Quoting: lucifertdarkI see this as a good thing, recently a developer stated they couldn't port to Linux because, in their own words, they didn't have a Linux pc, well that excuse is now null & void thanks to Steam Play, there's absolutely NO excuse for Developers to ignore Linux any longer.

To be fair that was a completely ridiculous excuse to begin with and they probably just don't want to bother. Installing user-friendly distros is child's play in this day and age, not to mention the availability of live CDs, dual booting and virtual machines. It's not like they need to buy a dedicated/additional machine or pay for licenses.

Quoting: aFoxNamedMorrisLiam, I'm pretty sure that only whitelisted Windows titles count as Linux purchases. Could be wrong, but I was under that impression from their initial announcement.

They said "Proton counts as Linux." Anything you run in Steam Play mode uses Proton.

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Quoting: BraqoonThey should add RAGE, worked out of the box on wine for me.

It froze on me during the second cinematic, but on the second run I was able to get to the gameplay and keep going for a little while. Steam Controller integration isn't great, though. Shame my mice are showing their age and won't do for FPS's anymore.

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Quoting: jarhead_hLinux only has to be the second biggest and we still get the AAA titles, the creative suites, Fusion360, etc. We'll be large enough to be catered to like the Apple cult. That's all we need.

I wonder about that. Perception is a hell of a drug. Even if Linux earns more share than Mac on the desktop, I wouldn't be surprised if it remains marginalized for a good while because it's free and liberating (vs Apple's high-paying consumers who are used to being restricted and led by a leash) and associated with nerds (vs Apple's image of luxury and style). I'm not saying we won't get there, mind you, but I'm not at all certain that being the second largest userbase will cut it on its own.

Quoting: oldeschoolLooks likes this is happening a bunch of people have been requesting a Linux port of City of Brass; the developer finally replied with a link to the announcement of Steam Play.

On the other hand, that doesn't have to be the end of the conversation. People can try it on Proton, find out what doesn't work, and report back to the dev. Knowing that they only need to fix a few issues that can't be handled by a default compatibility layer and seeing first-hand how many users are trying to play their game, what's to say the dev won't cave in and finally put some time into making their game more compatible with Linux, even if they don't truly port it? If they do, not only is it good news for their existing players who run Linux, but it puts the OS on their mind for future releases. Even if they won't port, they might consider choices that make their games more compatible with Steam Play, such as Vulkan. The snowball effect could be interesting.

This is an opportunity for Linux gamers to advocate the platform and work hand in hand with devs.

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Quoting: edo

Quoting: NatedawgI think this is great news!

I can see this discouraging some developers from making a Linux port, but these developers will likely be the same ones who are on the fence about making a Linux port anyway. The ones who have been natively supporting us will likely continue to do so.

Knowing the Linux community, I 'm pretty sure we will still make it a top priority to support publishers like Feral / Aspyr / etc.

but now there is no reason to not buy a game because it doesnt have a linux version, feral business model is in danger.
We will see how things goes.

You seem to be assuming that Proton magically makes/will make everything work perfectly. This is still just Wine doing the heavy lifting in the background, and plenty of things will still be broken. A dedicated port means actual guarantees that all features work on the target OS at release and will be supported going forward. Those are no small benefits.

To give a real-life example, it took years before Guild Wars 2 on Wine became truly playable for me with only one graphical glitch, and recently it started crashing randomly every few minutes. Continued support would mean I can buy the game with confidence and not be locked out of it randomly from one patch to the next. That would make me more likely to keep spending money on it, instead of gambling with a purchase. Unless and until Valve or anyone else manage to make Wine perfect, there is absolutely still room for native ports.

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Quoting: GuestA big issue here is, does Proton really mean "Linux support" ? I don't think it does. Here's why.

When you get a port to Linux, even if it's by a third party, a lot of work has been done to bring that game over to the platform... even if a D3D wrapper has been used etc (i'm not going to go into the "lazy wrapper" argument). The porter is selling you a product that is certified by them to work with Linux, and has official backing of the original developer/publisher. If something doesn't work, or breaks, there is an official support method available. It is someones job to provide help on getting it working, and to fix that if it doesnt....

