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Proton is the reason I moved from a Windows + MacOS machine to GNU/Linux full time. I understand the concern that some hardcore enthusiasts might have about it

Proton is the reason I moved from a Windows + MacOS machine to GNU/Linux full time. I understand the concern that some hardcore enthusiasts might have about it making devs lazy when it comes to developing native ports but to be honest I don't care. I am just glad to have a simple method of gaming on GNU/Linux. Proton plus Lutris and the slew other tools that have come out in recent years has made the transition to GNU/Linux very easy and has opened the door for many who were curious but scared of the learning curb.

k__ 6y ago
How good does this work with things like Oculus Quest, SteamVR, etc.? Are there any performance implications?
- ThaDood 6y ago
  I cannot speak to VR stuff specifically, I have heard of some issues with VR from lurking on other forums but I have no personal experience with them. As for performance implications in my experience it tends to vary. Some games running on Proton run better than the GNU/Linux native ports and their Windows alternatives. Sometimes the native ports are better when compared to ones using Proton but for someone who is a "casual" I have not seen any noticeable performance difference. Of course this might not be the case if you are running on cutting edge hardware and playing the latest games.
- Nullabillity 6y ago
  My Valve Index works fine for me (both native and Proton), as long as I keep SteamVR on the linux_v1.14 branch. It does have some issues keeping up sometimes, but that's probably mostly my ancient GPU (AMD RX480).
  - away_throw 6y ago
    The RX 480 is far from ancient and is probably one of the best cards that I've used. When I RMA'd my RX 5700XT (which still crashes after RMA), this thing was a champ. This card is still king for 1080p gaming and can handle 1440p too.
    - zlynx 6y ago
      It is almost 5 years old and several generations back. Perhaps not "ancient" but it's aging. From the 480 there was the 580, Vega 56/64/VII, RX 5700 and now the 6800. From a few random benchmark site checks online the 6800 is over three times faster than a 480. Admittedly, to actually buy a 6800 series it is probably at least three times the price of a new 480.
- lexa1979 6y ago
  I can speak for Oculus Quest 2, plugged with a cable in the computer: it doesn't work at all. SteamVR works by itself in native linux mode, but for the Quest 2 to be recognized, you need to run an Oculus windows only application that makes it look like it is a Rift headset... So... after years on Xubuntu only, I ended up reinstalling Windows to satisfy my new VR gaming "needs"...
- ebegnwgnen 6y ago
  Maybe the Valve Index works through SteamVR ? For oculus it won't work because it requires the oculus windows app. (Even when you use SteamVR with an Oculus, actually it's using Oculus app behind) There are also some projects to reverse-engineer / implement open tracking for VR headsets : https://monado.freedesktop.org/#supported-hardware https://monado.freedesktop.org/#supported-hardware
- ad404b8a372f2b9 6y ago
  There is still no functional VR media player for linux, none of the Windows ones work with Proton and the official SteamVR Media Player has no linux release.
  - podiki 6y ago
    Not sure what you mean, but there is the open source vr-video-player [0] that works with YouTube, can put flat games on a virtual big screen, etc. Works great. [0] https://git.dec05eba.com/vr-video-player/about/ https://git.dec05eba.com/vr-video-player/about/
    - ad404b8a372f2b9 6y ago
      Uh! Never found this one despite extensive googling. I'll install it and report back.
      - podiki 6y ago
        I found it in a round about way too, could use some better publicity maybe. You can also use this to enable side-by-side 3D in VR, so like the old Nvidia 3D shutter glasses that made games pop out of a flat screen, you can see that in your virtual screen in VR. Take a look at SteamTinkerLaunch [0] to set that up (currently helping organize that giant readme, but the info is all there to play around with [1]). [0] https://github.com/frostworx/steamtinkerlaunch https://github.com/frostworx/steamtinkerlaunch [1] https://github.com/frostworx/steamtinkerlaunch#Side-by-Side-VR https://github.com/frostworx/steamtinkerlaunch#Side-by-Side-... Edit: I should say side-by-side mode works for games with it builtin (like Trine) but can also use shader injection to emulate this which can work pretty well too.
  - WorkLobster 6y ago
    I use Whirligig, which works with a minor fix documented on ProtonDB.
    - ad404b8a372f2b9 6y ago
- ekianjo 6y ago
  This should answer your questions https://boilingsteam.com/the-state-of-virtual-reality-on-linux/ https://boilingsteam.com/the-state-of-virtual-reality-on-lin...
- sandworm101 6y ago
