Valve: Steam’d Penguins

Posted Jul 17, 2012 21:19 UTC (Tue) by dvrabel (subscriber, #9500)
In reply to: Valve: Steam’d Penguins by slashdot
Parent article: Valve: Steam’d Penguins

Only a very small fraction of the games available via Steam use the Source engine and many of the older titles (especially those developed by third parties) aren't going to be ported to Linux.

Valve might make a few bob selling a very limited selection of titles to existing Linux users but I cannot see any PC gamer switching to Linux on the back of this -- the breadth and variety of titles just won't be there.

Valve: Steam’d Penguins

Posted Jul 17, 2012 22:06 UTC (Tue) by anselm (subscriber, #2796) [Link] (1 responses)

»Making a few bob« by selling games to Linux users can't be a bad thing – it's a market with few commercial-grade games, so any offering Valve can make will have more of an impact than on Windows, where there is more competition. Especially because the »PC gamers« will have bought the games for Windows already, and there is nothing to be gained for Valve by trying to entice them to »switch to Linux«.

It's dipping a toe in the water. If it works out well, the »breadth and variety of titles« will take care of itself.

Valve: Steam’d Penguins

Posted Jul 18, 2012 6:11 UTC (Wed) by kragil (guest, #34373) [Link]

It is about making cross platform development even more attractive. If you use an engine that runs well on Win/Mac/Linux/IOS/Android/Xbox/PS3/Wii U you have a lot of places where your game can make money.
So this is about discouraging Windows-only development.

The humble bundles have shown that there are people willing to pay for games on Linux.

The recent Kickstarter funded games will run on Linux with very few exeptions. (LWN was dead quiet about the "revolution" of funding stuff on Kickstarter, although I think Lighttable, Git-annex and Double Fine Adventure should have been mentioned. I submitted the news, but nobody cared)
Popular stuff like Unity (the game engine) and Moai and others are also developments that clearly make more Linux games possible.

All these trends are very good for Linux gaming.

Valve: Steam’d Penguins

Posted Jul 17, 2012 22:51 UTC (Tue) by andreasb (guest, #80258) [Link] (3 responses)

Yeah, I don't see gamers switching to Linux specifically for the games — just like they're not switching to Macs specifically for games, and Steam + Valve games have been ported there two years ago. It's about tapping the market of people who don't want to switch to Windows specifically for the games. And just maybe a preparation for a rumored Valve/Steam console.

I have Windows installed just for games, but not having to reboot for playing would be awesome. Although I'll have to wait and see… I really, really don't want to install those PITA binary blob graphics drivers anymore and if the open source drivers won't perform well enough, I may need to keep using Windows for those games that are available. Now, Windows is a giant PITA too, but at least it's compartmented away…

And as for the selection of games, having a well established game sale/distribution platform coming to Linux might be an incentive for more publishers to port some of their games.

The final burning question is: Will Team Fortress 2 be ported? And will Linux gamers get Linux themed hats? Because that's what it's really all about.

Valve: Steam’d Penguins

Posted Jul 18, 2012 10:14 UTC (Wed) by k3ninho (subscriber, #50375) [Link] (2 responses)

> ...And just maybe a preparation for a rumored Valve/Steam console.
No OS licensing fees, lowering their costs to build a device supported by a free-to-play/pay-for-accessories model - this is the important part. In their shoes I'd consider including an Android userspace for movies and music, to save Steam over-reaching themselves.

>The final burning question is: Will Team Fortress 2 be ported? And will Linux gamers get Linux themed hats? Because that's what it's really all about.
If Left 4 Dead 2 is coming, then the Source engine is coming over, so the free-to-play Hat Simulator will be ported, too. I would expect some joke about Red Hats and Fedoras in there - but the Ubuntu platform doesn't have a link to hat-wearing. Space helmet?

K3n.

Valve: Steam’d Penguins

Posted Jul 18, 2012 13:24 UTC (Wed) by leoc (guest, #39773) [Link] (1 responses)

No OS licensing fees...

And if it is successful, Microsoft, Sony, Apple, and Nintendo will probably sue them using some dumb patents as a pretext to shut down competition.

Valve: Steam’d Penguins

Posted Jul 18, 2012 23:36 UTC (Wed) by rgmoore (✭ supporter ✭, #75) [Link]

Yeah, because that could never happen if it weren't Free Software.

Valve: Steam’d Penguins

Posted Jul 18, 2012 21:32 UTC (Wed) by ssmith32 (subscriber, #72404) [Link]

> many of the older titles (especially those developed by third parties) aren't going to be ported to Linux.

In all fairness, I don't know too many gamers jumping up and down to get their hands on old titles. So as long as Valve expands the program to new games going forward - it should be fine.

Since I think it's safe to assume any core libraries they re-use from game to game got ported with L4D2.. and any new code will just be written with portability in mind, doing this as a moving-forward strategy makes sense, while backporting does not.

So there is hope. OTOH, I'm not a gamer, so I could be totally misunderstanding the market.

And the console/windows app backstop rumors do make some sense.. Valve was posting positions for hardware (and I mean actual hardware, not driver) engineers and designers.

Valve: Steam’d Penguins

Posted Jul 19, 2012 7:41 UTC (Thu) by Pawlerson (guest, #74136) [Link]

Valve said they'll be encouraging others to port their games as well.