Ironic name for the launcher. Epic Games are do little heroic deeds. They have helped make third party exclusivity a bigger thing on PC and are quite complacent in regards to helping Linux. Why are they not giving Vulkan as much attention as D3D12? Adoption of crossplatform software is essential for a future with native releases. And landing EAC support for Proton is important to create more momentum for Linux so that market share goes up. Not only does Vulkan lay groundwork for a future where devs can transition to Linux with less issues but it also gives best performance through Proton with negligible performance impact.

Tim Sweeney is also a shady character. We've always used many stores but in a tweet his wording implied that such thing has not been happening at all. That people had been buying from Steam only when in fact people do buy from other stores. It's just that Valve has, with Steam, provided a good choice which has made many people continue to buy from them. His thinking is made more evident with his company's actions, a quote from a spokesman (EGS integration into GOG Galaxy 2.0):

"It’s an important step towards breaking down walls between PC stores, as it enables a unified experience for players to manage their PC games library independent of where their games were purchased."

Why should people care about breaking Steam's dominance when you and your company continue to either be complacent about or in worst case support Microsoft's dominance on game development? Mind you Steam isn't a bad store to begin with. It's just that Epic Games can't compete with them with features. They even did some data collecting of Steam folders. Probably to combat Steam but it's such a slimy tactic, they did it without permission from Valve and users.

#FreeFortnite where they involved kids to put pressure on Apple while they sued them. But all these things don't surprise me from someone who talks about open platforms but doesn't support the most open of them all.

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Quoting: scaine

Quoting: LinuxwarperAnd Google is somehow much better? The problem isn't that they shutdown projects, they are the problem. I've seen many sites and services respect GDPR. But Google? They have already opted you into everything when you use their services. And when you click to opt out they add in a extra layer of barrier that is a prompt asking you if you are sure. Making the process of protecting yourself from their data collecting cumbersome and tiring.

Curious what country you live in that allows Google to use opt-out policies.

Here in the UK, everything Google does is opt-in. Everything.
Location. Contacts. Imprint. Assistant. It's CONSTANTLY popping up permissions when you first start using their services. Hell, you can't even search without accepting the privacy policy.

That's good to know. Northern EU. Everytime I interact with Youtube, when reviewing their privacy popup, everything is turned on.

Quoting: drlambIt's about the long term here. Stadia has helped Linux game development 10X what Valve has been able to do thus far in terms of AAA studios developing for/on Linux. While you may never benefit directly from this, its benefits are there.

Long term we could be looking at Stadia's streaming exclusive nature devouring local releases and at same time being one of many products under a ChromeOS/Fuschia ecosystem. There is zero commitment from Google to preserve gaming on Linux or/and local game releases.

Valve's commitment on other hand has been clear. Their goal is to make Windows games run as well as they possibly can on Linux through Proton, and they encourage Vulkan use. Unlike Google they also have provided all of their games natively. Proton is long term and it's at core of Valve's strategy to help Linux. Stadia has helped 10X of Valve's efforts? Absolute nonsense. It's not about getting developers to use Linux software, it's about market share. With market share developers will use Vulkan and every other software that works on Linux. You are not making a good point if you think that reason Linux isn't supported is because developers don't want to use or isn't used to using Linux friendly software like Vulkan. Stadia builds market share for Google, Proton builds market share for desktop Linux.

As I've pointed out, just like developers decide to forego a native release because their game works with Proton, developers could decide to forego local development and rely on Stadia. They could decide to target Linux players with Stadia or/and not provide Vulkan renderer for Proton compatibility.

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Quoting: slaapliedjeYeah, even the fact that the Facebook VR headsets can be jailbroken, I still wouldn't buy one because it gives Zuckerberg more money.

I wouldn't ever touch Stadia because it's Google. I mean how many projects have they put out there then went 'meh, we're bored of this now' and shut down?

And Google is somehow much better? The problem isn't that they shutdown projects, they are the problem. I've seen many sites and services respect GDPR. But Google? They have already opted you into everything when you use their services. And when you click to opt out they add in a extra layer of barrier that is a prompt asking you if you are sure. Making the process of protecting yourself from their data collecting cumbersome and tiring.

Their way is a proprietary and anti free way. Just because they deal with open source and Linux doesn't mean their values align with what users of FOSS distributions love. It's not about closed or open. Even closed source software can be good as long as it respects users choices and privacy. So you can provide open source software but that doesn't make the provider a champion of FOSS principles.

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Quoting: drlambI took your question as Stadia vs. Steam, apologies.

