Without any warning, Eleventh Hour Games have completely dropped support for and completely removed the Native Linux version of Last Epoch.
Initially, the patch notes didn't even mention Linux at all, but were later updated with the Steam Deck section expanded to include the notice. In the changelog they state "We’re no longer building a native Linux client and recommend Linux players use Proton on Linux which provides a much better experience".
For people who purchased specifically because it was advertised and sold on having a Native Linux version, it's not great and their communication after the fact is not a good look either. That said, Valve's Proton often really does offer a better experience. A lot of the time because of various game engine issues and/or just not a lot of time spent improving the Linux version. So Linux desktop and Steam Deck players can thankfully still play the game. From what I've seen, many players were already using Proton for it due to various problems.
The game currently has a Steam Deck Playable rating with Proton 9.
As for their promised Steam Deck improvements, they have now added UI scaling options with the latest update. However, a recent announcement noted they've pushed back some other changes as they "feel it’s important that when we say we are Steam Deck verified, players can trust that the experience they will receive on the Steam Deck is up to snuff with our expectations for player experience". So more to come there in future.
Article taken from GamingOnLinux.com.
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EagleDelta Sep 20
Quoting: RuohtasThis is especially egregious for those of us that backed the KS specifically due to the native Linux client. They only met their funding goal by about $45K, and that could have been due to the Linux version availability.
And I can tell you now as I've spent a LOT of time on developing to improve margins. 45K isn't enough to fund a Linux version itself.
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Quoting: constHowever, they could still provide an old Linux build as beta for those who are stubborn about "native" builds.
Terrible idea. Then the Steam forums would be full of complaints about missing features and bugs - which besides would never be fixed.
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pleasereadthemanual Sep 20
Situations like this are proof that having a Native Linux port is no guarantee of continued support. Proton doesn't offer any guarantees either, but it's certainly more reliable.
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Quoting: TightRopeRealistically, I would rather a studio just make one good version and make sure it runs well on proton. Be up front about that decision. I know money is a big factor. I don't want a bad version, no one patches, handed to me to play.
I bought Kingdom Come Deliverance on Kickstarter many years ago, with the promise of a native Linux version. They pulled out of that at the last minute. I still have it in my library and have never played it. It pisses me off every time I look at it.
I got it refunded and later in a bundle for free. Still never played it. But back in the day I would back pretty much anything that promised a Linux version. Things have changed dramatically over the last couple of years. Now my pile of shame is growing every month and pretty much any title would be playable on my Linux rig.
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Quoting: nenoroIt's fine
the game was good before they started to add that pollution named "chat" like in D4 it takes so much space on the UI, it's annoying you can't get rid of because they wanted to go online than solo.
This game had potential then useless players asked for online feature...
It could have been at the same level as Grim Dawn
You can run the game in true offline offline mode which runs only locally and has no online connection at all, therefore no chat.
Unfortunately their language around this is terrible and extremely confusing. There's
Online Online
Online Offline
Offline Offline
modes of play. You have to launch it with a specific option to get into offline offline. That's how I played the entire game through to the endgame and had an absolute blast, and had no chat at all, which I completely agree with you: is super annoying.
Regarding this post: I feel the same as what others have said: This seems totally okay to me, but they should have done a WAY better job communicating this to their players and fans. The way they did it with no comms at all is so amateur hour. They're a big studio, they should know way better.
Last edited by Jarmer on 20 September 2024 at 6:12 pm UTC
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This is becoming a common occurrence it would seem.
I do understand the reasoning for it as proton has become the better option. I recently decided to play Dirt Rally and was forced to use proton to get the game running as the native version is now completely broken. I am getting better reliability and performance using proton as well.
I think native builds will soon become a thing of the past until such a time that Linux market share grows to a big enough number to justify the extra work.
I do understand the reasoning for it as proton has become the better option. I recently decided to play Dirt Rally and was forced to use proton to get the game running as the native version is now completely broken. I am getting better reliability and performance using proton as well.
I think native builds will soon become a thing of the past until such a time that Linux market share grows to a big enough number to justify the extra work.
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To me, this serves as a good example for why I wouldn't trust game developers to support Linux with a native build, unless the game and/or engine is Open Source.
Even if a certain game developer uses a FOSS game engine that supports Linux, that doesn't necessarily mean the game will support Linux.
Also, it's incredibly hard for game developers to release their source code in this day and age.
Even if a certain game developer uses a FOSS game engine that supports Linux, that doesn't necessarily mean the game will support Linux.
Also, it's incredibly hard for game developers to release their source code in this day and age.
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Quoting: EagleDeltaHonestly, I get really annoyed by the "Proton/WINE isn't native" arguments. If WINE or Proton were Emulation tools, I'd agree, but where emulation tries to mimic hardware and other aspects that simply can't be done "natively", WINE and Proton's other tools are actually rebuilding the Windows and DX APIs for use within Linux. As such, Proton/WINE are absolutely native but the very definition of what an API does. I'm speaking of this as a Software Dev myself that works with various APIs every day. I've said it before and I'll say it again, if WINE/Proton isn't "native", then no API is native.
Agreed. Most people don't realize it, on Windows, WoW64 is a translation layer as well. It stands for Windows (32bit) on Windows64. All the old Windows 32 bit games are going through a translation layer. Any games that install to the Program Files(32) folder all run through WoW64.
Edit: Back in the day, WINE released a libwine library for Windows applications. If you programmed with libwine that would make your program compatible with Linux using WINE. I don't know how much use it got or if it ever got any traction. But, I've said this before, Valve should be developing a libproton library. Or at the very least investing in libwine and promoting that. Future games starting with libproton and Vulkan would be 100% compatible with Linux at that point and use 1:1 translations just like WoW64 does for older Windows programs and games.
Last edited by Highball on 20 September 2024 at 7:20 pm UTC
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Quoting: HighballEdit: Back in the day, WINE released a libwine library for Windows applications. If you programmed with libwine that would make your program compatible with Linux using WINE. I don't know how much use it got or if it ever got any traction. But, I've said this before, Valve should be developing a libproton library. Or at the very least investing in libwine and promoting that. Future games starting with libproton and Vulkan would be 100% compatible with Linux at that point and use 1:1 translations just like WoW64 does for older Windows programs and games.I think Winelib is still a thing, at least the user guide looks up to date?
But its a native port by any other name. With the same problems. You need active developer support, you have two versions to keep up to date, you need to manage dependencies etc.
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Quoting: whizseQuoting: HighballEdit: Back in the day, WINE released a libwine library for Windows applications. If you programmed with libwine that would make your program compatible with Linux using WINE. I don't know how much use it got or if it ever got any traction. But, I've said this before, Valve should be developing a libproton library. Or at the very least investing in libwine and promoting that. Future games starting with libproton and Vulkan would be 100% compatible with Linux at that point and use 1:1 translations just like WoW64 does for older Windows programs and games.I think Winelib is still a thing, at least the user guide looks up to date?
But its a native port by any other name. With the same problems. You need active developer support, you have two versions to keep up to date, you need to manage dependencies etc.
Hmmm, that is not how I remember libwine(Winelib). What a mistake. Valve definitely needs a libproton(Protonlib, haha) then.
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