I'm very hopeful that Linux gaming will save the open PC desktop despite big tech is coming to destroy it. Or at least keep PCs alive for another decade. Gamers are still a huge factor as hardware customers.<p>GOG creating a Linux launcher and Steam Box with SteamOS coming out soon should benefit PC users in general not just gamers since Microslop sees Windows like a social experiment where they can test AI on unsuspecting lusers, as an ad platform and a store front now.
I also feel like this is an insane opportunity for companies who previously did not offer Linux native clients to start doing so and see some of a hike in sales specifically coming from the Linux crowd. I would absolutely pay good money for high quality Linux compatible software, after all, its not free as in free beer. I am still surprised most Linux Distros haven't changed their package managers to allow for selling of proprietary solutions directly, fully opt-in by default of course. I think maybe Ubuntu did? I don't know that Arch ever has. I think its a wasted opportunity to fund Linux distros by taking a small cut (probably not 30%) from commercial products directly on those app repositories.
Steam developing proton was what made it possible for me to change fully. No dual boot or anything needed. It's great.<p>Funnily I also run GoG games through steam proton..
But looking forward to the GoG client working!
Steam with Proton is simply incredible.<p>And now it doesn't even split games in "Linux" vs "Windows"; it simply assumes all games run on Linux. And they mostly do! Though to be fair I had to tweak a couple to make them run, and Space Marine II absolutely refuses to play past the cutscene, but most other games "just work".
God I hope Valve gets serious with Steam OS and it becomes a competitive target for PC games. They're making amazing progress with the Steam Deck, and I'm so ready to be free from Windows.
Is there something wrong with the many distros that make Steam a really easy install, or in the box? I mean Bazzite literally has a FS Steam option in the box for installers that's pretty close to the Steam OS experience with broader hardware support.
I'm trying to word this without sounding dismissive of Bazzite for simply not being from a big company with money to throw around. I'm sure the people making it are doing great work. But I just don't get the feeling it's anywhere near the position it needs to be a "real platform" that could disrupt Windows. It has to be looked at from the perspective of publishers, and whether it's worth their money to target a new platform.<p>Valve has good, stable funding to pay a team full time to build and support Steam OS which, over a long period of time and with enough user uptake, I think will have better chances of getting publishers on board with ensuring their games work on something that isn't Windows. Hell, they could probably make deals with publishers to say "hey, here's a pile of money to make sure your game works on Steam OS day 1, and put it in all the ads" and get the ball rolling that way.<p>Gaming is a tough space to crack. I think Valve's money and their history of supporting the most popular gaming platform on PC inspires more trust needed to make their platform a standard target.
Considering the Steam Machine will come with SteamOS, it looks like they are going all in.
I was amazed that the PC port of Spider-man Myles Morales worked perfectly with no tweaking at all. That’s the newest AAA game I own (I think), and it runs silky smooth and hasn’t had any issues.<p>It wasn’t that long ago that Wine was only really useful for games that were at least 5-10 years old. Proton is amazing.
WINE crawled so that Proton could run.<p>Like even in 2014 WINE worked well enough for most games for me. Proton just made it utterly effortless, and lets me run AAA games like RDR2 and CP2077.
There is nothing to save as long as it relies on game studios using Windows workstations, coding in Visual Studio and targeting DirectX.<p>The goal has to be to make native Linux attractive, so that they actually bother to create native executables, using Vulkan and co.<p>Until then it is no different from playing arcade games with MAME on Linux.
The most stable Linux API is Wine/Win32.<p>There are many older games I can't install on Linux anymore, because they used an older SDL1 or some particular X11 version or some GPU driver that's no longer available for the current kernel.<p>The exact same game, Windows version, can be installed and runs flawlessly on both Linux and Windows.<p>So, native Vulkan executables? Sure, if they can continue to run in 20 years.
Just like for OS/2, what a great success it was.
The development tools for OS/2 were worse and far more expensive.
It’s working right now, what are you arguing against.
There are a lot of older games that won't run on windows 11 as well. In fact most of my games no longer work on windows 11.<p>Your point?
Targeting DirectX and Win32 has become targeting Linux with how good Wine/Proton have gotten. I am able to play brand new games with no Linux support absolutely perfectly through proton. These games run better than games that had linux support actually ran on linux.
Ironically, Win32 has sometimes become more universal than native Linux binaries. For example, Baldur's Gate 3 released a native Linux version only supported on the Steam Deck, whereas the Proton version is verified for Linux almost everywhere. Win32 became the stable Linux gaming ABI.
Thus making Linux irrelevant as target to game studios.<p>For them DirectX and Win32 is what matters, if folks go out of their way to run on Proton, that is Valve's problem.
You're assuming no game studio would test their windows executable on proton, just because they develop on Windows. If there's non-trivial market share to capture by being "Deck verified" I don't see why that would be the case. Game devs develop on Windows for PlayStation, Switch, mobile etc. At least with proton they don't even need to cross compile.
I wouldn't go that far, I would suggest that any game studio interested in the next 10 years of PC gaming will need to at least start doing testing through Proton/Wine to ensure there's no clear/prominent bugs. It doesn't take a lot of vocal users to elevate or kill a game, and Linux usage has passed that mark at this point... Generally seismic shifts in politics are around the 8% mark in terms of overall population, and Linux usage in the Steam survey is close to 4% and some other metrics have Linux usage over 6%.<p>Literally half the gaming/hardware focused channels I watch have run at least one, if not several Linux Gaming videos and tests this past year... mostly in the past 4 months and mostly praising the state of Linux gaming. It's not going away.
> Thus making Linux irrelevant as target to game studios.
