Linux

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1.47% of steam users

I’ve been gaming on Linux since Proton first launched. It was good back then, and at this point I can play just about everything in my Steam library (nearly 1000 games). From indies to racing sims to triple a games. It’s great.

Anti-cheat is still hit or miss, but I don’t really play any multiplayer games, so that doesn’t affect me luckily.

I do a bit of coding but I mostly use my pc to game tbh hahaha, Deep rock Galactic is what I'm obsessed with right now

I recommend using an AMD CPU and GPU, but otherwise you can just assume a game works and it will most of the time. If it doesn't, there might be some quick fixes, and if not then it's an unlucky one.

See ProtonDB.

I fully switched to Linux ~3 years ago and at the beginning I was worrying about compatibility, but nowadays I don't really have to think about it anymore. I play AA games almost daily with both Steam and Heroic. Like others have mentioned, there are some games that doesn't work because of anti-cheats, but I think there are only a handful of those anymore.

I have been gaming on Linux since 2017, and it is super super viable now. Did you know that over 70% of the top 1000 games on Steam are playable on Linux?

I switched near Windows 11 release. I went with Ubuntu hirsute hippo. I had an Nividia card and a steam account and was shocked at how well my games were running. And it has gotten better and better.

Steam is doing great with pleasing gamers.

Oh yes, there are gamers. I play Apex, Titanfall 2, Hunt Showdown. Sometimes Overwatch.

Very few games have not worked at all. R6Siege is a popular stickler that still doesn't work (even though it could if the devs let it, it starts up and runs training just fine).

I completely switched to Linux in 2015. I'd definitely call myself a gamer. I don't buy AAA games at release too often, but I sometimes do. I play games for several hours a week. So yeah, probably that makes me a gamer. Nowadays gaming on Linux works great 80-90% of the time. Proton on Steam has massively improved the experience. The only stuff that still regularly causes problems are anti-cheat systems for some multiplayer games. Otherwise gaming on Linux feels almost the same as on Windows.

I used to dual boot Linux & Windows, but these days, gaming on Linux works just fine. Granted, I don't play any hardcore multiplayer games that might have iffy anticheat or anything, but even modern games work with little to no issue.

I don't know where you draw the line for hardcore gamer but I play a lot of games and so does my friend, who is nontechnical and also plays on linux, and we both have very few issues and love the experience more than Windows. It really depends on what games you wanna play but there are very few games that aren't working OOTB. Protondb is a good site that I'm sure other people will link but if you're looking to switch I recommend taking a look at this site for the major games that will/won't work: https://areweanticheatyet.com/

@s804 consider subbing to /m/linux_gaming

Valve has certainly given linux a boost with the SteamDeck and all the work they've funded to make it a viable gaming platform. I just hope they release SteamOS for all platforms soon, maybe we'll see an uptick in PC pre-builds with SteamOS as an option instead of just Windows.

Seems pretty great to me. Yes, it is and will probably always be at least a bit worse than on windows, but definitely not enough to actually use windows. I'm really happy with the way it's going. The enjoyment linux brings for me FAR outweighs the cons. That is not gonna be the case for everyone and that's fine too.

I play games that are available on Linux via Steam. Not as hardcore as I used to be, though.

Currently playing Pokémon Luminescent Platinum on Linux.

LTT did a video last year where they tried to go full Linux for their gaming setups. Turns out it's doable, but has some pretty glaring complications if you deviate from the common branch of what people do. USB 3.2.2 remote gaming is unsupported, and they had some issues I can't recall. They basically ended on "Yes you can game, but you're gonna have to tinker a lot to get it working right, unless you're just using steam on a standard PC".

I use it for work, my personal desktop, and naturally my Steam Deck. It's far from being the majority but it is becoming increasingly common thanks to Valve.

I've clocked over 660 hours in Apex Legends. recently finished Psychonauts 2. currently playing Valheim with some friends and Witcher 2 on my own. all of that exclusively on Linux.

I've been gaming on Linux for years and steam has made it super easy. I used to deal with wine but now the process is exactly the same as any other OS (assuming you're using steam). If you want to play non steam games you probably want to have some knowledge about how Linux works

It's quite viable at the moment, and with Wine, you can run many Windows programs, including games. Sometimes it even runs some old games much better than current Windows versions.

If the developers don't use DirectX for 3D API, then it's quite easy to port. At least Windows still has OpenGL and Vulkan, unlike MacOS. (Why did they axed those in favor of Metal?)

