The steamdeck-like hardware market is going to explode and they are fools for not putting in even a tiny amount of effort there. Yeah a lot of steamdeck form factor devices will run windows, but idk linux has passed a critical threshold where windows just looks less and less attractive as an OS to base this kind of device around.
It doesn’t really matter how well Valve does or doesn’t do in the near term, the existence of the steam deck right now as a functional, easy to use gaming device irrevocably changes the pc gaming market. In the future kids are going to get these things before their parents shell out for a gaming pc, they are the clear gateway step into pc gaming because you can always buy a nice pc down the road and have all the same games to play as you do on your handheld.
It will increasingly matter more and more what multiplayer action game you can pick up and get running most easily on a steamdeck-like linux device to play with your friends. Right now for example Halo Infinite is pretty perfectly situated, it doesn’t have much competition for being the easy to get into steam deck multiplayer shooter choice.
I recently had a game I was waiting for released on steam and epic. The steam version (with some supporter pack stuff, because I like the dev) was $100, while the epic version was less than $50(with the same extras). I considered for a moment buying it on epic, but then I thought - “fuck, it’s epic games” and bought it on steam instead. I just couldn’t handle the thought of epic fucking games being in charge of my ability to play the game. I don’t trust them. Not even if all their shit is 50% off.
Idk much about business, but if you can’t be trusted to be reliable even when you’re offering massive discounts, maybe you don’t have a lasting business on your hands.
This is another reason Epic games will lose everything to Valve. Their storefront is useless and is a money loser. But even if it weren’t, valve is moving themselves to be the gaming king of Linux. Where no competitor exists meaningfully. Maybe GoG?
GoG doesn’t even have a Linux version so yea, there is no competition. Some games on GoG that are natively available in Linux have an installer for manual install but that’s it.
Sweeney has had a chip on his shoulder with Linux for at least 15 years. It’s honestly a bit weird since if you look at stuff before around 2005, he had quite a different tone.
Legend has it xX-1337_gnu_h4x0r-Xx once stalked Tim Sweeny in Unreal 2004. That led to the development of Unreal 2: The Liandri Conflict, where that same Linux user hacked Tim Sweeny’s character model to his own grandmother. It was Xbox only, but still somehow the Linux user killed him, at Tim Sweeny’s own video game! He just couldn’t handle that so he took 2 years to develop the technology to block all Linux users out of sheer spite. He accomplished his goal in 2007 when finally, Sweeny’s mission was completed with Unreal Tournament 3. It was so successful that no game from Epic since Unreal Tournament 2004 has had a Linux release.
But that wasn’t enough for Tim Sweeny. He needed more, he needed… Control. Afterall, we all know Gears of War 1 sales for PC were terrible because of pirating, which only Linux users do. Time passed and in June 2012 an opportunity arose, an offer that he could not refuse. Tencent, a multibillion dollar investment company purchases just under half of the shares of Epic Games. His own words, “Tencent’s directors are super valuable contributors whose advice and participation helped make Epic what it is today.” And thus, the adoption of the live service model arrives with Fortnite: Battle Royale.
Unfortunately for Tim, Beijing’s gaming laws culled any revenue from Fortnite China, but that doesn’t matter. Tim Sweeny’s goal was complete, being able to now buy out any game he desires and kill Linux support for it before it can even begin, even going so far as to actively remove support for it from existing games. With gamers faith in Epic now Dauntless from free games and their image as pioneers of developer first PC gaming, we can finally go to today.
The release of LEGO Fortnite and the other modes. See, there was a competitor to Epic Games that inspired Tim Sweeny deeply. Roblox. The game where you spend money to play games people have made, all without ever leaving the store. A concept that Tencent has successfully established elsewhere, but one that hasn’t quite fully succeeded in the United States (except of course for Steam, the actual anti-christ of PC gamers). But no longer, now gamers of all ages, young and younger can see the value of Epic Games all-in-one game, Fortnite. Soon, Tim Sweeny’s goal will be complete by extinguishing all games on Linux. But the Pariah Valve ruined that plan by releasing… the Steam Deck. The Linux device that steals candy from babies and money from developers.
Linux. Not even once. It turns your children into striped sock wearers who will grow up to not understand why having everything centrally located in one account is actually a good thing.
