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Not to pile on, but every few years I decide to see if Linux is ready for gaming. I use it every day to get my work done, so why not double dip and not have to

Not to pile on, but every few years I decide to see if Linux is ready for gaming. I use it every day to get my work done, so why not double dip and not have to deal with Windows? However it's never been good enough. At first there just were no drivers, so I couldn't get acceptable performance from any game. Then came drivers, but I had to fight for days to get them to work on handful of games and even then performance was sub par compared to Windows. Last time drivers installed without any problems, but still from the games I tend to play only couple had native Linux support (in this case, they could be downloaded straight from Steam), but still most required Wine and that sucked the performance right out. Then there were bunch of games that didn't even work with Wine. I'm first to admit that I do not have high end gaming PC, but 16GB of middle of the road RAM, i5 2500K, and nVidia GTX 970 serve me well on Windows side. Frankly, I see no reason to spend more money to get the same performance on Linux. If you can get acceptable performance from your Linux PC while gaming then more power to you, but from my point of view we are still long way and I mean really long way from gaming being "viable" on Linux.

vacri 9y ago
Steam has plenty of games for linux... but few of them are the kind of AAA titles that benefit from chunky GPUs. I use steam both on windows and linux, so see the store listing for each; linux 'is there' for gaming, but just doesn't have the offerings to drive desktop GPU demand.
- Freak_NL 9y ago
  Most of the games I play on Linux very much benefit from a beefy GPU. I'm currently playing Hitman (2016), which may not be the most graphically intense game ever, but it certainly looks great with the right hardware. I could run it on my laptop with on-board Intel GPU, but it would look like crap and lag. We do get our share of AAA titles, just not as many as on Windows. As it is, there are more appealing titles than I can ever play without cutting into work, chores, or (non-gaming) leisure time. Most indie games benefit as well though; even though these do tend to work on less well-endowed GPU's, they simply look better with a heftier graphics card. I've got a desktop computer with beefy GPU exactly because I enjoy gaming; and it runs Linux, exclusively.
  - SmellyGeekBoy 9y ago
    I'm in the same boat. The last AAA titles I played on Linux were Deus Ex: Mankind Divided and Alien Isolation - high end, graphics intensive games. I've been meaning to get around to Hitman - I downloaded the demo a few weeks back and it seems to run fine but not had time to get started with it properly. I also enjoyed Thimbleweed Park and I see the (excellent, btw) Wonderboy remake was released for Linux this week. Us Linux gamers are incredibly well catered for these days! (Ubuntu // i5 2500K // GTX 970 with Intel proprietary drivers, FWIW)
    - gpderetta 9y ago
      "Over 1/3 of Thimbleweed Park sales are are on Mac and Linux. You're being silly if your ignoring that." -- Ron Gilbert
- nextlevelwizard 9y ago
  Yes, for sure there are plenty of games for you to play, if you are mostly into indie type games. It might even be good for mostly story driven single player games. I'm probably out lier since I exclusively play multi player games, because for me video games are just replacement for out board game nights which we can no longer maintain constantly since my friends and I live now across the country. Only "native" Linux games I've played are Counter Strike: Global Offensive, Dota 2, and Insurgency. Beyond thous only game I've gotten to run smoothly enough that I could even consider playing them is Minecraft (which obviously runs even on a potato). But even with these I had some problems. CS:GO's FPS didn't quite keep above 120 all of the time and Dota 2 had few graphical glitches.
- gotbeans 9y ago
  I tend to think this works otherwise: I don't choose a platform because it has "many games", I want to play games X, Y and Z and I want no issue, what OS should I play them with. The answer in 99% of X, Y and Z combinations is Windows tragically
  - graphitezepp 9y ago
    Yup Linux definitely would have "enough" games for even a heavy gamer like myself, but it wouldn't have the freedom of ANY game that I enjoy using Windows, tragically.
shmerl 9y ago
Without high end gaming PC, it would be tougher on Linux, as you noted since in some cases performance can be lower, and translation layers like Wine or wrappers can introduce extra overhead, which higher end hardware helps to mitigate. However, it's more than good enough for many games already, and Linux gaming keeps improving and growing. And not all games need super performance. I can get around 40-50 fps in the Witcher 3 in Wine on Linux on max settings (minus hairworks), using AMD RX 480 at 1920x1200. Is that acceptable performance? It's somewhat lower than it would get on Windows on the same hardware, but it's pretty playable. More critical are rendering bugs that Wine developers are still working on.
- nextlevelwizard 9y ago
