There have been multiple accounts created with the sole purpose of posting advertisement posts or replies containing unsolicited advertising.

Accounts which solely post advertisements, or persistently post them may be terminated.

What’s the best distro for gaming on linux? Any tips and tricks?

Admittedly, the last time I tried it was maybe 5 years ago. I used ubuntu (can’t remember which distro) but I recall having to fiddle a lot with drivers and WINE. Is the scenario still the same today?

With the horrors of Win11 widely talked about, I’m thinking of flirting with linux once more. Is it a good idea at this time? Or is gaming on linux still niche as it once was?

What is your distro and what tips and tricks/perspectives you can share with a newbie like me :)

Hairyblue ,
@Hairyblue@kbin.social avatar

My gaming PC is Ubuntu 23.04. Steam/proton works for every game I wanted to play.

You can check ProtonDB website to get an idea if your games will run with Proton/steam.

sadreality ,

Win11 is like bill gates stinking finger in your butthole every time you click start or search... I digress.

I went with mint since it is easiest to switch but I am hoping install pop OS if it works. Few minor issues with mint mainly Bluetooth for controller

But like others have said any distro will work at this point thanks to daddy gabe.

warmaster ,

Crystal Linux

www.getcryst.al

ANuStart ,

SSL cert is busted for that site

verdantbanana ,
@verdantbanana@lemmy.world avatar

whole point of arch is creating your own environment yes it is the experience we and all those we install for have arch works flawlessly with community constantly adding and improving

20gramsWrench , (edited )

You need to distro hop for a while, in the end, the other aspects of the systems are going to feel more important to you and which aspects you will like the most if only for you to decide.

Try something Ubuntu based, something arch based, debian based…

you might end up picking one distro for a reason completely alien to most, I ended up on garuda because their little maintenance panel felt sexy for example.

Also I didn’t get one bug I had runing very old vn’s with gamescope and still don’t know why it worked on garuda but not on the othe arch including arch itself.

KidDogDad ,

I use Garuda as well! Can I ask what you’re referring to by the maintenance panel? I’m not able to place it.

20gramsWrench ,

I’m mainly refering to the “garuda assistant” app that is installed on there but I should have said garuda apps, since even the terminal launched “garuda-update” is nice to have

redcalcium ,

Using rolling release distro seems to be great for gaming because you’ll get bug fixes, kernel and driver updates faster. Even steam deck is based on a rolling release distro (Arch). On the flip side, you’ll also get new bugs before anyone else. Doesn’t happen too often but it does happen.

verdantbanana ,
@verdantbanana@lemmy.world avatar

arch is what steam deck uses maximum compatibility plus steam puts in code

ThreeHalflings ,

Sure, but they don’t just go installing arch from an arch ISO, they carefully curate an environment with a team of experts to make sure it doesn’t break.

That’s not the experience you’re gonna have gaming on Arch on your gaming desktop.

Zaphod ,

Eh, i recently did a fresh arch install on my desktop (had manjaro before) and I haven’t run into any bigger issues (at least related to gaming). Diablo 4 for example worked basically out of the box with bottles

ThreeHalflings ,

Maybe I’m biased because my only experience with arch in the past five years was install, boot, update packages, reboot, fail to boot, laugh, install Debian.

gabriele97 ,
@gabriele97@lemmy.g97.top avatar

I use pop os for gaming without any problems

simple , (edited )
@simple@lemmy.world avatar

There’s a lot of back and forth on this question constantly in the community. IMO you should just choose a Linux distro that’s beginner friendly with sane defaults. Any of them can game, basically.

  • Nobara Linux is made specifically for gaming, you might want to start here.
  • ZorinOS is made for people who aren’t used to Linux. It’s got a great UI and good features. I used to play Elden Ring on it, it’s very reliable.
  • Pop_OS is another great general distro. Lots of people gaming use this. They’re also making their own desktop environment which they’ll use here when it’s ready.
  • Arch Linux only if you know what you’re doing. If you don’t, avoid an arch linux based distro.
Oteron , (edited )
@Oteron@kbin.social avatar

So far this is the best answer in here.

Just choose something you can wrap your head around and start from there. No need to jump to anything complicated like Arch linux.

I first started gaming on openSUSE and then moved to Fedora. Can't say I don't have to look around for answers to run some games but I'm more than happy with the experience in general. I play some older games like Deus Ex, Baldur's gate and such, but I also play Cyberpunk 2077, Stray and Marvel's Spider-man Remastered without any real issues.

Also, let's be realistic about it - arm yourself with a bit of patience, because the process of installing games could be as simple as clicking install and then play, but it could also require some tinkering to get some games running smoothly.

Frostwolf OP ,
@Frostwolf@lemmy.world avatar

Thank you for the inputs. I have had experience with ubuntu and fedora before (they came free in my old high school computers). But I wasn’t so sure they can game. But maybe this has changed in recent years.

marzhall ,

I’ve been using fedora the last few years and have had a pretty good experience. Sometimes I need to go into steam and change the properties of a game to specify an arbitrary version of proton, but between that and googling some issue I’m running into and finding a solution online, I’m pretty darned impressed considering I started using Linux in 2005, and would never have believed back then it would become my primary gaming machine. Granted - I also have a PS5 and switch. I’d recommend giving it a go.

