this post was submitted on 11 Apr 2024
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It already does on my laptop. They also keep setting my default browser back to Edge. I don't use my laptop much anymore and keeping up with the BS of having to disable stuff I don't want running has become tiresome to the point where I don't even want to use it.
I know, I know, something something install Linux! Question I have there is my laptop is a gaming laptop so my question to all you Linux folks is. Can I continue to game using Linux. Will it work with my Nvidia Graphics card and Steam. If so I might consider it.
Yes you can game on Linux. Lookup your games on ProtonDB to see if they are all compatible. Most games run fine unless they have kernel level anticheat that stops them from running. On Steam, you just have to enable Proton and windows games will install normally.
Ppl tend to sugarcoat Linux to new users, so let me make a reality check: gaming is possible on Linux, but in a limited sense, and it might cost time and sanity.
Some games work natively, some need a workaround, some require you to craft your own solution, and some straight up won't.
The percentages shift, where there's slightly more games working natively or requiring a basic workaround, but the baseline is the same.
I dont have a windows machine, i game exclusively on linux and its got to the point where i just buy games on steam and assume they will work fine through proton. I honestly cant remember the last one that didnt. Shit i got the c&c collection on steam recently hopping to play generals with a friend, but while it works fine for me on linux its broken for him on windows.
Yeah, I've had such an easy time of it that I'm actually surprised when a game doesn't work in Linux now too. Which is a reverse of how it used to be.
I switched from Windows to Linux in the last year.
There are sometimes odd things to configure, but it's no more difficult than the windows XP era was.
It is much much easier than Linux used to be due to Steam, and I find I more often have problems with smaller indie games than big ones.
I've been playing Cyberpunk, Baldurs Gate 3, Stellaris, No Man's Sky, Crusader Kings 3 no problem. Plus many others.
I tried to game on Linux for many years with wine, but it was Steam that actually made it feasible for me .
The issue with Nvidia cards is that some Linux distros don't install their proprietary drivers by default and the open-source version is only just starting to catch up.
Most will ask if you want to install the OS with Nvidia's drivers, or they'll have an option somewhere in the settings for a one-click install.
Laptops are harder because they rely on more proprietary hardware and need more advanced power management.
Gaming is mostly respectable. The biggest exception is multiplayer games deliberately blocking Linux because it doesn't allow them to install their rootkit anticheat.
I use nobara, which has some nvidia focused tweaks automatically handled for you, and has largely been pretty smooth. However, you should know that there's a real possibility of needing to roll back, drop to the command line, or make some other tweak to resolve driver issues. It's not a regular occurrence (and both AMD and Nvidia have also borked windows releases), but maintainers dealing with Nvjdia have been frustrated with some of their decisions in the past and still have to jump through hoops sometimes. Some distros more targeted at casual users do a decent job of abstracting it away though.
This was me a few weeks ago and I decided to install PopOS.
https://pop.system76.com/
They make laptops that ship with nvidia GPUs so naturally they would want their OS up to date and working with the drivers. I do tinker here and there but so far I think it’s a good set-and-forget OS.
I looked into it and tried it myself just today. For the most part it's fine but you'll have to be prepared to do some tinkering here and there. Most of the games I wanted to play are listed on proton as works but with some issues.
I set up popOS yesterday and tried to install satisfactory today via steam but it wouldn't let me and when I filtered my games lost for Linux it shrank down to a very small list. Iirc it was listed on proton as gold or even platinum so there must be a way to get satisfactory to run but I honestly couldn't be asked today so I set up dual boot and went back to windows for now.
I think that's the way to got for a newbie. Set up dual boot and whenever you have the time & patience to try to get something to work on Linux go for it but when you just want to relax and play some games (or multiplayer) boot up windows.
I think Linux for everyday use is just fine even though popOS could use some UX designers.
Filtering the list for linux will only show games with native versions. As far as I know, Satisfactory doesn't have one so you will have to use proton. Go into the steam settings and enable proton for all games. Or if you don't want to enable it for your whole library, go into the game settings in your steam library and activate it for each game.
Go to the compatibility menu in settings and set a default version of proton, and it will let you install whatever (though there's still the possibility of it not working).
You're right that it's a bad experience, and I'm not sure when it changed to not have a default or if it's a bug, but that's the solution for that issue.
for your laptop i recommend looking up compatibility with your model first and be prepared to go back. some hardware may not be supported.
nvidia might have some trouble on Wayland for a while but i haven't had much day-to-day issues on x11 except with the various sync technologies being difficult to get working as expected.
Steam is works well for most games but note that for games with multiplayer, anti-cheat oftens only allow Windows