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Linux surpasses the Mac among Steam gamers

(arstechnica.com)
433 points Sporktacular | 1 comments | 04 Aug 23 00:36 UTC | HN request time: 0.213s | source
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015a ◴[04 Aug 23 05:12 UTC] No.36995730[source]▶
> But before you declare this a triumphant moment for desktop Linux, it's important to note that some of these Linux users are not, in fact, using Steam on a desktop. The Linux version "SteamOS Holo" 64-bit is the most popular reported, at just over 42 percent of the Linux slice of pie. That indicates that a huge portion of these Linux users are actually playing on Valve's Steam Deck portable, which runs Linux.

There's such a deep seeded, systemic bias against linux that it actually can never win, to any degree or magnitude, because the moment it starts winning we just move the goal-posts for the flimsiest of reasons to ensure it can't quite claim that victory.

Linux is obviously and clearly the most popular operating system kernel on the planet. Oh, no, that's no good a measure, servers are messy, let's refine it to most popular consumer operating system kernel? Oh... it, could also reasonably claim that title? No no, no Android, that doesn't count. Nope, No Chrome OS either, you can't have that, that's, well, that is linux, but its not. Just nice, pure, desktop linux, yes, perfect, arch linux, kde desktop, that'll never trend up and thus is the perfect new-new definition of desktop linu--wait hold up, I'm getting word this is, not possible, its actually SteamOS? Nope, kill it, that's not desktop linux either, kill it.

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johnnyanmac ◴[04 Aug 23 05:26 UTC] No.36995802[source]▶
I guess it really depends on what you expect out of a "user". I think servers and Android count but I think SteamOS is a bit tricky, because it's relying on a compatibility layers running Windows to run most games. This may not matter to the end user, but it isn't quite the developer revelation many imagine where suddenly tons of games and apps have a proper linux port.
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pxc ◴[04 Aug 23 07:11 UTC] No.36996490[source]▶
As far as I'm concerned, this misses the point on a couple levels. One is that the focus here is very intentionally on desktop Linux. Servers and Android absolutely do not count.

The other is that the notion of a 'proper port' here doesn't really matter. Source ports are rare and don't necessarily turn out better than compatibility layer ports. If the goal is to have playable games, or for Linux to become usable as a desktop OS for gamers, what kinds of ports we get doesn't come into it.

That said, source ports are nice and it'd be nice if they were common some day. It would also better secure desktop Linux's position here.

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1. johnnyanmac ◴[04 Aug 23 08:26 UTC] No.36997082[source]▶
>The other is that the notion of a 'proper port' here doesn't really matter. Source ports are rare and don't necessarily turn out better than compatibility layer ports.

It does to me, but I'm not a stranger to being part of an underrepresented niche. I have windows machines to make games playable if I want to play a windows platform game.

I simply prefer control where possible, and leaving something to a compatibility layers makes me rely on two separate platforms being maintained and contributed to (and/or not enshittified) in order to not be SO, be it now or in a future. 3 if you count Steam's contributions on Proton and choosing to carry whatever game you want to play. There can still be bugs in the game proper, but a native port eliminated points of failure for me to investigate.