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I don't even own a Steam Deck and I've been seeing the benefits just from its existence. Now, almost every game on Steam has a quick accessible rating that lets

I don't even own a Steam Deck and I've been seeing the benefits just from its existence. Now, almost every game on Steam has a quick accessible rating that lets me know if it works fine on Linux. This has led to me being able to buy games confidently that I never would have otherwise. In addition, the effectiveness of Proton for running Windows games is baffling, and something I never could have expected when I first switched to Linux back in 2015. Back when Steam Machines first came out, the expectation was that there would be a new push to get games working on Linux, which unfortunately didn't end up happening as strongly as expected. However, with how much of a success the Steam Deck was, it seems that the rush to get games ported to Linux actually is happening. I'm excited for the future.

baq 4y ago
Winapi is the stable Linux ABI we’ve been waiting for the whole time. Windows binaries are more cross-distribution-portable than native builds. The irony.
- deelowe 4y ago
  I think this is the more likely end state. Instead of builds targeting certain platforms, some amalgamation of windows APIs and perhaps vulcan or other special things sprinkled in will become a sort of standard. From there, Linux compatibility will be brought up to the same level as Windows and perhaps other platforms will follow suit. We've seen this pattern time and time again in software.
- viraptor 4y ago
  That's missing what ABI is and what features can/can't be accessed by the app. Otherwise we'd call nes ROMs an even more stable ABI accessible across all modern systems.
  - cleanchit 4y ago
    Yeah it is. But it isn't useful enough. (filesystem, resolution, network, performance)
DanHulton 4y ago
Windows 10 hits EOL in 2025. I'm really hoping I can just completely convert my gaming PC to a Linux machine by that time, because Windows 11 started out rough and has become less appealing over time. The Steam Deck is absolutely building that future, and I, too, am excited.
- eloisant 4y ago
  It seems like Windows is alternating "shit" and "decent" versions. - Vista: shit - 7: decent - 8: shit - 10: decent
  - 98codes 4y ago
    Skipping v9 broke the old "Even number releases bad, odd number releases good" rule of thumb, but the tick-tock (tick-clunk?) rhythm still seems to apply.
    - AnonymousPlanet 4y ago
      It's now like Star Trek movies.
    - soiler 4y ago
      The rule that existed from Windows 7 all the way to Windows 8?
  - dualboot 4y ago
    Vista had some launch bugs that were horrendous. Beyond that it was a solid operating system and one of the better Windows releases. Most people just had shit computers, combined with "group think" regarding it's quality. Vista64 on a moderately good system with a proper amount of RAM was fantastic for it's time.
    - account42 4y ago
      > Vista64 on a moderately good system with a proper amount of RAM was fantastic for it's time. Well yeah, a big part of the problem with Vista was the enourmous increase in resource usage compared to XP, which many PCs sold with it were not ready for. That hardware now has enough brute force to make it work doesn't really mean it is not still needlessly inefficient.
acomjean 4y ago
I have a steam deck and twice after playing a game its asked me how well it worked on the deck. So its great they're collecting that data. When I used my linux laptop for gaming there is a good online database of compatibility: https://www.protondb.com/ https://www.protondb.com/
- mmis1000 4y ago