For them DirectX and Win32 is what matters<p>I don't think so. I rather <i>do</i> believe that many game developers would actually love to give a more native approach for writing GNU/Linux games a try (to make this point more plausible: game developers are very used to game-console-native SDKs).<p>But what these game developers <i>really</i> demand is a very stable user-space API for everything that is necessary for writing games, which will work reliably on basically <i>every</i> GNU/Linux distribution, and will be supported for at least 20 years.
The only thing that will make native executables attractive is users. A lot of users. Much more than Macos, seeings as few bother with Mac clients either and there's not even a Wine equivalent.
UE can be crosscompiled on a windows host to linux and then it's a few checkboxes to enable the vulkan RHI.
I don't see what the problem is with game studios buying Windows licenses.<p>Sure, the platform is enshittified spyware, but that only impacts the game devs on their work machines (which are probably locked down to protect secret IP anyway). Microsoft has basically lost control over their own platform at this point. The game studios have been refusing to migrate to new APIs until after they're working well in Wine.<p>If the rest of us can run something decent at home, that's a > 99% solution to the problem.<p>Put another way, for a long time, you needed to buy an SGI workstation or whatever to make assets for PC games. That didn't hold the DOS ecosystem back.<p>As for the ABI:<p>The Linux kernel has started adding syscalls to enable native-like execution of Windows binaries, and game devs are testing with Linux at launch. In the worst case, these are only used by Wine. In the best case, some good ideas from the Windows kernel will be exposed to regular Linux user-land.<p>I don't see how it really matters if the binaries are targeting libc, musl, or an opensource win32 / win64 layer. It's free software regardless. End-users are getting better backward compatibility under Linux than Microsoft is supporting under Windows. That one victory goes a long way towards winning the entire war.<p>On top of that, Linux is starting to show better framerates than Windows in the same hardware. It's not 100% of the time, but it's enough that you should run the game in both places if you really care to get that extra few percent out of the hardware.
nothing stopping them from developing on Linux workstations, cross-compiling to Windows, and testing with Wine/Proton. saves them Windows license fees too.
The incentives are not there, as it is, they work as usual, and Valve is the one that has to make it work.
The top played games are not the ones made this year
Frankly, WINE/Proton are likely more consistent targets for game dev/testing... I wish they'd at least do that much more often than not. At least smooth out any rough edges.<p>I would say it's a lot different, since it's an API implementation, not hardware emulation.
Most gamers don't give a shit about openness. A <i>much</i> more likely outcome is "big tech" following the numbers and slowly making Linux unusable by using EEE or any other tactic under the pretense of usefulness.
> Most gamers don't give a shit about openness<p>I don't think this is a given. I think most gamers so far haven't cared about openness because pragmatically, it didn't matter for them.<p>Now they're seeing the long-term effect of not caring about that though, which is why we're suddenly seeing a movement of gamers moving to Linux, and trying to get others to move with them, because they realize the importance now, as their desktops are slowly collapsing over Microsoft's decision to let AI do all the programming, and having zero QA before releasing stuff to the public.
They don't care about it as an abstract idea, but they do notice that Windows 11 is worse than Windows 10 was worse than Windows 8 was worse than Windows 7.<p>I'm not saying there have been zero useful improvements in later Windows releases, but 7 looked good and did what you told it to. "Openness" is a very abstract idea but "Only does what you tell it to" is a selling point for Linux.<p>You know it's not going to upload all your documents to OneDrive and then erase them from the computer.
> I don't think this is a given<p>This is a given. They love Discord and shit like that.
They don’t care about FOSS, but they care about “computer lets me do what I want”.<p>Discord is obviously proprietary but it’s actually a very modular platform that gives a lot of nice controls. It’s easy to make your own “server”, it’s easy to add whatever bots you want, it’s easy to moderate. From a consumer perspective, it’s “open”.<p>Also, I know that this wasn’t your point, but I do feel compelled to point out that Discord works fine on Linux.
Right, but that proves nothing, is there something that is more open and better than Discord, for this group of people? Otherwise I'd say my argument applies in exactly the same way. Pragmatism wins, so why change unless there is a need?
Yes if gamers truly cared about openness and absence of corporate control, they would move to self-hosted Matrix channels.
I actually did selfhost my own matrix server to communicate with my friends while gaming. Works great on my steamdeck and I’ve got bazzite on my laptop. Most games I’m interested in work great on Linux and anything that doesn’t I just don’t play. There are so many games that do work great, but I can see people skipping Linux because of fomo.
> Most gamers don't give a shit about openness.<p>With the Windows 11 debacle, many are learning first hand about what closed ecosystems force on you. It seems every feed I have that has gaming as an interest has an article about Linux as the future. Clearly someone is reading these articles.
If we care about the future of computing, the future of consumer rights, we need to MAKE THEM GIVE A SHIT.<p>Cory Doctorow is doing a very good job of that, but there is only one Cory Doctorow.
The pretense is security, PC software attestation is already in the workings: <a href="https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=46784572">https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=46784572</a>
but they do care about AI slop and owning their own system.<p>a lot of FOSS is an abstraction but even the rubes can realize that they're being spied on, that Big Tech wants to be Big Brother, and is enshittifying their experience to that end.
Until it fully supports multiplayer which doesn't seem to be a thing for any major game or studio, it's a nothingburger for the majority of people.