Does anyone actually spend money on Epic Games? I claim the free ones every time I boot into Windows (like every month or so) but I don’t think I’ve ever heard anyone say they bought something on the Epic Store. They’re losing money hand over fist paying for all those free exclusives, so I don’t think it’s just the people I know.
Sweeney does not want to contribute in any way towards making the steam deck more profitable.
I think he actually wants a monopoly. He wants to be, functionally, the only digital storefront on PC. And doing anything that could help Valve, even in another market, would detrimental to that goal.
I’d rather not play games at all if Epic ever gets a monopoly. Though I would of course keep playing games, just without paying for them. Epic won’t see as much as a single cent from me.
Are there really that many people up in arms about this? Fuck epic and fuck fortnite, but were there really that many steam deck users that even wanted to play it in the first place? I see no issues with epic continuing to make dumb and short sighted business decisions, so long as somebody salvages unreal if they ever crash and burn.
For me it’s not about fortnite but more about fast-paced multiplayer on the steam deck
When I played Rocket league on the deck instead of my Desktop with Lan, higher resolution and much higher framerate I always felt as if I’m playing much worse than I usually do which is not fun in the slightest
It’s a great console for singleplayer and more tactical multiplayer but whenever reading the screen in less than a second and reacting very fast to it in an online game is necessary that’s not great…
No - I’m just saying that the delay in WIFI and the low framerate and small resolution of the screen makes the Steamdeck a sub-par choice for fast-paced games for me. It’s fine if you are only playing on that device but if you also have a desktop to play at it’s far worse imho
Well yeah but his sentiment is about Linux in general especially with their store only being supported on windows (maybe Mac as well?). Idc about fortnite but would be nice if more companies take the effort to support or simply stop kicking Linux out.
I mean, yes I don’t have a gaming machine but also I just find playing shooters more fun on the steam deck to be honest. I can also play it while in so many more contexts (not necessarily out and about, just even at home) that the loss in computing power and screen fidelity doesn’t really bother me. Do I mostly use guns with scopes? Yes lol… but whatev it works fine.
There’s an interesting issue here that shows Linux support is a cultural thing, not a business thing.
They’ve presented it as “it doesn’t make sense to financially support Linux due to low player count.” But they don’t need to provide official support, they just need to tick a box and say “yeah, we don’t support this, do it at your own risk.”
From a purely financial point of view, Linux support is almost free. If you release your game, a bunch of developers off of your payroll will just add Linux support. You don’t even need to give them technical support because they use an unsupported platform.
To use business lingo, blocking Linux support is just leaving money on the table.
But I think a lot of companies feel like they have to have full control of everything. That everything they do most be fully supported and approved by them. That they are scared of letting the community take charge of things because it might tarnish your brand or whatever.
They are worried that there’ll be graphical bugs or something and that’ll make Fornight look bad, so it’s better for their brand image to just block everything they don’t have control over.
It’s a worrying pattern I’ve seen in a few places, including Mozilla of all things.
… Or maybe it’s just that Epic are too stubborn to accept help and contributions from anyone else, especially their “enemies”.
I have been wondering why they don’t just take Heroic launcher and add a skin around it to make an “official” launcher. It’s probably just because they are too prideful to support anything open source or Valve. They think that they need to make their own thing, rather than using existing code.
Sorry for the rambling post, but I think this situation is more due to an unhealthy company culture than “lol 2% market share” as they present it.
There is no “unofficial client” to exploit, there is an unofficial installer/launcher. Windows games run using proton run in exactly the same way they do on windows, the game itself is not modified in any way, that’s the whole point.
It allows you to run games, as if they were on windows. All these companies have to do, is fucking allow it.
Epic already makes anticheat that supports Linux, and other games they own already run on Linux with anticheat.
They’re just holding out on fortnite because… actually I’m not sure why. Probably Sweeney’s personal thoughts on it. If they actually wanted it to run on Linux/deck I have no doubt they could without much trouble.
Sweeney is lying through his teeth here. From things he has said previously, it becomes very clear he hates the whole idea of linux. When steamdeck became a thing, it was clear he was salty about how it would shine a light on it as an alternative OS. With this interview, by now it seems he is beginning to bend under the pressure and at least pretending that “oh I have nothing against such and amazing platform, so sad we can’t support it” in order to not look like an ass.
Which is an out that will bite him in the ass, they can support it, so soon interviewers won’t be asking, “why can’t you support linux” but “why won’t you”.
