Shower thought: Valve could do the ultimate boss-move this year

Submitted ⁨⁨1⁩ ⁨day⁩ ago⁩ by ⁨cronenthal@discuss.tchncs.de⁩ to ⁨gaming@beehaw.org⁩

If Valve really wanted to make a splash, they could release a desktop version of SteamOS in October, right when support for Windows 10 ends. For additional damage, they could bundle in Half-Life 3. Just imagine the coverage this would get.

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BmeBenji@lemm.ee ⁨20⁩ ⁨hours⁩ ago
I see all of these “Why SteamOS and why not another distro?” comments and it kinda blows me away how much the idea of approachability designed by a trusted name seems like a foreign concept here.

Then again, we’re talking about Linux fanatics who probably also argue over whether emacs, vim, or vi are the best text editor lol

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- Kolanaki@pawb.social ⁨16⁩ ⁨hours⁩ ago
  VIM is the best because once you try it you are unable to quit.
  
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  - RisingSwell@lemmy.dbzer0.com ⁨10⁩ ⁨hours⁩ ago
    I keep seeing this, is it actually hard to close? Surely Linux has a version of alt f4, does that also fail?
    
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  - BmeBenji@lemm.ee ⁨16⁩ ⁨hours⁩ ago
    Just like meth! :D
    
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- dbtng@eviltoast.org ⁨9⁩ ⁨hours⁩ ago
  Those editors are toys. Use something with real power. Use nano.
  
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  - zerofk@lemm.ee ⁨5⁩ ⁨hours⁩ ago
    edlin or bust
    
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- ReversalHatchery@beehaw.org ⁨20⁩ ⁨hours⁩ ago
  real linux users don’t need a graphical session!!! everything can and should be done on the terminal!
  
  /s
  
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  - BmeBenji@lemm.ee ⁨19⁩ ⁨hours⁩ ago
    I love running Elden Ring in the terminal. Hells yeah, foul tarnished
    
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- superkret@feddit.org ⁨15⁩ ⁨hours⁩ ago
  It’s actually ed .
  
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YMS@discuss.tchncs.de ⁨23⁩ ⁨hours⁩ ago
SteamOS would be a particular poor choice as a desktop operating system compared to basically any other Linux distribution. It uses an immutable file system and reverts all system changes upon every update. That’s nice if you don’t want to fuck up your handeheld gaming device with some dumb changes, but it’s generally not what you will want on a device you use for all kinds of things. Of course, with some effort you can work around this, but then, why don’t use a system that doesn’t just use such a paradigm in the first place and won’t roll back your workaround to make it usable with the next update?

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- BmeBenji@lemm.ee ⁨21⁩ ⁨hours⁩ ago
  As someone who uses my desktop for gaming (and maybe web browsing) exclusively, and as someone mildly but not very familiar with OSes, I read this as “SteamOS is bad because of reason I personally don’t like that many people don’t understand, so do more research about Linux”
  
  The barrier to Linux as an OS is not how good it is but how understandable it is. After Pewdiepie’s video went up I’m confident the search phrase “Linux OS download” skyrocketed in popularity because people don’t know let alone understand what a distribution is.
  
  SteamOS is a great intro to Linux for the majority of PC gamers because it’s not only basically ready to use as soon as you boot it up, but also because it is being maintained by a team of people intent on making it the optimal PC gaming platform.
  
  Once Windows users are introduced to a basic Linux experience why not let them take their time learning more about the variables in distros?
  
  Maybe SteamOS is not the perfect distribution because <list your gripes here> but is there a perfect distribution?
  
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  - teawrecks@sopuli.xyz ⁨17⁩ ⁨hours⁩ ago
    Maybe you don’t understand it, but that doesn’t mean you don’t rely on it. If I said an OS was unusable by 99% of people because it didn’t support multithreading, it doesn’t matter if 99% of people know what multithreading is, that’s clearly a true statement. Similarly, if you’ve ever expected your PC to have the same files on it tomorrow that you put on it today, then you might find it annoying when that’s not the case.
    
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  - Unboxious@ani.social ⁨15⁩ ⁨hours⁩ ago
    
    I read this as “SteamOS is bad because of reason I personally don’t like that many people don’t understand, so do more research about Linux”
    
    It’s easy to dismiss this as something that won’t ever matter to you, but this is something that can cause problems in all sorts of ways even for gamers. The first thing that came to mind is not being able to install custom drivers to support weird hardware, like a racing wheel or something.
    
