Can anyone eli5 what the steam runtime actually does? Ive seen scout and sniper on my system and i kinda accept that it has to be there but what does it do?

different distros have different environments. as in different libraries, versions and ways of accomplishing the same tasks. this is good for the linux ecosystem but bad for developers who want a predictable and stable set of tools they can build upon.

this system addresses just that by providing this stable set of libraries and tools developers can target instead.

eli5 it’s basically so your choice of distro doesn’t affect game compatibility.

Ok thanks! Is it related to proton or is it just for native games?