I have an xbox with gamepass. All the games I would buy are on gamepass so I don’t want to re buy games that are already available to me through gamepass.
I know I can stream but it’s not always the best experience.
I can install windows and use the Xbox app, but the controls don’t work natively. I can use a third party tool like steam deck tools but I risk a ban in multiplayer games if I use any of the overlay or fan tools.
I love the steam deck but the lack of Xbox gamepass integration makes me want to sell it for a windows handheld.
Any ideas of how I can better integrate Gamepass on my Steam Deck?
Mandatory disclaimer about Gamepass:
Gamepass as a model is not sustainable. It is a loss leader, and there is no way it will go like this without enshittifying.
Not only does it lock you into windows via proprietary APIs, making sure wine can never make it work, it also locks you into its subscription, by, well being a subscription.
If you do not have the money to support the creators directly, just choose the lesser evil, pay less than a third (5$) for mullvad, support one of the best VPNs, and just pirate them.
That way it works on Linux, dosent lock you into anything, and instead of supporting a Megacorp, you are supporting a good company. Still not better than supporting the devs, but better than Microsoft.
For the other 12$ you are saving up, just buy the game you liked most every 3-6 months.
That’s how I do it with RE, Rimworld, and everythibg else I play.
But about your question: if you wanna suck Microsoft dick, you can’t just have the best of both worlds.
Either you stream, or you install Win on your Steamdeck, which will tank the Performance and battery life.
The short answer is: you don’t unfortunately.
You already listed what the options are. The Xbox app and UWP games are not an option on SteamOS, and Windows support is suboptimal. As for Xbox cloud, it’s alright as long as you have a good internet access, which kind of defeats the purpose of a handheld.
The Battle.Net client is supposed to offer at least some Gamepass games.
But yeah, all in all the Gamepass situation sucks.
Currently, it is not possible to run the Xbox App Store on Linux. While you can run the Epic Game Store and GoG with the Heroic launcher, you cannot run the Xbox app store.
Why is streaming not an option? I’ve had pc gamepassfor months. You can create a shortcut in game mode to an edge browser which brings you directly to the home page for games, and then all controls natively work.
I’ve not had any issues with streaming so far, and even got to play starfield for a little while (i believe that was on game pass? Or I steamed it from my pc idrk).
Granted this only works so well for me because I have decent internet, but unless I wasplaying cod I’d be tempted to try with my 4g phone and Hotspot it.
I find it to be inconsistent
What about it is inconsistent?
Input lag and visual quality. It’s good most of the time but still inconsistent enough to desire native
Probably better off just selling and going with an windows handheld, just of course make sure to look into whether or not the device will actually work with pc gamepass and how well it handles most games
I thought of doing that. Waiting to see if the Xbox Ally is good
Remote play.
This 100%
What do you use for that?
I’ve been using xbplay and I’m not nuts about it
I haven’t done it in a long time. I used greenlight.
Project Greenlight
This greenlight?
Greenlight is an open-source client for xCloud and Xbox home streaming
This should work, but I’ll be honest, Setup is a doozey
I’ve just spent the last three days setting it up to use Office365 on my laptop for school
Interesting on paper, but good luck running games with that setup.
If I understand correctly this basically starts a container which itself spawns a VM running windows. Good for running Minesweeper and probably not much else.
Agreed, I’m not sure the Deck has the performance necessary to make it work well.
I got it running on my chrultrabook but its NOT fast (installing o365 took 6 hours for example). You’d be pretty period limited to only games prior to around 2014 based on memory limitations.
Personally? I’m a nutter, so I’d have at it just for shits and giggles to see if it’d work then immediately proceed to abuse my newfound power.
I tried setting this up and did eventually get some windows apps working but they constantly had display issues, lost mouse focus or the mouse didn’t align inside the app, window resizing issues, etc. Its good for things that are going to be very static and not much else.
Unless I just set it up wrong, which could definitely be the case.
I’m intrigued. I’ll definitely check this out. Thanks!
I don’t have a steam deck, but on my LeGo I am using XBplay that connects remotely to my Xbox and that’s how I’ve been game-passing. (Running Cachy, btw)
What is cachy?
CachyOS is an arch based distro like Steam OS. I use the handheld version, so we may have similar experiences trying to run xbplay
piracy is always an option
OP said they want to play multiplayer games, which are sometimes crackable, but more often not.
piracy is an option some of the time in that case then.
This is the main reason I did a Rog Ally. I hate it, but I needed local installs when not on wifi.
You hate the Ally?
I hate the need for Windows, but my use case keeps me in it. Love the device though.
