Quoting: Arnaudk- Very few major games are available on Steam for Linux. There are plenty of minor games, especially for very young people, but not for gamers

I thought Linux was mature enough to have many good games available on it, but this is not the case...

Well, I'm born in the Seventies and have got way more native games I'd love to play than time to play games (not least because I've got way less time than when I was young).

Someone had a number of Linux games on Steam lately, was it about 10.000? Not sure.

Quoting: Liam DaweIf your only interest is Native stuff, I suggest you follow: https://www.gamingonlinux.com/articles/category/Native_Linux/

And maybe also https://www.gamingonlinux.com/articles/category/Open_Source/

Quoting: damarrinYeah, no one cares about native any more.

Wrong. Wide native support is crucial for Linux to become a valid gaming platform for the masses. Wine/proton/eon/etc. are nothing more than stopgap measures to make gaming on Linux less painful in the meantime.

As we've already seen with wineDB, protonDB, and the Steam Deck Verified program, compatibility layers are forever playing catchup with incompetent, inconsiderate, or downright hostile developers. Until Linux is seen as a first class citizen, and developers make native versions of their games, it's the end users that will suffer.

Last edited by WorMzy on 3 April 2022 at 10:04 pm UTC

Quoting: ArnaudkHi !

I used to be a Linux gamer in the early 2000, at the time when companies like Loki, LGP and Tribsoft released games on Linux, and when Desura was so promising. Due to personal and professional reasons, I went away from Linux gaming for years, even if I have Steam installed on my Linux machine.

As I have now more spare time, I wanted to take a look on the games available on Steam and I am rather disappointed:
- I wanted to play the original Quake (released in 1996). I noticed this is only available on Windows while it was possible to play it on Linux decades ago. We can still use Steam Play or do some tricks with opensource clients like vkQuake but we have to buy the Windows game before
- Almost all the RuneSoft games once available on Linux through Desura are only available on Windows / MacOS on Steam. We can still use Steam Play but what a shame, this is like a rollback !
- Very few major games are available on Steam for Linux. There are plenty of minor games, especially for very young people, but not for gamers

I thought Linux was mature enough to have many good games available on it, but this is not the case...

I was like you and got back into modern gaming around 2019. You can still get Linux native games. I get mine from itch.io mostly. I use to have a GOG account but I dropped that.

I still play the original quake using the dos files I had from when they first released. I use EzQuake to run my games.

I also picked up a lot of Linux boxed games from indiebox.com awhile back.

I don't know about major games but when I want to play an Online only game like Destiny 2 I use Stadia. I think I have every RunSoft game from Desura's days backed up. Not sure if I can link here but if you let me know which games you are looking for I can pass you the files I have.

Quoting: ArnaudkMaybe this is because I use Steam (latest version) on OpenSUSE (not officially supported)

OpenSUSE user here, for many years :-) I've certainly found no issue with playing games through Steam on this OS. As someone else has said: sometimes you need to use a very specific version of Proton to get certain games to work. Check out ProtonDB for this kind of information.

There are many games for Linux users both young and old. My playlist from the last few weeks looks something like this:
Weird West [Proton]
9th Dawn II [Proton]
Get Even [Proton]
Cathedral
Project Zomboid
Edge of Eternity [Proton]
Light Fairytale Episode II
Splitgate
Scarlet Hollow
Pathfinder: Wrath of the Righteous [Proton]
Giana Sisters: Twisted Dreams [Proton]
Dead Cells

A couple of the non-native games from this list require a small amount of tinkering, but nothing that ProtonDB won't help with.

Hope this is helpful :-)

In case anyone else is interested, these are native releases on Steam over the last five years:

2021 1236
2020 1120
2019 991
2018 1231
2017 1175

So aside for a small dip in '19 it's a pretty steady stream of releases. It will certainly be interesting to see what long term effects Proton and the Steam Deck will have.

Quoting: whizseIn case anyone else is interested, these are native releases on Steam over the last five years:

2021 1236
2020 1120
2019 991
2018 1231
2017 1175

So aside for a small dip in '19 it's a pretty steady stream of releases. It will certainly be interesting to see what long term effects Proton and the Steam Deck will have.

I guess though the release of Windows games is less "steady" but more like an exponential curve.
But I'd consider a thousand a year/three a day far from "very few".

Last edited by Eike on 4 April 2022 at 12:24 pm UTC

I think Proton is both a blessing and a curse. It gives Linux users unprecedented access to games on their preferred operating system, but it also gives developers zero effort access to the Linux market with little if any incentive to support us directly. Why should a developer spend the resources to make their game compatible with Linux if Valve is essentially going to do it for them for free?