Valve introduces Steam Deck

The Mass Shooter Ron Soye said:

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SteamOS wrecking Windows yet again. This time on the Lenovo Legion Go S.

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It is kind of insane how Microsoft has dropped the ball by not providing a proper handheld friendly interface built into Windows by default after all this time and OEMs have had to cobble up their own overlay solutions that inevitably end up lagging behind what Valve offers out-of-the-box.

It goes without saying that Windows 11 is such a bloated resource hog that it kills battery life and it doesn't offer a suspend option anywhere near as seamless as SteamOS does. There are less and less reasons to have Windows on any gaming focused device, it is already falling behind in raw performance as well compared to Linux running Proton. I've never believed in the "too big to fail" mantra and while Microsoft may retain their hold in the business focused side of the aisle, the PC gaming scene might shift dramatically to Linux in the next decade.
 
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The Mass Shooter Ron Soye said:
I'll probably get whatever the Steam Deck 2 is in 2027 and hard limit it to 10W, and see how that does. I assume that will get you to 3-4 hours battery life.
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If I were to get one, it would be the 2nd version of it. Considering how the Switch 2 is going with game key cards there won't be any physical copies which was one of the main reasons for getting a Switch 2. You might as well just get a Steam Deck and buy digital games from Valve. But I know, it's the first party games that count. There won't ever be any Zelda or Mario games on Steam. But people said that about Playstation games.
 
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Belvedere said:
the PC gaming scene might shift dramatically to Linux in the next decade.
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Linux is still pretty niche outside of the steam deck. Most games and installers will run out of box on windows. Even with the retards attempt at destroying backwards compatibility for older games. Linux requires some autistic third party workaround for a lot of games.
 
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Imperial Commandos said:
Linux requires some autistic third party workaround for a lot of games.
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Such as?

SteamOS is already using Proton, which can also be used on other distros. Unless you're saying that WINE is a "autistic third party workaround", in which case, you're wrong. Only "work" you have to do on that is install it via the comand line. Otherwise you can use Winetricks as a frontend to install whatever dlls you may be missing (most of the time it's directx, dotnet, and visual studio runtime libraries). If that's really to complicated for you, then use a virtual machine and install a windows os on it to play whatever game you want on that.

I use a combination of ScummVM, DOSBOX, VMWare Workstation Player, and PCem to play whatever windows games decide not to run properly on WINE, and it's usually the ones that either need specific video cards and Voodoo graphics, or something made for a SPECIFIC version of Windows, including games that will ONLY run in 256 color mode. And yes, even on newer Windows ( 10/11 ) you would have to do all these things to run old games, especially since x86 support is being completely gutted.
 
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Celebrate Nite said:
Such as?

SteamOS is already using Proton, which can also be used on other distros. Unless you're saying that WINE is a "autistic third party workaround", in which case, you're wrong. Only "work" you have to do on that is install it via the comand line. Otherwise you can use Winetricks as a frontend to install whatever dlls you may be missing (most of the time it's directx, dotnet, and visual studio runtime libraries). If that's really to complicated for you, then use a virtual machine and install a windows os on it to play whatever game you want on that.

I use a combination of ScummVM, DOSBOX, VMWare Workstation Player, and PCem to play whatever windows games decide not to run properly on WINE, and it's usually the ones that either need specific video cards and Voodoo graphics, or something made for a SPECIFIC version of Windows, including games that will ONLY run in 256 color mode. And yes, even on newer Windows ( 10/11 ) you would have to do all these things to run old games, especially since x86 support is being completely gutted.
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Backing this up. Im biased as a Linux guy (haven't run windows in ages, more than 2 decades) but I'm blown away at how I can just buy AAA games on launch day and they just run.

The fact that proton is containers for games also makes older games run way easier on Linux than Windows. Proton requests the version of windows appropriate for that era, service packs, vscode sdk etc and then locks it in.

Professionally at one point in time I lived in the command line but now I can basically game in kde without ever once opening a terminal. It helps to stick in the steam ecosystem but installing stuff outside that with Lutris is ez pz. Modding? No problem. Very very few things can't be done these days. And very little autistic tinkering is needed anymore. Granted I recall early efforts to get games like half life 1 running under wine in the early 2000s. It's wild how things have improved. I owned boxes copies of Linux games from Loki Games (anyone here old enough to remember them?) and Proton is easier than those native games with native installers.

The age of the Linux desktop is upon us.
 
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Celebrate Nite said:
Such as?

SteamOS is already using Proton, which can also be used on other distros. Unless you're saying that WINE is a "autistic third party workaround", in which case, you're wrong. Only "work" you have to do on that is install it via the comand line. Otherwise you can use Winetricks as a frontend to install whatever dlls you may be missing (most of the time it's directx, dotnet, and visual studio runtime libraries). If that's really to complicated for you, then use a virtual machine and install a windows os on it to play whatever game you want on that.