Are you aware that Fortnite uses EasyAntiCheat which is already working on Linux with plenty of other games? It’s literally as simple as Epic Games allowing it. And yes the anticheat still works, so no it’s not about preventing cheaters. Read the news from earlier this year about EAC enabling it on Linux and how a whole host of games have already done so.
Valve is guilty of the same crime, a billionaire can’t hire anyone to do CSGO2 Apple support. It’s never been about money or support. The CEOs are just being jerks.
Valve did purchase the for-profit MoltenVK layer and had it open-sourced under the Khronos umbrella, so they’ve already been happy to provide people a Vulkan-on-Metal solution for those who want to support Apple without an entirely separate rendering engine.
In the case of fortnite, this isn’t really true. The issue of fortnite is the anti cheat system is not designed to play nice with Linux and allowing Linux without having the anti cheat on point would lead to players getting mad at cheaters and the collapse of fortnite. It’s happened to several games in the past that couldn’t prevent people from cheating.
Easy anti-cheat stays on. Several other games have implemented it on Linux without problems. Easy anti-cheat made it as easy as the developer (Epic Games) checking a box to allow it to run on Linux. That’s what the person you’re responding to is referring to. It’s a recent development that happened earlier this year.
It’s happened to several games in the past that couldn’t prevent people from cheating.
And those games are…? There are plenty of games that have allowed anticheat to work on Linux and haven’t imploded, but I don’t know of a single one that has. Care to encourage enlighten me?
I don’t specifically mean games that used anti cheats that ran on Linux. I just mean games that couldn’t keep from too many people cheating and it ruining the online aspect of a game. A couple different Diablo games come to mind. COD:Warzone got pummeled for a while. Fall Guys had a very rough season 1.
For instance, having to deal with desktop Windows’ BS. Oh, you wanted to play games? Well we have to take over your Steam Deck and install updates for the next 20 minutes.
I mean...sure you should be able to wait on the updates, but that's not that common once you actually do the updates. And it's not as if you don't do updates on Steam deck (You absolutely should, and the flathub apps have tons of updates at least weekly when I run them)
That’s not the case, and you didn’t read what you linked. I’m also a professional system admin with decades of experience on Windows and Linux, so we can keep arguing if you’d like, but I’m not going to accept that Windows is as you’re saying when I know better.
What that link says is that I can delay the updates by a week on Windows 10, but then am forced to update after that. I can also set active hours, but the system will still force the updates and reboot the computer.
Linux can update without forcing a reboot until I’m ready. It also never has a “Updates Applying” screen that locks me from using it. And, in fact, most updates don’t require a reboot and the kernel can be setup for live updates that almost never require one to begin with.
Oh you’re not going to do the thing you then proceeded to do? Okay. How long did it take you to attempt a recovery from not being able to read the info in your last link?
I mean fair enough, i can also drink gasoline and douse myself in it, then set myself on fire and jump inside a shark infested ocean to put out the fire, but I’m not gonna do that either
This is why I have respect for Valve. They’re willing to invest into changing the status quo instead of seeing it as not profitable immediately. They’re playing the long game, and they’ve put their version of Linux into millions of hands. They’ve built hardware for it, they’ve invested a ton into Wine/Proton, they’ve invested in open-source graphics drivers. They’re actively fixing up third party games to the point some of them run better on a their handheld than decent Windows PCs. And a good chunk of it is open-source and given away for free to everyone to use.
Meanwhile Sweeney is just there whining that Linux is too hard. They can’t even be bothered to try.
I would give money to Valve just so they keep going. I have no desire to buy an Epic game they’re not even willing to try to at least make it easier to run in Wine.
I am all for valve in terms of games, even though I don’t like the buying but not owning things stuff I would always prefer Steam over anything else. They earned my trust, something no other non-human entity will ever get. This company just has it figured out.
They tried. Then apple dropped 32bit binaries support.
Apple is a very expensive partner to have. They do whatever they want with their ecosystem and many developers have been burned when apple decides to make their work obsolete or outright copies it and makes part of the bundled in apps.
So. It would be amazing if valve updated every one of their games for new versions of macOS and if they would kept MacOS proton support. But macOS is a moving target that will break backwards compatibility whenever it suits apple. So I understand that is hard to justify the investment.
In the end MacOs and Linux where less than a 1% of the Steam user base. But one is an open ecosystem where there is competition and some semblance of respect for backwards compatibility and the other is a closed and sometimes hostile environment.
