gaming on Linux

[JarylGaren]

ngl, playing videogames on Linux has come a pretty long way over the years.

full disclosure, I've only really started playing games on PC in general since around last year, and I moved away from Windows in favor of Linux around 2021, where official Microsoft updates kept BSODing a new(!) laptop I had only gotten a couple weeks beforehand. So with the guidance of a friend of mine I gave specifically Manjaro a shot at the time, because I figured I hadn't really much to lose anymore anyways, and I liked it! there's significantly less bullshit running in the background that slows down your system, and I also appreciate not getting nagged by Microsoft with ads and automatic updates that I was never really able to permanently disable.

last year I got a gaming PC with Windows 11, but I couldn't even make it through a full year with Windows 11 before deciding to get rid of it, because oh my god I heavily dislike Windows 11, lmao. So I put bazzite on it, which is a Linux distribution more heavily geared towards gaming, and so far things have been relatively smooth sailing for me!
on PC, I mainly play games on Steam, where Valve has been doing a lot of work with the Steam Deck and the Proton compatibility layer, so a lot of games you don't really need to tinker to get them to work properly, you just hit play. I don't have much experience with other launchers and how to get other services to work on Linux, though, so your mileage may vary in the case of Epic or GoG.

some games are just kinda weird and finicky, though, but that's also the case on Windows with a bunch of PC ports anyways. For instance, on Windows 11 I had driver timeout issues with Horizon Zero Dawn Remastered and Monster Hunter Wilds with the latest AMD drivers, where I had to downgrade to slightly older drivers in order to play them properly. And on Linux, long story short, I had to use a launch command for Horizon ZDR in order to be able to finish it without issues. Meanwhile, I haven't really stumbled into issues in MonHun Wilds yet, but I also haven't really been motivated to play it recently. the two, three hunts I did after swapping to Bazzite went without a hitch though, so I'd say so far so good?

if you wanna play games on Linux, protonDB and Are We Anti Cheat Yet? are *very* good ressources for checking if the games you play a lot work well or at all on Linux. like, for instance, if you play a lot of Fortnite or Apex, then you may want to think twice about swapping over to Linux, because the devs for those two games specifically lock out Linux users with the anti-cheat stuff. Meanwhile, other games like Final Fantasy VII Remake or the Mega Man Zero/ZX Legacy Collection have been very seamless affairs for me so far!
(funnily enough, games like the MM Zero/ZX collection, the Kingdom Hearts collections and Tales of Berseria ran way better on Linux for me compared to Windows 11. Funny how that works!)

if you do wanna give it a shot, it's also pretty easy to get started (though I do recommend putting it on its own SSD). here's a video from JayzTwoCents where he checks out Bazzite himself:



So yeah, anyone else on here who plays games on Linux?

[Cayman]

I'm gonna follow this topic because I'm using linux for my living room PC now, and it's been an ordeal keeping it consistently working while trying to game on it. Valve has honestly done a great job of supporting linux with Proton, but it can still be a crapshoot what's going to run on it. It's a little tougher dealing with indie games and VNs that are developed for windows natively--I've tried using wine and Bottles to emulate a windows environment to run them but have always fallen short.

Microsoft has determined that my CPU on my main pc isn't good enough for Win11, literally skipping over my model number, so I'm riding out 10 support for now, and eventually have to make the tough decision.

Emulating consoles on Linux is fantastic, trying to run even simple games off itch.io developed in ren.py or rpg maker is a nightmare.

[JarylGaren]

Emulating consoles on Linux is fantastic, trying to run even simple games off itch.io developed in ren.py or rpg maker is a nightmare.

I remember having a similar issue with an itch.io game on Linux, and I think I managed to solve that by adding it to Steam as a non-Steam game and playing around with the compatibility settings there.

but yeah, there is still a lot of work to be done for gaming on Linux to be as (generally) painless as it is on Windows. there's *a lot* of differing use cases and user experiences.

[Cayman]

Emulating consoles on Linux is fantastic, trying to run even simple games off itch.io developed in ren.py or rpg maker is a nightmare.

I remember having a similar issue with an itch.io game on Linux, and I think I managed to solve that by adding it to Steam as a non-Steam game and playing around with the compatibility settings there.

but yeah, there is still a lot of work to be done for gaming on Linux to be as (generally) painless as it is on Windows. there's *a lot* of differing use cases and user experiences.