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- prole@lemmy.blahaj.zone ⁨22⁩ ⁨hours⁩ ago
  I use Bazzite on my main laptop (basically SteamOS) and it’s fantastic.
  
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  - lost_faith@lemmy.ca ⁨18⁩ ⁨hours⁩ ago
    Hows it work with rtx(looks supported now?) and vr? last time i tried and said i had nvidia it said “Go away!”
    
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- PanArab@lemm.ee ⁨20⁩ ⁨hours⁩ ago
  It doesn’t revert things stored in /home according to my experience, that’s good enough for most users
  
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  - CrabAndBroom@lemmy.ml ⁨16⁩ ⁨hours⁩ ago
    Yeah anything I put in /home has always stayed there, and things like customizations to KDE and whatnot always persist. I’m sure it changes a bunch of system files being an immutable OS, but I really don’t think it’d be anything a layperson coming fresh from Windows would ever really notice.
    
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- Ulrich@feddit.org ⁨21⁩ ⁨hours⁩ ago
  Not true. Steam OS is not the only immutable distro. Lots of people actually prefer that for their desktops.
  
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- cronenthal@discuss.tchncs.de ⁨21⁩ ⁨hours⁩ ago
  Fedora bluefin is a much bigger project and a much larger paradigm shift in how Linux distros can be understood than what you make out to be. Tweaking system files might be a good choice for users who need to go beyond what comes with the standard, but it’s not something a wide majority of users will or should need.
  
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  - bilb@lemmy.ml ⁨16⁩ ⁨hours⁩ ago
    When you can easily spin up virtual operating systems with distrobox, you never need to. You might, for some hardware support reasons, need to layer in some additional packages, but I’m curious how true even that is.
    
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- tatann@lemm.ee ⁨23⁩ ⁨hours⁩ ago
  I’d personally prefer to have an OS dedicating to playing, one I can’t broke by installing too many stuff or, on the hand, I could reinstall quickly without having to reinstall all the other stuff (printer, cloud syncing, etc…)
  
  So having a multi-boot for gaming and regular (although rare) computer use. There’s a good chance I’ll still sadly have a Windows boot option for some multiplayer online games (anticheat 😐)
  
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JakobFel@retrolemmy.com ⁨13⁩ ⁨hours⁩ ago
That could be what they’re waiting for.

However, I do not believe SteamOS is going to be the silver bullet people think it is. I’m somewhat of a fanboy of Valve but SteamOS is really only good for a console-like PC experience.

People who want to ditch Windows need to look at Linux as a whole, not just SteamOS.

Michael Horn talks about this in greater detail: www.youtube.com/watch?v=Y4g1dZfF5KA

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- DeathsEmbrace@lemm.ee ⁨24⁩ ⁨minutes⁩ ago
  If people want to ditch Windows then the gaming industry needs to stop gating the community. Either get rid of the shitty anti Linux anticheat or tell them to turn on Linux support naturally. For fucks sake I can’t believe I find out most anticheat just needs a simple email to turn it on for Linux.
  
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Blackmist@feddit.uk ⁨15⁩ ⁨hours⁩ ago
Reminder that supporting a single GPU is a lot simpler than supporting all of them…

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- mic_check_one_two@lemmy.dbzer0.com ⁨14⁩ ⁨hours⁩ ago
  Also, SteamOS would make a dogshit desktop OS. It’s designed specifically for Steam’s Big Picture Mode. It has Arch running in the background, but that’s not the primary focus of the OS.
  
  It would be great for something like an arcade cabinet or a family TV, but not so great for a desktop.
  
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  - DieserTypMatthias@lemmy.ml ⁨5⁩ ⁨hours⁩ ago
    They can make SteamOS Lite at any point.
    
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  - JohnEdwa@sopuli.xyz ⁨9⁩ ⁨hours⁩ ago
    Yup I’ve spent a good while running Deck in desktop mode compared to my laptop running Manjaro, and so far the only thing I’ve noticed is that the Deck has that handy “add to steam” context menu item that automatically sets a 3rd party game to run in proton through steam.
    And there’s an AUR package for that.
    
    So unless there’s something more I’ve missed, Manjaro + that package gets you the entire desktop SteamOS experience on any device.
    
