And how many run on linux via a well documented way?
I’ve been playing around with bazzite a bit, and for sure, i can run a lot of games on it, but you often end up googling which launcher to use, which settings to use, … And then even if you find something, it doesn’t always work.
Linux is making good progress in this regard, but this title feels a bit over optimistic (or at least, users who take it at face value will quickly be disappointed when they can’t get 90% of their games to work).
I’ve been playing around with bazzite a bit, and for sure, i can run a lot of games on it, but you often end up googling which launcher to use, which settings to use, … And then even if you find something, it doesn’t always work.
One of the biggest traps for new linux users since forever has been to jump straight into the deep end- tweaking any and every tunable- then when that inevitably all breaks, blaming Linux and moving back.
For anyone reading- You don’t need Arch as your first distro, you don’t want to on the bleeding edge unless you’re prepared to bleed. You don’t need things like Golden Eggroll Proton or any external launchers.
Just keep it simple to start- Something like Mint, SuSE or plain Fedora with Steam using the built-in Proton.
Bazzite gets… let say ‘advertised’ a lot and it’s got a lot of good ideas - but if you’re coming from Windows I think it’s just too much - it’s an immutable system* with containers for everything. That’s an ocean away from Windows unless you were comfortable with Sandboxie beforehand (if you were, dive right in)
*\the system is read only, you cannot change anything in the default image, ie. imagine if you were never allowed to add files to c:\windows
You think you’re describing a problem with Linux, but you’re just describing a problem with the game. If it’s not on steam it would be the same way on Windows. It will most likely be in a different, less popular and barely supported launcher. By then it is the publisher who is screwing you up, not Linux.
I was simply offering a case where steam isn’t the simple solution to gaming on Linux, as described by the post above.
I never said I was describing a ‘problem with Linux’ or a ‘problem with the game’.
Not all games are available on Steam or will work with steams proton/wine/whatever.
Game publishers have the right to choose how and where they publish their games. If I can’t install and play them on my machine I simply won’t. AS there is already an endless list of great games I haven’t played.
If you only play new popular games, and buy them on steam (and not GOG which is a platform that’s far more aligned with the linux way of thinking), sure.
But i’ve got plenty of old steam games that have issues, or require me to muck around with custom control stuff, have warnings that they might not be fully supported, …
I love that we’re all moving to linux to be free, and then be using steam iso GOG XD.
Please let me know if you find good documentation. I want to make the jump off of windows, but honestly I’m scared it will just cause a ton of frustration
Most games will just launch, no problems. But then you’ll get one title like the above poster has, that just refuses to launch no matter what you do.
Most of the times there’s a work around on ProtonDB that will get you running in a few minutes. But sometimes it feels like, or is the case, where the developers actively prevent the game from launching on Linux.
Honestly, check https://www.protondb.com/ and look for the games you want to play, it will let you know how well they work out of the box by just installing them on steam and hitting play. The reality is that it very much depends on what games you want to play, if you like CoD and other competitive multiplayer you’re unfortunately in the missing 10%, but for most cases you should be fairly well covered.
thing is, not even protondb is reliable. There’s been many times I’ve tried running a game, and encountered an error not posted anywhere, nor protondb, reddit or steam forums. All the comments on protondb will say, “works great out of the box!”, and I’m just left digging through random forums at that point.
I previously played with just Steam and there’s basically one setting to enable - allowing the install of non-native games - and then (for supported games) it’s pretty much the same as Windows. In some cases you need to select the Proton version but generally using “latest” does the trick.
There are games that require Proton-GE to work. These were essentially ones where Valve’s Proton version doesn’t have workarounds for various DRM etc (likely because doing so would get them in trouble). On Steam Deck this is done by pretty much going into the local Appstore in “desktop mode” to install. Other distros may vary.
For non-Steam games it’s a bit more of a pain, and can vary widely by game. I’ve installed a ton either just by running the Windows installer from Wine or scripts provided by Lutris.
Honestly if you’ve got the cash and want to try things, grab a Deck and give that a shot. If it works for you, take the leap to Linux on PC. Alternatively on PC, add/resize a disk and go dual-boot. The guided installers on Ubuntu variants generally make this pretty easy.