I use a combination of ScummVM, DOSBOX, VMWare Workstation Player, and PCem to play whatever windows games decide not to run properly on WINE, and it's usually the ones that either need specific video cards and Voodoo graphics, or something made for a SPECIFIC version of Windows, including games that will ONLY run in 256 color mode. And yes, even on newer Windows ( 10/11 ) you would have to do all these things to run old games, especially since x86 support is being completely gutted.
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I tried playing Oblivion 2006 recently on Fedora in Steam with Proton and it refused to launch. If I run it on a steam deck or bazzite it just werks.

I tried a couple autistic third party workarounds which involved editing a fake registry that Wine makes and adjusting some launch parameters but I didn't feel like continuing after burning too much time on this, there's certainly some way to get it to work but how many times am I going to try?

SteamOS is doing something right.
 
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Baraka Obama said:
SteamOS is doing something right.
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I haven't tried linux with proton outside deck but, steam OS really does seem to run a lot, even semi obscure tech openxcom extended.

I could see it running a little better on steam OS, but yeah its some revolutionary tech.

I remember people heckling the idea of proton when it just came out like "PPPFFFF FAGGOT THAT WONT WORK" and sure at first it was REALLY spotty, but at this point, most of anything I launch works fine, because its not just making each individual game work but learning FROM each game WHAT windows things need to be emulated to make it work.

Provide enough samples, the odds of it working go up a lot.
 
harbringer883 said:
Breh I thought it already was
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Used to be when it first came out, but afaik it was a buggy mess, along with everything else when the Steam Machine was released years ago.

If you head over to their support page, it gives you instructions on how to download/install it, but apparently it's only 100% working on Steam Decks (obviously) and Legion Go S machines. They seem to be strictly targeting handehdls only ATM and their specific AMD/NVME hardware.
 
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Imperial Commandos said:
Linux is still pretty niche outside of the steam deck. Most games and installers will run out of box on windows. Even with the retards attempt at destroying backwards compatibility for older games. Linux requires some autistic third party workaround for a lot of games.
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That's why I mentioned the time frame of a decade. It'll take time but the sentiment and shift is gradually happening, users in the desktop and gaming PC space are growing ever more frustrated with the intrusive and dystopian nature of Windows as an operating system. Linux is niche in the desktop space but it is dominant everywhere else where stability, efficiency and security matters and those characteristics are being noticed the more Linux is becoming friendlier to newbies and Windows grows more frustrating to deal with. The Steam Deck was the successful proof of concept needed to showcase what could be possible.

We have to remember that a decade ago the overwhelming majority of games were incompatible with Linux, then the DXVK breakthrough happened, fast forward to today and now most games work on Linux out of the box thanks to Proton. The more time passes the more that compatibility will grow, what it is needed is for that market share of Desktop Linux users to reach a critical mass for it to be taken as a serious clientele that needs to be catered to and offered official driver for peripherals, dedicated hardware and more variety of software support. MacOS users represent around 15% of global PC users and there is no lack of support for that platform, desktop Linux is around 4%, if over time that number reaches the 10% mark, that is going to make a big difference in the way software developers and hardware manufacturers will treat that ecosystem. As for game developers, they don't even have to concern themselves with making "native" Linux applications, they only need to make sure their Windows games run well under Proton and they are good to go, and that includes anti-cheat solutions (and I know for a fact some of them just make the AC on their products incompatible on purpose).

As for Windows backwards compatibility, that's highly debatable as there are plenty of old games from the Windows XP era and earlier that simply do not work on modern systems without their own fair share of autistic-level fixes and workarounds, there is a reason the "GOG Preservation Program" exist to make a lot of those old game playable hassle free.

hog cranking frog said:
The oddest bit of steam deck lore is none of this would be possible if a gooner anime weeb didn't obsess over the performance of a weeb game in windows and start the dxvk project.
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Yoko Taro unintentionally spurring a gaming revolution on Linux.

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hog cranking frog said:
The oddest bit of steam deck lore is none of this would be possible if a gooner anime weeb didn't obsess over the performance of a weeb game in windows and start the dxvk project.
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Proton wouldn’t be possible if someone didn’t want to thirst over 2B. And to be honest, I don’t blame him either.
 
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GeorgeFloydFentanylStash said:
Can it play Xbox One/Series game plus the Backwards compatibility catalog?
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As far as know it is whatever would be available in Gamepass for PC: https://www.xbox.com/en-US/xbox-game-pass/games

It is a Windows powered device so you can run whatever storefront launcher there is and I imagine since it has a Ryzen chipset it'll work great dual booting SteamOS or Bazzite.

Baraka Obama said:
dpad and buttons in this look like something from a ps2 era madcatz controller.
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This style of dpad if done right is amazing, by personal experience I find them way more comfortable and easier to use than regular cross-shaped ones but your mileage may vary. Asus has been iterating and improving a lot with their Ally handhelds, I can't imagine for these controllers to be of low quality.
 
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