  Even better, you can get the decky-loader and proton-badges plugin. It can show the protondb rating directly on the game mode ui. Allows you to know will a game(or a program) even run even it is not rated as steamdeck compatible yet.
deckard1 4y ago
> almost every game on Steam has a quick accessible rating that lets me know if it works fine on Linux Sure, it's more convenient that Valve runs Steam and can put the rating right there. But let's give WineHQ a bit of credit here. They have a database going back more than a decade now, telling you how games run on Linux. The effects of Valve getting into Linux gaming are definitely noticeable. But the Wine team deserves a boatload of praise too. I was playing World of Warcraft back in 2007 and it was a flawless experience. > rush to get games ported to Linux actually is happening I'm not really sure about this. By having Proton/Wine at such a high quality, most devs are just going to target Windows. Because why bother? They will probably ensure their games run good under Wine and that's where it ends. Nowadays I'm totally okay with that. Lutris is great, Wine is actually easy to use. It's the best time to be a Linux gamer.
- badsectoracula 4y ago
  > let's give WineHQ a bit of credit here [..] But the Wine team deserves a boatload of praise too. The Wine team deserves a ton of praise that IMO is often directed to Proton BUT WineHQ has always been a useless experience for me. It needs a massive cleanup since it contains data from ancient versions of Wine, there is barely enough information to figure out what is going on and the whole "bronze, silver, gold, etc" rating is completely subjective with people rating something "bronze" because a pixel is off in some application and something "gold" despite being unable to use some major functionality. Sadly ProtonDB seems to be going the same way, the main saving grace right now is that it doesn't have all the baggage accumulated over decades (and it is focused on games - Wine still has to get all Win32 APIs for UIs, etc working for regular applications that Proton doesn't have to care beyond whatever little functionality is used for launchers) but still has the whole subjective thing (a favorite case of mine is Rage[0] which has lots of comment about broken textures etc with others saying that the game works fine - and it takes some searching to figure out that the people who are fine have Nvidia GPUs while the people with issues have AMD GPUs - while in a few cases, people recommend the game while at the same time mentioning the textures are broken!). [0] https://www.protondb.com/app/9200 https://www.protondb.com/app/9200
  - 0cf8612b2e1e 4y ago
red-iron-pine 4y ago
> I don't even own a Steam Deck and I've been seeing the benefits just from its existence. Now, almost every game on Steam has a quick accessible rating that lets me know if it works fine on Linux. WineDB did this for years, as does ProtonDB now. And both usually have tweaks and how-tos. But I'll concede its nice to see it in Steam itself.
12345hn6789 4y ago
Proton was around for years before the steam deck was announced. Linux gaming was already thriving
- delusional 4y ago
  Wine was also quite capable before proton came about. Valve obviously did a lot for the linux gamers, that much is clear, but we must not forget the volunteers (and codeweavers) that worked tirelessly for years to get wine to that point. Wine is a tremendous achievement.
TMWNN 4y ago
>In addition, the effectiveness of Proton for running Windows games is baffling, and something I never could have expected when I first switched to Linux back in 2015. Is it true that Windows games run better on Proton than on Windows?

