this post was submitted on 13 Aug 2026
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Linux Gaming

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[–] Tattorack@lemmy.world 15 points 2 months ago (6 children)

Of they're doing "Proton support" why not just make a Linux version.

[–] draco_aeneus@mander.xyz 29 points 2 months ago (1 children)

Because properly packaging/distributing your game is hard. Maintaining a build environment, running tests, having unique deliverables, it all adds effort. With Proton specifically, it's a much lower effort to report. If there is a linux specific bug, it's fine, because Linux isn't officially supported, it's just known to work with Proton. You also only need to ship one binary file (the Windows build), so you don't have to adjust or alter any processes.

This may not be the reason they do it, but there are real reasons.

[–] Tattorack@lemmy.world 3 points 2 months ago (2 children)

So essentially they're offloading the work they'd do themselves to the developers of Wine, Proton, and ProtonGE.

I wonder if they contribute a donation to these projects.

[–] four@lemmy.zip 23 points 2 months ago (1 children)

They sell the game on Steam, Valve gets a cut, so Proton funding should be covered.

But I agree that we should donate to open source projects!

[–] Axolotl_cpp@feddit.it 2 points 2 months ago (1 children)

I hope they donate to Wine then

[–] ysjet@lemmy.world 7 points 2 months ago

iirc, valve employs people to contribute to wine.

[–] draco_aeneus@mander.xyz 2 points 2 months ago

You'll have to ask them. Maybe you should, and maybe they'll consider it. If you don't ask, it's much less likely they'll think of it themselves.

[–] minfapper@piefed.social 10 points 2 months ago

Honestly, the Linux ecosystem is so fragmented that Win32 is the best API for targeting Linux.

[–] vapeloki@lemmy.world 10 points 2 months ago (1 children)

Valve does not recommend that anymore.

And for good reasons:

Nearly all Linux native games I have from steam do not work any more. Glibc changes. Xorg gone. Other stuff. You would need to maintain and adopt constantly.

Having a product that advertises native Linux support on the storefront but requires Ubuntu 20.04 is nothing we or valve could want

Proton offers a stable surface, and decouples the dependencies

[–] Tattorack@lemmy.world 2 points 2 months ago (1 children)

Don't we have Flatpak as a solution to this? Why don't developers or Valve make use of Flatpaks for Linux native games? Or is there a licensing issue?

[–] vapeloki@lemmy.world 4 points 2 months ago

Not really, no. Flat packs still need the host GPU, kernel driver and more.

I sometimes build software and opensource is easy for Linux. "Just compile once for fedora 40,41,42 and 4 Ubuntu versions, look how to build for Debian because the compiler there is 8 years old and then do that for very major update. Forever

[–] vogi@piefed.social 2 points 2 months ago* (last edited 2 months ago) (1 children)

Actually good question as they apparently are using an altered version of unreal engine (https://www.wardynamics.com/) UE has linux support, but maybe that got lost in the changed version.

[–] Anberibaburia@lemmy.dbzer0.com 2 points 2 months ago

Default voice chat stuff in ue is windows only so would need to be redone from scratch (if they using that).

[–] muusemuuse@sh.itjust.works 1 points 2 months ago

Games are typically made once, given a few patches, then abandoned. They will not keep chasing Linux dependencies forever so things break all the time. Windows is more stubborn about backward compatibility.

[–] silentjohn@lemmy.ml 0 points 2 months ago (1 children)

Proton usually works better than native linux lol

[–] Tattorack@lemmy.world 3 points 2 months ago (1 children)

No, that's incredibly situational. Largely depends how much effort has been put towards making the Linux version.

[–] silentjohn@lemmy.ml 0 points 2 months ago

That's not been my experience, even with a native version.