I've been gaming on Linux primarily for the last ~5 years. I also use Linux professionally (though I am a research scientist, not a programmer). I would say Linux gaming is 95% feasible if you do SP only. If you do MP in addition to SP, it's maybe 70% ish doable? If you do just MP, that drops to like 20%-30%.

Most things "just work" now, especially for SP games. Occasionally you find an old game with a glitch or bug you need to search the web to fix, but it's not bad, similar things happen on Windows.

If you stick to the biggest supported distros (Fedora, Ubuntu) and stick to Steam, and stick to SP, it's basically no different from Windows as far as ease of use and compatibility.

I know Steam (Valve) have metrics on it that probably give a good idea of how Linux fares in the PC market for gaming. Probably not entirely accurate but maybe accurate enough. I know it's the best I've ever seen though.

Through Steam and Proton, I'm able to play most of the games I'm interested in: Mass Effect, Last of Us, Jedi Fallen Order & Survivor. Steam Deck is built on Linux too.

Linux is a great choice for gaming!

While there may be some anti cheat games it cant run (at the moment), I've heard that some games can run even better on Linux than on Windows!

Us retrogamers are gamers too, and there's a ton of great emulators on Linux.

Steam deck has grown it a fair bit. Excluding anticheat, most games can be made to work with the assistance of proton See protonDB for specific games, but it's a definite thing.

With Proton most games run with no issues and just as fast as on Windows. Those that don't are because of anticheat, weird launchers or invasive DRM. I still have a Windows partition for those games and Windows only tools but haven't used it in months.

ProtonDB and using a combo with Lutris and Steam. And of course some third party Proton like Proton GE to make games run smooth. Funny enough, the games I found hardest to run been the Neptunia (example Cyberdimension) games. I guess no one really cares about them.

I was putting some old donated computers into a school in the Dominican Republic and they had old Windows versions and I could not update without spending some cash. So I installed Ubuntu Linux on them. It was GREAT! So pretty soon I upgraded my own PC and now I have been using Linux for a decade. The range of games is reduced - some Windows games just won't work. But I am not a "coder" and not really a hardcore gamer either - I do some engineering and some technical writing, surf internet, and watch videos. I have no idea why anyone still uses Windows except for the fact that it came on their PC when they bought it (and it cost them $200 for the privilege!).

Well the Steam Deck's OS is forked from Arch so.

I play mostly Indie so I couldn't speak for stuff like anti-cheat/graphics but... the types of game I play, for the most part "it just works".
If you're into RPG maker games, they sometimes require workarounds (hint: you can hot-swap the contents of RPG Maker MV/MX/MZ into Linux's native nwjs...)
I think the only games that struggle on my computer are mostly because of GPU (I'm on a laptop) rather than anything else Tbh

I've clocked well over 100 hours on Snowrunner in Steam Games, and now started Red Dead Redemption 2. I mainly play simulators, and many of the fames are actually Windows games, but Steam with Proton seems to be handling them just fine.

At this point you can use linux or windows without having to switch around except for more specific applications (things not directly supported through proton can still be run through it by just adding to steam as a non-steam app)

You may not find as many Linux users, but it'd be more a numbers game than anything. The games are definitely there now.

Linux gaming is growing a lot, especially in the last couple of years. You can play almost any windows game on Linux, the biggest hang-up right now is anti-cheat. Most anti-cheat made for windows will not like being emulated on Linux, and even if it works a lot of time you will run the risk of being banned.

So bigger multiplayer games, mainly AAA titles, are still lagging behind.

I use Linux exclusively for gaming. Sometimes there's a performance hit or weird bug, but mostly it runs very well, occasionally better than on Windows. I have quite often heard of windows players complaining about older games no longer running properly, and I've often had no problems with these on Linux, for example the original Dead Space.

However there are technologies which are still quite some ways off. Rtaytracing is improving but still a generation behind windows in terms of performance and support. HDR is barely supported anywhere. Variable refresh rate, is supported in some instances, but not universally, e.g. Gnome doesn't support it yet for Wayland. I don't know anything much about VR but would suspect it may not be very well supported yet either.

I hate to say it but I haven’t had much luck gaming on Linux. Long time Linux user (bounce between Ubuntu and arch type distro since before 2008).

I haven’t had much luck getting may games working at all on Linux (fallout, Skyrim) or running well (City Skylines, KSP). I’ve followed plenty of guides but have limited luck, so not sure if it’s my aging CPU/GPU or what.

I would like nothing more than to use Linux as my only OS but I have limited time to game (less than 4-5 hours / month), so I’m stuck with windows since I can still quickly fire up games there.