Gamers generally game on PC because they like building their system. Otherwise they would use a PS5 Pro or whatever.<p>The PC is an “open” platform in that you can buy and choose your own hardware. Intel vs AMD vs Nvidia, Seagate vs Western Digital, etc….<p>Using open software isn’t really more than a few steps from that. Being able to pick how your system works and customizing it to your liking is basically the software version of picking your PC parts. Gamers also like to run all sorts of software to rice there Windows desktops and will install all sorts of abominations tha mess with the Windows desktop shell. Much easier and fun to rice a Linux desktop.<p>Linux enthusiasts need to just learn how to appeal to their sensibilities. Valve knows, and they are very effective at getting people excited for a Linux based gaming platform. They’ve also proven they can walk the walk, not just talk the talk.<p>Sure, they won’t give a crap about the source code but there is more to libre software than just being able to change the source code if you want.<p>We’re also at an inflection point where people are getting really really really annoyed with companies like Microsoft treating them like lab rats and shoving Copilot down their throat when they don’t want it. There is a chink in the armor; people are opening up to the idea of alternative platforms where you don’t have to worry about any of that garbage.<p>> making Linux unusable by using EEE or any other tactic<p>This will never happen because projects will just be forked.
> Gamers generally game on PC because they like building their system. Otherwise they would use a PS5 Pro or whatever.<p>You're making a huge assumption here. I think that's a really small percentage. Most people game on PC because certain games they like to play are only on PC, or are much better suited to PC, or because their friends are on PC, or because they want to play on the go (Steam Deck is very recent and still not widely used), or because they need to have a PC anyway. Or because they grew up with it at home/in the neighborhood because there was no money for a console. Or because "Because they like building their system", I'm going to peg at <10%.
It's a bit on a tangent because it's about hardware rather than OS choice, but the next few years are going to be a stress test on how much people value PC versus the cash-value of components increases, and what happens to the numbers of people entering the market, staying with older systems or upgrading (or replacing/complimenting with a console). Someone saying they think it's worth a lot is different to opening their wallet.<p>One aspect I think will be interesting is to compare what happens to attitudes with prices changes in more affluent markets like North America or Western Europe compare to how PC has been approached in other markets like Asia or South America.
I got into PC gaming in ~2009 primarily because it is so much cheaper than console. Steam sales and Humble Bundle allowed me to buy so many more games for less money.<p>The initial cost upfront was higher than a console but if you want a lot of games it ends up being worth it.
<i>>This will never happen because projects will just be forked.</i><p>There's a chasm of difference between a technical fork and a meaningful fork. The entire point of EEE is relying on usefulness and convenience combined with network effects to make the entire system restricted and control it. Sure, you can go and fork anything you want - nobody stops you, technically. But you're getting the rug pulled from under your feet in any case.<p>You can witness the early stage of subversion with very useful software (without any hint of irony) made by people who "left" Microsoft: <a href="https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=46784572">https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=46784572</a>
Many game mods and community maps, etc. are only available on PC. You can play the vanilla version on console, but not the mods you watch Twitch streamers playing. So, it's not b/c they like building PCs, it's because they want to play the mods with their friends.<p>I am speaking as an old gamer. I no longer play.
I would not worry too much about the mod community! They are the one persistant group of people who will hack the software to their liking. Yes you can't play full FiveM GTA V right now, but it will get there eventually. There is nothing technical that is limiting the mods from working on Proton, just time from some annoyed mod dev that has had enough with windows, and it will be migrated over.
I'd rather say<p>1, because multiplayer is free. Still baffling to me that you actually have to pay to play with others on consoles<p>2, piracy is much much easier
Forgeting the part that all those parts bring in Windows drivers with them for easy installation.
Wrong, most PC gamers do not build their systems
I love gaming on pc because of the wealth of games, keyboard mouse setup, and less $ overall.<p>I hate building it and messing w hardware. Its a a necessity pain for me
With GPU, ram and flash prices where they are pc gaming isn’t moving anywhere but backwards for the next couple years, unfortunately.
On the one hand, hardware prices went up.<p>On the other hand, they didn't go up as much as our grocery bill and other bills. So, they're not keeping up with inflation, at least around here.
On top of that, Nvidia just released a beta version of their GeforceNow client.
Plus, the backlog of playable games is so awesome. I am working through things I always wanted to play that I can now throw on my steam deck.
> Gamers are still a huge factor as hardware customers.<p>They are but AI has fried the markets for RAM, SSDs and GPUs. Everything has gotten ridiculously expensive ever since the wash trading and the 100s of billions of $ worth of deals really took off.<p>Personally, I think at least one or two of the major GPU OEMs will go bust thanks to all of this, and I would be surprised if Framework, Pine64 and Steam's hardware line survive it. Hell, at the point we're at, I even have serious doubts the <i>Xbox</i> line survives.
Things have become crazy, indeed. I still kick myself for not buying the SSD I was eyeing in December, which has now went form 250 € to almost 400. I'm already maxed on RAM since a year ago, bought 64 GB for a fraction of today's cost.<p>But I still feel like we're still in the eye of the storm, and things will improve. Remember late 2020 when every useless GPU would command a fortune? I remember buying a used RX 5600 XT with a warranty somewhere around October for 300 €. A month later, it would cost at least twice as much, if you could even find one in stock. Last December I looked a bit at prices, and the current equivalent model (9060xt 16 GB) was roughly around 300 again, and I don't think it has gone up since. I understand there may be a shortage of equivalent Nvidia GPUs from a thread the other day, so this may change soon, again. I have no use for top-of-the-line models, so I'm not familiar with their prices and availability.
