Feral Interactive have no plans to update their Linux ports for Steam Deck

I love Feral and I respect a lot their work, they are amazing. But yeah, fragmentation IS a issue, and Linux do a little to support older softwares (which is comprehensive) while Windows has a system bloated to just works™.

As their ports doesn't runs in a container, sooner or later it will stop working.

good point, as an reminder, we CANT blame feral for only supporting one distro, its the fragmentation fault that things wich work on one might not work on others to begin with, not feral fault.

I'd expect the contract to port to be very specific with regards to what they are porting to, probably down to a specific distro/version. Imagine if you were told to port a game to "every Linux distro"; it would be impossible! Maybe some people here who do porting or freelance work have better insight, but it seems sensible to me to be very specific on the deliverables as a protection from client abuse/allegations.

android is a distro, imagine geting permission to port to android because you can port to ubuntu...
companies would never allow that

Absolutely disgusting statement from Feral but their GNU+Linux native games will work on any distro. It's not like they can restrict them to Ubuntu.

I'm not buying anymore games they've ported or developed going forward, which is fine by me.

Such comments really disturb me and it happens again and again. If a company invests in Linux gaming and drops out or just skips a title for any reason, everyone screams evil and boycot.
Easier to ignore us. If valve makes the game somewhat playable, people will buy.

Feral had a key role in making LinuxGaming as awesome as it is today. It's sad they are not profiting from the current momentum. At the same time it's awesome we are not dependent on porting houses and their ability to get publishers into a contract any more. These contracts often were strangely restricted, we are aware of that for a long time. It's not their games and if the publisher doesn't make it worthwhile for them, they have done their job and are not forced to do work for no pay. Times have changed and they are free to go on. We should wish them luck and maybe they will play a role in the future.

Amen, and I hope so.

Proton is great, but if it puts an end to native ports, it could wind up being a real can of worms!

I mean look at web browsers for example: they've all become chromium clones or lookalikes because of a certain browser being bundled in so many installers over the years. Firefox webextensions can't do half of what XUL addons could, and none of the forks are tenable in the long term. Now most browsers all look and act the same, and I hate it!

The current generation of programmers seem dead-set on taking choices away from the user... phooey!

I guess it's another win for Valve and Open source successes. I guess I feel slightly conflicted about it. While I appreciate Feral's work, I'm also glad that open source tools like Wine/Proton have finally taken over in a meaningful way.

I guess it's both a loss and a gain.

it is a loss.
on one hand, its good that an general purpose solution like wine/proton is better than porting, but that says more about the porting process and quality than about wine.
the ideal solution is linux geting enough marketshare to be threated like an first class citizen and open apis like vulkan becoming the standard.
its almost like if we were living the flash era vs html5 era, flash was multiplatform but had an crap support for linux, where html5 would be the "native" solution, using open standards.
while wine is gpl, directX isnt.

Is it? I'm under the impression most of these porting companies use wrappers, don't they? It's not like they all rewrote the binary and renderer into openGL. Maybe some did, but Valve has toGL, I forget what Aspry's wrapper was, etc. I'd bet some of these older ports looked a lot like a windows game under the hood, and the proprietary porting tech worked a lot like wine in some cases. Heck, there are even projects using DXVK as a wrapper for porting. I believe there are a number of Linux releases on GOG that are essentially wrapped with Wine.

I guess what I'm trying to say is that, in a sense, we've put the power to "port" into our own hands, at a level simple users like me can leverage. And if a "native" port is just using its own wrappers and layers under the hood, is there really a huge moral difference there?

take a look at this conference, where the company who ported dying light to linux comment about the porting process:
https://www.gamingonlinux.com/2015/04/techland-presentation-on-porting-dying-light-to-linux/

TL:DR, it was impossible to rewrite the code writen by 200 employees with only 2~3 employees, especially considering that the game was still under development and as a result the code was changing all the time, so they had to seek for paterns and make an translator or layer or soomething akin to that.
but if they relied only on this layers, the performance would tank and no computer in the world would be able to play the game in an acceptable framerate even on minimal setings, so they had to manually optimize any bootnecks.

i think that is how you port anything, write an general purpose code converter, then look at the profilers to see what is kiling the performance and optimize by hand.

as for anyone who want to complain that 'this or that company' is lazy, then go port something, there are plenty of open source projects on github that are windows only.
in the mean time, try to turn this ports of you into an sustainable business model, and if you can, you can complain about feral all you want.

They do not have contracts for the IPs for SteamDeck. I think it's as simple as that.

