Let’s face it, while there are many excellent operating system options available for PC users, if you’re a gamer the choice is clear – Microsoft Windows. As Windows continues to be the most popular operating system, it makes sense for game developers to focus their time and energy on building software for the platform with the largest client base.
What a pity for players who want to use open source operating systems such as Ubuntu Linux There are many moral, legal, and technical reasons for choosing this (or any other) Linux option over Windows.
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Most of the major commercial Windows software tools also have open source equivalents. However, getting a fix for games on Linux systems was challenging. This is why an OS like Ubuntu has earned a reputation for being suitable only for non-gaming purposes.
If this is your current impression of gaming on Ubuntu Linux or Linux in general, it’s time to rethink your prejudices. While no one can argue that gaming on Linux is as good as it is on Windows, that is not the same as saying that it is bad. This is how the game has changed for the better.
Better driver and API support
Games run as well as they do on Windows because hardware manufacturers work hard to write optimized and stable drivers for them. It’s the same with the APIs (Application Programming Interfaces) that games are designed for. They make the most of Windows and the hardware it runs on.
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When it comes to drivers and APIs, Linux support has been somewhat overdue. Now, however, Nvidia, AMD, and Intel seem to be doing much better at providing Linux users with feature parity and stability in their kernel modules. We are also seeing increased use of the Vulkan API, which is independent of Windows, unlike DirectX.
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If the game is running on Vulkan or another cross-platform API, it makes it easy to build your own Linux version and run the Windows version on Linux using dedicated compatibility software.
Increase Linux Native Games
Valve’s Steam platform is the most dominant player in the PC gaming market. So it’s no surprise that the Steam client has its own version for Linux. Valve also introduced a feature known as Steam Play If the game has a Linux or Mac version, it will automatically appear on Steam when installed on the corresponding OS.
There is a good chance that if you log into the Steam client today on a Linux computer, a significant number of games you already own will have their own Linux versions. You might also be surprised at how many future big-name releases will get native versions of Linux.
If the game has a Linux or Mac version, it will automatically appear on Steam when installed on the corresponding OS. There is a good chance that if you log into the Steam client today on a Linux computer, a significant number of games you already own will have their own Linux versions. You might also be surprised at how many future big-name releases will get native versions of Linux.
Better wine than ever
WINE, which is a recursive acronym for Wine is Not an Emulator , is the first stop for anyone looking to try running Windows software on a Linux distribution like Ubuntu. While it was never explicitly intended to run games, there are many Windows titles that work well or even perfect when using Wine.
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The community maintains a list of games (and software packages) with ratings indicating how good the experience is. WINE is constantly improving and these days you might be surprised to know that your favorite titles might be on this list.
Steam Proton API
While WINE is great, Valve is committed to expanding its Steam Play initiative to make games run well on Linux. They released the Proton API in 2018. It is a proprietary version of WINE‘s technology that creates profiles for each game so that Windows titles work as best as possible on Linux machines.
Valve maintains a whitelist of games that work flawlessly with Proton. You can download and run these games on Linux from the Steam client just like on Windows. You can try the Proton API with any Windows game, regardless of whether Valve approved it. Obviously, the results may vary, but the community has found that many games are more than playable.
This whitelist is constantly growing and with every major game being added, Linux games are becoming more realistic.
Game streaming is now a thing
Whether you like it or not, game streaming is becoming an important part of the gaming pantheon of platforms. Services such as Project Xcloud and Google Stadia are designed to transform any internet-connected device into a high-performance gaming platform. This includes Linux, although you’ll need a high-speed and reliable internet connection to get it running.
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You can also use local streaming, such as Steam In-home Streaming technology. This means using a Windows gaming PC to play on another Linux PC on the same local network. So you’re not technically playing on a Linux machine, but that’s an option.
Here it is The Catch
While games on operating systems like Ubuntu Linux are better than ever and totally viable, they’re not perfect. In addition to game-related bugs and limitations, there is also an overall performance degradation. This is mainly due to the overhead of running non-native games on Linux. Also, while the driver performance is better, it is not as good as Windows.
There’s still a bit more work to run games as well, so if you get a cold sweat from the idea of ??tinkering with different menu settings or reading a few online guides to get the game running, there might not be enough Linux games in general for you yet. On the other hand, to become a Windows PC also player has to tinker with the settings and read the manual from time to time, so it might not be that different.
After all, this is a great time to give Linux a try without fear of having nothing to play with when the day’s work is done. It literally costs nothing but time, and who knows? You might like this more than you think.
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