A bit of a nitpick - that's not what the "eye of the storm" is. In fact, if you perceive RAM prices as leveling off, that <i>would</i> be the "eye of the storm", meaning a brief, deceptive calm surrounded by... storm.<p>Truly I have seen not even a hint of reason to believe prices would come back down in the near term. Fab allocation is booked years out, and building out new manufacturing capabilities is difficult and slow. Everything I'm seeing points in the same direction: this is only going to keep getting worse for consumers month after month for a <i>long</i> time.
My next GPU will be from AMD, not just because I'm in the process of switching to Linux but I have a gut feeling that Nvidia doesn't see desktop GPUs as their priority anymore and support might diminish faster.
Thing is, you don't need a GPU.<p>One of the major x86 manufacturers makes CPUs with integrated graphics that is good enough for gaming. It's in "Steam's hardware line" btw.<p>Oh yes, AAAs maybe won't run on that. But they're boring af anyway. And predatory. So not much loss.
> Thing is, you don't need a GPU.<p>You would struggle to play any graphically intensive game, old or new, without at least a modest GPU. It's not only AAA.
Intel also sees the value in decent onboard GPUs now, their newly announced laptop processors have solid onboard GPUs too
> Oh yes, AAAs maybe won't run on that.<p>...so you do need a GPU.
A lot of hate in the comments, I think it's great that companies are in a position where they think it makes sense financially to support Linux as a target platform.
I think this is a good lesson in why companies don't try to bring stuff to Linux: the market is <i>incredibly</i> resentful of products.
Come on... it's always the same reason: money.<p>Companies don't support Linux because it's not widespread enough so it can't outweigh the costs. They don't give a rat's ass for the market's resentfulness or lack thereof. The Linux market was basically not a real market before because their market share was simply too small.<p>There are plenty of products made for resentful markets and as long as they keep being profitable they don't care.
Companies? <i>gasp</i> corporations? Using, <i>spit</i>, money? HOW DARE THEY!
It's not hate, but we are now at a point where the vast majority of games just run, mostly thanks to Valve and the Wine/DVXK community's efforts. What Linux gamers fear now (with good reason) is that increased interest in the platform from companies more interested in money than freedom will undermine these efforts with anti-consumer and anti-FOSS initiatives, such as closed source clients, DRM, signed kernels, hardware attestations.
This is the mixed bag... and I'm glad that Valve is at the forefront of this one... While I feel the fees may be excessive in a lot of cases (same for mobile app stores), at least Valve seems to be good stewards of PC gaming as a whole, and building a lot of good will in the community.<p>I don't really want to see locked down hardware in the space any more than there already has been (Nintendo, Sony, X-Box, etc)... I think the PC centered gaming community largely wants a more open platform in general. In the long run, I don't see a lot of solid competition... especially with ever growing legacy libraries of content.
> closed source clients<p>If people <i>really</i> want Linux to be a viable alternative to Windows, run by a majority of the general public, it has to be possible to sell closed-source software that runs on it (where "it" means a broad range of different distros).<p>Yes, that means less freedom concerning that particular software. But without it, the platform is a tiny niche that's easily run over by the hardware OEMs.
If I am signing my own kernel, that's awesome.<p>If Poettering is signing my kernel and reporting my UUID to websites along with proof I am viewing all ads, that is dreadful.<p>Unfortunately it will be the latter. Motherboards already have signed binary firmware blobs, some people cannot remove the Microsoft keys and still have functioning UEFI secure boot.
They're just trying to ride the wave of Valve's deck (and they will fail). The fact is that, since I bought the Steam Deck, I bought less from GOG and more from Valve.<p>And this won't change a thing: it doesn't matter if they make a Linux-native frontend to the horrible GOG Galaxy. I just want my games to launch as seamlessly as they do from Valve's UI, not yet another launcher that I have to launch on top of Valve's system UI. I am already doing that with Heroic Games Launcher, which is far better than whatever they will concoct in-house and supports many other stores.
It's nice, Linux being an open platform, that if something isn't on Steam you can just install GOG and get it there.
>I just want my games to launch as seamlessly as they do from Valve's UI<p>Valve integrated steam all the way down to the OS level to do all that. GOG galaxy meanwhile is focusing more on being an accompanying app to optionally use than centralizing everything under GOG. I think Galaxy trying to strive to be as "seamless" will break the very philosophy of GOG to begin with; being a store to grab games you truly own, not a platform to immerse yourself in.
GOG supported Linux from before Galaxy.<p>I don't use Galaxy at all. My GOG games work on Linux. It's a good company.
While on the other hand I'm often frustrated and feel limited by a steam-only deck and am going to start installing the other store fronts. I have games there I've gotten cheaper or even free. I don't like being locked into steam and "Gabe the goodest billionaire" propaganda exists to keep people from engaging in competitor products. I also want to support stores that take less from developers, especially smaller ones. Steams 30% cut while Epic is 0% up to $1m is concerning. I want smaller devs to succeed better. Steam is a huge compromise even if its a 'fan favorite' quasi-monopoly.<p>So yes I want gog to be native linux on things like the deck.
I'm genuinely confused about all this. Can someone help me out?<p>I've been buying and playing games from GOG on Linux for a very long time with no need for GOG Galaxy -- which is a thing I know nothing about. Since this announcement, I've been trying to figure out why I'd need it.<p>It seems like it's just a convenience application and social connection point (leaderboards, etc.). In which case, it's not something of interest to me. However, I've also seen references to Galaxy that imply that it's necessary to play games -- which is obviously untrue in general, but perhaps there are some games that require it?<p>Anyway, I'm tremendously confused by all this.
People always say that Heroic or the other one (I forget the name) is seamless, but I needed to do troubleshooting with a few of the games I owned. In one case, the best solution was to install via steam as a non-steam game. So, I'm hoping for better support and compatibility.
