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Windows is all but an API now. I wouldn't be surprised if Windows, as an OS used for gaming, "dies" from enshittification, OEMs start shipping thier own crappy linux distros built around Wine, and every game dev targets Proton explicitly.
The irony would be delicious. It's not unprecedented, either.
That's my hope for it, like people target for the "IBM" PC platform, but IBM got out of the business years ago. It's better and more stable since they left.
Exactly.
I was also thinking of this lawsuit, which legally paves the way: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Google_LLC_v._Oracle_America%2C_Inc.
I'd like for that to happen as well, but this seems like a very optimistic outlook.
Windows is definitely, objectively dying.
The question is what fraction is replaced with Android/iOS and what with desktop Linux.
it frankly just seems like the sensible thing for microsoft to migrate to windows being a shell ontop of a linux base, they already rely on linux for azure and it would presumably let them ditch A LOT of old baggage
Not totally, I think? There are so many businesses that will cling to Windows forever, and even an "official" Wine distro would mess them up. Micrtosoft will milk it.
OEMs selling new consumer PCs, though? Their hands aren't so tied, especially if they get fed up with the enshittification they don't profit from.
As more and more games are built on 3rd party engines like unreal, unity and godot, it gets easier to have them run natively without proton or wine. Obviously there are compatibility issues that arise beyond the engine, but it helps a lot. Godot is particularly cool because it is FOSS, even if it is less developed than unreal or unity.
As cool as these developments are for Linux gaming, I am a bit worried about engine development becoming a lost art for studios/devs. Some kinds of game need specialized engines to work properly. Eugen’s proprietary engine, iriszoom, is kind of amazing in how well it handles the huge detailed maps and hundreds of units in Steel Division, Warno and Wargame. I was able to get their latest game, Warno, running just fine on integrated graphics, albeit at minimum settings and through proton. On the other hand, Cities Skylines 2, a game with similar scale to Warno, is built in unity, and it runs like a pig even on high end machines.
I really hope we can get more stuff running natively on Linux without having to go all in on these 3rd party engines, more stuff built in Godot would also be cool.
Cities Skylines 2 issues has nothing to do with Unity. The game has been rushed out the door and is unoptimized. Like for example the game was rendering full set of teeth on the NPCs even when the camera was far away. Unity can be really fast nowadays if you use it properly. Like with the Jobs system and Burst you can write very fast parallelized code that gets converted to native C++ code.
One thing I noticed about cross platform sim games is that, frankly, they run horrible on native Linux. I measure like a 40% TPS drop, and even worse frame time spikes, in Rimworld and Stellaris.
The former is Unity, the later an in-house engine (Clausewitz). And they run fine in Proton.
Point being that you still have to be careful with popular engines, as the actual game dev still has to optimize it for Linux. If they can’t… honestly, targeting Proton is a fine alternative.
The only games that won't run under Linux are those that have extremely intrusive kernel level anti cheat installed. I won't play any of those anyway.
Even on linux its cool how you can play some easy anti cheat games and genshin impact / other mihoyo games without kernel level access even though jts required on windows
As someone that only uses Linux computers, I'll play anything, even nintendo games. But I prioritize giving my money to FOSS games and projects.
The linux purist has the vegan morale superiority, but no one will know what the fuck they're talking about.
What's an open source? Like a river?
It just means the developer posted the source code of their program for others to use. There's nothing wrong with it. Id open sourced their Doom and Quake games back in the 90's. Valve recently open sourced Team Fortress 2.
So you're free to play around with the code and make changes, but if you want the full game with all the maps, you still have to buy a copy.
Disclaimer before anyone jumps on me, that's just two examples. There are tons of different types of open sources licenses.
I use arch btw
Lol, my bad. I didn't pick up on the satire in your comment. I guess I knew posting about Linux would be a shitstorm and I was mentally prepared for the worst.
Maybe you are still confusing this place with somewhere else. Were all linux users here, even those that are running windows are either doing so in dualboot or as potential linux users to be indoctrinated into our cult.
There are people here that don't yet realize that they are future Linux users too.
Funny you should say that cus if you asked me two months ago if I’d consider Linux I’d tell you no, now I’m doing reasearch to finally achieve transcendence
All windows users are temporarily embarrassed Linux users.
yeah it's like having a clean river that anyone can drink from, as opposed to having a river of pure sewage that they charge you 5 bucks to have a sip from and people for some reason pay that price
One of my favorite games, SS14, is open source, but I won't deny myself Karlach's warm embrace just because that infernal engine isn't.
