5 ms·

Out of the 11 games I've bought through Steam this year, I've had to refund one (1) because it wouldn't run under Proton, two (2) had minor graphical glitches t

Out of the 11 games I've bought through Steam this year, I've had to refund one (1) because it wouldn't run under Proton, two (2) had minor graphical glitches that didn't meaningfully affect my enjoyment of them, and two (2) had native Linux builds. Proton has gotten good enough that I've switched from spending time researching if I can play a game to just assuming that I can. Presumably ymmv depending on your taste in games of course, but I'm not interested in competitive multiplayer games with invasive anticheat which appears to be the biggest remaining pain point. My experience with running non-game windows-only programs has been similar over the past ~5 years. It really is finally the Year of the Linux Desktop, only few people seem to have noticed.

mystified5016 1y ago
The only games in my library at all that don't work on linux are indie games from the early 2000s, and I'm comfortable blaming the games themselves in this case. I also don't play any games that require a rootkit, so..
- globalnode 1y ago
  good move, thats why i treat my windows install as a dumb game box, they can steal whatever data they want from that i dont care. i do my real work on linux, as far away from windows as i can possibly get.
  - theshackleford 1y ago
    Same way I treat my windows machine, but also the reason I wont be swapping it to linux any time soon. I use different operating systems for different purposes for a reason. It's great for fompartmentalization. When I am in front of windows, I know I can permit myself to relax, breath easy and let off some steam. When I am not, I know I am there to learn/earn a living/produce something etc. Most probably do not need this, but my brain does, or I would never switch off.
    - duckmysick 1y ago
      What works for me is having different Activities/Workspaces in KDE - they have different wallpapers, pinned programs in the taskbar, the programs themselves launch only in a specific Activity. I hear others also use completely different user accounts.
proc0 1y ago
My hesitation is around high end settings, can Proton run 240hz on 1440p and high settings? I'm switching anyway soon and might just have a separate machine for gaming but I'd rather it be Linux. SteamOS looks promising if they release for PC.
- onli 1y ago
  Proton has often better performance than gaming under Windows - partly because Linux is faster - so sure it can run those settings.
  - proc0 1y ago
    Interesting, thanks.
    - onli 1y ago
      :) To give a source, https://www.computerbase.de/artikel/betriebssysteme/welche-linux-distribution-zum-spielen.85568/seite-2#abschnitt_benchmarks_dreimal_linux_einmal_windows https://www.computerbase.de/artikel/betriebssysteme/welche-l... is one. There was a more recent article the search is not showing me now.
PoshBreeze 1y ago
It depends on the games you play and what you are doing. It is a mixed bag IME. If you are installing a game that is several years old it will work wonderfully. Most guides assume you have Arch Linux or are using one of the "gaming" distros like Bazzite. I use Debian (I am running Testing/Trixie RC on my main PC). I play a lot of HellDivers 2. Despite what a lot of Linux YouTubers say. It doesn't work very well on Linux. The recommendations I got from people was to change distro. I do other stuff on Linux. Game slows down when you need it to be running smoothly doesn't matter what resolution/settings you set. Anything with anti-cheat probably won't work very well if at all. I also wanted to play the old Command and Conquer games. Getting the fan made patchers (not the games itself) to run properly that fix a bunch of bugs that EA/Westwood never fixed and mod support is more difficult than I cared to bother with.
- esseph 1y ago
  Fedora 42, Helldivers 2 Make sure to change your Steam launch options to: PULSE_LATENCY_MSEC=84 gamemoderun %command% This will use gamemode to run it, give it priority, put the system in performance power mode, and will fix any pulse audio static you may be having. You can do this for any game you launch with steam, any shortcut, etc. It's missing probably 15fps on this card between windows and Linux, and since it's above 100fps I really don't even notice. It does seem to run a bit better under gnome with Variable Refresh Rate than KDE.
  - PoshBreeze 1y ago
    I will be honest, I just gave up. I couldn't get consistent performance on HellDivers 2. Many of the things you have mentioned I've tried and found they don't make much of a difference or made things worse. I did get it running nice for about a day and then an update was pushed and it ran like rubbish again. The game runs smoothly when initially running the map and then massive dip in frames for several seconds. This is usually when one of the bugs is jumping at you. This game may work better on Fedora/Bazzite or <some other distro> but I find Debian to be super reliable and don't want to switch distro. I also don't like Fedora generally as I've found it unreliable in the past. I had a look at Bazzite and I honestly just wasn't interested. This is due to it having a bunch of technologies that I have no interest in using. There are other issues that are tangential but related issues. e.g. I normally play on Super HellDive with other players in a Discord VC. Discord / Pipewire seems to reset my sound for no particular reason and my Plantronics Headset Mic (good headset, not some gamer nonsense) will be not found. This requires a restart of pipewire/wireplumber and Discord (in that order). This happens often enough I have a shell script alias called "fix_discord". I have weird audio problems on HDMI (AMD card) thanks to a regression in the kernel (Kernel 6.1 with Debian worked fine). I could mess about with this for ages and maybe get it working or just reboot into Windows which takes me all of a minute. It is just easier to use Windows for Gaming. Then use Linux for work stuff.
deleted 1y ago
[deleted]

mystified5016 1y ago

The only games in my library at all that don't work on linux are indie games from the early 2000s, and I'm comfortable blaming the games themselves in this case. I also don't play any games that require a rootkit, so..

