Steam Deck

cross-posted from: https://beehaw.org/post/16434132

YouTube video: https://youtu.be/uScsmjvdwyo

Invidious video from YouTube without YouTube: https://inv.nadeko.net/watch?v=uScsmjvdwyo or https://invidious.nerdvpn.de/watch?v=uScsmjvdwyo

Video description:

It’s clear there are some people who don’t understand Proton. So let’s talk about it. #Proton #SteamPlay #CompatibilityLayer

00:00 Introduction
00:41 The basics of a computer
01:46 What Proton is not
03:04 What is an emulator
04:32 Proton acts like a map
05:25 Proton translates API and system calls
06:18 Proton provides a Windows-like software environment
06:55 Why are some games incompatible?
08:52 Shouldn't we demand native Linux games?
11:07 Conclusion

Here's the article link

And here's the point store link.

You can re-enable these options by using the SteamDeck=0 %command% launch option, but this might cause the deck to crash if it runs out of RAM/VRAM.

This crash shouldn't happen if you're on SteamOS Beta (version 3.6 or newer) because it uses ZRAM, or if you've increased your swap file size. However memory having to be moved between ZRAM/swap and RAM/VRAM does cause reduced performance too, so more testing will be needed to see if it's better to use FSR3/XeSS this way or not.

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The also mentioned that it will support SteamOS specifically, which I would assume means that the Deck will be specifically supported.

UMU comes from GloriousEggroll who is well known for making protonGE that's required to run several games on linux/deck.

It's not a launcher by itself, but rather something that can be built into other game launchers like Heroic, Lutris, and Junk Store. Right now most all steam games that don't have anticheat run great on deck without any tweaks. However many of those same games don't run by default if you install them from Epic/GOG/etc using one of the previously mentioned launchers. The games often require additional windows components to be manually installed with winetricks/protontricks, and many have lesser performance than their steam counterparts.

UMU is supposed to help other launchers have comparable compatibility and performance to what we see in steam native games. This project will hopefully improve the 3rd party launcher experience a lot.

This beta update doesn't change much, but the name of the update makes me think Valve is nearly ready to push 3.6 to stable.

Hi, I'm in the process of installing a standard arch distro on the deck with the idea of using the deck as my main pc for daily use giving preference to the desktop session and with a standard type of installation instead of an immutable one (among other things, I need luks and custom udev rules). I have openbox working.

The idea is to have a X11 session with openbox, a Wayland session with Labwc and lastly the gamescope/steam UI session and just switch between them via SDDM.

I added the steam jupiter repo to install the jupiter-fan-control package. I was wondering what other packages I should install besides the fan-control.

Any ideas?. Thanks!.

I just started trying to setup two screen using the official dock and the experience has been pretty awful. In desktop mode, I got two freezes while trying to have the displays recognized. Booting with both screens plugged in resulted in no detection. Then after replugging a screen (display port) I only got 640x480 resolution. Second replug I got the 1080p but plugging the second screen either results in a crash, or just now it's not frozen but I only have a black background and the mouse cursor.

Is there some setting to change to improve the situation? Ideally I'd like it to be automatic when I plug the Deck on the dock, especially with valve official dock which costs quite a bit compared to other options.

I'm curious about other people's experience with this

Noticed this update got pushed just now.

Edit: Seems they’re doing this to prevent costs from arbitration. Read comment below.

I'm trying to configure the gyro to help me aim. I've tried every configuration I can think of, or find online. I'm slamming head into a wall.

From what I can tell, the game now only accepts "steam controller" input. Which means the right joystick isn't actually a joystick, it's a weird virtual joystick, and there's some conversion going on. So when the old methods for getting gyro input are used, ie "as joystick" or "as mouse", the input is completely ignored by the game.

I've tried configuring a fresh controller configuration based on a standard controller, but then the game things I'm trying to use a keyboard and mouse and ignores all controller input.

Now, if I set gyro to "right stick (steam controller logo)", then suddenly the gyro starts affecting the right stick. But instead of being a relative input, as in when I pull the left trigger to aim, use the current gyro position as zero, and all relative movement should be applied to the stick. Instead it is an absolute value, with the movement being relative to the calibrated location of gravity down. So when I pull the left trigger, I immediately stare into the sky.

I think the solution to this is the "auto world tilt" option, but that is only available in the "gyro to joystick" configuration, which of course doesn't work.

Am I missing something completely obvious here? Can someone please guide me in the right direction? I miss gyro aim.

Thanks

This would presumably let x86 windows games run on ARM hardware.

This is almost certainly meant for the next Valve VR headset, but ARM has so much better power efficiency than x86 that a future ARM based Deck would be a huge improvement to battery life.

Also see this tweet:

VR games that have already secretly pushed Android ARM builds onto the Steam Store are ran via Waydroid (androidARM to LinuxARM)

VR games that do not have an ARM build on Steam (windows x86) are being translated/emulated via ProtonARM and FEX

Edit: here's gamingonlinux coverage of this info, includes some more information

SteamDeckHQ has also posted a first look, and praises how well the game runs.

The game unfortunately does require a PlayStation network account.

The game has the same PlayStation overlay that's incompatible with Linux, but when playing on Steam Deck the overlay is automatically disabled. Desktop Linux players will need to use the SteamDeck=1 %command% launch option to disable the overlay.

Here's a link to the game's store page

And here's a link to their X post with the animated Steam Deck art.