My comment isn’t meant to scare away people, but to keep our feet on the ground. Linux gaming has made amazing progress. If you play recent, mainstream games, it’ll be very well documented, and most things will work, unless they’re explicitly made to not work (such as certain anti cheat systems).
If you play lesser known indie games, really old games, or more specific things (not sure how good VR support is?), you’ll quickly encounter issues that may or may not be well documented.
Also, in another reply thread to my post, someone commented a game not working because he has multiple monitors on linux. Stuff like that is also still happening.
So it can be really decent, but know that you might encounter issues. Give it a try and see if it works for the games that are the most important for you :).
A lot of people have mentioned ProtonDB already, but I’ll throw in Lutris as well. It’s a multi-platform game launcher that supports Steam, GOG, Humble Games, Epic Games, EA, etc. but its website also lets you search for a game title, and most should have a user-created method to launch.
I know, i’ve got steam, and lutris, and heroic.
And some games work in some of these things. For some free games i only find ancient versions in these launchers, …
All i’m saying is that it’s still far away from “just working”. It’s made incredible leaps, but if someone reading this will think “this’ll be easy”, and they try to play an older or less known game, they’ll quickly be disillusioned…
Gaming on Linux is like gaming on Windows 20 years ago when you spent more time just trying to get the fucking game to run than actually playing the game.
I got an error trying to launch a BF2 expansion that told me to contact the nearest rendering developer.
My comment isn’t meant to scare away people, but to keep our feet on the ground. Linux gaming has made amazing progress. If you play recent, mainstream games, it’ll be very well documented, and most things will work, unless they’re explicitly made to not work (such as certain anti cheat systems).
If you play lesser known indie games, really old games, or more specific things (not sure how good VR support is?), you’ll quickly encounter issues that may or may not be well documented.
Also, in another reply thread to my post, someone commented a game not working because he has multiple monitors on linux. Stuff like that is also still happening.
So it can be really decent, but know that you might encounter issues. Give it a try and see if it works for the games that are the most important for you :).
And how many run on linux via a well documented way?
I’ve been playing around with bazzite a bit, and for sure, i can run a lot of games on it, but you often end up googling which launcher to use, which settings to use, … And then even if you find something, it doesn’t always work.
Linux is making good progress in this regard, but this title feels a bit over optimistic (or at least, users who take it at face value will quickly be disappointed when they can’t get 90% of their games to work).
Here’s a step-by-step guide:
Zero issues.
To add to this-
One of the biggest traps for new linux users since forever has been to jump straight into the deep end- tweaking any and every tunable- then when that inevitably all breaks, blaming Linux and moving back.
For anyone reading- You don’t need Arch as your first distro, you don’t want to on the bleeding edge unless you’re prepared to bleed. You don’t need things like Golden Eggroll Proton or any external launchers.
Just keep it simple to start- Something like Mint, SuSE or plain Fedora with Steam using the built-in Proton.
Bazzite gets… let say ‘advertised’ a lot and it’s got a lot of good ideas - but if you’re coming from Windows I think it’s just too much - it’s an immutable system* with containers for everything. That’s an ocean away from Windows unless you were comfortable with Sandboxie beforehand (if you were, dive right in)
*\the system is read only, you cannot change anything in the default image, ie. imagine if you were never allowed to add files to c:\windows
Edit: For the newbs, an ancient meme- https://www.shlomifish.org/humour/by-others/funroll-loops/Gentoo-is-Rice.html
I know its not important, but it is actually Glorious Eggroll.
There are Issues.
You think you’re describing a problem with Linux, but you’re just describing a problem with the game. If it’s not on steam it would be the same way on Windows. It will most likely be in a different, less popular and barely supported launcher. By then it is the publisher who is screwing you up, not Linux.
I was simply offering a case where steam isn’t the simple solution to gaming on Linux, as described by the post above.
I never said I was describing a ‘problem with Linux’ or a ‘problem with the game’.
Not all games are available on Steam or will work with steams proton/wine/whatever.
Game publishers have the right to choose how and where they publish their games. If I can’t install and play them on my machine I simply won’t. AS there is already an endless list of great games I haven’t played.
