Gaming on Linux
Over the last couple months, I've been using my desktop as my primary machine, only using my MacBook when sitting out on the couch or porch. On my desktop, I've remained on my Linux Mint partition, continuing to stick with Linux. Historically, I've never really done much with gaming on Linux as I've often had issues with getting Wine to work properly. Well, it's been a while since I've really tried to get games to work, and happily, a lot (of good things) has changed.
A little while back, I was able to get Battle.net up and running through Wine, Proton and Lutris so I could install World of Warcraft. I was running into some initial issues, but eventually was able to get it installed and a quick test worked. Then I got tied up in other endeavors, and most of my gaming got put on the back burner.
Fast forward several months and I'm booting WoW back up again. It works, and it works well. The game runs without any hiccups, I can get my addons working, it's just like I'm on Windows or MacOS. It's gotten me wondering how many of my other Windows games I can get working on Linux. I know I was able to get a few old ones running like Star Wars: Dark Forces, but that also with what appeared to be a DOS emulator. I'm not going to try right at the moment, but it'd be nice if I can stick with Linux for nearly all of my computing needs, including gaming. Gaming really has been the last piece keeping me from ditching Windows. If that really is starting to change, I fully welcome it. I also don't know how it is with the latest games as I'm so far behind the times when it comes to my gaming backlog. I only just now re-started God of War (released 2018). But given my large Steam backlog, I'm fine with it not playing the latest and greatest...especially since I need to upgrade my graphics card anyway.
I wonder how much of this stems from Valve's Steamdeck. I'm going to be honest in that I don't know all of its capabilities as I've never actually dug into it as it's not a device I'm looking to obtain. What I do know is that it runs Linux. It would make sense that if you're going to create a new handheld gaming system, you're going to want to maximize the games you can play on it. If you're going to base its operating system on Linux, you're also going to need to make sure that games can be played on Linux. It was in Valve's commercial interest to help take gaming on Linux to the next level which is why they were so involved with getting Proton off the ground.
It'd really be nice if at some point down the line I can just get rid of Windows completely and use the drive it sits on for something else.