As far I'm aware as a casual user of Galaxy, you're correct. It's just a convenience application with some light social features.<p>I find it slightly more convenient when installing games on a new machine. I've never personally seen a game that required using it.
Convenience is 100% Steam’s most important feature. Finding games, installing them, updating, auto-login, cloud saves, probably more that I can’t think of right now.
So to me the things I want from a game launcher are pretty simple:<p>- Download and all the gamefiles that I am entitled to, and keep them updated.<p>- Show me a pretty interface to launch games from, including recent news and patch notes about that game's updates.<p>- Keep track of my save files, synchronize them to other devices, and make sure they never get lost.<p>- (linux) have some kind of per-game startup command manager because even a platinum rated proton game might need a --force-grab-cursor or something.
It's just a convenience app, but it's a pretty nice one. When I moved my main PC from Windows to Linux, I was definitely sad to lose the ecosystem of nice launcher apps (GOG Galaxy but also others like Playnite, Launchbox, etc). The dream for me is to have all my games in one cohesive library, and that's what these sorts of apps offer. On Linux I use Lutris for this and it's fine enough, but I'll definitely be taking a look at Galaxy when it comes to Linux.
also I believe it helps you track save games. I have multiple Linux boxes I play GOG games on using Heroic launcher and save game tracking is a big issue (maybe there's a way to do this with Heroic, idk). But I think Galaxy would help here.
Galaxy is purely convenience. If you want to see all your games from all storefronts (Epic, Steam, GOG, etc) in one place, Galaxy lets you do that. (Along with the social stuff)<p>You can still play GOG games without any launcher, which is how it's intended to work.<p>Some people <i>really</i> like having a launcher to keep track of everything, so this isn't a nothing burger. It's one more convenience to help convince people to move over.
While you're waiting for a GoG native client, I can whole-heartedly recommend:<p>Heroic Game Launcher: <a href="https://heroicgameslauncher.com/" rel="nofollow">https://heroicgameslauncher.com/</a><p>RPM/Deb/Flatpack/TGZ/AppImage for Linux<p>DMG for MacOS Intel/M1+<p>EXE for Windows<p>Heroic supports GoG, Amazon Luna, and the Epic Game stores.<p>Heroic even streamlines the app updates so you don't have to figure that out.
No. Please don't. Contribute to something like Heroic Launcher instead. Don't create something new just for GOG. Help make the existing tools better. It'll mean GOG has to do less work, and the programs people are already using will get better. Or even just sponsor Heroic so they can send more time we can working on it themselves.
GNU/Linux gamers are always decrying GOG, saying they won't buy stuff from them because Galaxy doesn't run on GNU/Linux, now we're getting people saying GOG porting Galaxy to GNU/Linux is bad!? By Taranis, GOG just can't get a break, can they?
Yep, luckily they represent a very small, albeit loud, minority of Linux users.<p>The vast majority of Linux users are very happy to get an official GOG Galaxy for Linux. I hope they will plug into Proton and collaborate with Valve, but we really need official tools and brands on Linux for common users to feel comfortable enough to come over.
How is GNU/Linux different from Linux?
It is the same thing, just emphasizing that the OS is more than the kernel, and than the userland comes from the GNU project.<p>The latter had been designed to be a full OS but didn't have a functional kernel when Linux was released, and Torvalds adopted the GNU userland for his project.<p>See <a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/GNU_Hurd" rel="nofollow">https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/GNU_Hurd</a>
Stallman preferred nomenclature
Android/Linux also exists.
linux is the kernel gnu is the full operating system
GOG needs to contribute 0-day fixes to the kernel, otherwise they’re not committed to Linux /s
They're not creating something new. They're taking their existing tool (which - for all its flaws - is still far ahead of Heroic in many ways), improving it further, <i>and</i> changing it to also work on Linux.<p>If they then go add additional features like wine integration to that tool to make it overlap more with Heroic is something we're all assuming, but not actually a given.
Had various issues with Heroic and whatever the other popular one was (Lutris, maybe). I personally don't need official support for a single launcher that tries to integrate every gaming platform ala Steam, GOG, Blizzard, Epic, Amazon. A single-platform launcher with native Linux support would be good enough for me.
> It'll mean GOG has to do less work<p>[citation needed]<p>GOG's launcher team is presumably already familiar with their codebase, already has a checkout, already has a codebase that's missing 0 features, has a user interface that already matches their customer's muscle memory, and presumably already has semi-decent platform abstraction layer, considering they have binaries for both Windows and OS X. Unless they've utterly botched their PAL and buried it under several mountains of technical debt, porting is probably going to be relatively straightforward.<p>I'm not giving Linux gaming a second shot merely because of a bunch of ancedata about proton and wine improvements - I'm giving it a second shot because Steam themselves have staked enough of their brand and reputation on the experience, and put enough skin in the game with official linux support in their launcher. While I don't have enough of a GOG library for GOG's launcher to move the needle on that front for me personally, what it <i>might</i> do is get me <i>looking</i> at the GOG storefront again - in a way that some third party launcher simply <i>wouldn't</i>. Epic? I do have Satisfactory there, Heroic Launcher might be enough to avoid repurchasing it on Steam just for Linux, but it's not enough to make me want to stop avoiding Epic for future purchases on account of poor Linux support.
Alternatively, work on developing protocols for game launchers instead. Get the Heroic Launcher devs and devs from other launchers to work on a common interface.
