Gaming

Valve knows they need to provide an alternative to windows if they want to stay relevant. Windows + XBox exclusives could kill their business model if they allowed it to happen. And they've been trying to improve Linux gaming for over a decade now.

I trust that they want my money

So long as Gabe is at the helm, I'll bet they'll keep being rad. Once he's gone, though, the enshittification will undoubtedly begin.

I was so skeptical of staying on steamos instead of replacing it instantly with windows for the deck, but compatability has been great and relatively easy to get working for even games that aren't verified.

Big difference from when they tried the steam machines and game compatibility with Linux back then.

Valve knows better than to put all of their eggs into one basket. Microsoft has signalled that they’re slowly but steadily moving towards a Windows + Xbox walled garden ecosystem, and while we’re not there yet, it is coming and Valve know that it could kill them off when it does.

I'm so torn about valve. It is after all a proprietary platform. I use it since always and have hundreds of games and just know they'll all be gone at some point in the future. No word about making steam client open source, not even talking about something like decentralized proof of ownership etc. (For obvious reasons)

That said: they do incredible work for Linux. Their games have been Linux compatible since ages! And actually play well on Linux. Their client works flawlessly. And what they have done with proton is just flat out incredible. As you say Linux gaming is awesome currently and has not been that exciting for a long time. In short they do awesome work, I'd just wish they were a little bit open sourceier.

I decided about three years ago to give "100% Linux" gaming a go for a few months, since I was fed up with Windows shitting itself on a dual-boot system, see how I got on. Never went back. It does help that I'm not in to MMOs or things which require anti-cheat, since that's a stumbling block, but it's rare that I even check protondb before purchases now, nearly everything just works and it keeps getting better.

Very yes. Not only are Steam and Proton usable on distros aside SteamOS, improvements from those regularly flow upstream into Wine, DXVK and also the Linux kernel itself.

Almost nothing Valve has worked on is only for SteamOS, other than packaging and distributing SteamOS itself. They've upstreamed kernel patches, RADV patches, KDE patches, etc which affects all desktops. Not to mention the open source tools like Gamescope and Fossilize, the latter of which is used automatically on all Linux PCs playing Steam games, and their contributions and funding to Wine and other projects. Even the new Steam big picture UI, which was initially only available on SteamOS, is now broadly available.

It's no exaggeration to say that Valve is carrying Linux gaming these past few years. It has been a downright renaissance.

@Kaldo @sdx Even though #Valve is maintaining #Proton, which is based on #Wine, I think projects like #DXVK and #GalliumNine would not exist or have come this far if it weren't for Valve.

I think Valve's contribution to the #Linux world is very indirect, but cannot be denied.

Lets take the imaginary program Y. It is free open source software with the GPLv3 license. If Valve wants to include Y in SteamOS, they are free to do so. Any time Valve makes changes or fixes to Y, they are legally required to provide the source code of their changes, as stated in the GPL license included with Y.

A lot of programs have this license (or a similar one), which forces corporations to contribute back to FOSS projects.

Some Valve-made components in SteamOS are truly "SteamOS only", but a good amount of fixes to non-Valve programs are submitted "upstream" (to the original project). Due to the nature of Linux, it might be possible to copy the few non-foss components in SteamOS and directly use them in another distro.

Alongside forced contributions due to licensing, Valve contributes a lot of code to "gaming" programs on Linux, such as Wine or DXVK. They also make some SteamOS components FOSS, including Gamescope for example. Valve is (currently) doing a lot of work "for the community" rather than for direct profit.

Mainly their creation of Proton, and contributions to DXVK and WINE have helped Linux gaming become possible on any distro.

Before SteamOS could become a thing Valve made HUGE effort to make Linux useful for gaming. All the games everyone can now easily play on any x86 Linux distribution - that was possible, in a big part, by Valve efforts. Driver improvements, compatibility layers (not just Proton, but also improvements in the upstream wine), etc.
And they do continue the improvements, not just for their own Linux systems.

Since Proton can be used on any other distro, every distro is positively affected by Valves development/improvements of it.

I think the days of the Windows monopoly are already gone - in my (academic) circles at least, I see more OS X/Mac than Windows users.

The OS X dominance is probably less sustainable than the Windows monopoly was, as it depends on one (already abusive) company for both hardware and software. In addition, mobile devices are increasingly taking over, shaking up the entire industry.

To me at least, it seems to be turbulent times where there is absolutely room for changes to happen. Not saying it's going up be the year of the Linux desktop though, that one is getting a bit old.

Valve is truly one of the last respected game companies. Sure, they make a lot of money and take a 30% cut from developers on Steam, but because of how satisfied their users are, they keep coming back and keep buying more games, which is a win in the long term. Too many companies think short-term or quarterly while Valve seems to look at the big picture. I give a lot of credit to Gabe for not truly selling out at any point. And if it hasn't happened by this point, I don't see it happening in the future. It would have happened by now if so.

Its just sensible. Building their own os would take so much resources that they would have to successfully make a profit on it. Leveraging linux and the open source community allows them to make sure there is an alternative and gives them an os to use on their handheld device or any other they choose to make ensuring they can't be cut out by a monopoly power. And all for pennies really.

I have some vague memory that they started seriously pushing for linux support after microsoft tried to limite steam acces on windows 8 or something like that.
But I can't find any info on that...