2016 was the year of Linux desktop!

Just kidding of course :D The "big boom" is not happening but I truly believe that Linux will indeed keep growing to the point where developers cannot just ignore us anymore. And when that happens, a whole bunch of new users should come to us as well.

Linux these days reminds me of what Windows used to be 10 years ago, just better... It is also starting to change rapidly in all departments (Wine windows compatibility, driver compatibility, new native software, stability, Vulkan, Wayland...) There is just so much going on that we are actually only beginning to see big changes in linux itself and yet we're already gaining some marketshare, I really hope that 2017 will show even bigger growths in the marketshare and that more companies will consider making linux preinstalled PCs.

Nonetheless Linux on desktop in my honest opinion looks healthier than ever before!

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I personally love Wine... not in the sense that it should replace linux-native stuff, but being able to play my favorite legacy Windows games is amazing and having this backwards compatibility is awesome... I sure like to see that even Wine started to evolve really quickly lately, it is really nice addition to the games that we get natively and having options for running Windows games and software makes our platform even greater if anyone agrees with that or not :)

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This clearly shows the power of Vulkan, it also shows on how Bethesda is screwing around with us since it works perfectly fine over Wine with comparable performance to Windows and it would take them no effort to bring it to linux.

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I just don't understand why Windows users have this urge to bombard us on forums... What pleasure does it give them, if Windows is so great then use it and be quiet and ignore linux posts, everybody has the right to like different things depending on the taste. It's like they're allergic to such threads where our community asks for linux ports. However it's useless to even try and start a debate with people that don't want it in the first place. I don't understand the fanboyism about the things that I pay for, if I buy a game I'm not its' fanboy, I expect it to work. If I buy Windows I have no reason to be a fanboy just want it to do what it's meant to do. However linux is different, it is a philosophy before the OS and made for community by community and majority of people don't understand the benefits that Linux is actually giving them at this very moment (iOS vs Android).

I don't mind anyone using Windows if he needs to, I also doesn't mind using Windows if I really needed to but this hate coming from those kids on Steam acting all smart are just useless.

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As other people said, it's nice to see Vulkan active and actually used by game developers :) other than that there's nothing to be happy about... Nintendo doesn't even release their games for Windows xD

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No problem Liam, 2 streams, double the fun :D GOL is really a great community and I like to participate in live streams always when I have the time! :)

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Quoting: Guest

Quoting: fabry92Finally office 2013. Maybe it help some new users to migrate on linux

Forgive me if this is an incredibly naïve question: What can people do in Office 2013 that they can't already do in LibreOffice or Open Office (which are both free and supported in Linux)?

Also not just the habitude, I personally know a few people that will switch to linux in the near future and they need MS Office specifically because that's exactly what they use on work and it is obviously easier to work from home while having MS Office availible rather than learning to do the same thing 2 different ways :) Having Office 2013 fully availible on linux could be a huge deal maker for a lot of users :) This in combination with Overwatch, 64-bit programs working is huge for the Wine project's future, it seems like their development is everything but slowing down!

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Quoting: Purple Library Guy

Quoting: MaCroX95

Quoting: Purple Library Guy

Quoting: MaCroX95We have also seen a lot of cool electron-based apps

Aren't all apps electron-based? Unless you're rocking a Babbage engine . . . I don't think that's what's normally meant by Steam powered though.

Not really, Viber for example is QT based... electron is quite new framework that uses HTML5, CSS and javascript to produce desktop apps... It's not as resource efficient as others but it is very easy for developers to produce high-quality cross-platform desktop apps or software.

I fear you missed my jest. If it doesn't come to you, check the spoiler.

Spoiler, click me

You see, the word "electron" may refer to some platform, but it is also (particularly when not capitalized) the name for the elementary particles which are responsible for electricity, upon which all digital computing is based. Except for the abovementioned Babbage engines [External Link]. Which, had they been built, would probably have been powered by steam (the not-capitalized kind).

Ah sure that I know what an electron is :D I was so into a specific conversation that didn't think that broad :D but anyways thanks for enlightening me with the spoiler :P

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Quoting: Purple Library Guy

Quoting: MaCroX95We have also seen a lot of cool electron-based apps

Aren't all apps electron-based? Unless you're rocking a Babbage engine . . . I don't think that's what's normally meant by Steam powered though.

Not really, Viber for example is QT based... electron is quite new framework that uses HTML5, CSS and javascript to produce desktop apps... It's not as resource efficient as others but it is very easy for developers to produce high-quality cross-platform desktop apps or software.

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This year was awesome and there are a lot of pros in terms of gaming! I would like to point out that I'm really happy about the release of Vulkan and Wayland coming into play because I think that after this headstart Linux-based OSs will become a real threat to Windows userbase especially when users are already pissed off.

We have also seen a lot of cool electron-based apps that we wouldn't otherwise have like new Skype for Linux client and Discord (there are many many more).

Big cheers to Feral Interactive for managing to release so many great games for a so small userbase and a "mess" that OpenGL was bringing to Linux. I am certainly sure that Vulkan will change things for them dramatically and that we might be able to see even more games from them.

Now for the cons of this year. Eventhough the whole picture looks great I agree with Liam about Feral being the major developer that released AAA games this year. If you cross out their games from library we would be naked practically, sad thing is that still majority of AAA developers don't consider linux as a gaming platform and sadly I expect this not to magically turn around with the release of Vulkan, I believe that if we truly wanted AAA games on our beloved OS we would have to hugely gain in marketshare because after all, companies are doing things for money.

Another sad part is that hardware manufacturers are slowly starting to lose interest in building Steam machines because of Windows 10 + HDMI or SteamLink combination... Valve really has to do something in order to keep the ball rolling otherwise things could change quickly to worse because SteamOS is what pushed linux gaming so far in the first place.

There are clearly pros and cons about Linux gaming but for Linux-based OSs themselves I think that it was a great year.

And of course cheers to Liam and GamingOnLinux for being so awesome and providing us with best linux gaming news and to the awesome GamingOnLinux community!

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