Slashdot Mirror

← Back to Stories (view on slashdot.org)

Valve Reveals First Month of Steam Linux Gains

Posted by Soulskill on from the year-of-linux-on-the-steambox dept.

An anonymous reader writes with news that Valve has updated its Hardware & Software Survey for December 2012, which reflects the first month of the platform being available for Linux. Even though the project is still in a beta test, players on Ubuntu already account for 0.8% of Steam usage. The 64-bit clients for Ubuntu 12.10 and 12.04.1 showed about double the share of the 32-bit versions. MacOS use also showed growth, rising to about 3.7%. Windows 7's usage share dropped by over 2%, but balanced by the growth of Windows 8, which is now at just under 7%. The total share for Windows is still about 95%.

5 of 295 comments (clear)

  1. DRM by kthreadd · · Score: 0, Troll

    Games on Linux is good, but DRM is not. Hopefully Steam will stop using DRM one day.

    1. Re:DRM by RCL · · Score: 1, Troll

      There's no "your property" involved. You never "buy" games, you always license them, be it digital distribution or not. Read the EULA on boxed games that you have. I think technically they can revoke a license for boxed game and make it illegal for you to play it, although you will still own the box/disc itself.

      --
      Coding etudes
  2. RMS doesn't proprieatry games by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0, Troll

    ... and neither should you. Many of the games available via Steam are proprietary software. Proprietary software, as Richard Stallman (peace be upon him) has reminded us time and time again, is immoral and thus wrong for society. Who knows what games could by spying on you and subverting your freedom? Why would any right-minded GNU/Linux user defile themselves with such filth? Protect your freedom. Boycott Steam!

    1. Re:RMS doesn't proprieatry games by moronoxyd · · Score: 0, Troll

      RMS is against Steam?
      Then I will install Steam imitatively on all my machines.

      I've made the experience that NOT following what RMS says usually is the way to go for a fuller, more meaningful life.

  3. Re:What margins are you expecting. by JakeBurn · · Score: 1, Troll

    This entire debate is exactly the same as PC gamers demanding that Activision support COD on PC the same way they do on consoles. PC gamers were around 5% of all players of COD and still get pissed on. You would still need a seven fold increase in market share on your platform to reach that level and would still be getting handed crap. Cross platform is not a must its a goodwill gesture that may or may not break even for the company. You are so far in the minority of gamers your dollars are practically irrelevant. I feel sorry for any company bothering to try their hand in linux because of the PITA of dealing with whiny customers who expect their crappy port to work better than a crappy port who should just be grateful that it exists at all. Add to that the fact that every other linux guy has a different distro with different needs and there is zero reason to believe any major player in PC gaming will ever go wholly into the Linux market. "In future steam may only exist OS X and Linux." Considering the amount of stupid things a person can read here I don't lightly say this, but this is one of the dumbest things I've read in quite a long time. Second only to some asshat spewing racist remarks in a different thread I read a couple days ago.