Steam recently announced that after February of 2024 they’ll no longer support Mojave (a 5 year old OS) and older versions of MacOS, which Apple no longer even supports with security updates. The dropped support is due to Chrome dropping support for those OS versions, and Steam relies on Chrome for some of its functionality. The lack of support also doesn’t mean Steam will suddenly stop working, simply that they are no longer going to provide updates or customer service for it. This impacts 2% of Steam customers with Macs - meaning roughly 0.03% of Steam’s customers, or around 46,000 people.
Just to be clear, is that what you’re talking about?
The technology used by Valve is Irrelevant. The operating system losing support is not even supported by apple. The users of that version of MacOs are at risk because they use a closed source unmantained operating system.
As I said Apple is not concerned with kind of old software. They expect everyone to move up with them, developers and users, or get left behind.
Portal is a game released THE SAME YEAR the iPhone was. In classic hit PC game time that’s “nothing”, you expect to be able to run it, but in Apple’s timeline is ancient history. Take a look into how many iPhone games just won’t work anymore.
It’s getting bigger, but I said they WERE less than an 1%. And macOS was bigger that Linux for ages.
Then Apple proved they were not an ideal alternative platform, being even more closed than Microsoft, and not understanding the games ecosystem, so Valve pivoted and got into the Linux thing, failed with the Steam Machines, pivoted into Proton, and now I have a Deck.
Steam isn’t dropping support for all Macs, just those on Mojave and older, and Apple no longer even supports them. This impacts 2% of Steam customers with Macs - meaning roughly 0.03% of Steam’s customers, or around 46,000 people (assuming 150 million customers worldwide, which would track with historical numbers that end at around 2021).
Their dropped support coincides with Google ending support for Chrome in those OSes, and Steam has Chrome as a dependency. It’s not just because of having a tiny market share.
It’s certainly reasonable to be sceptical, but you should also ask yourself: what would be their motivation for lying here? What would they gain by saying there are 3.5% non-Windows users when there are actually less than 1%? Lying about funding and legal compliance has obvious motivation. And maybe there is some reason for lying about their platform usage breakdown too, but it’s certainly not as obvious.
People are just believing in the status. In the old days the sales numbers from individual businesses were the focus. Nowadays they are used as a console indicator for sales.
If you play Genshin Impact, a false god was believed to be their god for years. Only it wasn’t their actual god. This is the same thing, Valve wants people to believe in the status and they want people to not question it.
Not to mention having zero support for Vulkan or modern OGL, excepting compatibility layers on top of Metal (which is not an easy task) by third parties.
Meanwhile Sweeney is just there whining that Linux is too hard.
I’m with you on Valve trying to be more open (in a semi-walled-garden with Steam on Steamdeck, circumventable with some effort). But gaming on Linux - practically nobody is actually writing games natively for Linux. They’re writing for Windows (or a console) and the community is making the run under Proton/Wine on Linux. Is Epic intentionally preventing them from running on Proton? Well, effectively, yes - but that’s not a Linux-to-hard problem, more of a “we don’t want to have to police cheating on another OS” problem.
Sure. By default you get the Steam store. Correct me if I’m wrong, but it’s the only option to load games from the default Gaming interface. There is no option to load from Gog, Epic, Uplay, Playstation, Xbox, Nintendo, or any other 3rd party store. If you are not willing (or able) to manage the deck in desktop mode, you can’t install non-Steam games so - as a console - it’s a walled garden. I say semi- because it’s not terribly difficult to switch to desktop mode and install other applications, launchers, and games - but if you’ve never used Linux and are not computer savvy, Steam is the only way to get games onto the device.
I feel like you’ve just described a garden. There are no walls. You can just walk out of the carefully curated garden and nobody will stop you. Heck, you can even bring things from outside of the garden back with you. Yes, things aren’t as pretty outside the garden, and yes, it may be a bit intimidating if you’re not familiar with the wild lands of Linux, but that’s just the nature of modern computing (regardless of what OS you’re using).
By default you start in Steam Big Picture mode, but you can, without doing anything unusual, likely without even needing to read a manual or follow a guide, easily get to Desktop Mode. From there, you can easily install anything that’s available for Linux. You can even install an entirely different OS. At no point does Valve do anything to stop you - if they did, that would be the “wall” in question. And they make it pretty easy to add anything available in desktop mode to Steam, which means you don’t even have to leave the “garden” to play those games.
