Re: What's Your Go-to OS
By: MRO to Accession on Sun Feb 23 2025 01:56 am

i'm not a big gamer, i just can't stand the repetition. i will mess around with a sandbox game but i dont think i can ever play a game until completion ever again.

I've never been a gamer... never played any game to completion. And I came from the Atari 8-bit computer world. When people used to upload games to my Atari BBS in the 80's, I would load them up and test them and then never run them again. I still have a few games on my BBS now, but nobody ever downloads them. They aren't pirated games... just stuff from mags and a few new ones.

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Hey Nightfox!

On Sat, 22 Feb 2025 21:20:46 -0800, you wrote:

I'd like to see more Linux support for gaming too. It sounds like it
has come a little ways though. I've heard of Proton for Linux,
allowing more Windows games to run on Linux, but I think it still has
a bit of a ways to go.

The last bit of news on their website is from November 2023. Has it been abandoned already? Their site also says 10% of games have been verified, 60% are 'playable' (whatever that means, still somewhat broken possibly?), and 30% is unsupported. I'd definitely agree that's a little ways, and not making strides by any means.

That said, after looking a bit, I also found a github page for ValveSoftware/Proton that was updated last month, so maybe they just abandoned the actual website and moved to github around that time.

There's a huge difference between 'being able to run Windows games on Linux' and the games running natively. The former (even with Proton) still utilizes Wine and whatever else to get them to run, which probably takes quite a bit away from performance. But the fact that at least they can run is better than nothing, I suppose.

Native Linux versions of games would be ideal too - but I've been
seeing more of that too. Several months ago, I heard of a 2018
sequel to the old PC Descent games, called Overload, and it's
available for Linux, as well as Windows and Mac. And if you like
flight simulators, X-Plane is available for Linux - I've tried it,
and I actually think it's quite good. There's also an open-source
arena shooter game called Xonotic that's pretty good (it's somewhat
similar to Unreal Tournament).

These aren't AAA games, though. Not really a driving force in gaming or anything that would attract gamers to possibly make the move to Linux, at all. It seems a lot of these bigger games have shitty anti-cheat measures that while trying to run these games on Linux will set off, probably getting you banned from the game(s). That would definitely have to be addressed at some point.

And the Java version of Minecraft should naturally run on Linux too.

I've never played Minecraft, but have watched my kids play it over the years. From what I've seen of it (as well as anything from 'Roblox'), I'm not interested in any of that stuff where the graphics seem to be straight out of the 90s.

Regards,
Nick

... He who laughs last, thinks slowest.
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Hey MRO!

On Sun, 23 Feb 2025 01:56:14 -0600, you wrote:

i just think it was a poor decision to make it LOOK like a mobile
device and there was backlash so they change it to make people happy.
you cant fault them for trying, though.

Agreed that it was a poor decision, and I definitely don't fault them. It just turned me away and made me dive into other options, is all.

I still use windows for my home system because i am no longer a power
user. i of course use linux for my servers because that's the best
way to do things.

My current PC is a gaming rig. I built it from the ground up for exactly that purpose, so Windows is really the only smart choice for this system until if/when this system won't be able to handle newer game releases any more. That could still be up to 5 years from now, though.

I'm going to do a lot more pre-planning for my next build, though. No need for all this RGB crap in full glass cases any more. It was a fun build, but definitely not needed and probably paid more for each piece of hardware because of it.

i'm not a big gamer, i just can't stand the repetition. i will mess
around with a sandbox game but i dont think i can ever play a game
until completion ever again.

While I don't play nearly as much as I used to, I've still enjoyed some of the recent releases like 'The Last of Us, part 1' and the Resident Evil series and remakes. I'd rather jump into one of those stories than watch TV, if that makes sense.

I think I'm over the repetitive, sweaty, 'skill-based matchmaking' games like COD and the like, though. Had a lot of fun playing them over the years, but I can't really stand the repetition, either.

Regards,
Nick

... He who laughs last, thinks slowest.
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Re: What's Your Go-to OS
By: Accession to Nightfox on Sun Feb 23 2025 06:29 am

And the Java version of Minecraft should naturally run on Linux too.

I've never played Minecraft, but have watched my kids play it over the years. From what I've seen of it (as well as anything from 'Roblox'), I'm not interested in any of that stuff where the graphics seem to be straight out of the 90s.

I've never played Roblox, but for Minecraft, it's more about the gameplay than the graphics. And there are mods for it too (at least, the Java version) that can change the graphics too.

Nightfox

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Re: What's Your Go-to OS
By: Nightfox to Accession on Sun Feb 23 2025 02:10 pm

And the Java version of Minecraft should naturally run on Linux too.

I've never played Minecraft, but have watched my kids play it over the years. From what I've seen of it (as well as anything from 'Roblox'), I'm not interested in any of that stuff where the graphics seem to be straight out of the 90s.

I've never played Roblox, but for Minecraft, it's more about the gameplay than the graphics. And there are mods for it too (at least, the Java version) that can change the graphics too.

I got into Minecraft when my daughter expressed an interest, she picks it up from time to time, she built a world with just horse stuff and modded it herself. I moved her world to a server so she can pop on whenever she feels like it. I just figured out how to make it easy for her friends to play with her too.

I agree with NF, the gameplay is amazing. It's not about the graphics, but the graphics are next level beautiful, and anyone that says otherwise has never taken the time to play it.

Action, Exploration, Discovery, and truely free to do whatever you want. It's such an amazing game/program/tool. Buy the client once, server software is free. For like $30 it's a no brainer purchase.

