QuoteWhat are your hopes for SteamOS/Steam Machines in 2018?

That the work which Valve etc have been doing to prepare the Linux graphics stack for VR will be ready for consumers at the same time as the Knuckles controller, a new headset, the SteamVR 2.0 base stations, and the new games Valve has been working on. I'd find a bundle of those compelling.

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Quoting: TheRiddickI think there is a Metal to Vulkan and vis versa conversion tool around. No idea how good it is but surely its easier then DX12 to Vulkan?

The software for running Vulkan over Metal is Molten VK. I have doubts about how well it'd work unless the app being ported has been "dumbed down" to ignore some Vulkan features though.

A couple of years ago Aras Pranckevičius of Unity noted that some of the extra complexity in Vulkan and DX12 make them harder to program than Metal, but it was worth it for the greater efficiency. In particular he mentioned resource binding flexibility and reusing command buffer chunks.

At the Q&A session which finished the Khronos Dev Day at GDC this year Alen Ladavac of Croteam said that Molten VK hadn't worked for them, though suggested trying it because perhaps it would for simpler cases.

Khronos are considering creating a layer that could work over Vulkan/DX12/Metal.

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8 out of 10 in this bundle are on Linux. All but 1 have been bundled multiple times before though.
https://www.bundlestars.com/en/bundle/best-of-indie-legends-bundle

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Quoting: lucifertdarkDon't want to put a downer on this but what OS does the Steam box they were using have installed? I seem to remember most are Windows based & not acutally SteamOS.

I'm sure they meant a Steam Machine. Valve has control over what can be sold as a Steam Machine. Those are all sold with SteamOS, and as another example of the control Valve have they've commented that they rejected some hardware vendor's plans to include optical drives. Some of that hardware is also sold with Windows, but Valve isn't involved and it has to be rebranded.

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Keith Packard has commented on the consulting he'll be doing for Valve.

TL;DR: This is part time. First task is allowing VR to bypass the window system, next is frame timing reporting.

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Quoting: dmantioneYou need to set the right environment variables to run games. I.e. Bioshock Infinite.

That surprised me as I've played through this game on Mesa without setting any environment variable. Searching the web I think this is about ARB_copy_image, which was added to Mesa in 2015 specifically for Bioshock but required an environment variable as it was incomplete and probably wouldn't work for anything else. Looks like that was completed in 2016 and so is now enabled without having to set that variable.

Quoting: liamdaweI would say many Nvidia users previously have a lot of experience with AMD, like me, who decided to switch.

I've seen a few arguments where someone insists that based on their experience from years earlier a particular game can't be played at all on Radeon even though someone else with current experience says it runs fine. I don't see that in this thread but perhaps dmantione is getting something similar elsewhere at the moment.

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Quoting: bubexelAdd head mounted display to it!!! i want to add my vive ^^

I'd like to see this too. I figure that many of us want VR but have been waiting for it to be available on Linux; it'd be good to start collecting stats soon to see trends. I'd also be interested to know how many normally-Linux-gamers have made an exception for VR and so have a headset already, but I guess it is too late for that.

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It may be coincidence but this is ready just in time for GDC and Valve have made some major announcements there before. Croteam's announcement including VR support on Linux came out just a few days ago too.

Dave Airlie (open source GPU driver developer) says they're using Vulkan extensions which Khronos haven't yet made public. Khronos will be at GDC.

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Quoting: poke86What exactly do they mean by "original"?

For a long time Aspyr has published games when the developed the port. Last February Aspyr published a game which they weren't listed as a developer for.

In November they announced that they were closing their retail website so they could focus more on publishing. I'd guess that means talking to other retailers is easier if they aren't competing.

So presumably they'll be sole publisher for more games. Given their history I'm optimistic that they'll be preferred by and supportive of developers who want their games on Linux.

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At last month's Vulkan presentation at linux.conf.au by David Airlie (Red Hat employee who does a lot of GPU driver work) he said that Valve have the Dota 2 VR Hub working on Linux.

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