globalnode 1y ago
good move, thats why i treat my windows install as a dumb game box, they can steal whatever data they want from that i dont care. i do my real work on linux, as far away from windows as i can possibly get.
- theshackleford 1y ago
  Same way I treat my windows machine, but also the reason I wont be swapping it to linux any time soon. I use different operating systems for different purposes for a reason. It's great for fompartmentalization. When I am in front of windows, I know I can permit myself to relax, breath easy and let off some steam. When I am not, I know I am there to learn/earn a living/produce something etc. Most probably do not need this, but my brain does, or I would never switch off.
  - duckmysick 1y ago
    What works for me is having different Activities/Workspaces in KDE - they have different wallpapers, pinned programs in the taskbar, the programs themselves launch only in a specific Activity. I hear others also use completely different user accounts.

proc0 1y ago

My hesitation is around high end settings, can Proton run 240hz on 1440p and high settings? I'm switching anyway soon and might just have a separate machine for gaming but I'd rather it be Linux. SteamOS looks promising if they release for PC.

onli 1y ago
Proton has often better performance than gaming under Windows - partly because Linux is faster - so sure it can run those settings.
- proc0 1y ago
  Interesting, thanks.
  - onli 1y ago
    :) To give a source, https://www.computerbase.de/artikel/betriebssysteme/welche-linux-distribution-zum-spielen.85568/seite-2#abschnitt_benchmarks_dreimal_linux_einmal_windows https://www.computerbase.de/artikel/betriebssysteme/welche-l... is one. There was a more recent article the search is not showing me now.

PoshBreeze 1y ago

It depends on the games you play and what you are doing. It is a mixed bag IME. If you are installing a game that is several years old it will work wonderfully. Most guides assume you have Arch Linux or are using one of the "gaming" distros like Bazzite. I use Debian (I am running Testing/Trixie RC on my main PC). I play a lot of HellDivers 2. Despite what a lot of Linux YouTubers say. It doesn't work very well on Linux. The recommendations I got from people was to change distro. I do other stuff on Linux. Game slows down when you need it to be running smoothly doesn't matter what resolution/settings you set. Anything with anti-cheat probably won't work very well if at all. I also wanted to play the old Command and Conquer games. Getting the fan made patchers (not the games itself) to run properly that fix a bunch of bugs that EA/Westwood never fixed and mod support is more difficult than I cared to bother with.

esseph 1y ago
Fedora 42, Helldivers 2 Make sure to change your Steam launch options to: PULSE_LATENCY_MSEC=84 gamemoderun %command% This will use gamemode to run it, give it priority, put the system in performance power mode, and will fix any pulse audio static you may be having. You can do this for any game you launch with steam, any shortcut, etc. It's missing probably 15fps on this card between windows and Linux, and since it's above 100fps I really don't even notice. It does seem to run a bit better under gnome with Variable Refresh Rate than KDE.
- PoshBreeze 1y ago
  I will be honest, I just gave up. I couldn't get consistent performance on HellDivers 2. Many of the things you have mentioned I've tried and found they don't make much of a difference or made things worse. I did get it running nice for about a day and then an update was pushed and it ran like rubbish again. The game runs smoothly when initially running the map and then massive dip in frames for several seconds. This is usually when one of the bugs is jumping at you. This game may work better on Fedora/Bazzite or <some other distro> but I find Debian to be super reliable and don't want to switch distro. I also don't like Fedora generally as I've found it unreliable in the past. I had a look at Bazzite and I honestly just wasn't interested. This is due to it having a bunch of technologies that I have no interest in using. There are other issues that are tangential but related issues. e.g. I normally play on Super HellDive with other players in a Discord VC. Discord / Pipewire seems to reset my sound for no particular reason and my Plantronics Headset Mic (good headset, not some gamer nonsense) will be not found. This requires a restart of pipewire/wireplumber and Discord (in that order). This happens often enough I have a shell script alias called "fix_discord". I have weird audio problems on HDMI (AMD card) thanks to a regression in the kernel (Kernel 6.1 with Debian worked fine). I could mess about with this for ages and maybe get it working or just reboot into Windows which takes me all of a minute. It is just easier to use Windows for Gaming. Then use Linux for work stuff.

deleted 1y ago

[deleted]