First Screens and Info of Steam and Source Running on Linux

[Shawn Zipay]

As a follow-up to last night's news that Michael Larabel saw Steam running on Linux on his recent visit to Valve, the man himself has provided a nice writeup and photographs of Steam and the Source engine running on Linux.

Specifically, Larabel noted that he saw Left 4 Dead 2 running natively on Linux. There was nothing being faked and "no Wine library." The preview he saw was of the game running on Ubuntu 11.10 with an AMD card and Catalyst Linux driver.

Since his site has been slammed with eager visitors, we're going to re-host a few of the images here for your viewing pleasure.

Without mentioning their current planned target for having their first Linux release, it is not too far out. If you have been waiting since I first talked about Steam on Linux, the current wait is not bad at all. By the time that my "annual pilgrimage" rolls around for 2012, those not in the land of beer and wonderful Bayerischen Frauen and delicious food, will hopefully have something new to be entertained by instead on their Linux desktop... But again, this is Valve time. The initial release will likely be in the form of a "beta" so that they can release earlier and this initial public version may be limited to just Left 4 Dead 2, but their grand plans for Gabe/Valve's support on Linux are nothing short of greatness. The wait should be worth the wait. I often cite Unigine Corp and their Unigine Engine as being Linux-friendly, but Valve has the potential for much more.

Just having Steam and the Source Engine on Linux is not their end game. Gabe's / Valve's embracement of Linux is stunning, even if they only partially go after what was talked about. Valve easily has the potential of being the most Linux-friendly game company(...).

Apparently during the visit, Valve's Gabe Newell also spent quite a bit of time talking up the Linux platform in general while voicing his negative opinion of Windows 8.

[Linux]

This is a HUGE win for the PC market. I'm a HUGE linux user [although I suffer with Windows throughout my day] I'm super excited to see this in action on my computer!

[Shawn Zipay]

I was wondering when you were going to start replying to these news items!

[SupaDupaNoodle]

Re: First Screens and Info of Steam and Source Running on Linux

Judging by how crummy looking Win8 is with its noobized Start "screen"/button, inability to set the default logon screen to the traditional desktop, and the erasure of the start button/orb in the bottom left of the taskbar, I have been thinking about whether to just switch to some version of Linux (probably Ubuntu) when I upgrade my PC and if Win7 is unavailable then -- except that then I would be unable to use Steam which is the only gaming platform I need since all I enjoy playing these days is CS1.6, for the most part. My prayers have been answered with this news! Just hope they aren't gonna ruin everything by charging extra for it, or somesuch nonsense as games companies are prone to do in these greedy times.

[dvereb]

Re: First Screens and Info of Steam and Source Running on Linux

Judging by how crummy looking Win8 is with its noobized Start "screen"/button, inability to set the default logon screen to the traditional desktop, and the erasure of the start button/orb in the bottom left of the taskbar, I have been thinking about whether to just switch to some version of Linux (probably Ubuntu) when I upgrade my PC and if Win7 is unavailable then -- except that then I would be unable to use Steam which is the only gaming platform I need since all I enjoy playing these days is CS1.6, for the most part. My prayers have been answered with this news! Just hope they aren't gonna ruin everything by charging extra for it, or somesuch nonsense as games companies are prone to do in these greedy times.

Do you think all games will make it over to Linux? 1.6 is the only game that keeps me comingback for more, but I'm not convinced hl1 engine games will make the cut unless someone tells me otherwise. Don't get me wrong, I REALLY REALLY hope it happens, but I cant imagine them porting games that probably won't sell.

[SupaDupaNoodle]

Re: First Screens and Info of Steam and Source Running on Linux

Do you think all games will make it over to Linux? 1.6 is the only game that keeps me comingback for more, but I'm not convinced hl1 engine games will make the cut unless someone tells me otherwise. Don't get me wrong, I REALLY REALLY hope it happens, but I cant imagine them porting games that probably won't sell.

Good point. I was under the impression that they would literally make Steam and all of their own Valve games operable on Linux, so that one could logon to one's steam account and play your already purchased games on, say, a Ubuntu machine, just as easily as you would on a Windows PC.

[Stev0esque]

Re: First Screens and Info of Steam and Source Running on Linux

Well taking Steam for Mac as an example, only certain games are mac compatible. I think it will be the same deal. Though I know Valve put their games through first, but as Linux is a comparitive niche for gaming even next to Mac AFAIK then Im not sure others are going to rush out to support it, especially with those who think that Open source= Piracy (Unsure if there are people who think that... but it seems like there might)