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> ...outside of gaming my computing life is linux... If you've games purchased through Steam, try running them on Linux with the officially-supported-and-writt

> ...outside of gaming my computing life is linux... If you've games purchased through Steam, try running them on Linux with the officially-supported-and-written-for-Linux Steam client. Over the past decade+, a ton of work has been put into making games work fine under Wine and Valve's fork of Wine called Proton. I've found that nearly every game in my embarrassingly-large Steam library works fine on Linux.

rpigab 1y ago
Plus, Epic and Gog work through the third-party launcher "Heroic Game Launcher", for Ubisoft, EA and Blizzard, you can just install their launcher using Steam compatibility, or Lutris, then run games from it. The major hurdle is games plagued with Windows-only Kernel-level anti cheat software (mostly competitive multiplayer games): https://areweanticheatyet.com/ https://areweanticheatyet.com/
drdec 1y ago
> I've found that nearly every game in my embarrassingly-large Steam library works fine on Linux. I have on occasion been scared off of buying a package from Humble Bundle when the games are available on Steam but not explicitly marked as linux. (Some of the games are marked with linux and some are not.) Are you saying I am being unnecessarily cautious? For example, there is a "momcore" bundle at the moment where some games claim linux support and others do not, if you want to see what I'm talking about.
- vitus 1y ago
  > Are you saying I am being unnecessarily cautious? Yes. If a game is marked with Linux, that means it has a native Linux port. However, Proton has gotten so good in recent years that some of the native Linux ports actually perform _worse_ than just downloading the Windows exe and running it with the compatibility layer. The investment in Proton makes sense in retrospect, since SteamOS is based on Arch Linux, and most of these games you mention should run just fine on a Steam Deck.
- thesuitonym 1y ago
  You can still use Proton with games not purchased on Steam: https://www.reddit.com/r/linux_gaming/comments/pvzn03/running_nonsteam_games_using_proton/ https://www.reddit.com/r/linux_gaming/comments/pvzn03/runnin...
- Levitz 1y ago
  You can often find reports from people running games on linux at protondb.com
- tpxl 1y ago
  Check protondb.com. Current protondb status for Lake, Calico, We should talk, Beasts of Maravilla Island: Platinum, Apico: Gold, Kana Quest, Bombfest, Where the Bees Make Honey: Uknown, Onsen Master: Uknown (but has native build), Beans: The Coffee Shop Simulator: Playable.
- simoncion 1y ago
  > Are you saying I am being unnecessarily cautious? Yeah, definitely. Given enough time, you absolutely will find games that don't work under Linux, but I expect that such games will be few and far between. Though, games with extremely invasive anticheat (such as Valorant) will almost certainly never, ever work on Linux. Games that use less-invasive anticheat like Easy Anti-Cheat (EAC) (such as Elden Ring or Hunt: Showdown) work. [0] I have just shy of 500 games in my Steam library. Maybe three or five of them have Linux builds. I've run into only a handful of games that don't work correctly on Linux. [1] As others have said, you can check ProtonDB to get an idea of whether a game will work for you. But: 1) ProtonDB is not always accurate. For instance, sometimes it says that a bunch of workarounds are needed, but everything works just fine with Proton in Steam. Other times, it says a game works, but it doesn't. On my computer, HighFleet is an example of a game that's said to work, but doesn't. 2) In my experience, games just work. For the very rare ones that don't, I go look around to see if there are easy workarounds, and -so far- there always have been. [0] Though, specifically for EAC, if you have more than something like 28 CPUs, you need to limit the number of CPUs that Proton will tell EAC about, or it will fail with an unhelpful error. You'd do that by setting WINE_CPU_TOPOLOGY like this: <https://www.protondb.com/app/1245620#4SzWJRl8sv https://www.protondb.com/app/1245620#4SzWJRl8sv>, altering the string in the obvious way if claiming you only have 28 CPUs doesn't work and you need to claim you have fewer. [1] I've also run into one (Ruiner) that has a Linux build that's far, far worse than the Windows build. It turns out that you can force a game that has both Windows and Linux builds to run the Windows version by going to the Compatibility tab in the game's properties and force the use of one of the Proton versions. My go-to is 'Proton Experimental', as that seems to be the Steam default.
tribaal 1y ago
I was very skeptical of the claim that gaming on linux is good now, but fully switched over last weekend. All of the games I play on a regular basis just worked out of the box with no fiddling at all (nVidia graphics card, X11, pop_OS - but I'm pretty sure any modern distribution would work just as well). Fresh OS install (nvidia drivers just worked), install the steam flatpack, click "download", click "play". That's it. This includes "modern" games such as Borderlands 4 and e.g. Helldivers 2.
- avhception 1y ago
  The "nvidia driver" thing may go away, too. See Nvidias contributions to Nova.
- esseph 1y ago
  Running steam itself as a flatpak may cost you between 10-15% in overhead if what I've read is true. Installing from repo on fedora/debian/etc should work in most cases just fine.
  - tribaal 1y ago
    Oh really? Wow! I'll switch over tonight and give it a shot. Thanks!

