Has it really been that long? Apparently so. Valve originally announced their rebranding of Steam Play with Proton back on August 21st, 2018. Seems like a good time for a quick reflection being halfway to a decade old now with the tech that gave rise to the Steam Deck.
Kind of. Its more aimed at developers to “port” the game rather than the end user. Saying that there will no doubt be a third party solution.