Overkill drops Linux support for PAYDAY 2

Very disappointed with this to be honest. Payday 2 was one of the first games I was amazed to have linux support, I played it so much at that point.

I understand their reasoning, though in my opinion it doesn't bode well for Payday 3.

I imagine a lot of the team's allocated to Payday 3, so it makes sense they probably just don't have the technical resources available to maintain multiple OS support in the engine. Better than them pulling the same old excuse of "Linux users are all hackers" or similar. At least it still works well with Proton, so nothing significant lost!

Quoting: TurkeysteaksVery disappointed with this to be honest. Payday 2 was one of the first games I was amazed to have linux support, I played it so much at that point.

I understand their reasoning, though in my opinion it doesn't bode well for Payday 3.

Their reasoning is most likely not wanting to implement EOS into the native version, despite EOS having a native linux build. I can tell when Overkill are using PR speak to cover up for a a lie, and this is one of those times.

It's really frustrating too, It was a damn good port.


Last edited by Dribbleondo on 8 June 2023 at 4:36 pm UTC

Quotebut the ultimate reason is pretty much the same as always — Linux and Steam Deck together hold a less than 2% user share on Steam

Sorry, but no, that's wrong. The reason is this:

Quotedue to the Linux version being on an older version of the PAYDAY 2 engine

I.e. a terrible development environment, the developers being bad at their job.

That quote right there, that tells me that they kept the Linux codebase in a separate fork. That's bad praxis, that's objectively incompetent.

Forking the codebase to put in support for another platform is fundamentally wrong, and we see, time and time again, that this leads to the codebases growing apart with the developers not being able to keep up keeping them in sync, and then abandoning the other platform. 90% of the time were we had Linux support being wiped away was because of this very reason. Why aren't people learning? You don't do that.

Instead, you need to make portability a feature of your code outright, you need to make the same single codebase run on all the individual platforms. No forks, just one portable repository that can run everywhere. That's not new knowledge either, we've known that for decades!

Quoting: JowseyAt least it still works well with Proton, so nothing significant lost!

On the flip side we could look at it and say something is gained. Now that the steam deck is here and pretty much people are exclusively using proton to game on modern titles, the motivation to make their next game work on proton may be higher as it is not seen as a 'moving target' like Linux is often portrayed as by developers and it must be easier to test if their build works on proton.
Of course there is the issue with anti-cheat, but again given the success and popularity of the steam deck, hopefully they are now aware of this and make the adjustments necessary.

But did they EVER actually fix the mic issue with the Linux version?

I could write a whole book on what I think about what Apple is doing, but for the sake of my mental health and inner peace, I'll abstain :P

Quoting: DrMcCoy

Quotebut the ultimate reason is pretty much the same as always — Linux and Steam Deck together hold a less than 2% user share on Steam

Sorry, but no, that's wrong. The reason is this:

Quotedue to the Linux version being on an older version of the PAYDAY 2 engine

I.e. a terrible development environment, the developers being bad at their job.

What I said still isn't wrong. If it was financially worth it, they would do it and they would have kept it up with other changes in the background. Debate the finer details of what it all would entail, and what they should have done, but the reasoning is exactly as I said and anyone saying otherwise at this point is deluded.

Quoting: Liam DaweIf it was financially worth it, they would do it and they would have kept it up with other changes in the background

So I guess I shouldn't have said "you're wrong", but "that's the wrong point to make"? Because, yes, if we had a higher market share, they might have done that, but it's still the wrong thing to do. Heck, I don't want them to do that.

Quoting: DrMcCoy

Quotebut the ultimate reason is pretty much the same as always — Linux and Steam Deck together hold a less than 2% user share on Steam

Sorry, but no, that's wrong. The reason is this:

Quotedue to the Linux version being on an older version of the PAYDAY 2 engine

I.e. a terrible development environment, the developers being bad at their job.

That quote right there, that tells me that they kept the Linux codebase in a separate fork. That's bad praxis, that's objectively incompetent.

Forking the codebase to put in support for another platform is fundamentally wrong, and we see, time and time again, that this leads to the codebases growing apart with the developers not being able to keep up keeping them in sync, and then abandoning the other platform. 90% of the time were we had Linux support being wiped away was because of this very reason. Why aren't people learning? You don't do that.

Instead, you need to make portability a feature of your code outright, you need to make the same single codebase run on all the individual platforms. No forks, just one portable repository that can run everywhere. That's not new knowledge either, we've known that for decades!

Payday 2's lua is largely consistent to that of Windows. While there are Linux-specific pieces of code (and vice versa), it's not nearly to the extent you're implying here.