Linux gaming and the Steam Summer Sale: What are your favorites?
I've gamed my entire life on Windows until about a month ago, when I switched due to my dissatisfaction with it as an operating system (another thread, another time). After years of hearing that gaming on Linux was improving thanks to Steam Deck and Proton, I took the plunge and installed Pop!_OS on my desktop and loaded my favorite games. Holy smokes, it's amazing. I haven't found a game yet that's required any custom tweaking; download the game through Steam, let it install whatever it needs to on first run, and away they go. I'm blown away.
However, I want to start exploring Linux-native titles in a more deliberate manner. Do many others here game on Linux, and if so what are some of your favorites that you would recommend now that the Steam Summer Sale is on? I mostly gravitate towards builders and colony simulators, RPGs, and 4X games, but I'll take any recommendations that people are excited to share.
[Edit to add:] Thanks for your recommendations everyone! I'll definitely check out several of these.
I've been gaming exclusively on Linux for about 20 years. It definitely got more interesting with steam and now proton support but I also still prefer to just spend money on native titles for devs who care enough to offer it.
Some of my favorite native games are:
Factorio
Stellaris
Dwarf Fortress
Stardew Valley
7 Days to Die
Valheim
Tabletop Simulator
Escape Simulator
Quern
Spiritfarer
I couldn't get into Factorio, but I found Mindustry was exactly what I was looking for. (Also Factorio never goes on sale, and Mindustry is cheap and even free if you look in the right spots - it's in Arch's user repository. :)
Mindustry is fun too, and is also FOSS which is great!
I do love Factorio though and while it will never go on discount it does have a great Linux native demo on steam for anyone else curious about it.
Yea, I tried the demo for Factorio... just didn't mesh for my brain I guess.
I do love Mindustry being FOSS and that Anuken is so active! (Also have it on the phone... after I had both computer and phone versions for free, I had to actually buy it and was happy to pay full price. Great stuff!) I just wish there was a hippy version where I could code and farm and not worry about attacks.
I get a little overwhelmed with Dwarf Fortress. I love reading about it or watching someone who knows what they're doing build a fortress and follow the intricate stories being lived by their inhabitants... the only problem is I struggle to get to the level where I can become immersed in the social stories of my dwarfs.
If anyone has a resource or guide to make this game a little less daunting to begin with I'd love to know!
I think becoming proficient at just keeping your dwarves alive is the first start. Once you get to the point of surviving several sieges you tend to get to know your characters better and can start to use some imagination to fill in the gaps of their lives.
I really like what Kruggsmash has done with his latest series Spearcavern in giving all his dwarves nicknames and disabling migrant waves to really get to know them all better.
Getting overwhelmed is absolutely normal! I recommend checking out the Youtuber Blind. He covers a lot of good tips and tricks and has a good tutorial let's play you could follow along with.
I also switched full-time to Linux last year, and gaming on it has been a positive experience. I've had only a couple of games not run (as in literally two), but for the most part it's been great.
For RPGs, Divinity: Original Sin 1 & 2 run natively on Linux, as well as the Pillars of Eternity series and the Wasteland remakes--you may already be familiar with them, but if not, definitely pick them up. A couple of lesser-known ones I've been getting into and are Linux-native are Roadwarden, Deep Sky Derelicts, Fell Seal, and Nowhere Prophet.
(Sims and 4x I'm not really into but I'm sure others will make great recommendations.)
Seconding Roadwarden and Fell Seal: Arbiter's Mark. Both are pretty enjoyable
If OP (or anyone) tries Divinity: Original Sin, don't start with 2. I did and I just can't get into 1 now. It feels so clunky story-wise.
I've been running Pop OS for about four years as my main system and I haven't had to boot into Windows for a game in nearly two years. I find that it is pretty rare that I run into trouble getting games to run, native Linux doesn't feel like much of a requirement anymore.
I finally picked up Baldur's Gate 3 on this sale and just started it. I don't believe it is in any way Linux native, but its been perfectly smooth thus far.
As far as Linux native games, the list is long and you've probably played many of them, but off the top of my head I can think of Rim World, Civ 6, Hollow Knight, Valheim. All are on sale right now (Civ 6 is a hilarious 95% off, my kind of sale).
