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Well actually I've been technically playing all the games that are protected by these aggressive anticheats on linux since I've decided to switch. My setup is

Well actually I've been technically playing all the games that are protected by these aggressive anticheats on linux since I've decided to switch. My setup is a custom version of the linux kernel that 'backdoors' itself and exposes host information to the windows vm making all the anticheats happy enough to work out of the box. Have not gotten banned in any of the games either. Custom VMM and EDK builds are required to block blanket detections of virtualized hardware. I repurposed lookingglass to instead stream all the wdm buffers as seperate applications that I can open directly in linux like they're native applications. The neat part is that I forward all the installed applications to KRunner which talks to the windows vm and launches the application there and spawns a looking glass instance for that applications assigned path. The only downside that this is a two GPU solution and you have to run any GPU intensive applications in windows.

progforlyfe 7mo ago
That is honestly amazing and impressive. Probably a bit too much tweaking for the common gamer though, but glad it is possible!
- himata4113 7mo ago
  I've been messing with kernel-mode anticheats for 3 to 4 years so yah, not something a typical gamer can do. But I have been contempating on making this publically available for everyone to use wrapped in a neat little package!
  - freedomben 7mo ago
    You definitely should! Even just a blog post about it would be great. I won't be doing it myself, but my son would for sure.
  - drakythe 7mo ago
    Out of curiosity do you run the backdoored kernel in your day to day computing or only when gaming? Any concerns about incidental security issues?
    - himata4113 7mo ago
      It's only backdoored within the virtual machines and require kernelmode within the virtual machine. Any untrusted virtual machines don't run on my machine to begin with so it's alright.
senko 7mo ago
Care to write it up somewhere? Would be a fascinating read!
- himata4113 7mo ago
  Unfortunately doing something like that will simply make anticheats respond as they have in the past and make it increasingly difficult to do so. I did contemplate playing this cat and mouse game and making anticheats accept that it's easier to just support linux instead of fighting it.
  - jamdolomite 7mo ago
    What about in regards to streaming separate applications through looking glass?
fluoridation 7mo ago
If you have to run a Windows VM anyway, why not just reboot into Windows?
- Garlef 7mo ago
  I guess installing windows is more work than running a VM ... and more invasive
  - fluoridation 7mo ago
    More work than using custom builds of everything on the Linux host?
    - davkan 7mo ago
      It’s just the kernel and virtualization stack that are custom. Dual booting is annoying as you lose access to your entire desktop environment. Want to tab out of your game and check your email client? Well you can’t unless you maintain another email on the Windows partition that you only want to use for running a game anyway. If you spend any significant amount of time gaming you just end up getting dragged away from Linux where you want to be. I was dual booting for a while and it was fine for a focused Skyrim session here and there but when I started playing an mmo that I was in and out of constantly it was very inconvenient to not have access to my Linux desktop environment while I was idling in the city for hours. With lookingglass nowadays it practically feels like just running a windows game on Linux. I used a vfio setup for years before Linux gaming support was good and I had to switch monitors inputs and toggle my kvm whenever I launched a game and it was still better than dual booting. There wasn’t kernel anticheat back then though so i didn’t have to muck with the kernel and uefi.
      - tehbeard 7mo ago
        Not sure if it's still the case in the 2020's, but back in the 2010's I had no end of issues with Windows deciding to either fuck up the dualboot so nothing would load or overwrite it entirely and leave it as Windows only.
TheLegace 7mo ago
With the Windows VM are you doing GPU pass through to get native performance? Is there still a relatively minimal overhead doing it that way? I would be interested in running applications in their own Windows VM(one at a time at least) but the VM is essentially invisible and only application window is available?

progforlyfe 7mo ago

That is honestly amazing and impressive. Probably a bit too much tweaking for the common gamer though, but glad it is possible!

himata4113 7mo ago
I've been messing with kernel-mode anticheats for 3 to 4 years so yah, not something a typical gamer can do. But I have been contempating on making this publically available for everyone to use wrapped in a neat little package!
- freedomben 7mo ago
  You definitely should! Even just a blog post about it would be great. I won't be doing it myself, but my son would for sure.
- drakythe 7mo ago
  Out of curiosity do you run the backdoored kernel in your day to day computing or only when gaming? Any concerns about incidental security issues?
  - himata4113 7mo ago
    It's only backdoored within the virtual machines and require kernelmode within the virtual machine. Any untrusted virtual machines don't run on my machine to begin with so it's alright.

senko 7mo ago

Care to write it up somewhere? Would be a fascinating read!

himata4113 7mo ago
Unfortunately doing something like that will simply make anticheats respond as they have in the past and make it increasingly difficult to do so. I did contemplate playing this cat and mouse game and making anticheats accept that it's easier to just support linux instead of fighting it.
- jamdolomite 7mo ago
  What about in regards to streaming separate applications through looking glass?

fluoridation 7mo ago

If you have to run a Windows VM anyway, why not just reboot into Windows?

Garlef 7mo ago
I guess installing windows is more work than running a VM ... and more invasive
- fluoridation 7mo ago
  More work than using custom builds of everything on the Linux host?
  - davkan 7mo ago
    It’s just the kernel and virtualization stack that are custom. Dual booting is annoying as you lose access to your entire desktop environment. Want to tab out of your game and check your email client? Well you can’t unless you maintain another email on the Windows partition that you only want to use for running a game anyway. If you spend any significant amount of time gaming you just end up getting dragged away from Linux where you want to be. I was dual booting for a while and it was fine for a focused Skyrim session here and there but when I started playing an mmo that I was in and out of constantly it was very inconvenient to not have access to my Linux desktop environment while I was idling in the city for hours. With lookingglass nowadays it practically feels like just running a windows game on Linux. I used a vfio setup for years before Linux gaming support was good and I had to switch monitors inputs and toggle my kvm whenever I launched a game and it was still better than dual booting. There wasn’t kernel anticheat back then though so i didn’t have to muck with the kernel and uefi.
    - tehbeard 7mo ago
      Not sure if it's still the case in the 2020's, but back in the 2010's I had no end of issues with Windows deciding to either fuck up the dualboot so nothing would load or overwrite it entirely and leave it as Windows only.

TheLegace 7mo ago

With the Windows VM are you doing GPU pass through to get native performance? Is there still a relatively minimal overhead doing it that way? I would be interested in running applications in their own Windows VM(one at a time at least) but the VM is essentially invisible and only application window is available?