The Steam Deck is changing how normies think of gaming PCs.
Just thought I'd share something I thought was pretty interesting. I have a mother in law who is... well let's just say she's a stereotypical older mom who doesn't own a computer, just an iPad. During the pandemic, she started getting into Nintendo games and bought herself a Switch. Fast forward a few years later and she's interested in getting a Steam Deck, since one of her "mom groups" told her about some pandemic inspired games, similar to Stardew Valley and Animal Crossing that are only available on Steam.
When it comes down to it, she doesn't care about her computer, she just wants to play computer games in a way that's easy and accessible for her. We'll be getting her a Steam Deck for her birthday, which in my opinion is just super neat. Even PC gaming is becoming extremely accessible, and it's a fantastic time to be a gamer.
It's also changing how normies think of Linux.
Also it basically doubled the % of linux users at Steam.
Normies don't think about Linux. You don't even need to see Linux if you use a Steam Deck.
Still, casual gamers did think Linux couldn't game. It's changing this opinion in the best way possible and that's really important since Linux is the best OS. I personally think we still live in medieval PC times as long as Windows is the main OS used.
The parent comment is right. Most people don't think about Linux. Ask a 'casual' Swtich owner what OS the Switch uses, and their answer is probably going to be pretty close to the answer that a similar Deck user would give.
I was going to say I slightly disagree, but then I thought about it some more and realized they probably just see it as SteamOS in the same way Android doesn't make people think about Linux either.
Normies¹ don't even really think about Windows or OS in general, most people just think it's just what a computer is like regardless.
¹ : Normie as in person who is not experienced with computers and PC gaming
Even so it made it significantly harder for people to make the dated throwaway comment that you'll lose access to a majority of your games by switching to Linux.
With that I feel like people will see it's just as usable as MacOS and Windows in a majority of circumstances.
You can use crossover and it isn't awful, but I think Mac is third for gaming at this point.
I'm not too sure. I used to browse /r/MacGaming despite not owning a Mac but I lost of track of things when they killed 32 bit support
There are some games that get official Mac ports, and that's nice, but compatibility on the rest of your library doesn't just work out of the box.
Like I said, crossover is OK but when Mac's biggest strength is ease of use, fiddly manual configuration to make your library work isn't awesome.
I lost all my games when I swapped to Linux.
But that’s because it was a decade ago, and I was way too lazy to figure out why wine wouldn’t work, tho I don’t really pc game anyway and these were mostly older games, even then. Small loss.
I know there’s a lot of stuff either native dev or ported/cracked for Linux, just never really spent the time to look into it.
The only thing that’s going to cause problems for me now is idk how Linux handles vr. I assume not terribly well, since none (almost none?) of it is native dev. I’m looking to move away from consoles now that they are moving away from physical media (no point collecting if there’s nothing to collect), so Linux being more robust is great! But vr maybe my stick point. Depends how well developed it gets I guess.
VR headsets and games with anti-cheat software still have issues. I haven't been able to get Oculus Rift S to work for example.
I think some headsets like the ones made by Valve and HTC work better though. I'm not sure if there's currently the same degree of rapid advancements for VR Linux gaming as there are for gaming in general on Linux. I know OpenHMD exists but I haven't tried it out myself.
My Vive Pro does work - but not as nicely as it did on windows. Driver support for stuff like reprojection doesn't seem to be there.
Yeah that’s kinda what I was expecting.
I don’t really have a vr setup right now (have a psvr, the tracking sucks but I want to like it) but I was thinking maybe an index at some point..
Tho tbh if I need to keep a windows pc for that to work… I can… I won’t be thrilled for it, but my laptop is touchscreen and running 11… idk how Linux does with touchscreen so I haven’t changed it out yet, probs could upgrade the hardware to game off it.
Have you tried using the PSVR on your computer?
Not yet, but I looked into it before I bought it and I’ve seen that it can be done as sort of a viewing unit? If I understand correctly that’s all it would be, which is still probably a powerful tool, but I just got the vr like a month ago and then immediately got two surprise kittens so I have not had time to play at all, much less do anything fancy with it.
However if you want to tell me all about it, I am more than happy to learn from a person rather than an impersonal article. Really.
I would have linked an article. I haven't experimented with it myself but it seems like there's one paid project available through Steam that aims to support the PSVR
No worries.
It’s a thing I’ll probably do at some point. Just for kicks. I’m a big fan of playing around with hardware to save money 😁 but it’ll probably be a while before I get to it. I have some self hosting and automation to learn to do first (not super knowledgeable presently, but omfg is the fediverse helpful with tech stuff 💜)
Me too. Messing around with hardware is something that's always stuck with me from when I was a teenager. If you give the PSVR thing a test mind messaging me or commenting so I can hear how it goes?
I was also messing with hardware/software starting in teens. Grew up during the brief period in which home computers were fairly common though still quite expensive, but pc repair shops weren’t really around.
I will try to remember, but it might not be for a while. :)
When some Microsoft simp makes unfounded claims about how you can't game on Linux, we now only need to point at the Steam Deck.
that's like saying apple is changing how normies think of Unix
Thats because its linux only in a technical sense
We're talking about software, what other senses are there? :D
Well for the user. Like the mum from the post won't go like "Oh wow the linux pc that is my steam deck can game"
They only experience steam OS as the console. Like when mum used to say you play "the nintendo" too much :D
Most people probably won't explore the desktop mode, but SteamOS is basically a full-on Linux distro.
Exactly!
Most improvements on the Deck translate to all Linux distros. That's pretty good.
Good point, i didnt think about it that way
No, this is incorrect, OP thought steam deck is ok because the games are exclusively only in steam. OP never try to consider her mother-in-law. Giving someone linux and just assuming they understand is not going to help make them like the game or machine.