  I own a valve index. I use it only on linux (mint) via proton. I can say that it does work. There are quirks. don't expect it to be seemless. For instance, more than half the time I start SteamVR but have to then "restart" the headset. Once it is working it is working. Not all VR games support linux but many do, probably a higher proportion than amongst non-VR games. VR games tend to come from smaller developers who are generally not implementing the things that bork linux (eg DRM). IMho now is not the time to get into VR, on any OS. You need a serious graphic card. Whatever you are running now, you will want something better once you plug in a VR headset. Good luck with that atm.
  - away_throw 6y ago
    The restarting issue also occurs for me on Windows 10. Although, it usually occurs 80% of the time rather than half for me. I suspect it might be due to me plugging in power to the headset after starting the system, but I've seen it occur without doing that as well, so I am unsure.
    - sandworm101 6y ago
      That's my thinking too. I have my VR hardware (2 tracker things+headset) on a power bar that I turn on separately after boot.
- podiki 6y ago
  There will tend to be at least a little performance difference from Windows, but personally haven't tested it. I have an Index and it works great [0], though I really need a GPU upgrade (which is impossible these days, as others here noted). I only play on Linux so can't compare to Windows, but besides some little things not being supported like passthrough camera, base station power management (though you can do it through your phone), it works without any fuss. [0] https://boilingsteam.com/the-valve-index-on-linux-on-a-min-spec-machine/ https://boilingsteam.com/the-valve-index-on-linux-on-a-min-s...
- Yen 6y ago
  I've been using an HTC Vive on linux. It usually works pretty great. The performance might be percentage-points worse than a "clean" Windows install, but in my experience Windows didn't manage to stay clean. I've got a gtx 1070, which at this point is pretty far from top-of-the-line VR-capable card. I'd probably get significantly better performance improvement per effort spent by upgrading my card than I would by tweaking the OS. I can pretty consistently enjoy VR games. I haven't tried vr web browsing in a while; I remember it being pretty finicky on Windows several years ago.
neogodless 6y ago
> making devs lazy when it comes to developing native ports Is this first order thinking? Whereas second order thinking might be "with Proton enabling an order of magnitude more users that enjoy PC gaming to move to Linux, studios might consider improving the PC gaming experience further with more native ports/testing directly on Linux?" I don't know if that's how things could play out, but it seems logical to me.
- _fat_santa 6y ago
  The problem is always market share. Unfortunately Linux has and most likely will always be a niche desktop product. For that reason when devs are developing a game, the question is always "should we spend X amount of time for 0.5% of the userbase" and often times the value proposition just isn't there.
  - high_priest 6y ago
    Gluglu with their chromeOS has pushed the linux adoption line quite rapidly. Valve finally making SteamOS a viable product is definitely going to impact the change significantly. The only reason I still keep Windows dual booted is the Office suit, which is still unbeatable.
    - iFreilicht 6y ago
      Sadly true. I get by with LibreOffice, but I'm not a power user at all, yet I still hit usability quirks and bugs all the time. For stuff that just needs to work, I use Google stuff instead, if begrudgingly.
- kevincox 6y ago
  This seems like right approach, although I'm not a purist anyways. I have a personal policy not to buy games unless they have Linux support, however I have decided that games that officially support Proton are good enough. At the end of the day I just expect that it works, if the performance or something is terrible I can always refund it. I don't really care what tools/APIs the devs use as long as it works well. If they target Windows APIs but use Wine that is fine with me as long as they test it and make sure it works. And as you said, if this allows more people to game on Linux it makes the Linux experience more important to the game developers. If they decide at some point that Wine is holding them back they will make that switch when the investment makes sense. I think that the most important thing to the long-term success of Linux gaming is ensuring that companies think they can make money there. If they think they can make money then they will continue to make games and put effort into making sure that the games work well.
2OEH8eoCRo0 6y ago
I finally took the plunge and started dual booting with Fedora as the default. Unless I plan to game I just use Linux and it's been awesome. Though I can't use Wayland (Nvidia) and digital audio is flakey (though fixed in fedora 34), none have been deal breakers.
- zbobet2012 6y ago
