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#151 2012-08-25 01:23:43

Zancarius
Member
From: NM, USA
Registered: 2012-05-06
Posts: 207

Re: Looking forward to having Steam on Linux? Read this.

zzaw wrote:

Is the main reason we see very few linux ports the fact that the majority of games are developed for Direct X, or are there other major hurdles involved in getting a game ported to linux?
Also out of interest is there a reason why Direct X became so favored?

In a post-360 world, part of the inertia exists solely on the basis that it's easier (in theory) to port from the console to the Windows world with mostly similar or analogous APIs. 'Course, you wind up with crummy ports from a console that barely work on the desktop...

Personally, I'm of the mindset that if something is done cross-platform from the start using the appropriate libraries (OpenGL, SDL, etc) it shouldn't be a tremendous pain to support most major platforms. But again, none of these have the same backing that DirectX has from a large corporation with deep pockets. I suspect the financial gains involved are what have caused DirectX to be favored over OpenGL (for instance) more than any weaknesses/strengths in the libraries themselves.

The other reason so few Linux ports exist is because the Linux market is a tiny, tiny fraction of the PC market. That is probably the real reason--certainly more so than portability. Hopefully that'll change some day, and that Valve is porting Steam to Linux could very much change this. I still boot to Windows periodically to play games that I don't really want to be bothered fooling around with under Wine, for instance.


He who has no .plan has small finger.
~Confucius on UNIX.

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#152 2012-09-12 16:25:22

blackout23
Member
Registered: 2011-11-16
Posts: 781

Re: Looking forward to having Steam on Linux? Read this.

Steam Greenlight Linux Games
Slowly getting there. Nice to see Linux listed as Platform on the official Steam website.
As it seems the Linux Client has already been submitted to their content servers.

http://marlamin.com/cdr/view.php?type=sub&id=16549
This is a website which constantly pulls xmls from their server and puts them into a database.
The records are basically entries in the steam catalog.

http://www.phoronix.com/scan.php?page=n … px=MTE4Mzk

L4D2 at 30 min mark.

Last edited by blackout23 (2012-09-13 15:29:59)

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#153 2012-09-27 06:30:12

WorMzy
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From: Scotland
Registered: 2010-06-16
Posts: 11,787
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Re: Looking forward to having Steam on Linux? Read this.


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#154 2012-09-27 07:58:03

Thom
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Registered: 2012-05-22
Posts: 72
Website

Re: Looking forward to having Steam on Linux? Read this.

F*ck Yeah!
I hope to see that this year.

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#155 2012-09-28 02:50:59

boast
Member
Registered: 2010-09-28
Posts: 219

Re: Looking forward to having Steam on Linux? Read this.

They should skip the beta and just release it. Everything feels like a beta on linux anyways. *ducks*


Asus M4A785TD-V ;; Phenom II X4 @ 3.9GHz ;; Ripjaws 12GB DDR3-1600 ;; 128GB Samsung 830 ;; MSI GTX460 v2 w/ blob ;; Arch Linux + KDE 4.x

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#156 2012-09-28 05:08:24

Vash63
Member
Registered: 2012-09-22
Posts: 30

Re: Looking forward to having Steam on Linux? Read this.

boast wrote:

They should skip the beta and just release it. Everything feels like a beta on linux anyways. *ducks*

Not going to disagree, but maybe changing that is one of their goals.

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#157 2012-09-28 18:32:39

Zancarius
Member
From: NM, USA
Registered: 2012-05-06
Posts: 207

Re: Looking forward to having Steam on Linux? Read this.

boast wrote:

They should skip the beta and just release it. Everything feels like a beta on linux anyways. *ducks*

I think you could rephrase this to "software in general feels like a beta," because I've encountered plenty of commercial software on Windows that has felt the same way. wink

To be fair to Valve, a beta client is generally a good idea because it may (or may not) work out of the box on all distros. Slapping "beta" on it serves as a good warning that it probably won't work as expected or there'll at least be some effort required to get it to work at all.

It'll be interesting to see how many titles show up on the Steam Linux beta. If the Humble Bundle 6 is any indication, there's already a few indie titles out there that have at least been partially ported to Linux. Of course, it's not without its problems, but it's a start.


He who has no .plan has small finger.
~Confucius on UNIX.

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#158 2012-10-08 21:58:15

Jalbindi
Member
Registered: 2012-10-08
Posts: 1

Re: Looking forward to having Steam on Linux? Read this.

This really isn't anything to get all hyped up about. Steam on Linux will end up like it did on the Mac, a few ported games, a collection of indie games overpriced from other OS specific online stores and the requirement to update the client every second day just to see that nothing has been added to the game library beyond training horses and kissing ponies simulations. It's pretty much how it happened with the Mac. Macgamestore which is a moderately sized mac game online store have their own client and library of Mac-only games which in comparison were cheaper to Steam counterparts which made buying games through steam distasteful unless you could only get them from Steam.

