It's funny, part of the Tetris resemblance is actually pointless from a gameplay perspective. I mean, as far as I can tell it doesn't matter much what shape the things are coming down because they just turn into sand on contact, so they could just be blobs (narrower and taller or wider and flatter) coming down and it would work the same. But they use the Tetris shapes just for the evocation of Tetris-ness.

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Whenever I see "Call of Duty" I think "Doll of Cutie". Kind of changes the ambience . . .

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Quoting: hardpenguinLinux desktop needed immutable desktop since forever. To definitively close the issue of system-breaking updates. This could help Linux adoption in the long run.

I guess system-breaking updates is something that happens if you're, I dunno, not using Mint?

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Quoting: Mountain ManI enjoyed the few hours I played in the beta, but $70 is a lot to ask for a game.

$70. Seven zero. And we're not talking Australian dollars here, are we? Damn.

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Quoting: NumericAt the core of it, the people I work with want to know very little about their PC (for a variety of reasons). Majority never even change the desktop wallpaper. They push the power button, then expect everything to work and be up to date. The younger ones do some customization, but defaults are king. Their systems take care of themselves and manual interaction is only performed when forced by system prompts.

I'm not quite at this level, but I'm close. I understand some things about computers in theory, but I'm not a tinkerer in practice. And I don't see why an immutable OS helps with this. I don't think it would cause a problem either, but I mean,

Case 1: Immutable OS. System guts cannot be changed, so they don't get changed. This means they remain as push-button user friendly or user unfriendly as they were when first installed, but does not imply anything about what that initial state is like.

Case 2: Non-immutable OS. System guts can be changed, but that never happens because I don't change them. Because, like, why would I? I'm not a tinkerer. Result, exactly the same story as case 1.

So I don't see why or how an immutable OS leads to the situation you describe of simpler more push-a-button functionality. I'm sure it has use cases, and as I say I can see it being about as good for a simple end user so it's not like I'd never try one, like if it had other features that were desirable, I just don't see why "being immutable" would in itself be a feature that would make my life better.

(The one thing I'm actually a bit uncertain about is the side effect where it seems like often immutable OSes want everything I can install to be Snaps or Flatpaks or stuff. I dunno, I think there's a lot to like about traditional package management; I don't mind a few Flatpaks for particular things, but . . . I dunno.)

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In the trailer, I don't think I saw any towers defending anything. Maybe I missed that part in all the colorfulness?

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Fun story.

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Quoting: adolsonAgain, this is all pretty theoretical at this point, and even with Steam Deck, the numbers are abysmal - as they have always been. I'm still not seeing anything to celebrate at this point in time.

This is the one thing you've said I can't argue with--partly because it's true, growth is there but not that high yet, and partly because what kind of numbers are exciting is pretty subjective. I can't tell you what you should be excited by.

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Quoting: adolson

Quoting: Purple Library GuySteam Deck users do represent Linux adoption

Not knowingly, in most cases, which was my point.

Whether it's knowingly or not doesn't matter much. If they add to the market they add to the market. Your analogy, Android, do not. Steam Decks do.

Although it has surprised me how many people do seem to be aware of it. So for instance, I was amazed that in an article I looked at about the new Samsung Steam-Deck-like-thing that was not on a Linux site, comments about how it would work worse than the Steam Deck because Windows is crappy at doing that kind of thing were quite prevalent.

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Quoting: adolson

Quoting: Purple Library GuyThe likelihood of at least game software being made to target Linux does grow with the number of Steam Deck users

Time will tell. It's still early days, but so far, we're seeing the opposite effect due to Proton. Which, by the way, was the worry back in the Loki/LGP days (when I switched to Linux) with Wine/WineX and later on, Cedega.

So, first, as CatKiller points out, we are not seeing the opposite effect. I myself assumed that Proton effect would exist, but it does not seem to be happening.

Second, that's a separate argument. Assume Proton reduces the chance of games being released for Linux. Market share still increases it--Linux with Proton at 10% would get more releases than Linux with Proton at 3%. And, the Steam Deck still represents Linux market share in the game market. So counting Steam Decks as Linux users still is not at all the same as counting Android users as Linux users. So even if this point were accurate (which, to my surprise, it does not seem to be), your original claim would still be wrong.

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