baq 4y ago

Winapi is the stable Linux ABI we’ve been waiting for the whole time. Windows binaries are more cross-distribution-portable than native builds. The irony.

deelowe 4y ago
I think this is the more likely end state. Instead of builds targeting certain platforms, some amalgamation of windows APIs and perhaps vulcan or other special things sprinkled in will become a sort of standard. From there, Linux compatibility will be brought up to the same level as Windows and perhaps other platforms will follow suit. We've seen this pattern time and time again in software.
viraptor 4y ago
That's missing what ABI is and what features can/can't be accessed by the app. Otherwise we'd call nes ROMs an even more stable ABI accessible across all modern systems.
- cleanchit 4y ago
  Yeah it is. But it isn't useful enough. (filesystem, resolution, network, performance)

DanHulton 4y ago

Windows 10 hits EOL in 2025. I'm really hoping I can just completely convert my gaming PC to a Linux machine by that time, because Windows 11 started out rough and has become less appealing over time. The Steam Deck is absolutely building that future, and I, too, am excited.

eloisant 4y ago
It seems like Windows is alternating "shit" and "decent" versions. - Vista: shit - 7: decent - 8: shit - 10: decent
- 98codes 4y ago
  Skipping v9 broke the old "Even number releases bad, odd number releases good" rule of thumb, but the tick-tock (tick-clunk?) rhythm still seems to apply.
  - AnonymousPlanet 4y ago
    It's now like Star Trek movies.
  - soiler 4y ago
    The rule that existed from Windows 7 all the way to Windows 8?
- dualboot 4y ago
  Vista had some launch bugs that were horrendous. Beyond that it was a solid operating system and one of the better Windows releases. Most people just had shit computers, combined with "group think" regarding it's quality. Vista64 on a moderately good system with a proper amount of RAM was fantastic for it's time.
  - account42 4y ago
    > Vista64 on a moderately good system with a proper amount of RAM was fantastic for it's time. Well yeah, a big part of the problem with Vista was the enourmous increase in resource usage compared to XP, which many PCs sold with it were not ready for. That hardware now has enough brute force to make it work doesn't really mean it is not still needlessly inefficient.

acomjean 4y ago

I have a steam deck and twice after playing a game its asked me how well it worked on the deck. So its great they're collecting that data. When I used my linux laptop for gaming there is a good online database of compatibility: https://www.protondb.com/ https://www.protondb.com/

mmis1000 4y ago
Even better, you can get the decky-loader and proton-badges plugin. It can show the protondb rating directly on the game mode ui. Allows you to know will a game(or a program) even run even it is not rated as steamdeck compatible yet.

deckard1 4y ago

> almost every game on Steam has a quick accessible rating that lets me know if it works fine on Linux Sure, it's more convenient that Valve runs Steam and can put the rating right there. But let's give WineHQ a bit of credit here. They have a database going back more than a decade now, telling you how games run on Linux. The effects of Valve getting into Linux gaming are definitely noticeable. But the Wine team deserves a boatload of praise too. I was playing World of Warcraft back in 2007 and it was a flawless experience. > rush to get games ported to Linux actually is happening I'm not really sure about this. By having Proton/Wine at such a high quality, most devs are just going to target Windows. Because why bother? They will probably ensure their games run good under Wine and that's where it ends. Nowadays I'm totally okay with that. Lutris is great, Wine is actually easy to use. It's the best time to be a Linux gamer.

badsectoracula 4y ago
> let's give WineHQ a bit of credit here [..] But the Wine team deserves a boatload of praise too. The Wine team deserves a ton of praise that IMO is often directed to Proton BUT WineHQ has always been a useless experience for me. It needs a massive cleanup since it contains data from ancient versions of Wine, there is barely enough information to figure out what is going on and the whole "bronze, silver, gold, etc" rating is completely subjective with people rating something "bronze" because a pixel is off in some application and something "gold" despite being unable to use some major functionality. Sadly ProtonDB seems to be going the same way, the main saving grace right now is that it doesn't have all the baggage accumulated over decades (and it is focused on games - Wine still has to get all Win32 APIs for UIs, etc working for regular applications that Proton doesn't have to care beyond whatever little functionality is used for launchers) but still has the whole subjective thing (a favorite case of mine is Rage[0] which has lots of comment about broken textures etc with others saying that the game works fine - and it takes some searching to figure out that the people who are fine have Nvidia GPUs while the people with issues have AMD GPUs - while in a few cases, people recommend the game while at the same time mentioning the textures are broken!). [0] https://www.protondb.com/app/9200 https://www.protondb.com/app/9200
- 0cf8612b2e1e 4y ago

red-iron-pine 4y ago

> I don't even own a Steam Deck and I've been seeing the benefits just from its existence. Now, almost every game on Steam has a quick accessible rating that lets me know if it works fine on Linux. WineDB did this for years, as does ProtonDB now. And both usually have tweaks and how-tos. But I'll concede its nice to see it in Steam itself.

12345hn6789 4y ago

Proton was around for years before the steam deck was announced. Linux gaming was already thriving

delusional 4y ago
Wine was also quite capable before proton came about. Valve obviously did a lot for the linux gamers, that much is clear, but we must not forget the volunteers (and codeweavers) that worked tirelessly for years to get wine to that point. Wine is a tremendous achievement.

TMWNN 4y ago

>In addition, the effectiveness of Proton for running Windows games is baffling, and something I never could have expected when I first switched to Linux back in 2015. Is it true that Windows games run better on Proton than on Windows?