We're seeing more reports of Steam for Chromebooks coming and Luke Short writing for Android Police thinks it will be soon. This would be a long time coming, after we've seen hints of it appearing for over a year now.
It won't be particularly helpful for a lot of the lower-end devices, but Chromebooks have been steadily getting bigger storage drives, with newer processors too that are much more capable. The new system that makes all this work is named Borealis, and it appears that as of November 29 it gained new "flags" regarding a Beta mode and a way to disabled "ChromeOS-specific integrations for the borealis client".
Not only that, there's also an earlier one from November 24 that mentions Borealis gained "support for Proton and SLR versions in Borealis game reports". Based on that wording, it appears they might have their own game compatibility database, which could end up looking something perhaps like Deck Verified for the Steam Deck.
Since Chrome OS is a Gentoo Linux-based operating system, it's another way that might help push up the Linux numbers on Steam. Although, it's possible Valve might tag it specifically as it's own thing since it's not really a "normal" Linux distribution, regardless, it will be running Linux native games and Windows games through Proton so it will still help Linux gaming as a whole.
Article taken from GamingOnLinux.com.
google is struggling to sell stadia, so steam is quite important for chromebook gamers, google will have to work harder on making sure steam work flawless on chromebooks (aka, make sure their sandbox for linux native apps dont have any major flaw) if they want to enter the operating system market.
Mohandevir Dec 3, 2021
Aside from the Steam Deck, it's probably the other big Linux initiative that could push Linux adoption, imo. The Borealis "container" was (last time I checked) an Ubuntu VM, so it still helps getting games running on Linux, even if you are not a fan of Google.
Thing is, Chromebooks have a much bigger audience than Linux desktop. So, let's wait and see what kind of Chromebooks will be available for that kind of use-case and if there is a lot of interrest for gaming in the Chromebook user pool (or if it will draw new gamers to the platform).
Last edited by Mohandevir on 3 December 2021 at 2:32 pm UTC
Quoting: elmapulthat make things... interesting.
google is struggling to sell stadia, so steam is quite important for chromebook gamers, google will have to work harder on making sure steam work flawless on chromebooks (aka, make sure their sandbox for linux native apps dont have any major flaw) if they want to enter the operating system market.
Now imagine if Stadia would have gotten the publishers to publish the native Linux version of the games running on Stadia how much easier it would be for Google to have some games on their Chromebooks right now :-)
Quoting: F.UltraSo who feels like they're only going ahead with this because Stadia is failing?Quoting: elmapulthat make things... interesting.
google is struggling to sell stadia, so steam is quite important for chromebook gamers, google will have to work harder on making sure steam work flawless on chromebooks (aka, make sure their sandbox for linux native apps dont have any major flaw) if they want to enter the operating system market.
Now imagine if Stadia would have gotten the publishers to publish the native Linux version of the games running on Stadia how much easier it would be for Google to have some games on their Chromebooks right now :-)
Mohandevir Dec 3, 2021
Quoting: Purple Library GuyQuoting: F.UltraSo who feels like they're only going ahead with this because Stadia is failing?Quoting: elmapulthat make things... interesting.
google is struggling to sell stadia, so steam is quite important for chromebook gamers, google will have to work harder on making sure steam work flawless on chromebooks (aka, make sure their sandbox for linux native apps dont have any major flaw) if they want to enter the operating system market.
Now imagine if Stadia would have gotten the publishers to publish the native Linux version of the games running on Stadia how much easier it would be for Google to have some games on their Chromebooks right now :-)
Maybe, but the Borealis project was started a while ago... Even before Stadia's official release, if my memory doesn't fail me... It might be a factor explaining why they are giving up that quickly on Stadia, though.
Last edited by Mohandevir on 3 December 2021 at 5:06 pm UTC
Quoting: MohandevirI just figure if Stadia had really taken off they would likely have let this wither on the vine. It's a fallback. One they knew they might need, so they made overtures and started plans, but if Stadia meant they didn't need this I suspect their first preference would have been to do a kind of Apple-but-in-the-cloud thing, controlling the whole experience end to end . . . and incidentally, not depending on the little Chromebooks' actual on-board capabilities as much.Quoting: Purple Library GuySo who feels like they're only going ahead with this because Stadia is failing?
Maybe, but the Borealis project was started a while ago... Even before Stadia's official release, if my memory doesn't fail me... It might be a factor explaining why they are giving up that quickly on Stadia, though.
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