A lot of the games they ported would be a good experience on steamdeck. But that would require the publishers to agree for the revenue cut to go to feral, without that it makes no sense for them.

And supporting steamos 3 .. seriously is a non issue technically.


Last edited by STiAT on 21 February 2022 at 9:00 pm UTC

It was the Feral port of Alien: Isolation that brought me back to normal gaming. I am grateful to them for that to this day.

Alien Isolation is much better in proton. Surround sound works. DXVK is much faster than their OpenGL stuff. And you can use the Alias Isolation mod to vastly improve the graphics.

I believe there are a number of Linux releases on GOG that are essentially wrapped with Wine.

Not just GoG. Iron Sky Invasion on Steam, for example, is just wrapped in vanilla Wine.

And then there are the Eon ports (Witcher 2, Bioshock Infinite, Saint's Row 3 and 4, etc.), which is just the Windows binary in a proprietary equivalent to Wine.

All Feral is saying in that statement is that they currently don't have plans to specifically bring games that have already been released to steam deck, which is true for the vast majority of steam games for most publishers. Companies don't want to spent resources on something that probably won't make much money.

They are not saying that they won't optimize future ports for Steam Deck and they are also not saying that no game that has already been ported will ever receive attention for a better experience on the deck, there just aren't any plans for that currently.

FWIW macOS versions of DLC for the likes of BioShock Infinite have been pulled from Steam. Linux versions still available. I still give them props for gamemode. I surmise Aspyr have gone for greener pastures long ago (Switch and PC) while Feral Interactive are still trying to figure out their game plan.

Sad, but true.

They are not saying that they won't optimize future ports for Steam Deck and they are also not saying that no game that has already been ported will ever receive attention for a better experience on the deck, there just aren't any plans for that currently.

Guys! It's not the porters task to change functionality and/or GUI of the ported source! Y'all are aiming at the wrong guy here.

Feral makes ports of the source provided. Period. If there needs to be made alterations of the source, being it the GUI or game mechanics, controller support or whatnot - it's changes that needs to be done within the source! When that is done - and only then - should Feral take over the task of porting this patch to their ported version.

I seriously doubt they contractually even COULD do such changes even if they wanted to!


Last edited by Beamboom on 22 February 2022 at 3:55 pm UTC

I guess it's another win for Valve and Open source successes. I guess I feel slightly conflicted about it. While I appreciate Feral's work, I'm also glad that open source tools like Wine/Proton have finally taken over in a meaningful way.

I guess it's both a loss and a gain.

it is a loss.
on one hand, its good that an general purpose solution like wine/proton is better than porting, but that says more about the porting process and quality than about wine.
the ideal solution is linux geting enough marketshare to be threated like an first class citizen and open apis like vulkan becoming the standard.
its almost like if we were living the flash era vs html5 era, flash was multiplatform but had an crap support for linux, where html5 would be the "native" solution, using open standards.
while wine is gpl, directX isnt.

Is it? I'm under the impression most of these porting companies use wrappers, don't they? It's not like they all rewrote the binary and renderer into openGL. Maybe some did, but Valve has toGL, I forget what Aspry's wrapper was, etc. I'd bet some of these older ports looked a lot like a windows game under the hood, and the proprietary porting tech worked a lot like wine in some cases. Heck, there are even projects using DXVK as a wrapper for porting. I believe there are a number of Linux releases on GOG that are essentially wrapped with Wine.

I guess what I'm trying to say is that, in a sense, we've put the power to "port" into our own hands, at a level simple users like me can leverage. And if a "native" port is just using its own wrappers and layers under the hood, is there really a huge moral difference there?

take a look at this conference, where the company who ported dying light to linux comment about the porting process:
https://www.gamingonlinux.com/2015/04/techland-presentation-on-porting-dying-light-to-linux/

TL:DR, it was impossible to rewrite the code writen by 200 employees with only 2~3 employees, especially considering that the game was still under development and as a result the code was changing all the time, so they had to seek for paterns and make an translator or layer or soomething akin to that.
but if they relied only on this layers, the performance would tank and no computer in the world would be able to play the game in an acceptable framerate even on minimal setings, so they had to manually optimize any bootnecks.

i think that is how you port anything, write an general purpose code converter, then look at the profilers to see what is kiling the performance and optimize by hand.

as for anyone who want to complain that 'this or that company' is lazy, then go port something, there are plenty of open source projects on github that are windows only.
in the mean time, try to turn this ports of you into an sustainable business model, and if you can, you can complain about feral all you want.

