Linux

Check out https://www.protondb.com, to see which games work well on Linux. Games that are platinum should work out of the box, ones that are Gold might need some tinkering. Most games work great, but a lot of multiplayer games aren't supported.

In general gaming on Linux has been a pretty smooth experience lately. Games on Steam usually just work, but IMO running games outside of Steam is pretty hit or miss. They sometimes need following a guide or trying to fix an obscure issue that only like 2 other people have.

The thing about Linux is that you might have some issues outside of gaming. Things you might not expect like Discord not being able to screenshare audio or that one program you need not working on your distro properly. Also you should know games on an NTFS drive don't work well on Linux, so you can't expect your drive full of Windows games to just work if you have them on a 2nd drive. In general I still think you need some patience if you're going to settle on a Linux desktop, it's not entirely a bug free experience yet.

It depends. Do you play stuff with kernel level anticheat? If no, then the current state of Linux gaming is, by and large as good as, and occasionally better than, Windows - even on games that don't run natively.

Proton is astounding, and the state of Wine is amazing compared to 10 years ago (and it wasn't bad then). Get Bottles or Play on Linux going, plus Steam, and there's very little you can't do…

Except kernel level anticheat.

(To be 100% transparent, there are other issues. I have a couple games I can't get to run reliability, but they're all obscure edge cases. But like 90% of stuff without anticheat just works at this point.)

Edit: proofreading

If a game doesn't work on linux, I don't buy/play it until it does. End of story. There is plenty of choice and time is limited, so having an extra filter is just helpful.

The only experience I have is with Steam Deck and it's fantastic! I love it so much that I've decided to build my next PC as a Linux only box. I am a refugee from /r/patientgamers though. I don't play the new hotness unless it's first party Nintendo stuff.

I'm also so fed up with Microsoft's anti-consumer practices and disastrous updates, so it makes it an easier decision.

protondb.com will tell you how well each game works. There's also an icon on Steam, if it says it's certified for the Steam Deck that's also good.

I've installed Manjaro in 2020 during covid specifically for gaming and never looked back since.

We're living in the golden age of Linux gaming right now, get yourself a piece of it.

For me it reached a point where I now expect a new game I'm trying to just work. This was a monumental shift when I first realized that a few months ago.

Your best bet is Steam/Proton, since Valve stands behind it and development on all the Proton components (Wine, DXVK, VKD3D, Gamescope, ...) is very active.

If you get games outside of Steam (I often prefer GoG if that's an option, plus I have some itch.io bundles purchased a while ago), some tinkering may be necessary. For those, I like to go "vanilla" with Wine(-GE-custom usually), plus DXVK or VKD3D on top. There's also Lutris to help with these scenarios. Works great too.

Another topic is native Linux games. There are some gems which work beautifully. I recently finished native Celeste from itch.io and it was flawless. Another great Linux port is Bastion. But some older titles may have compatibility issues - missing or incompatible libraries, broken gamepad support or stuff like that. For those, the Windows version via Proton may actually work better than the native version. Luckily, we can now pick either one.

Its really fucking good. Open and play nowdays

Have you heard of ProtonDB? It rates the current state of games and recommended fixes.

Gaming on Linux has improved a lot over the years. It's typically only multiplayer games with Easy Anti-Cheat (EAC) that you'll run into major issues with. Mod managers frequently require a fair amount of extra work and reading but I think a lot of Bethesda games have easy work arounds and documentation.

The whole reason I kept Windows around was for Genshin Impact. At compete random, the game silently added proton compatibility with their anti cheat, so now I never have to boot into Windows anymore. I was never expecting it to actually happen lol.

"Making do"

i5 7500

1660

32 GB RAM!

me with my plebian i5 6500, 16gb back alley ram and igpu 😭

I'm playing Baldur's Gate 3 since day 1. That's really all I need and a lot more than I expected just a few years ago. It's only gonna get better from here.

Sorry if there's a lot of technical terms.

My anecdotal experience is that Skyrim modding under Linux worked surprisingly well. Despite that I think I would still say "YMMV". I have it running under Lutris-GE-Proton8-13.

I used the GOG release because having local access to the installer is a major win. Note that even if you don't install the AE upgrade it's the same version number, 1.6.659 so bear this in mind when installing SKSE64 and mods. I think there's a specific release of SKSE64 for GOG. Many mods label that version as AE only, which isn't true of the GOG release.

I chose to install in Lutris because of how easy it is to manipulate prefixes. I had issues with the automated scripts, which I expected. So I did it myself.

I downloaded Skyrim from GOG and installed Skyrim using the "Install a Windows game from media" option, then run once from the launcher to ensure everything was initialised before modding.

Inside this prefix I installed MO2 using "Run EXE inside WINE prefix".