  Wayland with Nvidia works in fedora 33, you just have to un-blacklist the driver.
  - 2OEH8eoCRo0 6y ago
    I'll have to take a look at that later- thanks! Every time I revisit this there's some issue.
    - 2OEH8eoCRo0 6y ago
      It seems to be working but performance is worse than when using x11. it's quite usable but I'm switching back for now.
markjgx 6y ago
I choose to irrationally support Linux, because I like Linux. There is literally no financial incentive for me to do so. We were recently debugging a newer build on Linux, which was inexplicitly crashing on a players machine, while running great in the testing environment. This was causing a major headache as the game needed to ship that day. We had another Linux volunteer test it out on his mostly vanilla Ubuntu setup, and it worked great. Ended up creating a chart of all the available testing configurations, e.g. comparing drivers across all the available environments. The supposed blame ended up being a statically linked library on his system. Funny thing is the tester who was crashing was enjoying the game in Proton while I was debugging the Linux build.
- bogwog 6y ago
  AppImage to the rescue! (https://appimage.org/ https://appimage.org/)
- rolandog 6y ago
  Would you mind sharing the name of your game? I'm saving up to buy some games soon, and I'd like to support cool devs like you!
  - markjgx 6y ago
    Thanks. It's called BadLads, it's all about multiplayer roleplay, where each player has their own job. The games about to get giant procedural cities (with full interiors!) and native virtual reality support. Here's the last devblog, although a bit dated: https://devblog.chemicalheads.com/posts/upcoming-update-tease https://devblog.chemicalheads.com/posts/upcoming-update-teas... https://store.steampowered.com/app/1200710/BadLads/ https://store.steampowered.com/app/1200710/BadLads/
    - rolandog 6y ago
      Thanks for replying; it looks really great! I just purchased it, and I hope to play it over the weekend!
    - 6y ago
washadjeffmad 6y ago
I dropped the "native Linux or nothing" mindset sometime in 2013 when I saw the harm it did to developers. As a disproportionately vocal minority comprising <1% customers but >50% of bug requests, making Linux users happy was pretty literally taking food out of some dev's mouths. The two goals that actually needed to be achieved were preventing market monopolies and enabling smaller devs, which platform agnosticism has been a welcome and necessary side effect of. i) Reducing the resource overhead required to publish and support games is make or break for indie/small devs. Just by being Steamplay/Proton aware, compatible games don't require exclusive support, allowing devs to focus on content and expansion instead of learning quirks of all different distro just to be able to support that one user on Hannah Montana Linux. Helping individual customers feels great, but it can become a deadly rabbit hole. ii) The market aligned against publishing monopolies, which Valve isn't singlehandedly responsible for but has been a major contributor to. Linux native was just a way to get devs and publishers to realize that they couldn't and shouldn't fall prey to the exclusive marketplaces on the rise at the time like GWFL that would only reduce choice and availability for customers and non-AAA devs in the long-term. Breaking OS dependence was key in this. I think we ultimately want Linux to be able to do whatever we want, be that running video games, powering Mars rovers, or running our HPC clusters. Once software can be run with the same ease on Linux as on Windows, it might as well be Linux native, and non-FOSS Linux purist arguments are confusing and dilute that.
- sandworm101 6y ago
  >> fall prey to the exclusive marketplaces on the rise Valves initial support for linux was for precisely these reasons. Microsoft was talking about restricting which games could run on windows in much the same way an Apple does with iPhone software. The prospect of Microsoft having veto/censorship powers over violent video games struck fear across the industry. Valve then pushed towards "steam machines" running not-windows. Those issues have reduced as of late but were the trigger for what would eventually become the proton project.
- charcircuit 6y ago
  >a disproportionately vocal minority comprising <1% customers but >50% of bug requests I doubt that this is generally true based off the discussions I've seen in the Steam forums for various games.
MeinBlutIstBlau 6y ago
I'm in the same camp because a lot of devs that say they have Linux support don't always support it well.
babypuncher 6y ago
Frankly I believe Proton is better for the longevity of these games on Linux. It's not uncommon for native Linux versions of games to break over time, or become a hassle to use as they rely on old unmaintained libraries. Win32/Proton is almost like a framework game developers can target and not have to worry about OS specifics.