  For sure, 40 fps is playable, but at that point you might as well just buy a console and play the games with that with no hassle and run Linux for other purposes. It will probably be cheaper in the long run. However I've spent money on 144Hz monitors and for enough performance that the games I play run on at least constant 120 fps. Obviously it's not necessary if you are in it just for a story, but as mentioned in another post I exclusively play multiplayer games with my friends and if you haven't experienced playing games (or even just using a computer) with 144Hz (running at or higher frame rate) it's like a night and day.
  - shmerl 9y ago
    > but at that point you might as well just buy a console and play the games with that with no hassle and run Linux for other purposes. I stay away from DRMed platforms, so incumbent consoles are no go for me. About higher framerates - it should be OK, once AMD will merge FreeSync support in amdgpu driver upstream. My monitor is 60Hz anyway, but to have good experience without tearing on high frequency monitors, FreeSync can help. Today, to use it you'd need to install customized kernel from AMD.
    - nextlevelwizard 9y ago
      As I said earlier we are still long, long way away from Linux gaming being a thing and longer it takes for Linux to come to parity now the further Windows will race ahead if you believe all in the VR hype that's going on. >I stay away from DRMed platforms I am not ideologically bound, I care about performance. If Linux is enough for you then more power to you, I wish it could be enough for me too.
perakojotgenije 9y ago
Portal, Portal2, Tomb Raider, Kerbal space program, Shadow of Mordor, Rocket League, The Talos Principle are some of the AAA games that I've played on my linux mint box in the last few years. I am just an occasional gamer and I do not have a gaming machine (amd fx8350, nvidia gtx770, 1GBram) but all these games worked flawlessly. No wine, no glitches no driver problems. I don't know if it would have been "good enough" for professional gamers (I admit I play on "high details" instead of "ultra high details" mode)
- BEEdwards 9y ago
  Shadow of Mordor and Tomb Raider are the only AAA game on your list. The rest are indie games tiny budget indie games.
  - shmerl 9y ago
    Everyone's list is different. And it's not about the size of the budget, it's about quality (in different meanings of it).
    - Armisael16 9y ago
      AAA is in fact precisely about the size of the budget and amount of promotion.
      - shmerl 9y ago
        Which again isn't equal to quality (enough to mention some "AAA" releases which were complete trash, remember Batman: Arkham Knight fiasco?). So again, AAA or not AAA, quality is what matters, both artistic and technical. Today, good studios are releasing games for Linux. Such as inXile, Obsidian and others.
        sqeaky 9y ago
        Nothing you said is wrong, but it doesn't change the fact that quality doesn't sell. Once a game is "good enough" it often comes down to marketing, and the studios putting out for Linux do not control a majority of the marketing dollars.
Sir_Cmpwn 9y ago
This is the wrong mindset, and if you take it, Linux will never be better by your criteria. Linux is not a 1:1 replacement for Windows. It is a separate platform. In the same way you can't expect to play all PS4 games on Windows, you can't expect to play all Windows games on Linux. Retune your expectations.
- nextlevelwizard 9y ago
  Just means I won't be playing on Linux since if not all most of the good games live on Windows. If I take your perspective, that Linux is separate platform, like console vs PC. Then the battle is already lost and there is no point for me to care in the slightest.
  - Sir_Cmpwn 9y ago
    Many, many great games are available on Linux, and the platform has a lot of compelling reasons outside of games to choose it over Windows. And unlike any other gaming platform, Linux has software like Wine to expand its game library into those of other platforms. And unlike the typical console vs PC wars, Linux is still a PC and has all of the benefits of using one. But it sounds like you're just looking to justify your confirmation bias, and so be it.
    - nextlevelwizard 9y ago
      Most games I play do not have Linux port, so by definition I would be spending most if not all of my time in Wine, which drastically lowers performance. All examples people have thrown at me have been single player story driven games which do not interest me in the least. I only play multi player games with my friends, since single player games rarely keep my interest (last single player campaign/game I finished was Portal 2 since it was so short) Then there's always "will this even work with wine" question. Like take any Blizzard game, the downloader/launcher simply does not work on Wine (or at least it did not when I last tried it). When a new game comes out that I want to play, I don't want to think if I can play it, I want know I can if I choose to. This is even bigger concern since most interesting games now days are not AAA titles, but various smaller games, mods, and early access titles. Game we've spent most time playing last month is easily Playerunknown's Battlegrounds and with quick look at Wine DB it's status is "garbage" If I look Linux as separate platform then there is no hope I would be using it to play games.
jcadam 9y ago
I just stopped gaming on the PC, so no more need for windows :) I do own a couple of gaming consoles, but now that I have less spare time, my gaming preferences have definitely shifted toward casual games I can pick up and play for 20 minutes and then forget about for a week (so I'm a Nintendo fan these days).