I chose that mod manager because I used it on Windows and it worked just fine. I don't know a lot about Vortex. There's a DLL to add support for Epic and GOG installs of Skyrim. I duplicated the Skyrim SE runner and changed the target to ModOrganizer dot exe. There's a UI bug that makes reordering mods act weird, just click another mod entry if it gets stuck.

The Nemesis issue I had, which appears to be a Linux/WINE problem - the solution given (Extract it to the Data folder then run the executable from MO2 with VFS) worked for me.

TBH my modlist is pretty tame compared to most that I've come across so I didn't expect many problems. LOOT worked as expected so I just let LOOT handle my load order.

There's probably more to it but this is what I remember. Happy modding!

Modlist

Nemesis issue

Mod Organizer 2

Super useful tool to help manage proton versions

If your pc doesn't support vulkan you're fucked, unless you use steam

Can be pain free but it can also be painful. Some things straight up won't work because of anti cheat and unsupportive developers. I'd say give it a try. Gotta bump up the market share so Linux support actually matters in developer business cases.

I started using Linux maybe 5 years ago, just before DXVK and proton became a thing. The difference between now and then for gaming is night and day.

If it's on steam, there is a pretty good chance it'll work. If it's not on steam, it still might work through lutris.

There are some holdouts like Riot games, but I haven't owned windows in almost two years.

I'm using Pop OS for gaming and work and it works flawlessly. Looking at the game you listed, I think they will work without problems. Give a look at protondb so you can have an idea. However I would suggest you to try it yourself and see how it goes, gaming on Linux is a very different matter compared to ten years ago!

Skyrim with proton GE will work just fine. Modding will be trickier. Vortex can be setup, with lutris. But I've ran into issues when it comes to external programs like resaver, loot, nemesis/fnis.

You could slap in a cheap second drive and see what happens. Compared to 10 years ago, it's so much better.

Cyberpunk, Baldurs Gate 3, Sims 4, Minecraft (not a shocker, just need Java for modded), it's been great.

Xevil still works.

The only thing that still makes me keep a Windows partition on my computer is Valorant, I want to start playing CounterStrike so I can drop this damn malware game.

I have played modded skyrim on my Linux system, and it worked fine. It was somewhat of a headache to make Vortex work, but once I figured out the quirks, it worked fine (used steamtinkerlaunch as compatibility tool). Civilization too - 5 (with and without EUI) and 6 worked pretty much out of the box via proton. A friend of mine plays RDR2 and also has no issues, doing coop stuff and singleplayer or whatever.

I'd say in terms of your choice of games, you should be fine. Proton runs most games just like windows nowadays, and you get the added benefit of less system load. There might be some games that require a bit of tinkering to get working flawlessly, but chances are some user on protondb has a solution.

If you need a distro, a rolling release one might be your best bet, as having up-to-date packages does help with gaming.

I've had varying luck with the standard distros, but when I found Nobara, somehow all my gaming problems went away. And now everything just works, actually better than on Windows. I don't have the time or energy to find out what they're doing better for my particular case, but apparently something.

(avoid KDE)

The native steam package in most repos seems more than functional(esp with using proton when necessary)
(Archlinux, EndeavourOS, Pop!_OS are ones I've tried with success with a GTX 1080(fuck nvidia))

just tried to use the flatpak version of steam and it seems to have issues with linking external libraries(disks/partitions) and flatpak steam won't let you install any Windows games(as of Aug 8, 2023)

So I swapped to linux again about a month ago and I'm frankly shocked at how much better it is now, especially for gaming. While I don't have first hand experience with the games you listed (in linux), based on the games I have played, I have no doubt those games will all work just fine.

Honestly, I don't see myself going back to Windows at all at this point.

(For the record, I'm on Pop!_OS.)

I've been having a great experience. I am on an all AMD system, which generally has better support than Nvidia, so ymmv. The only thing I occasionally miss is Xbox game pass, but I didn't use it a ton to be honest so I guess Linux just saved me 15 bucks a month.

Most games I've played have been a literal cakewalk, just install and play. Stuff that uses the ea launcher acts a little strange on launch but has worked fine so far - just have to not panic when you see a blank ea window sit there for like 10-15 seconds and have faith it will move passed it, lol.

I would be keen to hear back on these. I think you will have no problem with Civilisation, but for Skyrim modding, possibly issues especially if you're using an ENB mod.

I've been meaning to try Skyrim but I'm waiting until total conversion mods Skywind and Skyblivion come out.

I am using Pop OS! For my gaming. I haven't booted into windows in a month.

On a very rare occasion do I ever run into a game that doesn't work on Linux, have completely ditched windows about a month ago and haven't looked back

I even get significantly better performance in most games, used to just about manage 60-70fps in overwatch on max settings under windows, now it smashed 170 no problem