I think Valve are being pretty clear about that and most people here realize it behind all their excitement. The mere fact that Valve are actively investing money and developer time in Wine is thrilling to me, and them making it easier to use in the process for people who don't like to tamper with configs is icing on the cake. There is no question that this is "just Wine integrated into Steam," but Valve are also clearly putting effort into making Wine better, and by all accounts they have been making considerable progress in the past half year alone.

Because it's an experimental feature by nature, I and many others here have already said they would continue to buy actual ports primarily. And there are those who won't buy newer Windows games even if they run well through Proton, out of principle. But easier access to games we all already owned and couldn't play without a fuss is a definite short-term win, and I feel like things are likely to be favorable to porters in the mid-term when the userbase grows and more studios become interested in having a properly supported product on Linux.

There may be rough waters ahead, but I'm optimistic for a rainbow on the other side :)

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Quoting: dhellion

Quoting: silentprocyonTL;DR... Outcome of Oracle feuding with Google is that APIs can now be copyrighted. It started with Oracle acquiring Sun, wanting to make lots of money from Java; not satisfied with just some money, they also attempted to launch their own smartphone venture that failed; after failing in the smartphone business, Oracle sought to make more money from Java by suing Google over the latter copying code from Java (which was not the case) and claimed they owned copyright of the APIs; Oracle had lost in court and appealed, then another court ruled in Oracle's favor over copyright, but ruled that Google's use is "fair use"; not happy with the "fair use" ruling and wanting $9 billion for copyright infringement, Oracle appealed again, battle is still going on in Federal court; might or might not reach Supreme Court.

This will be an epic battle.

And I feel like I want to take it on. I'd happily give money to Valve to help the proceedings if something like this were to happen, for the chance to see Microsoft break some teeth on Linux.

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I like how Valve seem to also be pushing for Vulkan adoption with this in their statements. And with Google funding Photoshop compatibility via Wine, that's more and more barriers falling before a new Windows exodus.

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Hot damn that is both unexpected and very welcome. I feel like all the work put into WINE by the community over the years will now really pay off and provide even more value for Linux as a whole thanks to Valve's participation. And if Valve does the tinkering for me, all the better. It will be very interesting to see how this plays out. If they get good, continued support going for enough high-profile games, they may very well drive Linux adoption up in the coming months. It might make some devs lazy in the short term, but a bigger market share in the long term could well turn that around.

I do hope porters can continue to thrive in this new context. Fewer games may be suitable for native ports if they already work well via Proton, but they will likely have a bigger audience to sell to for the games that can still benefit from a proper port, especially if they can convince publishers of doing simultaneous releases thanks to Linux being a more valuable demographic.

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Quoting: TheSHEEEPYou can blare about FOSS and idealism all you want, but if you have a choice between a small FOSS project that does what you want, but has like a handful of people developing it in their free time - and a closed source alternative that does the same thing and doesn't cost a lot, then you pick the closed source one if you can afford it and the support is known to be good.
Because that gives you access to people who are paid to aid you in your requests - while FOSS gives you the chance that nobody does anything about your issues or the whole project gets dropped.

To this, part of me wants to argue that I can pay anyone I choose to work on the FOSS solution if and when needed, if I'm going to pay anyway, but you would be right to counter that in many cases that would end up more expensive than a subscription/license-based model where the cost of development is shared by a number of customers. I still think it makes sense in several scenarios, though. When it comes to government entities, when you consider that it helps protect citizen data, creates local jobs and contributes to publicly-accessible software (i.e. added value for the entire population beyond your specific office's needs), preferring FOSS over proprietary solutions seems almost like a no-brainer and I'm eager to see more governments make the switch.

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Considering how much press the game got, that must have been one hell of an expensive porting job to only make back 25% of the cost without it even being properly finished. Too bad they didn't go with one of the more reputable porting houses.

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