k__ 6y ago

How good does this work with things like Oculus Quest, SteamVR, etc.? Are there any performance implications?

ThaDood 6y ago
I cannot speak to VR stuff specifically, I have heard of some issues with VR from lurking on other forums but I have no personal experience with them. As for performance implications in my experience it tends to vary. Some games running on Proton run better than the GNU/Linux native ports and their Windows alternatives. Sometimes the native ports are better when compared to ones using Proton but for someone who is a "casual" I have not seen any noticeable performance difference. Of course this might not be the case if you are running on cutting edge hardware and playing the latest games.
Nullabillity 6y ago
My Valve Index works fine for me (both native and Proton), as long as I keep SteamVR on the linux_v1.14 branch. It does have some issues keeping up sometimes, but that's probably mostly my ancient GPU (AMD RX480).
- away_throw 6y ago
  The RX 480 is far from ancient and is probably one of the best cards that I've used. When I RMA'd my RX 5700XT (which still crashes after RMA), this thing was a champ. This card is still king for 1080p gaming and can handle 1440p too.
  - zlynx 6y ago
    It is almost 5 years old and several generations back. Perhaps not "ancient" but it's aging. From the 480 there was the 580, Vega 56/64/VII, RX 5700 and now the 6800. From a few random benchmark site checks online the 6800 is over three times faster than a 480. Admittedly, to actually buy a 6800 series it is probably at least three times the price of a new 480.
lexa1979 6y ago
I can speak for Oculus Quest 2, plugged with a cable in the computer: it doesn't work at all. SteamVR works by itself in native linux mode, but for the Quest 2 to be recognized, you need to run an Oculus windows only application that makes it look like it is a Rift headset... So... after years on Xubuntu only, I ended up reinstalling Windows to satisfy my new VR gaming "needs"...
ebegnwgnen 6y ago
Maybe the Valve Index works through SteamVR ? For oculus it won't work because it requires the oculus windows app. (Even when you use SteamVR with an Oculus, actually it's using Oculus app behind) There are also some projects to reverse-engineer / implement open tracking for VR headsets : https://monado.freedesktop.org/#supported-hardware https://monado.freedesktop.org/#supported-hardware
ad404b8a372f2b9 6y ago
There is still no functional VR media player for linux, none of the Windows ones work with Proton and the official SteamVR Media Player has no linux release.
- podiki 6y ago
  Not sure what you mean, but there is the open source vr-video-player [0] that works with YouTube, can put flat games on a virtual big screen, etc. Works great. [0] https://git.dec05eba.com/vr-video-player/about/ https://git.dec05eba.com/vr-video-player/about/
  - ad404b8a372f2b9 6y ago
    Uh! Never found this one despite extensive googling. I'll install it and report back.
    - podiki 6y ago
      I found it in a round about way too, could use some better publicity maybe. You can also use this to enable side-by-side 3D in VR, so like the old Nvidia 3D shutter glasses that made games pop out of a flat screen, you can see that in your virtual screen in VR. Take a look at SteamTinkerLaunch [0] to set that up (currently helping organize that giant readme, but the info is all there to play around with [1]). [0] https://github.com/frostworx/steamtinkerlaunch https://github.com/frostworx/steamtinkerlaunch [1] https://github.com/frostworx/steamtinkerlaunch#Side-by-Side-VR https://github.com/frostworx/steamtinkerlaunch#Side-by-Side-... Edit: I should say side-by-side mode works for games with it builtin (like Trine) but can also use shader injection to emulate this which can work pretty well too.
- WorkLobster 6y ago
  I use Whirligig, which works with a minor fix documented on ProtonDB.
  - ad404b8a372f2b9 6y ago
ekianjo 6y ago
This should answer your questions https://boilingsteam.com/the-state-of-virtual-reality-on-linux/ https://boilingsteam.com/the-state-of-virtual-reality-on-lin...
sandworm101 6y ago
I own a valve index. I use it only on linux (mint) via proton. I can say that it does work. There are quirks. don't expect it to be seemless. For instance, more than half the time I start SteamVR but have to then "restart" the headset. Once it is working it is working. Not all VR games support linux but many do, probably a higher proportion than amongst non-VR games. VR games tend to come from smaller developers who are generally not implementing the things that bork linux (eg DRM). IMho now is not the time to get into VR, on any OS. You need a serious graphic card. Whatever you are running now, you will want something better once you plug in a VR headset. Good luck with that atm.
- away_throw 6y ago
  The restarting issue also occurs for me on Windows 10. Although, it usually occurs 80% of the time rather than half for me. I suspect it might be due to me plugging in power to the headset after starting the system, but I've seen it occur without doing that as well, so I am unsure.
  - sandworm101 6y ago
    That's my thinking too. I have my VR hardware (2 tracker things+headset) on a power bar that I turn on separately after boot.
podiki 6y ago
There will tend to be at least a little performance difference from Windows, but personally haven't tested it. I have an Index and it works great [0], though I really need a GPU upgrade (which is impossible these days, as others here noted). I only play on Linux so can't compare to Windows, but besides some little things not being supported like passthrough camera, base station power management (though you can do it through your phone), it works without any fuss. [0] https://boilingsteam.com/the-valve-index-on-linux-on-a-min-spec-machine/ https://boilingsteam.com/the-valve-index-on-linux-on-a-min-s...
Yen 6y ago
I've been using an HTC Vive on linux. It usually works pretty great. The performance might be percentage-points worse than a "clean" Windows install, but in my experience Windows didn't manage to stay clean. I've got a gtx 1070, which at this point is pretty far from top-of-the-line VR-capable card. I'd probably get significantly better performance improvement per effort spent by upgrading my card than I would by tweaking the OS. I can pretty consistently enjoy VR games. I haven't tried vr web browsing in a while; I remember it being pretty finicky on Windows several years ago.