vacri 9y ago

Steam has plenty of games for linux... but few of them are the kind of AAA titles that benefit from chunky GPUs. I use steam both on windows and linux, so see the store listing for each; linux 'is there' for gaming, but just doesn't have the offerings to drive desktop GPU demand.

Freak_NL 9y ago
Most of the games I play on Linux very much benefit from a beefy GPU. I'm currently playing Hitman (2016), which may not be the most graphically intense game ever, but it certainly looks great with the right hardware. I could run it on my laptop with on-board Intel GPU, but it would look like crap and lag. We do get our share of AAA titles, just not as many as on Windows. As it is, there are more appealing titles than I can ever play without cutting into work, chores, or (non-gaming) leisure time. Most indie games benefit as well though; even though these do tend to work on less well-endowed GPU's, they simply look better with a heftier graphics card. I've got a desktop computer with beefy GPU exactly because I enjoy gaming; and it runs Linux, exclusively.
- SmellyGeekBoy 9y ago
  I'm in the same boat. The last AAA titles I played on Linux were Deus Ex: Mankind Divided and Alien Isolation - high end, graphics intensive games. I've been meaning to get around to Hitman - I downloaded the demo a few weeks back and it seems to run fine but not had time to get started with it properly. I also enjoyed Thimbleweed Park and I see the (excellent, btw) Wonderboy remake was released for Linux this week. Us Linux gamers are incredibly well catered for these days! (Ubuntu // i5 2500K // GTX 970 with Intel proprietary drivers, FWIW)
  - gpderetta 9y ago
    "Over 1/3 of Thimbleweed Park sales are are on Mac and Linux. You're being silly if your ignoring that." -- Ron Gilbert
nextlevelwizard 9y ago
Yes, for sure there are plenty of games for you to play, if you are mostly into indie type games. It might even be good for mostly story driven single player games. I'm probably out lier since I exclusively play multi player games, because for me video games are just replacement for out board game nights which we can no longer maintain constantly since my friends and I live now across the country. Only "native" Linux games I've played are Counter Strike: Global Offensive, Dota 2, and Insurgency. Beyond thous only game I've gotten to run smoothly enough that I could even consider playing them is Minecraft (which obviously runs even on a potato). But even with these I had some problems. CS:GO's FPS didn't quite keep above 120 all of the time and Dota 2 had few graphical glitches.
gotbeans 9y ago
I tend to think this works otherwise: I don't choose a platform because it has "many games", I want to play games X, Y and Z and I want no issue, what OS should I play them with. The answer in 99% of X, Y and Z combinations is Windows tragically
- graphitezepp 9y ago
  Yup Linux definitely would have "enough" games for even a heavy gamer like myself, but it wouldn't have the freedom of ANY game that I enjoy using Windows, tragically.

shmerl 9y ago

Without high end gaming PC, it would be tougher on Linux, as you noted since in some cases performance can be lower, and translation layers like Wine or wrappers can introduce extra overhead, which higher end hardware helps to mitigate. However, it's more than good enough for many games already, and Linux gaming keeps improving and growing. And not all games need super performance. I can get around 40-50 fps in the Witcher 3 in Wine on Linux on max settings (minus hairworks), using AMD RX 480 at 1920x1200. Is that acceptable performance? It's somewhat lower than it would get on Windows on the same hardware, but it's pretty playable. More critical are rendering bugs that Wine developers are still working on.

