Dos_Box Posted July 17, 2012 Posted July 17, 2012 Tux Racing for all!: Valve to raise Steam for Ubuntu ? Reg Hardware
LosOjos Posted July 17, 2012 Posted July 17, 2012 This may be one for the blue cloud board, but how wonderful would it be if Valve had unprecedented success on Ubuntu, meaning other game devs made the plunge too. Suddenly, hardware would get proper Linux support from manufacturers when power hungry gamers demanded it to shave £150 off their rig by opting for Ubuntu over Windows. Then perhaps other software vendors would start to make the move too... We could be living in an open source dominated world in no time! But then again, maybe not.
Dos_Box Posted July 17, 2012 Author Posted July 17, 2012 TBH, Steam on Ubuntu - with the possibility of porting to other Linux variants - could be just the think Linux needs to push it mainstream. Imagine if someone released a stripped down gaming version of Linux just for Steam. Now that would generate a lot of attention!
jedmondson Posted July 17, 2012 Posted July 17, 2012 I don't know how meany people game on the pc here but it would be good to be able to use my Linux box as well.
DT2 Posted July 17, 2012 Posted July 17, 2012 It would be awesome to use my linux box for steam, I could get rid of that other #### then =D
dhicks Posted July 18, 2012 Posted July 18, 2012 Imagine if someone released a stripped down gaming version of Linux just for Steam. There are recent rumours of a "Steam Box" - a Linux-based games console ready to run Steam games. Valve have denied it's their intention to create such a bit of hardware, but it might be that a third party makes the hardware and installs Linux and Steam on top.
rich_tech Posted July 22, 2012 Posted July 22, 2012 I hope they port the catalogue over, hl2 based stuff would be nice native on there I think
Dos_Box Posted August 3, 2012 Author Posted August 3, 2012 A bit of an update here: Valve: Games run FASTER on Linux than Windows ? The Register The Linux port of Left 4 Dead 2 is just part of a larger plan to bring Valve's entire Steam gaming platform to the open source OS as a "hedging strategy" against Windows 8, which Newell believes could be "a catastrophe for everyone in the PC space." In the long run, Newell says, he'd like to get all 2,500 games now available through Steam running on Linux. That's a tall order, but it may just be possible if it turns out that Microsoft's proprietary technologies make for an inferior gaming platform. ®
Geoff Posted August 5, 2012 Posted August 5, 2012 If anything, I think valve might be lining itself up to enter the console market with a PC running Linux/steam in a pretty box. As mentioned already there were rumors of something like this being developed back in march. These were hotly denied by valve at the time...
Arthur Posted August 5, 2012 Posted August 5, 2012 a PC running Linux/steam in a pretty box. They could get Dell to rebrand their Alienware X51 (£649-£1,069). What do gamers do when they want to play a game that isn't on Steam or will never be supported on Linux like Battlefield 3 and 4 (both DX11-only games)? Switch to their other gaming PC running Windows? In terms of frames per second, are the majority of gamers going to care about a difference of 0.125-0.395 ms per frame in L4D2? Some might, but not all. 270.6 FPS = 3.695 ms per frame (DirectX/Windows) 303.0 FPS = 3.300 ms per frame (Open GL/Windows) 315.0 FPS = 3.175 ms per frame (Open GL/Linux) The problem for Valve will be the cost of the console (assuming it is just a standard PC*) and the fact that it will be obsolete the moment it is released - like all consoles. Anything with a decent graphics card is going to be expensive (a GTX 670 costs at least £300!). Obviously if you limit it to 1080p max you could get away with a cheaper card like the GTX 560Ti 448 (~£200). They will also have to compete with Sony and Microsoft's next gen consoles which according to the rumours will also be "PC-based" (but propriety of course) - the PS4 will supposedly have an AMD A8-3850 CPU and Radeon HD 7670 (the same GPU as in the next Xbox). * The alternative would be to create a cloud-based console similar to OnLive's MicroConsole (£70) or the Android-powered Ouya ($99/£75.95). I think this would be a bit more successful due to the substantially lower price. If they made Half-Life 3 an exclusive to the console for the first month or so it would be very successful.
CyberNerd Posted August 5, 2012 Posted August 5, 2012 What do gamers do when they want to play a game that isn't on Steam or will never be supported on Linux like Battlefield 3 and 4 (both DX11-only games)? Switch to their other gaming PC running Windows? Same thing we did with our old atari and amiga games
Arthur Posted August 5, 2012 Posted August 5, 2012 Same thing we did with our old atari and amiga games Which was? My first consoles were the SNES and MegaDrive.
CAM Posted August 7, 2012 Posted August 7, 2012 This would tempt me back to Linux. I can't dual boot as I end up using one OS or the other and Linux lost out due to a lack of support for games. Won't take the likes of EA long to cotton on though if Valve are successful. Remember this is a company that changed the games industry with digital distribution, I reckon they could do it if they don't screw up the launch with a meagre catalogue or forced re-purchasing. It's down to how much they dislike Windows 8 (affecting how much effort they put in) and how much effort third parties are willing to put in. If gamers just play Valve titles on it as an exhibition of curiosity it won't work.
rich_tech Posted August 7, 2012 Posted August 7, 2012 What do gamers do when they want to play a game that isn't on Steam or will never be supported on Linux like Battlefield 3 and 4 (both DX11-only games)? Switch to their other gaming PC running Windows? Wine is the ever dependant alternative for windows based programs on Linux, I play WoW and Diablo 3 on my fedora machine fine using it, Direct X stuff has been spoken about a fair bit lately with windows 8 offing and how it's very bloated comparative to OpenGL and developers are again evaluating it over alternatives. The problem for Valve will be the cost of the console (assuming it is just a standard PC*) and the fact that it will be obsolete the moment it is released - like all consoles. Anything with a decent graphics card is going to be expensive (a GTX 670 costs at least £300!). Obviously if you limit it to 1080p max you could get away with a cheaper card like the GTX 560Ti 448 Thats the retail costs of these cards, the manufacturing and supply side of it would probably not be comparable costs wise when supplying in bulk on an industrial scale I would think there That being said I cannot wait to see where they go with this project, I hope they port the HL2 stuff over soon, might make me swing back to Ubuntu then :-)
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