Tested: Valve's Steam for Linux beta

Steam Punk

Article from Issue 148/2013
Author(s):

Steam for Linux finally brings current games to the Linux desktop. Valve has put a lot of energy into the project, but the first steps on the new terrain still look a little shaky.

Games vendor Valve has ported its Steam platform [1] to Linux, thus shifting the free platform into the focus of serious gamers. The manufacturer recently invited some users to participate in a closed beta phase. I took a look at the trial version of the Steam client, which still has some quirks.

Officially, Valve only supports Ubuntu and other Debian-based distributions, so I used a recent version of Ubuntu (12.10 "Quantal Quetzal") in my tests. With some tinkering, you can talk Steam into cooperating with other distributions. The "Valve's Strategy" box explains why the company uses Linux as a platform.

Graphics Drivers

Shortly after the news broke that Valve was planning a Steam client for Linux, the company announced it would support programmers of free graphics drivers in their optimization efforts. Linux has long suffered from a lack of good drivers for 3D acceleration.

[...]

Use Express-Checkout link below to read the full article (PDF).

Buy this article as PDF

Download Article PDF now with Express Checkout
Price $2.95
(incl. VAT)

Buy Linux Magazine

SINGLE ISSUES
Print Issues
Digital Issues
SUBSCRIPTIONS
Print Subscriptions
Digital Subscriptions

Related content

comments powered by Disqus
Subscribe to our Linux Newsletters
Find Linux and Open Source Jobs
Subscribe to our ADMIN Newsletters

Support Our Work

Linux Magazine content is made possible with support from readers like you. Please consider contributing when you’ve found an article to be beneficial.

Learn More

News

Tag Cloud

Administration Community Desktop Events Hardware Linux Mobile Programming Security Software Ubuntu Web Development Windows free software open source