nextlevelwizard 9y ago
For sure, 40 fps is playable, but at that point you might as well just buy a console and play the games with that with no hassle and run Linux for other purposes. It will probably be cheaper in the long run. However I've spent money on 144Hz monitors and for enough performance that the games I play run on at least constant 120 fps. Obviously it's not necessary if you are in it just for a story, but as mentioned in another post I exclusively play multiplayer games with my friends and if you haven't experienced playing games (or even just using a computer) with 144Hz (running at or higher frame rate) it's like a night and day.
- shmerl 9y ago
  > but at that point you might as well just buy a console and play the games with that with no hassle and run Linux for other purposes. I stay away from DRMed platforms, so incumbent consoles are no go for me. About higher framerates - it should be OK, once AMD will merge FreeSync support in amdgpu driver upstream. My monitor is 60Hz anyway, but to have good experience without tearing on high frequency monitors, FreeSync can help. Today, to use it you'd need to install customized kernel from AMD.
  - nextlevelwizard 9y ago
    As I said earlier we are still long, long way away from Linux gaming being a thing and longer it takes for Linux to come to parity now the further Windows will race ahead if you believe all in the VR hype that's going on. >I stay away from DRMed platforms I am not ideologically bound, I care about performance. If Linux is enough for you then more power to you, I wish it could be enough for me too.

perakojotgenije 9y ago

Portal, Portal2, Tomb Raider, Kerbal space program, Shadow of Mordor, Rocket League, The Talos Principle are some of the AAA games that I've played on my linux mint box in the last few years. I am just an occasional gamer and I do not have a gaming machine (amd fx8350, nvidia gtx770, 1GBram) but all these games worked flawlessly. No wine, no glitches no driver problems. I don't know if it would have been "good enough" for professional gamers (I admit I play on "high details" instead of "ultra high details" mode)

BEEdwards 9y ago
Shadow of Mordor and Tomb Raider are the only AAA game on your list. The rest are indie games tiny budget indie games.
- shmerl 9y ago
  Everyone's list is different. And it's not about the size of the budget, it's about quality (in different meanings of it).
  - Armisael16 9y ago
    AAA is in fact precisely about the size of the budget and amount of promotion.
    - shmerl 9y ago
      Which again isn't equal to quality (enough to mention some "AAA" releases which were complete trash, remember Batman: Arkham Knight fiasco?). So again, AAA or not AAA, quality is what matters, both artistic and technical. Today, good studios are releasing games for Linux. Such as inXile, Obsidian and others.
      - sqeaky 9y ago
        Nothing you said is wrong, but it doesn't change the fact that quality doesn't sell. Once a game is "good enough" it often comes down to marketing, and the studios putting out for Linux do not control a majority of the marketing dollars.

Sir_Cmpwn 9y ago

This is the wrong mindset, and if you take it, Linux will never be better by your criteria. Linux is not a 1:1 replacement for Windows. It is a separate platform. In the same way you can't expect to play all PS4 games on Windows, you can't expect to play all Windows games on Linux. Retune your expectations.

nextlevelwizard 9y ago
Just means I won't be playing on Linux since if not all most of the good games live on Windows. If I take your perspective, that Linux is separate platform, like console vs PC. Then the battle is already lost and there is no point for me to care in the slightest.
- Sir_Cmpwn 9y ago
  Many, many great games are available on Linux, and the platform has a lot of compelling reasons outside of games to choose it over Windows. And unlike any other gaming platform, Linux has software like Wine to expand its game library into those of other platforms. And unlike the typical console vs PC wars, Linux is still a PC and has all of the benefits of using one. But it sounds like you're just looking to justify your confirmation bias, and so be it.
  - nextlevelwizard 9y ago
    Most games I play do not have Linux port, so by definition I would be spending most if not all of my time in Wine, which drastically lowers performance. All examples people have thrown at me have been single player story driven games which do not interest me in the least. I only play multi player games with my friends, since single player games rarely keep my interest (last single player campaign/game I finished was Portal 2 since it was so short) Then there's always "will this even work with wine" question. Like take any Blizzard game, the downloader/launcher simply does not work on Wine (or at least it did not when I last tried it). When a new game comes out that I want to play, I don't want to think if I can play it, I want know I can if I choose to. This is even bigger concern since most interesting games now days are not AAA titles, but various smaller games, mods, and early access titles. Game we've spent most time playing last month is easily Playerunknown's Battlegrounds and with quick look at Wine DB it's status is "garbage" If I look Linux as separate platform then there is no hope I would be using it to play games.

jcadam 9y ago

I just stopped gaming on the PC, so no more need for windows :) I do own a couple of gaming consoles, but now that I have less spare time, my gaming preferences have definitely shifted toward casual games I can pick up and play for 20 minutes and then forget about for a week (so I'm a Nintendo fan these days).