In the question of GoG vs. Steam I agree with both of you.

If it hasn't been clear, I honestly have a really bad feeling about Stadia. Consider this, do you want GOG on Windows to flourish or Stadia on Linux? GOG is a drm free platform while Stadia is as close to drm sun as you can get. Yes, I know Stadia is most likely excellent streaming but at what cost? Vulkan renderer for Cyberpunk on Steam/GOG is likely not happening. So where did we benefit with that game? Didn't we expect Stadia to help native development or at very least make Proton compatibility better by devs using Vulkan? That didn't happen.

It's not a uncommon thing though. People trade their rights away for convenience all the time. Then later when companies who provided the convenience do something they don't like, they are then surprised. Facebook and their VR headsets being cheap as opposed to waiting to buy VR from Valve a company that is much better than Facebook. I rather wait with VR than buy from Facebook. I also will wait for a better streaming service from Valve or a other company than use one from a company that uses open source but often clashes with FOSS ideals.

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Quoting: einherjarAnd my question was: Why not on Steam? I mean, who made it possible to play it on Linux?

I agree with this. I think CDP saying that if we buy their game on GOG they get 100% is strange thing. I guess they are saying that to Windows users. But for us Linux users, it's totally void statement because why would we give 100% of our money to them when they don't seem to want to even consider providing Vulkan renderer? Ultimately the decision is up to yourself, but I think buying the game on Steam gives the most back to Linux. If I had any power over the split, I would have given 25% to Valve.

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Quoting: Shmerl

Quoting: LinuxwarperHave you watched the HotHardware interview [External Link] with Scott Herkelman and Frank Azor?

Sounds good. That's the right way to do it. Good to see AMD are behind this idea. Nvidia will just keep making NIHs instead.

Yeah, I am hoping when he says open and crossplatform, that he also is thinking of Linux as well and not just open and crossplatform in context of all the big actors. NIHs? Is that some short for proprietary tech or something? If so, yeah I don't think Nvidia will change their tune. They have tried to silence Hardware Unboxed with their latest crap.

Upscaling will be nice. GPUs are to few and to expensive. I've hoped for a Pulse like you, but that one is nowhere to be seen. Reference cards seem to be ghosts.

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Quoting: ShmerlThere is some sane limit you want to chase after. I.e. if they reverse engineer Windows itself - it's one target. If they also have to chase after proprietary APIs of GPU makers - that's a lot more moving targets to chase.

Have you watched the HotHardware interview [External Link] with Scott Herkelman and Frank Azor?

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Quoting: ShmerlReverse engineering is one option, which Wine as a project is doing all the time, but in this case I'd consider it a waste of resources.

Noveau doesn't seem to be in good state, even with developers trying, as Nvidia aren't being nice. So yes, It would be wasteful. It would be best if Valve and Co focused on AMD only so that development will be faster and easier because it's open source. Then Linux gamers can just decide to buy AMD GPU on their next upgrade.

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Quoting: ShmerlWine developers (vkd3d-proton more exactly) said they won't bother with DLSS, so I don't expect that to happen.

How can they do anything with DLSS? It's proprietary and locked down. Perhaps they may decide for AMD's alternative as that will be open and supposedly crossplatform.

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Quoting: x_wingStadia real leverage are Android and Chromecast, Chromebooks are barely starting to gain traction (just see the numbers).

Android is Google's mobile ecosystem, and it's dominating mobile devices. For desktop and laptops, they have very low share. Just because Chromebooks barely have any market share or is getting traction it does not make it bad to pair up with Stadia. Chromebooks have low capacity SSD storage, low CPU and GPU powers, perfect match up with Stadia which requires no storage and bare minimum specs. Part of what earns Microsoft alot of money is because people are using a PC on their platform, which exposes them to all Microsoft services and products. This is the same thing that Google does with Android users, with preinstalled apps and what not. If Google can get ChromeOS to rival Windows, it will boost their business.

Quoting: x_wingEven if locally running a Stadia game on a common distro is possible (something that I really doubt), the advantages of the service are still there and there is nothing that any Linux distro or any other OS can do in order to affect them.

I truly believe that if running Stadia version of a game locally in any distro was possible (with the exception of multiplayer games), Google would not have any problem on allowing their users to download the game so they can use it offline as it would be very cool extra feature. So, with all this said, I completely disagree with your theory.

I'm sorry, Stadia foundation is Debian with Vulkan, and somehow you truly believe that Google don't have any means to make it so Stadia users can have local play on top of streaming? Greedy and shady companies like Google don't value free choice. Streaming is the ultimate DRM.

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