Holy shit, thank you so much for bringing this up, I used to play the shit out of SS13 a decade ago and followed the alpha development of SS14, then promptly forgot about it. I gotta check it out!
You're welcome to the station crew, enjoy your stay :3
Pixel movement is an abomination though.
Grid movement is only in ss13. Or do you like grid movement and think the free movement is bad?
It's not even that I prefer grid movement but every video I've seen makes it look nauseating and a guessing game if an entity is on a tile. They took the tile-based art of SS13 instead of making a new one to fit the free movement.
I don't understand what you mean, but it's ok :3
are these purists who have never heard of Proton here in the room with us, OP?
I've met one, back on Reddit
He was one of the most insufferable people I ever had the displeasure of interacting with. Not because of this in particular but yeah.
I'm an idealistic purist, but I don't refuse to use proton, I use it all the time.
My issue is that proton has enabled devs to put their head in the sand for Linux support.
It has shifted from -> we won't support Linux because nobody uses it to -> we won't support Linux because it works with proton.
So as a long term solution, proton enables bad practices from devs and continues the proliferation of libraries like directX
There was a time in the 2010s where some fairly large games had native Linux versions:
That, along with Valve games (and by extension a lot of mods and custom server content) and basically every indie game you'd get from the Humble Bundle or itch.io having a native Linux version made it possible to be a Linux gamer before Proton was even a twinkle in Gabe's eye. That was especially the case for me, since the types of games that tended to run on Linux were the sort of games I wanted to play anyway.
Fast forward to today and even Valve can't be arsed to make a native Linux version of Deadlock. All of Frictional's games from 2007 to 2020 had a Linux version, until 2023 when Amnesia: The Bunker didn't have one.
I'm glad we have Proton: it runs Arx Fatalis better than modern windows does, let's me play Vampire the Masquerade: Bloodlines, Fallout: New Vegas, and a slew of other games. It also opens Linux gaming up to a wider audience and removes a lot of the anxiety someone might have about switching over from wondering if they'll be able to play everything they're interested in. But in exchange for that we're definitely paying the price in actual native games, and to some degree further entrenching Windows as the standard.
It appears that the Civilization series is one notable exception to this trend, with V (2010), VI (2016) and VII (2025) all having Linux versions.
Civ VI's Linux port is pretty far behind the Windows/Proton version in terms of content, and is substantially less performant too IME.
While I can agree that native releases are better in theory, having to target an additional platform in practice means they're often neglected and offer a lesser experience.
You get cases like Rocket League, which had a Linux port until Epic bought it and decided that they couldn't be arsed maintaining it anymore.
You get things like Tomb Raider (2013), which had a great port that did run really well when I tried it on my RX 480 and core i5 5600 in the summer of 2016/2017, but now runs like total arse at 30fps on my RX 6800XT and 3700X because it relies on terribly outdated libraries, to the point where it now defaults to running under Proton anyway.
Yes, that's valid, but I think it's very much so short term thinking.
eventually if enough windows things are supported on linux, the question will become why use windows?
once everything works out of the box, laptop manufacturers will say "why are we paying microsoft this licensing fee"
there would have been no other way to win the war, this gives us a chance in the very long term.
eventually publishers may say "why do we support windows?"
the next pillar that I think will fall in our favor is anticheat, once that goes down the sky is the limit for our longterm prospects
I agree with this totally.
You have to get the users and the devs running all their favorite games / apps on Linux seamlessly, even those games which are out of development. Once that happens then the users won’t care about the ‘how’ for the most part, and the devs who do care about the ‘how’ will begin making things in a way that does not require the Microsoft tax.
Honestly, by now there are so many great open source games. Along with open source engines where you just have to buy the assets. Play all of those and you can probably have fun for the rest of your life. And if not, go on itch and filter by open source to fill the rest of your time.
I mean, my own Diarrhea 4 will probably amuse you for a whole minute.
That's well and good but I COULD just play gzdoom mods and be entertained for years, if not forever.
The purist, non-conformist, jaded subhuman terrorist
From flesh to steel and blood to bleed, I fight to exist
~ Edgecrusher, Fear Factory