I've tried that with some games as well (Undertale Yellow, Spark Hearts, UnderHeaven, etc), but it is a struggle I'm not willing to put up with. Proton has been amazing if it's a game natively listed on steam, though--I got Sea of Stars working no problem.

[JarylGaren]

Emulating consoles on Linux is fantastic, trying to run even simple games off itch.io developed in ren.py or rpg maker is a nightmare.

I remember having a similar issue with an itch.io game on Linux, and I think I managed to solve that by adding it to Steam as a non-Steam game and playing around with the compatibility settings there.

but yeah, there is still a lot of work to be done for gaming on Linux to be as (generally) painless as it is on Windows. there's *a lot* of differing use cases and user experiences.

I've tried that with some games as well (Undertale Yellow, Spark Hearts, UnderHeaven, etc), but it is a struggle I'm not willing to put up with. Proton has been amazing if it's a game natively listed on steam, though--I got Sea of Stars working no problem.

Yeah, that's fair enough!
if you still need Windows to get certain stuff running, then you should still keep it.

[Cayman]

I remember having a similar issue with an itch.io game on Linux, and I think I managed to solve that by adding it to Steam as a non-Steam game and playing around with the compatibility settings there.

but yeah, there is still a lot of work to be done for gaming on Linux to be as (generally) painless as it is on Windows. there's *a lot* of differing use cases and user experiences.

I've tried that with some games as well (Undertale Yellow, Spark Hearts, UnderHeaven, etc), but it is a struggle I'm not willing to put up with. Proton has been amazing if it's a game natively listed on steam, though--I got Sea of Stars working no problem.

Yeah, that's fair enough!
if you still need Windows to get certain stuff running, then you should still keep it.

I'll keep it as long as I can until I'm deemed not worthy. T_T

[Pandro]

I've been running Linux now as my daily driver for... many (8?) years and dual-boot to Win10 only for VR-related things nowadays. Gotta agree with linux having come a long way. Setting up a wine prefix and finding out which winetricks to use was annoying and Steam made it pretty smooth

A resource I didn't see mentioned here yet is Lutris. I haven't had too much luck with it but it is a decent starting point and sometimes worth a shot when the game is not running via proton (steam) or wine immediately.

[JarylGaren]

A resource I didn't see mentioned here yet is Lutris. I haven't had too much luck with it but it is a decent starting point and sometimes worth a shot when the game is not running via proton (steam) or wine immediately.

right, I forgot about Lutris!
I've had mixed luck with Lutris so far. Like, when I tried to play the GoG release of Breath of Fire IV or Doom 2016 with it, I couldn't get it to work, but I do remember getting one of the Tomb Raider games I own on GoG to work there last year. But that might also be just me missing something obvious, and I'm probably gonna give it another go with a couple other games again eventually.

There's also the Heroic Games Launcher, which I've also seen recommended a bunch of times when it comes to playing games on Linux, but I haven't looked into it too much yet.

[linuxavali]

Honestly, Valve has been a great upstream contributor to the Linux kernel and the open source community. They have been throwing a unprecedented number of hours at open source projects they don't own to make gaming on Linux work and they deserve every bit of praise that get for it. We might be seeing more anti-cheat compatability with linux going forward though since Microsoft is now working with anti-cheat and AV providers to move their code out of the windows kernel and into user land, making it a lot easier to emulate under wine/proton. I don't want to say "X year will be the year of the linux desktop" but damn does it ever feel close. The Linux usage numbers are constantly creeping up on the Steam hardware servery which is a good sign.

[Pandro]

A resource I didn't see mentioned here yet is Lutris. I haven't had too much luck with it but it is a decent starting point and sometimes worth a shot when the game is not running via proton (steam) or wine immediately.

right, I forgot about Lutris!
I've had mixed luck with Lutris so far. Like, when I tried to play the GoG release of Breath of Fire IV or Doom 2016 with it, I couldn't get it to work, but I do remember getting one of the Tomb Raider games I own on GoG to work there last year. But that might also be just me missing something obvious, and I'm probably gonna give it another go with a couple other games again eventually.

I got StarCraft 2 and FFXIV to run with it. Although for StarCraft 2 (and other Blizzard games) I had to fiddle with the wine prefix every now and then to keep it working when they changed something in the launcher. Has been a while though since I played either of them