Steam for Linux very very soon

[Haymakers9th]

Unless you're functionally retarded, you've probably seen something about Valve working on porting the Source engine and Steam software to Linux. It will be initially supported on Ubuntu (and by extension, Mint), but it's expected that they will branch out - and the community will more than likely get it working anyway.

The Valve Linux blog states that they've been in internal and private external betas through the month with "one Valve game" which I assume to be Left4Dead2.
I think they'll be moving on to public release or beta soon, and maybe with more than just L4D2. TF2 had an update that implies moving for Linux support, and a Steam Community page for Linux just went up recently.

A while back the L4D blog mentioned getting Workshop support, and the post mentions Linux support:

All of this will also be available not just on the PC and Mac, but also for Linux users as well starting in the middle of next month and rolling out from there. We will have more details as we get closer to launch.

(if you haven't been following, they've been using L4D2 as the testbed for putting Source onto Linux, so it's the Source game we're gonna see first out of the gate on Linux.)

And today, the L4D blog announced a free weekend:

Starting this Thursday, the entire game will be free to play for the whole weekend. New players can begin pre-loading now

So I might be wrong, but I'm kinda expecting this to happen this weekend, if not tomorrow.


There's also a list on the Steam CDR parser for what applications are flagged for Linux support, not just "there's a Linux version available" but they're actually Linux-ready on the Steam end: http://marlamin.com/cdr/search.php?s=linux&searchby=os
Most of the Humble Indie Bundle games, Killing Floor is there too as they use the Unreal engine (I actually emailed them about that near the initial announcement, they said they'd look into it, GUESS THEY DID).


Another thing, Drew Bliss, Valve Software Engineer, will be speaking for 15 minutes at the Ubuntu Developer Summit in Copenhagen: http://summit.ubuntu.com/uds-r/meeting/ ... iss-valve/



This is pretty fucking cool.


update: Valve have released a survey for candidacy in the next beta: http://www.valvesoftware.com/linuxsurvey.php

[Velp]

I was thinking about getting a usb 3.0 flash drive to install linux onto so I could try it out and see how games ran. I don't think I'll have time to order a drive now, and last time I check there are none in stores in town. An other thing is my G35 headset doesn't have any linux drivers, so no 7.1 surround sound if i do try it.

[Haymakers9th]

Does it not have drivers because the site doesn't have it listed, or have you tried it before?

[Eviltechie]

The G35 headset works in ubuntu. You might have to adjust the levels a bit though, because I remember mine being really fucking loud when I used it.

[Velp]

It works as a standard usb headset, the sound is a little off and surround sound doesn't work. Last time I check anyway.
I ended up going out and there are some 3.0 usb drives in store here now.

[dantesus]

I don't think my 7.1 works in ubuntu, but stereo is alright. I recommend googling linux drivers based on your headset model. I can't wait to test out Steam on linux!

[Haymakers9th]

http://www.valvesoftware.com/linuxsurvey.php


survey for the beta

[510 Baud One]

I know I am late on the subject, but yea, this is going to be amazing. I even found out Netflix is now available on Ubuntu. another driving factor of going "all linux" on your computer.

[scobywhru]

The beta is open to everyone now.
http://store.steampowered.com/news/9638/