You can also, once in desktop mode, easily install Heroic or Lutris (which enable installing games from other third party stores, like GOG and Epic), EmuDeck, or Chiaki via the Discover Store. (You can even install RetroArch directly via Steam.) AFAIK, the repo Discover uses isn’t maintained by Valve, so everything available there is “outside the garden,” as it were.
If you’re not computer savvy and aren’t familiar with all this, there are tons of resources out there that can help. But even if there weren’t, I struggle to understand how the Steam Deck would be different from any other computer, with the exception being that it provides a console like experience with Valve’s storefront emphasized - and every modern OS I can think of has an app store or GUI package manager, so… that’s not really all that different.
So I guess my follow-up question is: how could Valve change the Steam Deck to make it not a “semi-walled garden” (optimally without making the experience worse for the people still in the garden)? I can’t really think of anything other than somehow enabling anyone (e.g., GOG or Epic) to add their store as a Steam app and then letting those stores add games to your Steam library - and unfortunately that would be problematic for a number of reasons (both legal and practical).
I still say it’s semi-walled. It has a bunch of gates in and out but and, unlike the Switch or iOS, there are no locks on the gates or gatekeepers. But the gates are latched in a way that requires specialized - if freely available - knowledge to open.
I can’t really think of anything other than somehow enabling anyone (e.g., GOG or Epic) to add their store as a Steam app
No, no as a Steam App, but as an alternate startup interface. I would say that the garden is open if there were a startup screen allowing you to pick the launcher of your choice. For argument’s sake, I’ll say Android TV. You can one-click download any content launcher with no technical ability. You can watch content (“play games”) purchased at Amazon, or on Netflix, or HBO Go (or whatever they call themselves now) and it’s the native store interface. You can do the same thing with Google’s in-house launcher. An acceptable alternate would be any other content player - like Apple’s TVOS, Roku, or Amazon’s FireTV. You can’t just load anything you want like it’s Linux or Windows, but the startup page lets you select a content provider and then you use their interface to navigate your content. It’s a good analogy as the same content is available from multiple providers, and all three (four if you include Google/Youtube) have their own in-house content libraries - which often overlap with competitors. I have both Roku and Apple actively on my TVs and I don’t purchase any content from either one of them except the hardware.
I should say that I don’t blame Valve for not including competitors stores. It’s a cleaner interface not to have a loading or Home screen. They also have customized their interface for optimal user experience. And, if they are still selling at a net loss (after engineering, marketing, and distribution) then this is a loss leader to drive gamers to their store. You could say, of course, they have done it on an OS that doesn’t natively support other game launchers and therefore it is impractical, but Linux also doesn’t natively support the vast majority of major game titles, so that’s a little disingenuous. And that partly wraps us back to the Fortnight topic at hand.
I think your Android TV metaphor is a bit off base. By default you only have access to Google Playstore apps (the equivalent to games on Steam). And it takes a not insignificant amount of research to learn how to sideload apps. And many Android TV devices flat lock you out of doing so to begin with.
Android TV is more of a “large enough walled garden that you can miss the walls and might not noticed you’ve even been locked in” situation imho.
I mean, the whole Epic v Google lawsuit was about the walls in this garden.
By default you only have access to Google Playstore apps
Yes, but for the purpose of video content, those aren’t “games” in the context of the steam deck. For the steamdeck (or any console) you have games and launchers instead of shows and apps. Steam loading Gog or Epic or Uplay as the interface from an initial “home” menu, analgous to the home menu for Android TV (not Android), Apple’s TVOS, or the Roku home page loading Netflix, HBOGo, Prime, or AppleTV+. None of those are “games” - you don’t do anything with them - they launch the content from their catalog - content which competes with the hardware/OS vendor’s own catalog. I can buy a movie from Apple or Roku or Amazon from within their launcher, even though I could have bought it through Youtube.
So I might load up my SteamDeck and choose Epic as my Launcher. Then the Epic Launcher shows me all of my games and allows me to buy new ones or collect Epic Points (IDK, I don’t use their launcher, tbh) and chat with all my Epic friends. If I want to play a Steam game, I press Home and select the Steam interface (which is the only one on the real Deck) and then I have the familiar Steam launch interface.