In my experience even when a game has a native port I still usually play via Proton.
For example, the Linux ports of the TW:Warhammer series perform worse for me and are often several patches behind in terms of content, or at least they were the last time I tried them, not sure if that's still true.
The performance might be down to the graphics libraries. When you have that problem in the future, it might be worth seeing if you can use the Vulkan rendering rather than OpenGL.
That won't help with the content patches lagging, obviously.
Foreword: I haven't checked if any are on sale now and I'm on mobile, so I won't, sorry.
Have a look at FTL: Faster than light and also Into he breach from the same company. They are very different yet very well made games! And native.
I think Darkest Dungeon is also native but I haven't played it yet. It runs on Steam Deck on 3W (lowest possible) TDP setting lasting probably 10 hours on battery on OLED model.
I also strongly advise trying Dungeons of Dredmor which is very parody-like on many games you probably know. Hell lotta fun!
Don't starve is native survival type with original graphics and tone to it.
Vaporum is dungeon crawler in steampunk theme.
Baldur's Gate 1&2 Enhanced editions are native too I believe. Might be true for Planescape Torment and Neverwinter Nights too.
X series (space simulators/trade) are native too.
Battletech which is kinda Mech Commander turn-based game is also native.
And of course - the whole Valve collection.
You can run also run some native games outside of Steam.
OpenRCT2 is great engine makeover of Rollercoaster Tycoon 1 and 2 (you have to own original files).
OpenMW is great engine to play Morrowind (again, you have to have original files).
OpenXCOM and OpenApoc are great engines to play old XCOM/UFO games (again, files needed). You can play UFO: Alien Invasion which is WHOLE open source game based on XCOM/UFO games!
You can play OpenTTD whoch is completely new game (including assets) based on Transport Tycoon.
Warzone 2100 is old RTS game that is open source and still worth trying.
If you search for Spring RTS you will find game engine that can be fed various... mods? Basically giving you a few different games. Ballanced Annihilation is one such mod that is based on Total Annihilation. Great game to play!
There are many more games and ports of games - Civilization (FreeCiv), Age of Empires (0 A.D.), Baldur's Gate 1&2 (can't remember name of the engine) and others.
EDIT: The list continues a bit lower.
Awesome work with he source ports/open engines.
I want to preempt Warzone 2100 given the context around Steam in the OP: the Steam distribution is not officially supported, and does not sbare code upstream. There are modifications made to make it better in Steam, but you can't expect support from the original project.
Thanks! I'm running Linux since somewhere around 2008 as my main and only OS, I went through a lot!
There is open source engine for Heroes of Might and Magic 3, too. I believe there was native version of Doom 3 (true native version, not some engine rewrite), there was also some kind of native version of Railroad Tycoon 2 (through some specific distributor that doesn't exist anymore for likely more than 10 years). There is also Jagged Alliance 2 Stracciatella which is open source engine for, you guessed it, awesome Jagged Alliance 2 (which had native version too)! You can find open source engine for Jedi Knight 2: Jedi Outcast and Jedi Knight: Jedi Academy. Quake 3 has native version (made famous by Raspberry Pi as it was kinda awesome that such low power, inexpensive credit card PC can run such game) and I believe Quake 1 and 2 has some ports too. You may want to try World of Padman (if it still exists and runs), which is native very funny and great multiplayer FPS - you would have to find some friends to play with you though. Unreal Tournament (the OG one) had native version (I think Unreal had it too). If you like RTS more, have a look at OpenRA - open source engine for old C&C and Red Alert games, you don't even need original files as they were made freeware (?) by Westwood/EA/whoever-owned-the-at-the-time and the engine will download them by itself (if I remember correctly). You may want to have a look at Warcraft 2/Starcraft port/engine (Wargus/Stratagus), although I don't know how it runs. For RPG lovers there is DevilutionX, open source engine for Diablo 1 (needs original files)! There is a lot to be found and played on Linux!
And of course - SuperTux!
EDIT: Widelands is open source game inspired by Settlers 2.
It's in the native Arch repository, and apparently the official site is here: https://wz2100.net/
I'm definitely checking this one out.
