this post was submitted on 05 Jul 2026
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Linux Gaming

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I am and always was a casual gamer, I like playing puzzles, strategy and builder games, sometimes I play with friends some 7 days to die or AoE2. I am on Linux Mint for more than a year now and was surprised how easy gaming was. From time to time I had problems with weird DirectX error messages, but all in all everything just worked.

My setup:

  • AMD Ryzen 5 3600
  • GeForce GTX 1660 Super
  • 32 GB DDR4 RAM

So last week my girlfriend worked on my computer (we are not living together), she wrote some bills for customers and did some table stuff in calc. When I asked her at the end of the day how it was to work on Linux, she shrugged and said "Oh I didn't notice" lol (using Cinnamon as DE btw).

Today she bought Until Dawn the remake on Steam while she is here and because she really wanted to play she downloaded it to my PC. She just started to play and everything was great. I wondered again if I should say something like "you see how great you can game in Linux", but then it came to my mind - she doesn't care and she didn't even question it! The Linux Desktop got so mature, that non-tech people just don't notice!

I think the biggest "problem" with Linux adoption is that it does not come preinstalled on computers, and this kind of proves my point I guess.

Yeah that's all, I just wanted to share this with you guys.

P.S.: There were some bugs btw. but it turned out they have nothing to do with the OS.

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[–] Die4Ever@retrolemmy.com 107 points 1 day ago (3 children)

"Windows doesn't require any tinkering, just run this to make a local account, decline 100 requests to use OneDrive and Office 365, get these debloaters, uninstall all these things, and make sure you always tell Windows to not restart your computer while you're using it every time it updates. And when it does update, you'll need to run the debloaters again."

[–] hanrahan@slrpnk.net 3 points 10 hours ago (4 children)

I've been using Linux for 3 years, Mint then LMDE and the not tinkering is bullshit

On my laptop the boot drive is forever filling up with Linux Kernel updates and i need to delete them. i have a 1GB partition, there's no simple way to. do that, there's a bunch of commands i need to use in Terminal, it's bullshit that I even need to do it

On my desktop just installing Signal was a drama (no official flatpak) the command line given on the Signal site is not just copy paste and it's Debian.

then lets not even talk of Davinci Resolve.

i have zero intention of going back to Windows and my needs are quite simple but there is a fair bit of tinkering even then.

[–] FG_3479@lemmy.world 4 points 5 hours ago

There is a setting in the update manager which deletes the kernels for you. Regular Mint is also the better option because of the Ubuntu base.

[–] prole@lemmy.blahaj.zone 2 points 4 hours ago* (last edited 4 hours ago)

i have a 1GB partition

Uh, I'm going to go out on a limb and say that this is probably your main issue.

I didn't even know you could run Linux on a 1GB partition.

That said, you should be able to increase the size of that partition with something like gparted. I had to do it recently for my Bazzite install as I didn't make the OS partition big enough at first.

It was a little confusing at first because you have to actually move partitions around and make it so the blank space that you want to add to the partition is right next to the OS partition on the table before it will let you make it bigger.

[–] TotallyWorthLife@lemmy.world 4 points 9 hours ago

Out of three issues, two are just "app isn't made to be easily installed on Linux", which isn't on Linux itself, but the ones making the app. still, valid issues.

[–] Nurgus@lemmy.world 2 points 9 hours ago (1 children)

The boot drive filling up is REALLY annoying because on modern systems there's no need for it to even BE a dedicated partition.

Even with encryption and BTRFS, boot can live in your root partiotion just fine. Only EFI needs a partition and that never fills up.

Distros need to change this default!

[–] Die4Ever@retrolemmy.com 1 points 4 hours ago

I don't think Kubuntu makes partitions by default, I just have a single large partition aside from the EFI

[–] asudox@lemmy.asudox.dev 30 points 1 day ago (2 children)

I mean, you don't really have to do these stuff. I doubt the comment's author's friend cares about debloating and privacy.

[–] Die4Ever@retrolemmy.com 39 points 1 day ago* (last edited 1 day ago) (1 children)

Yes, in the same way that you don't typically need to tinker with Linux

In the end they're not so different, except Windows intentionally does anti-consumer things that make people want to tinker.

[–] mesamunefire@piefed.social 13 points 21 hours ago (2 children)

No joke my linux laptop hardest part was the initial install. Steam made gaming seemless. No ms account login, no asking for ai, no drivers. Just install and boom im playing my games. Its so nice.

[–] prole@lemmy.blahaj.zone 1 points 4 hours ago

And the initial install has gotten so easy

[–] TotallyWorthLife@lemmy.world 4 points 20 hours ago (1 children)

Literally, my Linux Mint came with the drivers for the wifi, meanwhile Windows always needed me to put them there...

[–] mesamunefire@piefed.social 2 points 20 hours ago* (last edited 20 hours ago) (1 children)

I put Windows on my laptop last year-ish, same exact one with Linux on it now. Took around 2.5x slower to start it up. Win 11 at the time. Fresh off a new image.

Linux takes less than 10 sec. And thats without any optimization and a "heavy" distro like PopOS.

Mint is a good option too :)

[–] TotallyWorthLife@lemmy.world 2 points 20 hours ago (1 children)

I prefer Mint Cinnamon because it's the closest I have to my long time experience with Windows. It feels closer to it, more intuitive even if vastly different.

[–] mesamunefire@piefed.social 2 points 20 hours ago (1 children)

Its good to have choice. Ive seen experienced users use Mint to the reasons you stated. I know a lot of people recommend it as a "beginner" linux, but if you can install stuff without issues, then its just as advanced as the other stuff.

I like Pop because it feels as stable as Debian while keeping up with the packages like other distros.

Ive tried Gentoo and Arch for a bit there and got the custom OS itch out. But I still respect people that do that kind of work for the rest of us. Stability for all.

[–] TotallyWorthLife@lemmy.world 1 points 20 hours ago

True, having different choices with different people to cater to is very good

[–] MystValkyrie@lemmy.blahaj.zone 5 points 21 hours ago* (last edited 20 hours ago)

There's what Die4Ever said, but there's also Windows 11 incompatibility with games that otherwise just work with Proton. Around when I got my Steam Deck, I also had a Windows PC that was, to my initial surprise, way more of a hassle for games, so I pretty quickly switched to Linux Mint, and later Fedora.

I used Ubuntu way back when on secondary PCs mostly for fun, but Linux has only outpaced Windows imo in the past five years.

[–] aksdb@lemmy.world 7 points 21 hours ago

And if some obscure error code shows up, the first five points in the knowledge base are powershell commands.