While this is funny, it is not true: Valve has contributed tremendously to the Linux environment (Mesa above all, and Proton) and based their own console on top of it, making it possible to play almost every game you own, both from their store and from elsewhere.
People at Valve have been cooking every day. Never sitting idle.
This without considering the countless features Steam already sports: friends, achievements, cloud saves, a curated front page.
Yeah really the strategy is chasing resilience and value rather than profit. And the strategy is called reasonable long term planning. Yeah they’re throwing millions into Linux now, because the alternative is being at the mercy of Microsoft who is a competitor with a known monopolistic streak.
Adding features is choosing to stay ahead of any competition now or in the future and to maintain the skills of your devs.
In a parallel universe where epic came out with the Deck instead of Valve, things are probably quite different. But no, Valve announces steam deck and the first thing epic does is drop their already small support for Linux.
Yes, but that’s beside the point. Most people use Steam not because of Linux support or because of BPM.
Valve hasn’t revolutionized their business once Ubisoft, EA, Amazon, CDPR and Epic started to compete with them. They just kept doing what they were doing and eventually saw the bodies passing in the river
Even though proton is legitimately amazing, I love turning on the filter in steam that shows Linux native games in my library. There are so many of them!
And it’s not just new stuff. Plenty of old favorites have Linux versions too. All the big valve titles of course (including Alyx) and classics like all the infinity engine RPG Enhanced Editions. Being able to hang out with my family, sitting on the couch, but also playing high res Baldur’s Gate with a trackball is some real gaming comfort food.
Huh? Am I missing something? All of Valve’s VR games show up as Windows only, running on proton. I think Deadlock is in the same boat, though maybe they’ll add cross platform support before release.
Maybe I missed something. Looking on the website on my phone it looks like windows only, so I’m not sure why that stuck in my head. I’ll have to double check on the PC to see what the heck I thought I saw.
Ten years ago when I first tried to play a game on Linux, with no experience, I was completely lost. I spent a few hours trying to get anything to run and eventually gave up.
Last year when I fully abandoned Windows and moved to Linux; I installed Steam, clicked play on a game, and it just ran no questions asked.
Since, I’ve run into a few titles that claim incompatibility; but when you enable the forced use of Proton to make it compatible; it fires right up, no problem.
Now, I could likely find and use the various compatibility tools without involving Steam; but this path has required 0 effort, it just works. I haven’t had to install and experiment with several packages and mess with configuration and pull my hair put after hours of failure or any of that. Just click play.
Commented this a year ago, and its just as relevant today.
While this is funny, it is not true: Valve has contributed tremendously to the Linux environment (Mesa above all, and Proton) and based their own console on top of it, making it possible to play almost every game you own, both from their store and from elsewhere.
People at Valve have been cooking every day. Never sitting idle.
This without considering the countless features Steam already sports: friends, achievements, cloud saves, a curated front page.
Yeah really the strategy is chasing resilience and value rather than profit. And the strategy is called reasonable long term planning. Yeah they’re throwing millions into Linux now, because the alternative is being at the mercy of Microsoft who is a competitor with a known monopolistic streak.
Adding features is choosing to stay ahead of any competition now or in the future and to maintain the skills of your devs.
In a parallel universe where epic came out with the Deck instead of Valve, things are probably quite different. But no, Valve announces steam deck and the first thing epic does is drop their already small support for Linux.
Yes, but that’s beside the point. Most people use Steam not because of Linux support or because of BPM.
Valve hasn’t revolutionized their business once Ubisoft, EA, Amazon, CDPR and Epic started to compete with them. They just kept doing what they were doing and eventually saw the bodies passing in the river
Linux support isn’t about competing with them, it’s about competing with xbox
Even though proton is legitimately amazing, I love turning on the filter in steam that shows Linux native games in my library. There are so many of them!
And it’s not just new stuff. Plenty of old favorites have Linux versions too. All the big valve titles of course (including Alyx) and classics like all the infinity engine RPG Enhanced Editions. Being able to hang out with my family, sitting on the couch, but also playing high res Baldur’s Gate with a trackball is some real gaming comfort food.
Huh? Am I missing something? All of Valve’s VR games show up as Windows only, running on proton. I think Deadlock is in the same boat, though maybe they’ll add cross platform support before release.
https://store.steampowered.com/news/app/546560/view/3758762298552654077
I think Linux is not formally still not production ready.
Maybe I missed something. Looking on the website on my phone it looks like windows only, so I’m not sure why that stuck in my head. I’ll have to double check on the PC to see what the heck I thought I saw.
Ten years ago when I first tried to play a game on Linux, with no experience, I was completely lost. I spent a few hours trying to get anything to run and eventually gave up.
Last year when I fully abandoned Windows and moved to Linux; I installed Steam, clicked play on a game, and it just ran no questions asked.
Since, I’ve run into a few titles that claim incompatibility; but when you enable the forced use of Proton to make it compatible; it fires right up, no problem.
Now, I could likely find and use the various compatibility tools without involving Steam; but this path has required 0 effort, it just works. I haven’t had to install and experiment with several packages and mess with configuration and pull my hair put after hours of failure or any of that. Just click play.
Its called “not having shareholders to maximise profits for”. Everything turns to shit once they go public.
In the great us downfall of 2026, valve might just be the only big company left standing.
I think it’s called “Do no evil” 🤔