Today during the Ubisoft conference call where they discussed first-quarter 2021-2022 sales, Steam Deck got mentioned.
It's an interesting one, since Ubisoft has pretty much left Steam behind in favour of other stores like the Epic Games Store. The Epic store doesn't support Linux, and Epic currently have no intention to do so. So unless people are expected to manually load up Windows to replace SteamOS, companies like Ubisoft would need to bring their games back to Steam to give users a good experience.
During the conference call that we listened to today, a question was asked about the Steam Deck from one investor.
Ubisoft CEO Yves Guillemot replied to say "We're happy to see Steam Deck coming to the industry, it shows that it continues a flow of very innovative new hardware coming to the market and so we will look and see how big it becomes, but if it's big we will be able to put our games on it."
So in future if the device is a success, and plenty of people keep SteamOS 3 on it, we could see the likes of Ubisoft (and so perhaps other big publishers) ensure their games work nicely on it. Ubisoft actually already has Linux ports of some games, since they currently support Stadia (which uses Debian Linux) so it wouldn't be a huge stretch to bring those builds with some optimizations over to the Steam Deck. However, whether they decide to use native Linux builds they have direct control over, or rely on the Steam Play Proton compatibility layer we just don't know - and only time will tell on how it all goes on that.
Article taken from GamingOnLinux.com.
rustybroomhandle Jul 21, 2021
While it is weird to view a different form factor PC as a new platform, it does have some advantages. Most PC games will not have user interfaces that are optimised for small screens. UI/font scaling will be tiny on a lot of them. So if viewed as a platform, developers may actually add some UI tweaks to make it more comfortable to use.
The other thing is that publishers may have to skip over their crappy launchers to make the Big Screen Mode user experience better and more seamless.
Quoting: Tuxee..They have a device with a pre-installed shiny working frontend and - say - 80% of their games working. For the extra 20% which might work you have to prepare boot media, drivers, put up with no frontend designed for the device...The Deck frontend is the BPM redesigned, which means it will be available for Windows as well.
Quoting: kokoko3kQuoting: elmapulbut the issue is: people will just install windows on it.I don't see this like an issue at all:
- #1 Probably, Valve invested so much in Linux Gaming to sell this device.
- #2 They expected userbase to switch operating system *and* left the device open, they also states you can switch to Windows as a selling point.
Do we have to expect Valve to not invest in linux gaming anymore because of #2?
I find it illogical, Why the things should change after the first launch?
So, let windows gamers buy the steam deck and let them install windows on it, it will be a good thing for Valve and Linux gaming too.
As for Ubisoft, Big Coorps tend not to see things in deep depth, so if Steam deck will sell enough, probably they would port their games to it, regardless for what users would install on the console.
i didnt said that valve will stop investing in linux, i just want to break the need of protonDB by breaking the chicken and egg problem.
valve broke part of the chiken problem by making tons of games work on linux, now we need to break the egg problem (lack of users) but even that thing might not be enough to do such change.
i dont want linux to have "an subset of windows games" forever
as for ubisoft porting, i hope they will indeed, the issue is:
if most of the users keep linux at it, and this device sell like hotcakes, they will port for sure.
if most users install windows on it, then valve played their cards wrong again and linux might lose the only opportunity it ever had of actually growing.
on a side note, assuming that valve threat this thing like an console (stay with it for ~5 years instead of launching an sucessor all the time like on pc) and that no other company manage to enter this market with an better deal, how many units do you think this thing can sell before we start the next gen of devices? (nintendo launches switch 2, valve launches dex2 , sony/microsoft might try to enter this market)
i hope it sell as well as an console would, 80~150 millions, this is not as much as pc sell by any means, but its enough to convince all the biggest developers to support it.
i think it has the potential to sell 80 millions, maybe even 100 millions, not much more than this, but valve probably would launch an sequel before that happens and many games may only work on the latest devices as it happens to pc.
slaapliedje Jul 21, 2021
Quoting: dubigrasuQuoting: Tuxee..They have a device with a pre-installed shiny working frontend and - say - 80% of their games working. For the extra 20% which might work you have to prepare boot media, drivers, put up with no frontend designed for the device...The Deck frontend is the BPM redesigned, which means it will be available for Windows as well.
Is this fact or just guessing? Anyway, you are viewing that from the Linux user perspective which pretty much always has been forced to install an OS and setup the system. This is something rarely ever happens to Windows users.
Quoting: TuxeeQuoting: dubigrasuQuoting: Tuxee..They have a device with a pre-installed shiny working frontend and - say - 80% of their games working. For the extra 20% which might work you have to prepare boot media, drivers, put up with no frontend designed for the device...The Deck frontend is the BPM redesigned, which means it will be available for Windows as well.
Is this fact or just guessing? Anyway, you are viewing that from the Linux user perspective which pretty much always has been forced to install an OS and setup the system. This is something rarely ever happens to Windows users.
Quoteaustinp_valvehttps://steamcommunity.com/groups/bigpicture/discussions/1/5167301764850695635/#c5167301764854104718
Yes, we are replacing Big Picture with the new UI from Deck. We don't have an ETA to share yet though.
I haven't added any personal perspective to my comment, I just relayed a bit of information.
You don't need to use Windows to use EGS or other stores. There's Lutris.
Patreon
PayPal
See more from me