Steam For Linux Will Launch In 2012

An anonymous reader writes "Gabe Newell has responded to an email asking if Steam for Linux will be released this year with the simple answer 'Yes.' That means at some point in the next 7 months anyone running Linux will be able to download Steam and start playing a number of games, including at least one Valve title (most likely Left 4 Dead 2). After that the emphasis will be on game developers to start porting their Steam games over to Linux. 2012 could be a great year for gaming on Linux. The news follows the revelation in April that Valve was indeed working on a Linux port of its digital games service. At the time though, and as with all Valve software, we had no idea when it would get released."

Comments

Developers, developers, developers

[Anonymous Coward]

The bigger question is, will it motivate developers to port to Linux?

Re:Developers, developers, developers

[buanzo]

Yes. Steam already has the market. I'm pretty sure they are making this move with good pre-analysis. Gamers that only boot Windows to play games will definitely support it, to say the least.

that sucking sound

[Phoenix666]

That sucking sound is all my productivity flying out the window when this goes live. The last few years since the dvd drive on the family Wii console died I have gotten so much done. After all, on linux we all know the fun is in the coding and productivity tools (albeit a rarified kind of fun that you gotta immerse yourself in). If steam goes live with good games, well, I could see the 15 minute break I take when stumped by a coding challenge stretching into a week...

Re:2012 the year of the Linux desktop

[hendridm]

Nearly all people don't give a rip about Slashdot pundits. They buy a PC at Best Buy or Dell.com's "For Home" section and it comes with Windows. Done deal.

I'm a Linux advocate, but come on! To suggest that Uncle Larry will switch to Linux because she doesn't like the tile interface is absurd!

Re:This is great news!

[Baloroth]

I wish Valve would issue an IPO so that I could invest.

No, you don't, because then Valve would be forced to answer to investors, which means a focus on quarterly-earnings, which means rushed games and restrictive DRM and bullshit like that. Look at what happened to Ubisoft, EA, and Activision-Blizzard. Valve manages to be better than most of the other publishers in large part because they are a privately owned company who can afford to mess around if they want (and because of their unique management structure, i.e. they don't have one). Also means their employees are extremely well paid, which pays off in the long run with talented employees sticking around.