This comment and some of the other nearby ones have me confused if many people have actually <i>tried</i> GOG Galaxy?<p>This is one of the areas where GOG Galaxy <i>has</i> tried to stand out. It supports integrations with other launchers in Python: <a href="https://github.com/gogcom/galaxy-integrations-python-api" rel="nofollow">https://github.com/gogcom/galaxy-integrations-python-api</a><p>It's intended for the other direction of other launchers (or third party integrations with other launchers) feeding data to GOG Galaxy, but it's still one of the more interesting attempts in the wild of a launcher trying to be a little bit more than just a walled garden.<p>I don't know if in an Official Linux port of Galaxy if they'll try to find more ways to integrate beyond what they've already done with their Python API and how much they would be willing work with other launchers, especially Heroic, but of the big game stores, GOG seems one of the few that actually wants to try. Maybe they will. It would be nice to see. It's interesting seeing so many comments assume the worst of them, as someone who has played around with that Python API a little bit. (I was toying with a third-party Itch.io integration. Didn't get very far, but it was neat what seemed possible.)
You don't need launchers. Game is a simple application like any other. Just double click it...
I'm a happy Heroic user but I don't mind them porting GOG Galaxy. Makes for a smoother migration for people coming from Windows, for example.
Why they shouldnt develop version over which they have full control?
If its open, heroic can include their code or solutions, as they do with proton. Rising tide lifts all boats.
Agreed, I don't want yet another launcher.<p>And as the underdog it even makes sense for GOG to fully embrace cross-store launchers.
Meh, I use Lutris instead of Heroic.<p>I am happy that GoG will finally make its launcher available to Linux.
literally the only two reasons I still have windows on my laptop currently are fusion360 and apex legends. I was happily playing Apex Legends on Linux for years until EA decided to disable Linux support due to "cheating". While I understand their concerns, I can't say as a regular player the cheating problem is any better or worse than it was before they removed Linux support.<p>As for fusion360... Freecad is getting mighty good these days...
It's not free but...zw3d has full* native Linux support. You'd be forgiven for not knowing this because they only offer it on their Chinese website, even though it comes complete with a fully localized English version that you just have to switch on in the settings.<p>* Integrations with online parts libraries don't seem to work (don't know why they didn't bother, as it looks like it just spawned a web browser anyway), and the simulation add-ons aren't available either, but the main program itself is equivalently functional.
Hopefully they'll somehow support Proton and Valve devices. Trying to run older windows-only games bought on GOG with launchers like Heroic is a bit of a hit or miss, despite the Steam releases of the same games having somehow a bigger chance of working out of the box. I guess there are some weird differences between the default Proton Runtime and the proton-ge/wine-ge builds.
One of the reasons I have not touched GOG more seriously is probably because they have no native presence. I hope they consider making it open source, so anyone from any distro could contribute to it. I feel like it would be the healthier choice for GOG.
On the upside, this might mean I'll buy more stuff from GOG again. Steam+Proton is just so darn <i>convenient</i>.
This is one thing that's been puzzling for me ever since I switched to Linux full time a few years ago and so also started gaming on it.<p>In my experience GOG bought games handled by Lutris/Heroic/Mini Galaxy trump Steam in convenience almost every time. There's been quite a few deal breaking issues with Steam client and/or Proton that went unaddressed by Valve for months that just never happened to me on the GOG+game manager combo. (Remember the most recent Steam rewrite that made certain UI elements not work on Linux and which still needs a workaround option in the client years later?) All that on top of another application requiring full browser engine under the hood eating resources just to be able to launch a game. I don't know if I am just extremely unlucky to get hit with every Linux related issue on Steam and notice its drawbacks or if people are offering Valve unreasonably high leniency, because they see then as some sort of champion of gaming on Linux, while not giving enough to other players like GOG.<p>Pardon my rant.
The Steam client was always flaky as hell - on Windows as well.<p>I've always wondered were problems on Steam's side or on the side of game devs implementing its APIs?<p>Anyway I personally experienced scaling issues, but chalked that up to my DE being unreliable. I also occasionally can't click on certain UI elements, but I recall this being a problem in Windows as well.
> made certain UI elements not work on Linux<p>... and on Mac OS. For a while i had to play games with what control has focus to PAY them.
I always make sure to not use the GoG downloader just download the game.<p>I don't need a client with your branding all over it, that has socials and my library and all engagement bait like that.<p>I figure it's one step away from putting the DRM back on so you have to use the launcher to get a game from GOG.<p>Just let me buy games and then shut up.
I like Steam as a user. It syncs game saves between computers. It takes care of game updates. It has a decent launcher UI that I use on my living room computer so that I can launch games using an xbox controller. It makes Windows games work without any fuss. And when I play with friends, it lets me join friends' games without having to deal with in-game lobby systems. It lets me show FPS counters and system info in a unified way even in games without built-in support for that stuff. That is all stuff I <i>want</i>.<p>Game launchers are a good idea that lots of people want. A good game launcher <i>needs</i> both deep game integration and an online account, to provide save game syncing, joining friends and updating games. So far, it's mainly Steam which has been able to do this on PC. If GoG wants to compete, which it does, it only makes sense for it to provide the same.<p>It's not some evil scheme.
Having a downloader is a bit more convenient for getting game updates (you can always download the update manually and run it of course) and also for big games where you have to download multiple files to install. So it makes sense to want to have such a tool, as a big part of getting and retaining customers is convenience. But been there, I have done it, and it is doable, and sometimes preferable. Eg you may not want to install gog in a machine to play a game, or I may want to play a game through crossover but not download gog through crossover to get the windows version: with steam, I cannot do that. But even if you download the game through gog client for convenience, you do not need to run the gog client to launch the game anyway.
Can we not allow them to continue letting you buy games (outside the launcher) and <i>not</i> shut up?
