[scheeseman486]

> If linux gaming requires you use a blessed immutable OS where everything you run is either unprivileged or signed by a central entity, it's not much better than just using Windows at that point.

Yes it is, given that unlike Windows you still ultimately know what code being executed on your computer and have some degree of control over it.

Should add, this isn't necessarily something I want, lucky for me I don't really play the games that require anti-cheat. But it is something that Valve could conceivably do.

[Arch-TK]

You have as much control over it as you do over windows in this state: i.e. uninstalling the OS.

Just because you know what the base is doing, doesn't mean you get to see what the proprietary kernel level drivers, loaded at runtime, are doing.

Really it's effectively as good as having windows and running an open source web browser, or an open source kernel driver. It doesn't change the fact that your computer is being fundamentally controlled by components you can't change, some/many of which are also proprietary.

[scheeseman486]

This isn't a problem unique to what we're talking about, virtually every desktop PC on the planet has proprietary blobs running regardless of the OS used. I agree it sucks, but they're also not strictly necessary to run the containerized setup I proposed (any more than they're necessary to run the computer itself). It's possible to have attestation without anything proprietary/closed source.

[Arch-TK]

While it's possible to have attestation without anything proprietary/closed source. If you look at widevine you will quickly notice how that's very unlikely to happen. While it's possible to do this in containers, if you look at how DRM is built into the HDMI protocol, you will notice that it's unlikely you'll ever get to control a base while running the proprietary stuff in a container.

Your idea is somewhat possible, but it's never going to happen in reality. I can already run windows in a VM for the exact same result.

[scheeseman486]

It's unlikely sure, but I look at the alternatives and they seem even less likely. I really doubt consumers would be happy with normalizing rootkits on Linux, even those at Valve wouldn't want that. So what other choices are there? That question left me with the answer I gave.

Running Windows in a VM would be less efficient than running a stripped down Linux stack inside of a container. Going the Linux+Wine route requires less proprietary code and would be free to license. Hardly an exact same result.

[Arch-TK]

There just won't be any rootkits or games which require such anti cheat on linux. That's the most likely end result.

[scheeseman486]

There already are games with anti-cheat on Linux, they're just using (arguably) less effective versions of them.

Valve are financially incentivized to get as many games working as possible, I don't think it makes sense for them to do nothing at all about this. They have a head start now due to the general crappiness of Windows on a handheld but Microsoft's mobile offerings could catch up and given that would have Call of Duty among a lot of other heavy hitters available while Deck wouldn't, that is a problem that Valve would need to solve in order to not get stomped.