neogodless 6y ago

> making devs lazy when it comes to developing native ports Is this first order thinking? Whereas second order thinking might be "with Proton enabling an order of magnitude more users that enjoy PC gaming to move to Linux, studios might consider improving the PC gaming experience further with more native ports/testing directly on Linux?" I don't know if that's how things could play out, but it seems logical to me.

_fat_santa 6y ago
The problem is always market share. Unfortunately Linux has and most likely will always be a niche desktop product. For that reason when devs are developing a game, the question is always "should we spend X amount of time for 0.5% of the userbase" and often times the value proposition just isn't there.
- high_priest 6y ago
  Gluglu with their chromeOS has pushed the linux adoption line quite rapidly. Valve finally making SteamOS a viable product is definitely going to impact the change significantly. The only reason I still keep Windows dual booted is the Office suit, which is still unbeatable.
  - iFreilicht 6y ago
    Sadly true. I get by with LibreOffice, but I'm not a power user at all, yet I still hit usability quirks and bugs all the time. For stuff that just needs to work, I use Google stuff instead, if begrudgingly.
kevincox 6y ago
This seems like right approach, although I'm not a purist anyways. I have a personal policy not to buy games unless they have Linux support, however I have decided that games that officially support Proton are good enough. At the end of the day I just expect that it works, if the performance or something is terrible I can always refund it. I don't really care what tools/APIs the devs use as long as it works well. If they target Windows APIs but use Wine that is fine with me as long as they test it and make sure it works. And as you said, if this allows more people to game on Linux it makes the Linux experience more important to the game developers. If they decide at some point that Wine is holding them back they will make that switch when the investment makes sense. I think that the most important thing to the long-term success of Linux gaming is ensuring that companies think they can make money there. If they think they can make money then they will continue to make games and put effort into making sure that the games work well.

