anyway.
Here's a chart provided to me by EndeavourAccuracy (thanks!), which shows the unfortunate trend:
There could be many reasons for this, all of which I've probably mentioned before at some point. The one thing I would like to stress though, is that market-share declining doesn't necessarily mean less people. The amount of people using Linux for gaming on Steam, might actually be increasing, just not as quickly as Windows so it gets swallowed up. We know for a fact Steam is constantly growing and perhaps in markets where Linux isn't popular pushing the Linux share down. However, the opposite could obviously be true too.
I don't claim to have any answers on it. All we can do is speculate, since we know nothing about how Valve actually pick the systems that get selected for a survey. We know nothing about the numbers behind the percentages, or well, anything really.
We do need to take into account people who dual-boot, which isn't going to be a small number. Even our own limited survey shows about 31.78% of people also use Windows.
Obviously it's not good to see this trend, but as long as Linux games sell enough for a developer to be happy, that's the main point. Going by the last time I spoke to multiple developers about sales of their Linux games, most games mentioned in that article were selling well above the current percentage of Linux gamers as tracked by Steam.
I highly doubt Feral Interactive would also be announcing another Linux port, if the real amount of Linux gamers was declining either, since the types of titles they port would likely need a lot of sales to be worth it, yet they have two new titles currently being teased for Linux.
What are your thoughts on this?
Article taken from GamingOnLinux.com.
Also there have been insane improvements to the the prerequisites to gaming on GNU/Linux: the graphics stacks have gotten way better and there are a lot of cross platform engines (like Unity for example).
The absolute amount of games we have on GNU/Linux already surpasses any console that I am aware of. It is not all AAA games but quite a few of them.
Gaming on GNU/Linux has never been more valid than it is today.
Mountain Man Oct 3, 2017
Quoting: peterp771... it's interesting that on the one hand we have the Netmarketshare story (even if it's not quite as earth-shattering as it first seemed), and on the other we have this. I think it just reflects the poor state of the Linux gaming market. Overall we're on the rise, but gaming is still difficult.I've mentioned it before, but the choice is basically, "Do I use Windows and have access to all the games, or use Linux and have access to only a small fraction of them?" For anybody who wants to play games on the PC, Linux simply doesn't look like a viable option compared to Windows.
Those of us who were already vested in Linux are thrilled with the improved game support we've seen over the past several years, but Valve has done an exceptionally poor job making the argument that anybody else should prefer Linux as a gaming platform.
elbuglione Oct 3, 2017
Mountain Man Oct 3, 2017
Quoting: Comandante ÑoñardoA Linux exclusive AAA game with super amazing graphics and gameplay is the only thing that can revert this trend...They might come, but will they stay? That's the important question.
You see.. Most PC gamers install an illegal windows distro just for to play (legally or illegally) the game of the moment..
If there is an Ultra AAA game and is Linux exclusive, they will come to Linux just for to play this game.
Quoting: Comandante ÑoñardoA Linux exclusive AAA game with super amazing graphics and gameplay is the only thing that can revert this trend...No one ever will burn his cash to develop Linux exclusive AAA title.
You see.. Most PC gamers install an illegal windows distro just for to play (legally or illegally) the game of the moment..
If there is an Ultra AAA game and is Linux exclusive, they will come to Linux just for to play this game.
Do you ever imagine what's to spend nearly $50 mln to develop AAA game for 400k consumers on the market? Even if you sell $60 per copy each 2nd gamer in the market, you will gain $12 mln back.
No, it's nonsense. Nobody will burn a few dozens millions of US dollars. And Steam will never allow there Linux exclusive title in foreseeble future.
I admit, there are tiny chance, to develop a multiplatfor AAA title and make this title Linux exclusive for a limited time (alpha, beta test, 30..60 or even 365 days after release).
Like people were pushed to buy a console to play GTA V after release instead getting the game immediatly on Windows PC.
Quoting: Mountain ManHead start of gaming titles on Linux (not on consoles, Mac or Windows) could do better job without burning cash to develop AAA games for small group of customers.Quoting: Comandante ÑoñardoA Linux exclusive AAA game with super amazing graphics and gameplay is the only thing that can revert this trend...They might come, but will they stay? That's the important question.
You see.. Most PC gamers install an illegal windows distro just for to play (legally or illegally) the game of the moment..
If there is an Ultra AAA game and is Linux exclusive, they will come to Linux just for to play this game.
appetrosyan Oct 3, 2017
Quoting: prosoorBecause there are less and less games for Linux.
Valve is not pushing SteomOS like it used to; maybe they abandoned SteamOS idea?
What it means is, game publishers have no incentive to make Linux ports anymore.
I suspect bribery.
I don't think Valve know what they want.
When they fist pitched the SteamOS idea, it wasn't quite clear why it was a competitive console. I mean, if it has a variety of PC hardware, it'll perform as well as a PC, but cost as much as a PC would, without any guarantee of a hassle free experience. It's not a superior console, but an Inferior Gaming rig.
Making matters worse, Wine is completely independent. The team has had more experience with running games, there's more of them, and the developers don't need to do Jack. Valve could have been in a far better place right now, if instead of porting source to Linux, they've said:
"Well, let's create a native client that runs wine for most programs and if a game is reported to run well, gives it a badge 'SteamOS compatible'."
That way, you have all the "Officially supported" games we have now from day one. Many new releases will be available right on, and with some tweaking, run as well as on Windows. And also since you know, that it's using a wrapper (currently almost everything uses SDL anyway), you won't be bombarding the poor devs with crap comments, you tweak the Wine settings to get the best you can. This is what we're good at - tinkering, and they completely ignore that.
And in all fairness, Carmack was right.
QuoteLinux is unsuitable for business. Maybe as a development environment, but not as a target. But if I were to push for games on Linux, I'd focus on such projects as Wine
Quoting: legluondunetAnd what about the linux game sales on GOG?
They aren't public, so there is no data to evaluate. Humble Bundle have public stats. Steam for the reference have no sales stats either. Their survey is not sales data.
So, when a data says Linux is going down in %, i wonder if i'm blind, or if the data translates its information into something else.
I do think China has its part, based on the so many chinese comments and request for translation i'm seeing poping everywhere (just like "Linux +1"), but only a part. Maybe it's only because the total amount is growing massively, and Linux is growing in raw number, but not in global %. Maybe the Steam Survey is biased (i almost never get surveyed,b ut i did last week).
According to developers i have contact with, they are all happy to support Linux, for politic reasons very often, and they at worst don't lose money, at best of course it's completely worthy.
So... i don't know, i am only a random Linux user, and i don't see myself going back to Windows again, never. Just to think about it, brrr... My computer's life is honestly easier since i'm not dual-booting anymore (it was with WinXP then Win7).
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