A_Random_Idiot ,

Gaming on linux on a whole has changed in recent years, in large part due to Valve dumping dumptrucks of money into Linux development and Proton, to make it easy for people who arent sysadmins to use and play games on.

ShaunaTheDead ,
@ShaunaTheDead@kbin.social avatar

The only downside that I've found to Pop!_OS is the default use of Flatpaks. While Flatpaks are generally pretty great, they can sometimes cause odd issues with interactivity with other apps because of their isolated nature. A pretty famous issue is with KeePassXC's Firefox add-on not being able to detect the Flatpak version of KeePassXC, but there are quite a few other notable examples. I also personally like theming my system icons which is a bit of a pain with Flatpaks.

verdantbanana ,
@verdantbanana@lemmy.world avatar

Arch Linux with Gnome Desktop proton-experimental and wine-staging installed just like the Steam Deck Two computers in the house both have 16gb DDR3 ram and 8gb rx 580 gpu Hogwarts Legacy plays smooth as does most modern games.

<a href="">archlinux.org</a>

djsaskdja ,

Doesn’t the Steam Deck use KDE Plasma 5 instead of GNOME?

kjetil ,

It does yes. Although it launches Steam directly as its own … “shelll”? Is that the right word? KDE is bypassed entirely unless you launch “Desktop Mode”

Anyways, I still wouldn’t recommend Arch to a new user, go with something easier and more mainstream for your first Linux experience. PopOS, Mint, Fedora, Norabora, Ubuntu/Kubuntu

Also, saying Steam Deck uses Arch isn’t wrong, but it’s a bit misleading. It uses an Arch base , curated, configured and tested by Valve, and finally periodically shipped as updates using immutable root images (on a single well defined hardware platform). If you install vanilla Arch yourself you’re responsible for all configuration and testing yourself.

djsaskdja ,

Fair points. I will say I use EndeavourOS and I find that to be much more usable than vanilla Arch. I wouldn’t exactly consider myself a beginner though. Not sure how a completely new Linux user would take all that in.

sambeastie ,

Endeavour is what I recommend for people who are technical but not interested in setting up Arch from scratch. It’s about as close to Vanilla Arch as you can get while having an installer and sane defaults. It’s kind of perfect for gaming, where up to date packages can be the difference between a game working flawlessly and that same game being a choppy mess.

I set my partner up with it, and they’ve had a very easy time running all their favorite games from Elden Ring to Valheim. No headaches required!

synapse1278 ,
@synapse1278@lemmy.world avatar

Any popular distro will work fine for gaming. The difference between distros are becoming less and less significant with de advancement of sandbox packaging like Flatpak. Pick which ever distro is exiting to yourself!

If you want a subjective opinion: Fedora is my personal favorite for few years now; otherwise Debian is a very strong and stable distro that I daily-drove for ~10 years.

OwlPaste ,

Manjaro user here, it works fine for me Using it for years now

basic_spud ,

This! Manjaro is most of the benefits of Arch (which SteamDeck runs) with easier installation and stability for common end users. One thing to note is that Nvidia drivers still suck on linux. You can make them work, but AMD cards tend to be pretty much plug and play these days

sambeastie ,

I do have one note of caution for anyone considering Manjaro: For most uses it’s totally fine, but if you plan to make heavy use of the AUR, tread carefully – because it updates on a different cycle from vanilla Arch, there can sometimes be unforeseen breakages in AUR packages. If it’s a gaming-only machine, this will likely not be a problem, but if you plan to also daily drive it as a general purpose workstation, this might be a deal breaker.

fell ,
@fell@ma.fellr.net avatar

@sambeastie @OwlPaste What kind of problems did you run into?

sambeastie ,

It’s been several years since I worked with Manjaro, so I don’t remember which specific apps I ran into problems with, but the general idea is this:

Manjaro holds back packages for several weeks behind vanilla Arch, so packages from the AUR are often built on versions of their dependencies that aren’t yet available to Manjaro users. This can result in apps not installing properly (or at all), or apps that were previously installed without issue suddenly breaking when they attempt to update.

This isn’t actually specific to Manjaro – other Arch-derivatives like Garuda can also run into this problem. You’ll find that any Arch-based distro that makes significant changes to Arch (like holding back packages, or distributing versions of packages different to the ones in the Arch repositories) can have issues if it’s attempting to use things from the AUR. Arch derivatives that make no changes to the base system, and just use the vanilla Arch repositories don’t have this problem. Endeavour OS is an example of this, as the only changes it makes are additive – they have their own extra packages, but don’t change any core functionality from vanilla Arch.

EposVox on youtube ran into some issues with Garuda about a year ago, and those are of the same flavor as what I experienced on Manjaro, even if they aren’t identical issues.

animist ,
@animist@lemmy.one avatar

I use fedora without issue

  • All
  • Subscribed
  • Moderated
  • Favorites
  • •
  • [email protected]
  • random
  • lifeLocal
  • goranko
  • All magazines
    •