It can't be overstated how big of a game changer Proton is. You can use it outside of Steam but if it weren't for Valve we wouldn't have it. Prior to Proton, g

It can't be overstated how big of a game changer Proton is. You can use it outside of Steam but if it weren't for Valve we wouldn't have it. Prior to Proton, gaming on Linux was hit or miss. Many games never worked, some worked like crap, some required convoluted incantations of Wine settings and specific game versions and then only on every second Sunday. Now? I install games via Steam's normal interface and 90% of the time it just works. And most of those that don't work use some non-Steam DRM that won't run under Proton. A bonus point is that it reports your usage as running under Linux so publishers and devs get accurate numbers for how big their potential market is on Linux which is good in the long run for getting native Linux games.