Steam is pretty popular on that though. I'm sure GoG did it following on their steps. Back when GOG started it was pretty much download from web and run.
Like it or not, a lot of people love a virtualization of their library. So the option is nice.<p>I like GOG's launcher because 1) it's open source and 2) it can show other gamijg libraries thanks to fan maintained plugins. Those aspects give me a sense that the goal here (outside of to lower the friction into GOG's store) is indeed to serve the user<p>And if that changes, it's easy to take my ball and go home. GOG trying to push hard on any DRM is basically them surrendering to Steam.
Going to a website's hardly massive friction is it ?<p>I've got tens of games through GoG and it's always my first port of call if I want a game. <i>Because</i> it keeps out of the way.<p>If it's got value to people, fair enough, it's got value to people. That's just my opinion. All I want you to do is sell me games. But we all know about enshittification and MBAs trying to round the wagons.
Having savegames online is nice. Being able to just download the game without the launcher is massive, though.
It is if you have games from multiple stores and don't remember which game is from where. I don't have all the games I own installed and installed.
I agree with you. I'm still a greybeard who organizes my games in a folder and finds the exe to click. At best I'll keep a handy folder of shortcuts for games I play often on my desktop. I even keep my startup programs to a bare minimum of my communication lines (if I wanna boot up steam, I'll type it in the search bar or wait for the launched game that requires it).<p>But we're in this hyper optimized world where kids are literally being auto scrolled through short form content. Attention spans have been utterly shot. So yes, there's a large number of people out there that see "going into a website and finding a game" as too much friction. That's a larger societal issue that I can't do much about in times where my country needs to debate the merits of citizens being shot on the streets by federal agents. Maybe one day we can get back to a point where proper educational and parental supprt resources is, say, a top 20 issue?
Maybe it's you and me, mate. I'm from the world before Steam. I'm from the world before computers, in fact. Atari 2600 was <i>my</i> first console, when it was new.
That's very nice to hear.
But diffuclt to beat valve here, they are actively contributing to drivers and wine. When you buy even just windows software from steam you are helping funding that.
I don't think they are trying to beat valve. GoG has been like those airlines that fly where no major airlines want to fly. Filling a underserved but large market.
I have a hunch that the currently sole owner just wants to do this until retirement. GoG is financially stable so there's no pressure to increase revenue.<p>I see no simpler explanation why someone would buy out a subsidiary like that.<p>All in all, GoG thrives on people being sentimental and it's totally in character for the owner to be sentimental as well.
They don't need to beat valve. The contribution made by valve is going to benefit GOG too. That's the power of open source.
I do the vast majority of my gaming on my handheld with Bazzite configured to feel like a Steam Deck.<p>I basically don't leave the Steam UX. Valve has done such a great job here I don't see why any Linux user would consider buying games anywhere else.
What handheld do you use? I'm window shopping an upgrade from my miyoo mini.
Lenovo Legion Go.<p>The original one with detachable controllers. The SSD is really easy to replace, and my logic is the controllers have to go bad eventually.<p>Edit: comes with a nice case and 2 USB c ports.<p>Be realist with what games will work, frame gen only goes so far.<p>I'd rather spend 80$ on new controllers vs 600$ on a new device.
The heroic launcher looks like it was trying to solve this and let you use cheaper gog games in your normal steam library. And I've seen similar tools for emulators to show up basically like native steam games
Okay. But I still probably have to hop into desktop mode to configure stuff.<p>I don't even know how to install non steam applications on my current stepup.
Heroic is the best attempt so far, but when comes to handheld UX, it’s meh.
Finally. It was the reason I was always reluctant to buy something from GOG.
I do wish more companies would bring their games to GOG.<p>That said, Square finally released some of their Final Fantasy games on it yesterday, so hopefully that's changing.
The so-called fragmentation people criticizes in the comments is also a strength for free software systems in long term.
I'm very excited for this. GoG is a DRM-free platform (for the most part) and I see it as the only positive competition Steam has. Imagine how bad the gaming landscape would be if a company like Epic soundly defeated Valve. They would enshittify at record pace. GoG doing well would only put positive pressure on other players. Ideally, you want your opponents to be healthy and sane, in case they win. And sane opponents drive the market towards better outcomes. I'll definitely buy some classics from GoG with their Linux client.
"GOG GALAXY is a long-lived product with a large and complex C++ codebase." Also known as a shitshow. Hopefully the new engineer(s) will be encouraged to at least add some tests and refactor things to stay sane.<p>No mention of a license, though. I guess it'll stay closed source.
The Linux billion dollar question is if the doubling of it's share in desktop in the last 2-3 years is going to saturate or continue doubling or exponential.
One of reasons why I buy games exclusively on GoG is clientlessness. I don't like when clients messing with game updates, because of modding incompatibility.<p>Unfortunately modding is reason, why switch to linux for gaming is not easy.
That's also one thing Galaxy gets right. You can turn off auto-updates and that won't stop you from playing the game (unlike with Steam, which will just replace your "play" button with "update"). They also support rolling back updates, but I never tried that and I'm not entirely sure if this works for every game, or if this is something a game developer has to actively support.
Why is the launcher not at least public source? GOG's value add is the service it provides, not the specialness of its launcher.<p>Hopefully they will pursue a container/Flatpak native system but probably not!
I have been playing Fallout: New Vegas on my ThinkPad T570 running Bazzite Linux for the last few weeks.<p>It's been... amazing. A good game, running at workable framerates, no more crashes than usual (it's a Bethesda game, after all), and the software was free as opposed to building out a new PC with Windows 11.<p>It's like rediscovering PC gaming after years of it becoming bloated and a cash grab.