Linux has had to build it's gaming "franchise" on Open-Source engines or the generosity of Indie developers, big game companies who wade into the Linux market don't do it because of the market share of big name titles and for everything else there's WINE unless you want to pay for a service to run Win games in Linux. So what exactly will end up in the grand library of Steam? Some steam-engine games made by Valve alone and maybe one or two other game companies porting a title over. All of that wrapped up in DRM in comparison to HumbleBundle, Open-Source development of games and any Linux publishing companies however small which still operate.

Steam will flop on Linux as it did on Mac

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#159 2012-10-09 11:37:22

blackout23
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Registered: 2011-11-16
Posts: 781

Re: Looking forward to having Steam on Linux? Read this.

I'd say from not having a steam client with some valve games on linux to having them that's still an improvement for linux.

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#160 2012-10-09 21:49:47

masteryod
Member
Registered: 2010-05-19
Posts: 433

Re: Looking forward to having Steam on Linux? Read this.

Jalbindi wrote:

This really isn't anything to get all hyped up about.[...]

And you're obviously not hyped about intel/radeon/nouveau/dri/mesa... basically whole linux graphics stack improvements (and kernel itself) in recent time, pretty much, just because Valve is interested in linux?

Jalbindi wrote:

[...]Steam will flop on Linux as it did on Mac

Yes... and AAA grade studio/publisher interested in linux, making their digital distribution platform available on it natively, with cooperation with upstream, doing some good PR about linux and spread the word about it around other big companies and whole bunch of people who didn't even heard "linux" word in their life is bad thing because?

None of us here thinks steam on linux will blow windows and macs from the surface of the planet but you really must be very shortsighted not to see advantages of this (and/or you are fresh in linux world).

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#161 2012-10-10 16:39:28

alphaniner
Member
From: Ancapistan
Registered: 2010-07-12
Posts: 2,810

Re: Looking forward to having Steam on Linux? Read this.

But is there anything concrete to suggest that the graphics stack improvements are actually happening or going to happen, or is it just an assumption that they will have to happen for Steam on Linux to be comparable to Steam on Windows?


But whether the Constitution really be one thing, or another, this much is certain - that it has either authorized such a government as we have had, or has been powerless to prevent it. In either case, it is unfit to exist.
-Lysander Spooner

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#162 2012-10-10 16:43:42

karol
Archivist
Registered: 2009-05-06
Posts: 25,440

Re: Looking forward to having Steam on Linux? Read this.

alphaniner wrote:

But is there anything concrete to suggest that the graphics stack improvements are actually happening or going to happen, or is it just an assumption that they will have to happen for Steam on Linux to be comparable to Steam on Windows?

We've got the L4D2 case: http://steamforlinux.com/?q=en/node/74

The first game is going to be Left 4 Dead 2, which is already has been tested on Ubuntu for some time now. However, the number of frames per second in the game was very low in the past. So the Linux team at Valve initially reported 6 FPS running the game on Ubuntu 12.04 32-bit when using the following hardware:

    Intel Core i7 3930k
    NVIDIA GeForce GTX 680
    32 GB RAM

In comparison to Ubuntu, the game ran with 270.6 FPS on Windows 7 using Direct3D drivers.
To solve this problem the team has accomplished the following enhancements:

    Modifying the game to work bettter with the Linux kernel
    Improving the OpenGL performance of the game
    Optimization of the graphics drivers

(emphasis mine)

Last edited by karol (2012-10-10 16:44:06)

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#163 2012-10-10 16:54:32

alphaniner
Member
From: Ancapistan
Registered: 2010-07-12
Posts: 2,810

Re: Looking forward to having Steam on Linux? Read this.

Well that certainly seems to lay the smackdown on my skepticism.


But whether the Constitution really be one thing, or another, this much is certain - that it has either authorized such a government as we have had, or has been powerless to prevent it. In either case, it is unfit to exist.
-Lysander Spooner

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#164 2012-10-10 17:11:53

blackout23
Member
Registered: 2011-11-16
Posts: 781

Re: Looking forward to having Steam on Linux? Read this.

There have already been changes to Intel Driver due to their colaboration with Valve.

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#165 2012-10-11 07:53:35

Gusar
Member
Registered: 2009-08-25
Posts: 3,605

Re: Looking forward to having Steam on Linux? Read this.

alphaniner wrote:

But is there anything concrete to suggest that the graphics stack improvements are actually happening or going to happen, or is it just an assumption that they will have to happen for Steam on Linux to be comparable to Steam on Windows?