If you only play new popular games, and buy them on steam (and not GOG which is a platform that’s far more aligned with the linux way of thinking), sure. But i’ve got plenty of old steam games that have issues, or require me to muck around with custom control stuff, have warnings that they might not be fully supported, …
I love that we’re all moving to linux to be free, and then be using steam iso GOG XD.
Step by step guide for GOG (or Epic):
(Heroic will use Proton or Wine for the compatibility layer and you will (most of the time) have zero issues with playing games)
Please let me know if you find good documentation. I want to make the jump off of windows, but honestly I’m scared it will just cause a ton of frustration
It’s very strange.
Most games will just launch, no problems. But then you’ll get one title like the above poster has, that just refuses to launch no matter what you do.
Most of the times there’s a work around on ProtonDB that will get you running in a few minutes. But sometimes it feels like, or is the case, where the developers actively prevent the game from launching on Linux.
Honestly, check https://www.protondb.com/ and look for the games you want to play, it will let you know how well they work out of the box by just installing them on steam and hitting play. The reality is that it very much depends on what games you want to play, if you like CoD and other competitive multiplayer you’re unfortunately in the missing 10%, but for most cases you should be fairly well covered.
thing is, not even protondb is reliable. There’s been many times I’ve tried running a game, and encountered an error not posted anywhere, nor protondb, reddit or steam forums. All the comments on protondb will say, “works great out of the box!”, and I’m just left digging through random forums at that point.
I previously played with just Steam and there’s basically one setting to enable - allowing the install of non-native games - and then (for supported games) it’s pretty much the same as Windows. In some cases you need to select the Proton version but generally using “latest” does the trick. There are games that require Proton-GE to work. These were essentially ones where Valve’s Proton version doesn’t have workarounds for various DRM etc (likely because doing so would get them in trouble). On Steam Deck this is done by pretty much going into the local Appstore in “desktop mode” to install. Other distros may vary.
For non-Steam games it’s a bit more of a pain, and can vary widely by game. I’ve installed a ton either just by running the Windows installer from Wine or scripts provided by Lutris.
Honestly if you’ve got the cash and want to try things, grab a Deck and give that a shot. If it works for you, take the leap to Linux on PC. Alternatively on PC, add/resize a disk and go dual-boot. The guided installers on Ubuntu variants generally make this pretty easy.
I think you’ve gotten some good replies here.
My comment isn’t meant to scare away people, but to keep our feet on the ground. Linux gaming has made amazing progress. If you play recent, mainstream games, it’ll be very well documented, and most things will work, unless they’re explicitly made to not work (such as certain anti cheat systems).
If you play lesser known indie games, really old games, or more specific things (not sure how good VR support is?), you’ll quickly encounter issues that may or may not be well documented. Also, in another reply thread to my post, someone commented a game not working because he has multiple monitors on linux. Stuff like that is also still happening.
So it can be really decent, but know that you might encounter issues. Give it a try and see if it works for the games that are the most important for you :).
A lot of people have mentioned ProtonDB already, but I’ll throw in Lutris as well. It’s a multi-platform game launcher that supports Steam, GOG, Humble Games, Epic Games, EA, etc. but its website also lets you search for a game title, and most should have a user-created method to launch.
I know, i’ve got steam, and lutris, and heroic. And some games work in some of these things. For some free games i only find ancient versions in these launchers, …
All i’m saying is that it’s still far away from “just working”. It’s made incredible leaps, but if someone reading this will think “this’ll be easy”, and they try to play an older or less known game, they’ll quickly be disillusioned…
Gaming on Linux is like gaming on Windows 20 years ago when you spent more time just trying to get the fucking game to run than actually playing the game.
I got an error trying to launch a BF2 expansion that told me to contact the nearest rendering developer.
I think you’ve gotten some good replies here.
My comment isn’t meant to scare away people, but to keep our feet on the ground. Linux gaming has made amazing progress. If you play recent, mainstream games, it’ll be very well documented, and most things will work, unless they’re explicitly made to not work (such as certain anti cheat systems).
If you play lesser known indie games, really old games, or more specific things (not sure how good VR support is?), you’ll quickly encounter issues that may or may not be well documented. Also, in another reply thread to my post, someone commented a game not working because he has multiple monitors on linux. Stuff like that is also still happening.
So it can be really decent, but know that you might encounter issues. Give it a try and see if it works for the games that are the most important for you :).