Warzone should be in repositories. UFO: Alien Invasion as well.
Warzone is very old, it run on PS1 back in the day (haven't played it, it must be real pain to play on controller), but still good. You can make your own units - combine chassis, wheels/tracks, guns. There are various guns for various jobs, various armor against various guns... The game is pretty deep!
I switched to linux back when Windows 7 was on its way out. I would have left sooner except i wanted to finish witcher 3. now of course, witcher 3 works flawlesy. I waited to play cyberpunk2077 until the 2.0 update and it is amazing. I've we got back into modding with that game and it is super easy using nexus and the manual modding approach. I dont play competitive games, but I see zero quality issues with linux in the single player realm, especially once I moved to AMD hardware.
My favorites:
Casette Beasts
Lenna's Inception (same dev as above)
Art of Rally
Factorio
Shapez (factorio but mining/shaping/coloring shapes)
Stardew Valley
Graveyard Keeper
Portal
Portal 2 (Notable mods: Portal Stories Mel, Portal: Reloaded, Portal Revolution)
Baldur's Gate 3
OpenTTD
I will say Proton is phenomenal for native Steam, ProtonUp-Qt is great for adding new/custom Proton versions (like Proton-GE), and Bottles is great for samdboxing anything you want not in Steam. Normal Linux gaming is a tiny bit harder than Windows, excluding games that simply cant be run on WINE/Proton for DRM/Anticheat reasons, but I find compatibility for older games to be better with WINE.
Heroic Launcher can integrate EGS and GoG similarly to Steam, and even has cloud save support for GoG, so definitely check that out. I even used it in Windows in place of GoG Galaxy and EGS's launcher.
Can I ask you questions? Feel free to ignore since I am not answering your question.
I am also Linux curious and find myself wanting to do what you did. I am tech savvy but don't have a programmer background.
Where did you go to learn how to install Pop OS and use it?
I primarily use my PC for gaming. For Steam and proton, is there a place you choose between proton and native support when launching a game?
Thanks.
I’ll let tech-savvier people than I handle the first few questions, since I’m not the person who should be giving a guide on those.
Steam will default to the native version. Sometimes the native version is a subpar build or out of date (which unfortunately isn’t that uncommon). You can instead load the Windows build through Proton by going into Properties > Compatibility > Force the use of a specific Steam Play compatibility tool.
This will give you a list of Proton builds to choose from. I either choose
Proton Experimentalor the most recent numbered release. The game will then download the Windows version and run it through Proton.OP here, there are good answers to most of your questions down below as well, so I don't feel like I have much to add.
I will note that there was a point of about a decade for which Linux (Debian 7, to age myself) was my daily driver for everything I did. I always had a second-hand refurbished Thinkpad around as my laptop for mobile work, and on that I distro-hopped quite a bit. That let me get used to loading up USBs (see @Asinine's post below) to test them, and that's what I did here too. I liked the UI and the Pop Shop, so I went with it. So, while I think I am reasonably savvy with using a Linux desktop in various situations and hardware configurations, I wanted to note that using Pop!_OS for gaming has been a really easy and positive experience.
Great thank you!
Not OP, but I think PopOS is great and their install guide is pretty easy to follow.
By default steam on Linux just runs native games but it's a simple option to toggle on proton for all steam games. This article from gamingonlinux.com explains it all pretty well. If you enable proton steam will still prefer the native games but you can just right click on the game in steam and change it use whichever you want in the game properties.
You can try out many of the distros on a USB and see what you think about it. They're pretty intuitive and user friendly these days - just as "difficult" as installing Windows and most take way less time.
That's good to know. When you say try it out on a USB, do you mean use the USB to install the distro or just temp run it off the USB to check it out?
Temp run. The OS is loaded into RAM, nothing is written on your disk. You're obviously limited in what you can do, but it can give a good feel of that UI & UX.
Cool, good to know. Definitely need to give it a try
I distrohopped a lot back in '19/2020, and you can (if your USB can handle it) install whole large stuffs - I had a Steam install that I was able to play actual Steam games on... granted, all was lost on a reboot, but that was a huge sell for me.
Interesting. Okay, good to know