rpigab 1y ago

Plus, Epic and Gog work through the third-party launcher "Heroic Game Launcher", for Ubisoft, EA and Blizzard, you can just install their launcher using Steam compatibility, or Lutris, then run games from it. The major hurdle is games plagued with Windows-only Kernel-level anti cheat software (mostly competitive multiplayer games): https://areweanticheatyet.com/ https://areweanticheatyet.com/

drdec 1y ago

> I've found that nearly every game in my embarrassingly-large Steam library works fine on Linux. I have on occasion been scared off of buying a package from Humble Bundle when the games are available on Steam but not explicitly marked as linux. (Some of the games are marked with linux and some are not.) Are you saying I am being unnecessarily cautious? For example, there is a "momcore" bundle at the moment where some games claim linux support and others do not, if you want to see what I'm talking about.

vitus 1y ago
> Are you saying I am being unnecessarily cautious? Yes. If a game is marked with Linux, that means it has a native Linux port. However, Proton has gotten so good in recent years that some of the native Linux ports actually perform _worse_ than just downloading the Windows exe and running it with the compatibility layer. The investment in Proton makes sense in retrospect, since SteamOS is based on Arch Linux, and most of these games you mention should run just fine on a Steam Deck.
thesuitonym 1y ago
You can still use Proton with games not purchased on Steam: https://www.reddit.com/r/linux_gaming/comments/pvzn03/running_nonsteam_games_using_proton/ https://www.reddit.com/r/linux_gaming/comments/pvzn03/runnin...
Levitz 1y ago
You can often find reports from people running games on linux at protondb.com
tpxl 1y ago
Check protondb.com. Current protondb status for Lake, Calico, We should talk, Beasts of Maravilla Island: Platinum, Apico: Gold, Kana Quest, Bombfest, Where the Bees Make Honey: Uknown, Onsen Master: Uknown (but has native build), Beans: The Coffee Shop Simulator: Playable.
simoncion 1y ago
> Are you saying I am being unnecessarily cautious? Yeah, definitely. Given enough time, you absolutely will find games that don't work under Linux, but I expect that such games will be few and far between. Though, games with extremely invasive anticheat (such as Valorant) will almost certainly never, ever work on Linux. Games that use less-invasive anticheat like Easy Anti-Cheat (EAC) (such as Elden Ring or Hunt: Showdown) work. [0] I have just shy of 500 games in my Steam library. Maybe three or five of them have Linux builds. I've run into only a handful of games that don't work correctly on Linux. [1] As others have said, you can check ProtonDB to get an idea of whether a game will work for you. But: 1) ProtonDB is not always accurate. For instance, sometimes it says that a bunch of workarounds are needed, but everything works just fine with Proton in Steam. Other times, it says a game works, but it doesn't. On my computer, HighFleet is an example of a game that's said to work, but doesn't. 2) In my experience, games just work. For the very rare ones that don't, I go look around to see if there are easy workarounds, and -so far- there always have been. [0] Though, specifically for EAC, if you have more than something like 28 CPUs, you need to limit the number of CPUs that Proton will tell EAC about, or it will fail with an unhelpful error. You'd do that by setting WINE_CPU_TOPOLOGY like this: <https://www.protondb.com/app/1245620#4SzWJRl8sv https://www.protondb.com/app/1245620#4SzWJRl8sv>, altering the string in the obvious way if claiming you only have 28 CPUs doesn't work and you need to claim you have fewer. [1] I've also run into one (Ruiner) that has a Linux build that's far, far worse than the Windows build. It turns out that you can force a game that has both Windows and Linux builds to run the Windows version by going to the Compatibility tab in the game's properties and force the use of one of the Proton versions. My go-to is 'Proton Experimental', as that seems to be the Steam default.

tribaal 1y ago

I was very skeptical of the claim that gaming on linux is good now, but fully switched over last weekend. All of the games I play on a regular basis just worked out of the box with no fiddling at all (nVidia graphics card, X11, pop_OS - but I'm pretty sure any modern distribution would work just as well). Fresh OS install (nvidia drivers just worked), install the steam flatpack, click "download", click "play". That's it. This includes "modern" games such as Borderlands 4 and e.g. Helldivers 2.

avhception 1y ago
The "nvidia driver" thing may go away, too. See Nvidias contributions to Nova.
esseph 1y ago
Running steam itself as a flatpak may cost you between 10-15% in overhead if what I've read is true. Installing from repo on fedora/debian/etc should work in most cases just fine.
- tribaal 1y ago
  Oh really? Wow! I'll switch over tonight and give it a shot. Thanks!