Epic v Google was about Fortnight and the 30% fees on in-app purchases which had to go through Google with no way around it. Same with Apple. This same problem might exist in SteamDeck if Steam required that any purchases made in the Gog or Epic launcher had to be processed through the Steam store and Steam took 30%. And, of course, the only reason this doesn’t exist for the steam deck is because you can’t even buy Fortnight on Steam. I don’t think, if you purchase a video through Amazon Prime on AppleTV or Roku, if Apple or Roku get a cut. If you subscribe to their monhtly license, they do - but not for discrete purchases made. The gaming angle - and fortnite’s fight with the stores, is about this cut applying to everything.
I understand your perspective, but it seems to me that Android TV creates the appearance of an open garden by painting the sky on the walls and ceiling. But in reality it is a labyrinth meant to keep you trapped that they allow other companies to setup small garden plots in.
What happens when I want to install an app exclusively available on F-Droid? Or what if I own an Amazon Fire tablet with apps purchased from the Amazon app store? These apps can’t be accessed through the Google Play Store.
While the apps you install from the Google Play Store act as content aggregators, it doesn’t mean you aren’t confined to the offerings of the default app store. Depending on your Android TV device, you might encounter hurdles or find it impossible to use alternative app stores.
Epic v Google was about Fortnight and the 30% fees on in-app purchases which had to go through Google with no way around it.
They key term there being “with no way around it”. Epic’s concern was precisely this lack of alternative app store availability. In Epic’s own words from their verdict announcement:
“Throughout the trial, we saw evidence that Google was willing to invest billions of dollars to hinder alternative app stores by incentivizing developers to abandon their own distribution plans and exclusive agreements with device manufacturers that excluded competing app stores. … Google imposes a 30% fee on developers because they have effectively prevented viable competitors from emerging.”
Epic not only aimed to reduce the 30% fee but also sought to prevent Google from imposing artificial barriers that prevented users from accessing alternative app stores on Android devices. This was done with the intention of launching an “Epic Games App Store” as an alternative, bypassing the 30% all together.
To relate this to the garden metaphor. You are so focused on the garden fiefdoms Google gives you access to, you never notice you are being prevented from leaving their Garden Kingdom. (Or to put it another way, the Google Play Store is a mall that hides the exits and pays other stores to prevent anyone from talking about other malls)
Fortnite serves as a prime example of this issue. While a capable Android TV device can run Fortnite, you can’t download it from Google Play, necessitating sideloading. Many Android TV devices even restrict you from downloading browsers or installing APKs from sources outside the Google Play Store. This means you’d need to research how to sideload it, even though it’s technically possible.
In contrast, consider the Steam Deck, where there’s only one gate: the “Switch to Desktop Mode” button. Once you cross that threshold, you have complete freedom, with only developers’ willingness to support it standing between you and any software you desire. If Epic were to develop a Linux version of the Epic Games Store, it would run on the Steam Deck, and they could even use Proton, an open-source software, for compatibility. You could even add games from it, or the launcher itself, to your list of Steam apps and launch it from “Game Mode”. So you could switch between launchers at will (I have done this with Battle.Net, Lutris, and the Heroic launcher without issues or blockers).
From this point of view, the SteamDeck is a fully open garden with a single very visible gate leading to a fully open world (albeit sometimes an untamed wilderness). And as was said earlier, if you find an interesting “plant” out there, you are free to bring it back to your garden, no questions asked. When you see a wall outside that garden, it’s not because you have been walled in, but rather walled out, or at the very least deemed unworthy of entry.
I can understand preferring to live in Google’s Kingdom, where all the conveniences you are used to are readily accessible. And I can see how the SteamDeck’s single well kept garden in an untamed wilderness where you have to learn how to get to any other garden would be less desirable. After all, a home is made up of walls, and even if you are trapped inside, you are “free” from the inconveniences of the wildernesses, but don’t mistake the wilderness for walls.
Edit/P.S. To be fair, Android TV’s often try to bar your path, but it’s not nearly as bad as iOS devices. Most of the time, you can leave the “Google Kingdom”, it just requires as much (or more) research and time investment than doing so on the SteamDeck. And unlike Valve, Google makes back room deals to keep it’s garden a labyrinth and prevent open discussion of other gardens, so users never even notice they can’t leave.
Valve is one of the few companies left that are not just a pure investor-pleaser and actually do some meaningful progress rather than changing the colors of their button every so often.
Valve pushes the medium forward in most everything they do. And they do it while not being dicks, too. I hope they can stay true to this direction forever.
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