Based take little dude. Gamers all care very much about "openness". Did you forget that in 1985 Nintendo created the first hardware-based security system designed to prevent unlicensed and low-quality games from running.<p>Gamers used to own the games they purchased via cassettes, disks, and later even digital copies. Now through platforms like Epic and Steam you are provided a digital "license" to play the game.<p>ALL of this speaks to the "openness" of gaming and it is ALL important to gamers.<p>As previously stated though, game creators have been forced to choose the platforms they can create their games for. By the 90s the majority of personal computers were running MS-DOS and Steve Jobs had a base take on games being "toys" and did not belong on Macintosh products.<p>Fast forward to the early Oughts and you see games like Angry Birds and Candy Crush making millions by producing games on ARM technology which really pushed the entire industry forward to focus multi-platform gaming outside of the tradition routes of either PC or console or both.<p>Furthermore triple A studios led the charge and made big decisions that smaller studios would follow until around the release of Cyberpunk 2077. This in my opinion was the big turning point that gamers decides to act against large studios from all of the decision making that has turned a relative open system to a closed system.<p>The invention of the Proton protocol to allow gaming on Linux Machines is FORCING industry to ABIDE by the wishes of the customer. The gamers. The gamers are FINALLY winning!<p>This isn't just about openness on operating systems and being able to own the thing you purchase. Its also about efficiency. Windows is a bloat farm that has what feels like a million service hosts running in the background sending telemetry data to NOT me. Furthermore, if windows is not optimized to use your hardware efficiently, why would your favorite game?<p>Changes like the Proton protocol are bridges to re-align the supply/demand curve by forcing the customer and producer back to the negotiation table so the gamers voice can be heard.<p>In closing, gamers have had limited options due to technological limitations, vendor lock ins, corporate anti-competitive practices, monopoly exploitation, or predatory pricings.<p>With inventions like ARM and Proton protocol, gamers have a louder voice to force game makers implement "openness" in their products.
Congrats! Their Linux support was behind. GOG's new owner is doing the right thing.
Finally. The previous hate GOG showed towards Linux was absolutely ridiculous.
Yay I suppose?
Geez, that headline was hard to parse.
New owner means their disgust of Linux is fading.
There's some great Linux gaming distros out these days,<p><a href="https://bazzite.gg/" rel="nofollow">https://bazzite.gg/</a> is based on Fedora<p>and <a href="https://chimeraos.org/" rel="nofollow">https://chimeraos.org/</a> is almost like SteamOS for non-Steam hardware. It ships a console-like UI on top of an immutable Arch base.
Tons of libre game engines will work with GOG data:<p><a href="https://osgameclones.com" rel="nofollow">https://osgameclones.com</a>
Thankfully it seems to be not yet another Electron crap shell.
In my experience, Galaxy works no better than a web app, unfortunately. Similarly laggy and lacks the snappiness you'd normally associate with a native app.
It's not Electron, however it uses Chromium Embedded Framework underneath.
Electron is best crossplatform tech available
Oh, really?<p>GOG is now providing a 'correct' set of ELF64 binaries as a client? (I guess (wayland->x11, vulkan->cpu))<p>Hopefully, they will support self-hosted email servers not in the DNS, mobile phone numbers, and wallet codes.
What a waste of effort. Just provide your current installers or even fallback to plain old tarballs.
>Competitive Salary – We ensure fair and attractive compensation that reflects your skills and experience: 18 000 - 27 000 PLN/month<p>I know it's eastern Europe but that's $5000-7500 a month, barely $90k a year. It sounds like a solo job too so a lot of responsibility for this salary.
> $90k a year.<p>$90K a year goes <i>much</i> further in most of Europe barring the centres of the biggest cities—let alone eastern Europe—than it does in the US.<p>NYC and Bay Area salaries are outrageously inflated, with much of the take-home being funnelled into four/five digit rents or mortgages for houses built out of matchsticks, car loans, health insurance payments, and more. None of this is necessary or costs as much in most of Europe, or the rest of the world, really.
That's in the 50k EUR - 77k EUR range which is senior-level pay in EU. Add to that it includes pension, tax prepayments and health insurance. They also seem to offer lots of perks in the office.<p>If you account for the fact that Poland is generally less expensive than the average and that the average monthly living cost is ~900 EUR ( <a href="https://www.numbeo.com/cost-of-living/country_result.jsp?country=Poland" rel="nofollow">https://www.numbeo.com/cost-of-living/country_result.jsp?cou...</a> ), even the 50k lower bracket is in the higher range. You get ~2k EUR net/month in your account after pension and tax contributions, health insurance, rent and expenses (as a single). That's not bad at all. EDIT: (excluding rent)
It doesn't compete with the better local companies though. It's fairly in the middle of the pack.
900 EUR might be enough for student-like living if you own the apartment you're living in, or by sharing a room when renting, but it's not even close to acceptable level in Warsaw.
$90k a year before tax is a very very good salary in <i>Norway</i>, and even a decent developer salary. It's <i>much</i> better in eastern Europe.
Yeah that's a good salary in Europe. It's only slightly less than I make in the UK as a senior.
The standard of living is higher in France than in eastern Europe, and even in France that's considered a high salary.
That's a <i>very</i> livable wage in Poland. The wages are significantly lower, but so are the costs of living.
US devs are vastly over payed.
Welcome to Europe!
Barely? It's more than twice the mediage wage in Poland.
Their lattes also cost much less than a Silicon Valley latte :)
In Eastern Europe, that's 1% level of income when measured against the quality of life you can have.