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LocoLobo@lemm.ee ⁨1⁩ ⁨day⁩ ago
OP clearly overestimates how many people would use SteamOS or any other Linux distro for that matter. Most users are casual gamers these days, they are not changing OS just because there is a forced Windows update.

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- bloup@lemmy.sdf.org ⁨1⁩ ⁨day⁩ ago
  This isn’t about people not wanting to use Windows 11 this is about people not wanting to purchase a new computer
  
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- Shayeta@feddit.org ⁨1⁩ ⁨day⁩ ago
  They are if they can’t afford a new computer.
  
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  - JohnnyCanuck@lemmy.ca ⁨20⁩ ⁨hours⁩ ago
    Windows 10 won’t just stop working. I still see businesses rocking Windows Vista occasionally.
    
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- princessnorah@lemmy.blahaj.zone ⁨1⁩ ⁨day⁩ ago
  I don’t know, I think you’re clearly underestimating how many people would install Valve’s OS. The number of people with a Steam Deck that don’t know that what it’s running is a Linux distro is pretty high. The other piece to this is that it’s not just a forced Windows update for a huge chunk of users, it’s a forced device upgrade. Valve offering a free upgrade that negates the need to buy new hardware would absolutely capture people’s attention.
  
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  - LocoLobo@lemm.ee ⁨1⁩ ⁨day⁩ ago
    Yes and no, people can still use win10, it just won’t receive patches anymore. And in this particular case, my best guess is, that most people would rather use and outdated OS for a long time, rather than changing the OS altogether. Not every game is on steam, also not every non game programm is easily available for Linux. Humans are lazy.
    
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- umbrella@lemmy.ml ⁨15⁩ ⁨hours⁩ ago
  people use whatever comes preinstalled.
  
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Ulrich@feddit.org ⁨1⁩ ⁨day⁩ ago
If they wanted to “make a splash” they could have released it 3 years ago.

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- VaalaVasaVarde@sopuli.xyz ⁨1⁩ ⁨day⁩ ago
  They are actively monitoring for “HL3 confirmed” and adds a hour to the release time for each they find.
  
  The current release date is in the year 252525.
  
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  - MBech@feddit.dk ⁨1⁩ ⁨day⁩ ago
    That’s dumb. The only technology in 252525 will be a rusty sword for practicing proctology.
    
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- Unboxious@ani.social ⁨15⁩ ⁨hours⁩ ago
  It’s not as simple as just releasing something. They need to develop it first, and making it a good experience with hardware is actually pretty hard.
  
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  - Ulrich@feddit.org ⁨15⁩ ⁨hours⁩ ago
    Not hard enough that it hasn’t already been done for years by volunteers with zero budget.
    
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lorthirk@feddit.it ⁨1⁩ ⁨day⁩ ago
Isn’t SreamOS already available for download? It has been for months actually… What do you mean by “release a desktop version”?

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- Ulrich@feddit.org ⁨1⁩ ⁨day⁩ ago
  SteamOS has been available for years but no general purpose desktop release as of yet. Or anytime in the near future.
  
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  - prole@lemmy.blahaj.zone ⁨22⁩ ⁨hours⁩ ago
    That’s a different iteration of SteamOS than the current Arch-based immutable image the Deck uses.
    
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- Midnitte@beehaw.org ⁨1⁩ ⁨day⁩ ago
  The new version on the Steam Deck isn’t available - the old version of course is, but you might as well use Bazzite.
  
  I dont think Valve would bother trying to convert people to Linux - regardless of where people’s OSes are, they are the gaming store. Plus, Valve really doesn’t think developers should develop Linux native ports, so I dont think they’re really push people to use Linux - just use whatever you want and play shit with Proton if needed.
  
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SCmSTR@lemmy.blahaj.zone ⁨15⁩ ⁨hours⁩ ago
Fuck. I would have to seriously consider that if they did. But imagine valve running kernel design and security support. There’s no way they would do that as a competitive alternative to Windows. None. No way. It would ruin them and so much of what makes them special and a positive influence to everything.

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- mic_check_one_two@lemmy.dbzer0.com ⁨14⁩ ⁨hours⁩ ago
  Valve wouldn’t be running kernel design. SteamOS is just a heavily modified version of Arch. Arch runs the kernel design and security, while Steam just runs on top of it.
  
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