Thanks! I'll try to check it out on my lunch break. I think it totally make sense that a porter would use a layer/translation tool/wrapper, especially if it is a business trying to maximize efficiency. I wasn't trying to imply the porters are lazy or anything, my apologies if it came off that way.

I know, some people are still clinging to the "No Tux, No Bux" mantra, but in reality, we're unlikely to see another major AAA game on Linux native anytime soon.

And I'd say "Good riddance!".
NTNB FTW all the way!

i hope you at least play the games even if you have to pirate then, otherwise the only one losing will be yourself, and you will regreat(sic) it later looking back.

Rest assured, I have more than I will ever be able to finish. All Linux native. Most on GOG, some on itch.io or Humble. Had not to "pirate" a game in a long time (sinse 2012 at least). Oh, and I have exactly 0 (zero) "Feral games" on my Steal library because… I have no Steam library.

I know, some people are still clinging to the "No Tux, No Bux" mantra, but in reality, we're unlikely to see another major AAA game on Linux native anytime soon.

And I'd say "Good riddance!".
NTNB FTW all the way!

i hope you at least play the games even if you have to pirate then, otherwise the only one losing will be yourself, and you will regreat(sic) it later looking back.

Rest assured, I have more than I will ever be able to finish. All Linux native. Most on GOG, some on itch.io or Humble. Had not to "pirate" a game in a long time (sinse 2012 at least). Oh, and I have exactly 0 (zero) "Feral games" on my Steal library because… I have no Steam library.

its not about the ammount of games, but the time you spend playing then, its worth?
there are tons of free games for android that, while they are free, they dont worth our time.
time is the most important thing in life, money? you can won on lotery and get rich and never need to worry about it again, but time? you cant recover that, and you only realize when its too late.
yes, i'm talking about myself.

Thanks! I'll try to check it out on my lunch break. I think it totally make sense that a porter would use a layer/translation tool/wrapper, especially if it is a business trying to maximize efficiency. I wasn't trying to imply the porters are lazy or anything, my apologies if it came off that way.

i has been a long time since i saw this video for the second/last time, so feel free to correct me if i made any mistake about its content, my memory isnt perfect after all.

in any case i didnt wanted to say that you implied that porters are lazy, i was just predicting that someone would come with that argument and replying it before it could ever happen to save time/headache for my future self.

Yes but updates and DLC will cease to work if released after Feral license. So you just gotta be careful. Also likely multiplayer cross-platform doesn't work due to patches halting on feral version if game has it.

Lord Carmack prophesized this ages ago; emulation is the way forward for Linux. His will be done.

You mean translation-layer... Emulation is what Console-Emulators do, wine/proton/dxvk/vkd3d are translation layers.

its not about the ammount(sic) of games, but the time you spend playing then, its worth?
there are tons of free games for android that, while they are free, they dont(sic) worth our time. time is the most important thing in life, money? you can won on lotery(sic) and get rich and never need to worry about it again, but time? you cant recover that, and you only realize when its too late.
yes, i'm talking about myself.

Are you serious right now?

So, having a loot run in "Project Zomboid" or building an empire in "X4: Foundations" is somehow worthless, while shooting General Barkovs and G-12s at the "Death Road" or smashing Lenin statues while reading some weepy notes of "GULAG victims" in "Tomb Raider" is a worthwhile activity? Are you implying there are "True Gamers" playing only the best games, while my ex-boss (for example) playing some chess on his "Windows 98" PC at lunch breaks every day just wastes his time on garbage?

Please, come to your senses! We are discussing games, effectively a time wasters, no matter what appearance they have. There are no "must play" "cult classic" games, only those that are fun (to you) and those that are not. And "AAA" does not make a game fun. Expensive? Sure. Resource-demanding? Most probably (those GPUs won't sell themselves, after all). But fun? Nope.

I say it again: good riddance! Good bye to "lootboxes", "game passes", "microtransactions", "always-online DRM" and other exciting attributes of modern "AAA games".

I spent many a happy hour on the Tomb Raiders, Deus Ex, Hitman and XCOM 2. I had no Windows partition (long gone by then) and was very excited to play them on Linux. Some of the few games I was actually happy to pay full price for. Thank you Feral.

It would be more smart, if they would use Proton tech to manage the compatibility for games.

That way they could sell TW TWH3 from Release day on and do special optimizations.

But hey, they can use their in House tech too, deliver month later and probably without working multiplayer.