The Intel open source team was invited to Valve headquarters, where they worked together face-to-face to fix issues. The Valve guys were really impressed with having the ability to look directly into the Intel driver to see what's going on where. The Intel team also got access to the Left 4 Dead 2 source code. So improvements to the graphics stack happened already! And will for sure continue to happen as Valve ports more games.

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#166 2012-10-11 09:14:19

kennethsewe
Member
From: usa
Registered: 2012-10-11
Posts: 1

Re: Looking forward to having Steam on Linux? Read this.

Thom wrote:

F*ck Yeah!
I hope to see that this year.

count me in.sooo.. exciting.


Tnx i got in the forum. the question really tricky.

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#167 2012-10-29 10:28:35

WorMzy
Forum Moderator
From: Scotland
Registered: 2010-06-16
Posts: 11,787
Website

Re: Looking forward to having Steam on Linux? Read this.

The sign up form for the beta is here: http://www.valvesoftware.com/linuxsurvey.php


Sakura:-
Mobo: MSI MAG X570S TORPEDO MAX // Processor: AMD Ryzen 9 5950X @4.9GHz // GFX: AMD Radeon RX 5700 XT // RAM: 32GB (4x 8GB) Corsair DDR4 (@ 3000MHz) // Storage: 1x 3TB HDD, 6x 1TB SSD, 2x 120GB SSD, 1x 275GB M2 SSD

Making lemonade from lemons since 2015.

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#168 2012-11-06 20:00:22

masteryod
Member
Registered: 2010-05-19
Posts: 433

Re: Looking forward to having Steam on Linux? Read this.

Steam AUR package is here.

Last edited by masteryod (2012-11-06 20:00:49)

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#169 2012-11-06 20:18:42

blackout23
Member
Registered: 2011-11-16
Posts: 781

Re: Looking forward to having Steam on Linux? Read this.

Did not get in. sad
According to Valve over 60.000 people filled out the survey in the first days.

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#170 2012-11-06 20:23:23

Box0
Member
From: Italy
Registered: 2011-09-21
Posts: 218

Re: Looking forward to having Steam on Linux? Read this.

So in the end, only ubuntu users have been enrolled?

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#171 2012-11-06 20:33:53

Unia
Member
From: Stockholm, Sweden
Registered: 2010-03-30
Posts: 2,486
Website

Re: Looking forward to having Steam on Linux? Read this.

Box0 wrote:

So in the end, only ubuntu users have been enrolled?

I guess not:

http://steamcommunity.com/app/221410/di … 609792678/


If you can't sit by a cozy fire with your code in hand enjoying its simplicity and clarity, it needs more work. --Carlos Torres

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#172 2012-11-06 20:43:09

Box0
Member
From: Italy
Registered: 2011-09-21
Posts: 218

Re: Looking forward to having Steam on Linux? Read this.

Yeah, i saw that, but the steam software is publicly available, you can istall it even if you've not been enrolled.
Anyway, since I'm seeing some guys on the steam and phoronix forums claiming to have received the confirmation email, and all of them are ubuntu users, I'm wondering if someone saw such a claim from some other distro user...

Last edited by Box0 (2012-11-06 20:43:29)

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#173 2012-11-06 20:47:51

Unia
Member
From: Stockholm, Sweden
Registered: 2010-03-30
Posts: 2,486
Website

Re: Looking forward to having Steam on Linux? Read this.

^ Ah, I see. I recall reading somewhere they would firstly focus on Ubuntu, though. They would focus on other (popular) distro's later.


If you can't sit by a cozy fire with your code in hand enjoying its simplicity and clarity, it needs more work. --Carlos Torres

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#174 2012-11-06 20:53:02

alphaniner
Member
From: Ancapistan
Registered: 2010-07-12
Posts: 2,810

Re: Looking forward to having Steam on Linux? Read this.

We knew Ubuntu was the 'development platform', and it seems sensible to limit official beta testing to Ubuntu to simplify the debugging process.


But whether the Constitution really be one thing, or another, this much is certain - that it has either authorized such a government as we have had, or has been powerless to prevent it. In either case, it is unfit to exist.
-Lysander Spooner

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#175 2012-11-06 21:22:43

blackout23
Member
Registered: 2011-11-16
Posts: 781

Re: Looking forward to having Steam on Linux? Read this.

They said that  “An overwhelming majority of beta applicants have reported they’re running the Ubuntu distro of Linux,”. But I belive a bunch of people like me just filled the survey with Ubuntu just to have a chance to participate. I don't have an Ubuntu install but would have installed it on a seperate partition just for the beta. On the steam discussion board it almost looks like there are more Archers than Ubuntu users.

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