Steam Proton will no longer forget the entire reason it exists if you have a humungous library, as of the most recent client beta

(Image credit: Valve)

The thing about Linux is: it's cool, and very interesting and beautiful people use it. I've been running Fedora 43 on my main machine for a few months now and, to be honest? It's easy. Almost boringly easy. I got into all this expecting to have to wrestle the OS' peccadilloes into submission, but aside from minor tinkering to get proprietary Nvidia drivers and codecs installed, it's been smooth sailing.

Imagine my disappointment. And now, as of the most recent Steam beta update, there's even less Linux weirdness to deal with when you slip free of the shackles of Windows. As of yesterday's Steam (and Steam Deck) client beta update, Valve has put paid to a bug that meant the platform would sometimes forget it can run Windows games on Linux. Cut it some slack; it's 23 years old.

The bug in question afflicted users with especially large libraries—though Valve doesn't say how large—and would "result in Proton games showing up as 'Not valid on current platform'". Which rather defeats the whole point of Proton—Valve's fancy, WINE-based compatibility layer that lets Windows-only games run on your Linux distro of choice.

Is it the end for Windows and the beginning of the era of total open-source dominance? Well, no. But even folks that have previously paid no mind to Linux are starting to have to pay attention. That's healthy and, as a beautiful, neophyte Linux-er, pretty dang cool.

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One of Josh's first memories is of playing Quake 2 on the family computer when he was much too young to be doing that, and he's been irreparably game-brained ever since. His writing has been featured in Vice, Fanbyte, and the Financial Times. He'll play pretty much anything, and has written far too much on everything from visual novels to Assassin's Creed. His most profound loves are for CRPGs, immersive sims, and any game whose ambition outstrips its budget. He thinks you're all far too mean about Deus Ex: Invisible War.

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