Previous incarnations of ProtonDB gave you an at-a-glance view of charts and graphs on the home page and a stats page. Both were retired over the last month. There was a reason for that: the ongoing new rating system made a lot of that information out of date or inaccurate. But that's left a gap in what ProtonDB used to provide and I'm happy to announce that its replacement is here and I hope you find that it's a whole lot better.

We now have a regularly updated dashboard and it lives at https://www.protondb.com/dashboard but it's also nimble enough to fit in that diagram of a Steam Deck on the home page. You didn't think that Steam Deck was gonna be just a gussied up video player did you?

Go ahead, give it a whirl. Either on the home page or in larger form at the Dashboard page!

Here's how to use it:

• You'll now be greeted on the home page with a regularly-updated visualization of the Steam catalog by three rating systems: Valve's Deck Verified program, a preview of the ProtonDB's new 'Click Play' algorithm, and the existing 'Medal' based algorithm.
• If you're already signed in from Steam on ProtonDB, you'll automatically start on the 'Your Library' section with a personalized compatibility report of your own gaming library.
• If you don't want to log in via Steam, that's ok! You'll start on the visualization of the Steam Catalog. Click the arrows to shuffle over to 'Your Library' section and enter your profile URL or Steam ID and you'll get a personalized compatibility report too.
• If you have your library loaded then on the home page (not the dashboard) and under the chart will be ten suggestions based on what you've most played in your library that are deck verified and ten more that the community says work great but haven't been given a Deck Verified status yet.
• One better, you get two other sets of recommendations: by Steam's user score or by peak player count. More will come.

A muse on the numbers

• Here we have another look on how many games the Steam Deck could play beyond the those that the official Deck Verified program has certified.
• 586: the number of games Deck Verified places at 'Verified' status.
• 1,098: the number of games Deck Verified places at 'Playable' or 'Verified' status.
• 2,505: the number of games for which the Click Play rating attests that ProtonDB community says work at tier 3 or higher.
• 4,324: the number of games for which the existing legacy medal rating attests that the ProtonDB community says work at silver or higher, if you're willing to tinker.
• If you're an advocate, you'll be encouraged by these numbers. But please note that we only began receiving Steam Deck reports a few days ago. At this time, ratings largely express how well a game may work on a general Linux PC. When we have enough data, we'll have a ProtonDB Steam Deck rating. Remember to write reports!
• The numbers above are for info-tainment purposes only. Please don't get emotionally attached to them. The rating heuristics may become more strict.

A running FAQ on the charts

• The 'tiers' are numbered 1 (best) to 5 (borked). This is intentionally a way to start fresh. And subject to change. What do you think of it? Come chat with us on Discord or IRC.
• There are fewer total ratings in Click Play compared to Medal out of being conservative for now. Borked counts are particularly underrepresented.
• The 'Steam Catalog' category is where I've excluded games that did not meet a minimum threshold of prominence. This reduces the catalog from roughly 34,000 to 9,000. Some lesser-known gems may not be tallied among these numbers but I think this is a more fitting representation of the compatibility status of the games that the vast majority of people play.
• Categories of top 10/100/1000 are coming shortly.

I'll have more to write regarding the details of how Click Play ratings are gathered in upcoming news posts.

Some disclaimers

• The new ratings, like the old ones, are not backed by any formal testing regimen. They are algorithmically derived from the reports that the community writes.
• This is a preview of the new Click Play rating system. Ratings elsewhere on the site will remain unchanged until we fully cut over.
• ProtonDB is an independent community unaffiliated with Steam or Valve.

A side note

These radial charts make me abnormally happy. They embody all the progress Linux gaming has made since the site started. And also what I wanted to achieve with your help, in neat compact imagery. Before pushing this release, I remembered a moment shortly after launching the site. An 'oh yeah i should get to that' moment that I never did get around to. And I thought: it's time. As a minor little celebration. So there it is: enjoy the golden treatment of the 'db' in the ProtonDB logo. Finally did it.

If you'd like me to keep running with all of this, I welcome you to support me on Patreon.

Cheers!

--migelius (@buck)