2OEH8eoCRo0 6y ago

I finally took the plunge and started dual booting with Fedora as the default. Unless I plan to game I just use Linux and it's been awesome. Though I can't use Wayland (Nvidia) and digital audio is flakey (though fixed in fedora 34), none have been deal breakers.

zbobet2012 6y ago
Wayland with Nvidia works in fedora 33, you just have to un-blacklist the driver.
- 2OEH8eoCRo0 6y ago
  I'll have to take a look at that later- thanks! Every time I revisit this there's some issue.
  - 2OEH8eoCRo0 6y ago
    It seems to be working but performance is worse than when using x11. it's quite usable but I'm switching back for now.

markjgx 6y ago

I choose to irrationally support Linux, because I like Linux. There is literally no financial incentive for me to do so. We were recently debugging a newer build on Linux, which was inexplicitly crashing on a players machine, while running great in the testing environment. This was causing a major headache as the game needed to ship that day. We had another Linux volunteer test it out on his mostly vanilla Ubuntu setup, and it worked great. Ended up creating a chart of all the available testing configurations, e.g. comparing drivers across all the available environments. The supposed blame ended up being a statically linked library on his system. Funny thing is the tester who was crashing was enjoying the game in Proton while I was debugging the Linux build.

bogwog 6y ago
AppImage to the rescue! (https://appimage.org/ https://appimage.org/)
rolandog 6y ago
Would you mind sharing the name of your game? I'm saving up to buy some games soon, and I'd like to support cool devs like you!
- markjgx 6y ago
  Thanks. It's called BadLads, it's all about multiplayer roleplay, where each player has their own job. The games about to get giant procedural cities (with full interiors!) and native virtual reality support. Here's the last devblog, although a bit dated: https://devblog.chemicalheads.com/posts/upcoming-update-tease https://devblog.chemicalheads.com/posts/upcoming-update-teas... https://store.steampowered.com/app/1200710/BadLads/ https://store.steampowered.com/app/1200710/BadLads/
  - rolandog 6y ago
    Thanks for replying; it looks really great! I just purchased it, and I hope to play it over the weekend!
  - 6y ago

washadjeffmad 6y ago

I dropped the "native Linux or nothing" mindset sometime in 2013 when I saw the harm it did to developers. As a disproportionately vocal minority comprising <1% customers but >50% of bug requests, making Linux users happy was pretty literally taking food out of some dev's mouths. The two goals that actually needed to be achieved were preventing market monopolies and enabling smaller devs, which platform agnosticism has been a welcome and necessary side effect of. i) Reducing the resource overhead required to publish and support games is make or break for indie/small devs. Just by being Steamplay/Proton aware, compatible games don't require exclusive support, allowing devs to focus on content and expansion instead of learning quirks of all different distro just to be able to support that one user on Hannah Montana Linux. Helping individual customers feels great, but it can become a deadly rabbit hole. ii) The market aligned against publishing monopolies, which Valve isn't singlehandedly responsible for but has been a major contributor to. Linux native was just a way to get devs and publishers to realize that they couldn't and shouldn't fall prey to the exclusive marketplaces on the rise at the time like GWFL that would only reduce choice and availability for customers and non-AAA devs in the long-term. Breaking OS dependence was key in this. I think we ultimately want Linux to be able to do whatever we want, be that running video games, powering Mars rovers, or running our HPC clusters. Once software can be run with the same ease on Linux as on Windows, it might as well be Linux native, and non-FOSS Linux purist arguments are confusing and dilute that.

sandworm101 6y ago
>> fall prey to the exclusive marketplaces on the rise Valves initial support for linux was for precisely these reasons. Microsoft was talking about restricting which games could run on windows in much the same way an Apple does with iPhone software. The prospect of Microsoft having veto/censorship powers over violent video games struck fear across the industry. Valve then pushed towards "steam machines" running not-windows. Those issues have reduced as of late but were the trigger for what would eventually become the proton project.
charcircuit 6y ago
>a disproportionately vocal minority comprising <1% customers but >50% of bug requests I doubt that this is generally true based off the discussions I've seen in the Steam forums for various games.

MeinBlutIstBlau 6y ago

I'm in the same camp because a lot of devs that say they have Linux support don't always support it well.

babypuncher 6y ago

Frankly I believe Proton is better for the longevity of these games on Linux. It's not uncommon for native Linux versions of games to break over time, or become a hassle to use as they rely on old unmaintained libraries. Win32/Proton is almost like a framework game developers can target and not have to worry about OS specifics.