Will buy. On steam. Will comment that only bought because the Native version was promised.

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Quoting: Liam Dawe

Quoting: ArdjeAs a side note: personally I promote making bug free windows games, that perform perfectly on proton.
The linux platform ABI changes a lot, and I consider the windows API is just middle ware.
If we can change that somehow to a platform agnostic middleware, that should be better.
Most old windows games are hard to run on modern windows. You have to know what you are doing (do this, click that, install this, turn off that), while these games are usually running problem free on proton.
So yeah lets keep the API legacy on the windows side for now. There is no proton for windows, so only those that know how to fiddle with windows can run old games.
It does not mean I do not appreciate the work of feral games. They are really dedicated, so I don't expect them to stop supporting old builds.

It's not a case of Linux APIs changing, it's all about how the games are built. I have plenty of games from 10 years ago on Linux that work without a single issue.

Sadly, not many of those games are OpenSource, and it’s only a matter of time when this issue crops up, if the community can’t patch the executable to work with newer libraries. Proton has one big advantage, being a non-ideal solution, it can work with very archaic code and make it work on a modern system.

That said, if possible, let’s have more FOSS games. I really enjoy Quake Darkplaces, and I don’t think that would’ve been possible if I’d tech 1 remained proprietary.

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Quoting: KimyrielleI said it before, but even when the money is coming from the next best thing to the devil, it's still money that will help Godot to become a better product, and they would be fools not to take it. If Godot will one day become good enough to bite into Unreal's market-share and cost Epic MORE money, that would be an added plus.

Uhm, the important thing is to not give Epic too much good publicity. Enough so that they keep spending money, but not too much so that people actually think that they're actually good.

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Quoting: scaine

Quoting: antisol

Quoting: scainethink about the end-game, which is perfect, seamless support for all Windows games, on Linux.

Firstly, that's not my end-game. I'm not particularly interested in running windows games on Linux. I'd rather have Linux games.

That's the point. Once SteamPlay hits its visionary goal, there won't be any distinction.

As for the rest of your post, it's weirdly pessimistic. There are literally thousands of games I can already "play like native" and this is only the first year. In fact, there are quite a few titles that run better on Linux now than Windows 10.

Sure, the goal is visionary. And it isn't just about wine. It's about Valve and others encouraging more open development so that future titles aren't really "Windows" games anymore. It'll take years, perhaps decades, but look at the impact Vulkan has already had in such a short time. Look at DXVK that followed closely. Look at the maturity of things like SDL. It's all coming together nicely, I think.

An important point to mention is that by improving wine, you're able to fix bugs to games that are otherwise frozen in a non-playable state. You can make a specific patch that averts a specific sys call from segfaulting. Doing the same using SDL without access to the source code, would only incur additional overhead. More importantly, instead of the decision of what works and what doesn't being down to the technologies used, you now incorporate elements of corporate politics. Bethesda's games will never feature an SDL client, having no Proton, leaves them to decide, if we get to play Doom Eternal, or TES VI. With proton, they need to actively work against supporting it, to make it incompatible.

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Quoting: antisol

Quoting: scainethink about the end-game, which is perfect, seamless support for all Windows games, on Linux.

Firstly, that's not my end-game. I'm not particularly interested in running windows games on Linux. I'd rather have Linux games.

Secondly, the idea of having perfect, seamless support for all Windows games is a pipe dream that will never happen unless Microsoft opens up the relevant tech (directx, win32 api or whatever the modern equivalent is), which they will absolutely never do. Even if they did you're only going to get up tp ~95% compatibility. Without the specs (at least) for these techs being open it's always going to be a reverse-engineering effort where you're playing whack-a-mole with new versions of APIs. If you think that this is a reasonable goal you're just setting yourself up for disappointment.

You're not going to get perfect support for all windows games under wine. Not ever. This is the nature of emulation. 100% is not achievable, even with open specs and non-moving targets. Attempting it with windows is bold and commendable but ultimately futile and laughable. Wine can't even run the ~20 year old stuff that I want to run.

This comment highlights a common misconception that plagues all of these discussions.. For the LAST TIME, WINE = WINE IS NOT an EMULATOR.

Reverse engineering, can and often does work better than having access to the source code, provided enough dedication and good enough platforms: nblood vs blood fresh supply is a good example of a reverse engineered lovingly crafted engine doing better than a commercial port.

Wine can't run things that are 20years old, may be up to the projects themselves, and it's highly likely that windows 10 can't either. At this stage the only thing that does actually make more sense to do is to think of the distant future. Apple just deprecated 90% of all games that have a Mac version, because of stubbornly removing 32-bit libraries. A similar thing can and might very well happen on Windows, and on Linux, we have averted the catastrophe once, we can avert it again. I'm positive that at some point, the libraries will be deprecated so badly that we'll simply be bundling them as part of retro gaming, much like we do now for the 8/16 bit stuff. This, you will never be able to do, if you've never ventured into emulation.

A pipe dream it might be, but I'm happy with the vertical slice of games that can reliably be played through wine. I'm also a bit unhappy with the state of "native" games with proprietary licenses.

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Quoting: 0aTT

Quoting: GuestIt's not necessary a "rival", it is a tool in the same sense as blender, maybe they see a use case (down the road) for it.

No, it's charity, non-profit, publicity. Call it what you want.

If you see a use case in your field of business, then you enter into a cooperation, because you want to control and influence the project accordingly. You pay people to develop a project in a certain direction.

Imagine Valve had simply given money to the Wine project. What would that have done for Valve? Absolutely nothing. There is a huge difference between giving money away and investing money.

Epic doesn't have a clue what they're doing. They just have a lot of money right now.

Good. We should make them part with as much of it as possible, while limiting the damage they do. All they've done so far gained them bad publicity and cost them money. Let's have them keep up the good work!

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Quoting: rkfg

Quoting: SslaxxHow bizarre. Why would Epic want to support a rival project, commercial or not, open source or not?

Unless they're going by the "enemy of my enemy is my friend" principle to hurt Unity...

Good publicity (they really need it), competition is good for everyone. To name a few.

They certainly do. On the one hand I would say that they shouldn't be getting any slack after killing Rocket League for us... On the other hand if they think it works, and it parts their grubby hands with the money, and feeds good developers; hey, I'll pretend I think they're the best company in the world.

But if you ask me... 👌👈

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Question: why do people care about achievements?

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Quoting: Liam DaweI've updated santa's naughty list.

Liam, would you let us also add the quoted reason for removal? I'm really curious how many times was "viable alternatives" mentioned in dropping support...

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Quoting: Eike

Quoting: antisolWell, for example, we got Papers, Please on Linux, but not Return Of Obra Dinn. I'd bet that proton is the reason why.

... or too much hazzle and too few bucks.

I agree Proton is a problem for native Linux gaming, but we shouldn't pretend it's the only one.

I respectfully disagree. Proton is just one avenue for Gauging interest in the GNU.Linux platform. Proton allows us to play the games we want, on the platform we want on, without worrying about the business decisions made by the horrible publishers that hold the game devs hostage. It costs them nothing; it promotes FOSS technologies indirectly; and it directly allows people to do native-like ports with ease.

The real problem for Native gaming by a stretch is Linux's small and diminishing market share; lack of fully opensource game engines, that keep native games from going extinct; Lack of Linux-exclusive cool tech; lack of authority of Linux design sensibilities; growing leniency towards abhorrent business strategies. IF Proton belongs to the same list, it only does so because most people think that SDL is somehow better.

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