Other games like Stardew Valley, while a little silly have some serious deep gameplay, and that one develper has been updating that game for more than 10 years at no charge. Buy the game once, and that's it. Game has always been $30. Worth every penny. (when it goes on sale)

Some of my new favorites, Dredge, Hades, Dave the Diver. I even spent money on Dwarf Fortress when it went retail (those guys deserved it).

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On 28 Feb 2025, Android8675 said the following...

I got into Minecraft when my daughter expressed an interest, she picks
it up from time to time, she built a world with just horse stuff and modded it herself. I moved her world to a server so she can pop on whenever she feels like it. I just figured out how to make it easy for
her friends to play with her too.

i've always enjoyed minecraft as well. me and my brother usually end up playing it after enough random new things have ended up in the game. that and there are some incredible mods if you're into that.

i duno if it's still maintained but there was one that added guns, gunsmithing, crafting ammo, grenades, etc etc.. and then another that added all the doom enemies to the nether. made for a pretty great combo heheh

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Android8675 wrote to Nightfox <=-

I got into Minecraft when my daughter expressed an interest, she picks
it up from time to time, she built a world with just horse stuff and modded it herself. I moved her world to a server so she can pop on whenever she feels like it. I just figured out how to make it easy for
her friends to play with her too.

I agree with NF, the gameplay is amazing. It's not about the graphics,
but the graphics are next level beautiful, and anyone that says
otherwise has never taken the time to play it.

I see they're making a minecraft movie, and it's going to be in 3d. I'd
see that.

I played with the early versions of Minecraft, and was amazed at
building when you don't have to worry about gravity. I mostly tried to
see how high I could go.

I really got into C418, the musician who wrote the piano pieces that
would play during the game. He's got a bunch of music online.




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Re: What's Your Go-to OS
By: Nightfox to Accession on Sat Feb 22 2025 09:20 pm

I'd like to see more Linux support for gaming too. It sounds like it has

You have plenty of commercial support nowadays. It is brutal. There is an incoming Linux Magazine article about that, by the way.

See, Steam has devoted a whole lot of money into designing a handheld computer and a Linux distribution to slap on it, designed specifically for playing commercial games on Linux, as a strategic moove to cease depending on Windows.

Nowadays, you can just install a game manager such as Lutris or Heroic Launcher and link it to a commercial games provider (such as Steam, GOG or Epic). You can download and install any games you have licensed under those platforms automatically because these launchers come with pre-configured install scripts. Installing a GOG game in Lutris is about as hard as installing a regular Steam game using the Steam client, which is to say it isn't. Now a game being Windows-only is no longer an issue.

Nowadays you are only really pressed when you want to play Windows 95 stuff, because those games don't run well on Wine nor Proton, but you can't run them directly on Dosbox. I find you can solve the issue for most of those titles by installing Windows 95 in Dosbox-x and running the games from there.
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Re: What's Your Go-to OS
By: Accession to Nightfox on Sun Feb 23 2025 06:29 am

The last bit of news on their website is from November 2023. Has it been abandoned already? Their site also says 10% of games have been verified, 60% are 'playable' (whatever that means, still somewhat broken possibly?), and 30% is unsupported. I'd definitely agree that's a little ways, and not making strides by any means.

"Playable" usually means the game is perfectly fine, but has some issue that prevents it from being considered perfect. Usually it is something stupid like the fonts of some menu not being the proper size. If a game is deemed "Playable" then it is most often possible to play the game from start to finish.

Wine and the like are actually quite performant. They are native grade, I dare say. What they do for the most part is to hijack library calls from the game and direct them to Windowesque libraries. It is not like you are running a Windows kernel in the background.

These projects are going nowhere. Steam is just making so much money from selling SteamDecks. Besides, they have a strategic interest in not being dependant on Microsoft.


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Re: What's Your Go-to OS
By: Arelor to Nightfox on Sun Mar 02 2025 07:30 am

I'd like to see more Linux support for gaming too. It sounds like it has

You have plenty of commercial support nowadays. It is brutal. There is an incoming Linux Magazine article about that, by the way.

See, Steam has devoted a whole lot of money into designing a handheld computer and a Linux distribution to slap on it, designed specifically for playing commercial games on Linux, as a strategic moove to cease depending on Windows.

I'm aware of that. Have you tried it though? Many people have said many Windows games still have trouble running in Linux or won't run at all. I've tried it myself and have been unable to run a few of the games I like to play. Also, there are some demanding Windows games that I like (such as Microsoft Flight Simulator 2024) that I just don't think would run in Linux.

Also, native Linux versions would be even more ideal than having a compatibility layer to run Windows games in Linux.

Nightfox

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Re: What's Your Go-to OS
By: Nightfox to Arelor on Sun Mar 02 2025 01:20 pm

I'm aware of that. Have you tried it though? Many people have said many Windows games still have trouble running in Linux or won't run at all. I've tried it myself and have been unable to run a few of the games I like to play. Also, there are some demanding Windows games that I like (such as Microsoft Flight Simulator 2024) that I just don't think would run in Linux.

I ran Bazzite for a couple of months, then wrote an article about it. The results were sound enough that I bought a SteamDeck for personal use.

Compatibility is not perfect but a significant percentage of the games I want to run work GreatTM and the overwhelmingly most works well enough. The real trick is using some means of automation in order to install the games, so you don't have to do it all manually yourself. Stuff like Lutris is great because it installs your games for you with known good configurations using community scripts.

Also, lots of games made with Unity get Linux native versions.

I don't play particularly new stuff, but I have found you can run most of the games most of the time. If you want 100% compatibility you are out of luck, but at this point of Computer History you are screwed with Windows there too.


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