4d ago

Gaming on Linux hasn't been great so far...

tl;dw their performance numbers don't match up to what we've seen in the past. Some pretty significant decreases in performance over Windows. I think there's clearly some sort of configuration error there. They also ran into the old dual-boot problem where Windows overwrites the Linux partition.

In my opinion this is lazy and irresponsible reporting. I don't at all mean to discount his experience, they are legitimate concerns, and it's fine to show the struggles of using Linux, but it's very clear he (admittedly) doesn't know what he's doing, and they need to consult an expert (or even a casual user) to figure out what the problem is before reporting. He said in the last video that Bazzite reached out to him to let them know if he has any problems so they could help but he obviously did not do that. As is, it just makes Linux/Bazzite look bad.

I hope he follows up with another video discussing the solutions.

What do you think?

Linux Gaming @lemmy.world

27:59

Gaming on Linux hasn't been great so far... | JayzTwoCents

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PC Gaming @lemmy.ca

Gaming on Linux hasn't been great so far... - JayzTwoCents

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46 comments

¯⁠\⁠_⁠(⁠ツ⁠)⁠_⁠/⁠¯ average non-linux tech youtuber video. Something goes wrong on windows = user error, something goes bad on linux = OS fault
They also ran into the old dual-boot problem where Windows overwrites the Linux partition.
This one kinda makes me laugh tho. Other than work I don't know why people would put up with that level of bullshitery from an OS
- The fact that M$ forced uefi on everyone then couldn't implement it properly on their own and does this fuckery instead, should make it very clear the quality of the rest of their work.
  
  It's not like it was an accident or that they didn't know what they were doing. This is working as intended as far as they're concerned.
- That’s why I put my Windows install and my Linux install on separate drives. I understand that not everyone has two drives to do this, but to anyone who does, it can save some headaches.
  
  I did that and windows still somehow fucked up my secure boot enrollment for Bazzite when I did an update.

I think part of the issue is people don't remember all of the little tricks they've learned over the years getting windows to work for them. So when they find Linux and have to learn a whole bag of them it feels like it's not worth it compared to something that "just works" (in their mind anyway)
Duel booting definitely isn't a viable strategy for most people imho. The best situation would be seeing crappy everyday laptops sold in bestbuy or whatever with either windows or some gaming configured Linux. People shouldn't have to think about the OS as much as possible
Prebuilts and preconfigured systems are where most people live. It's also often where most gamers start before diving into something more sophisticated for the sake of things like performance
- "all the little tricks" so damn true. meet a lot of first timers that dispense with any preconceptions and won't even right click files to see what options are available

I find it very interesting that as a windows user, for years learning the OS was this collaborative effort for me and the community at large. Wed google everything, find obscure forums with equally obscure sollutions, and then eventually youtube tutorials. It was always a community educatiing themselves further in infinite directions.
Why does it seem like people dont want this with linux? I get that it might be too slow for some people and they just need something to "work". I see so many people on various comment sections saying "yeah i tried it had issues and switched back" basically the same experience that the video portrayed. Why was that same person able to suffer through windows for 25+years but this is just "too much".
I personally feel that most of the linux community has been a breath of fresh air. I feel stupid sure, but at the same time its rewarding to communicate with others and find a solution.
Even some people within the linux community feel this way, telling users to simply read the man page or the official forums to find solutions rather than teach them to use the man pages and arch wiki for example. Its honestly baffling to me on both ends.
Open question to all: what is your level of profiency? How do you learn about linux? Do you think there is a problem or is it a loud minority of users?
- For me the problem is with Linux I typically have to go a lot "deeper" to solve issues I have and those issues come up more often. Yes there is documentation available but it isn't always use friendly and I tend to have to spend more time deciphering it than I would for a Windows issue where I can usually find the exact steps I need to take with a quick search (or often just poking around in menus).
  
  I see what you are saying, but thats where the collaborative effort comes in. The only reason you are able to get to a solution so efficeintly with windows is because the base level users of windows are more educated in their OS. There is 25+ years of effort from millions of base level or above users. The fact that windows hasnt changed very much since 98 helps alot too, The solutions from all those years ago generally still apply.
  Edit: also those solutions are noticed by microsoft and often get implemented directly into the OS.
  All that is to say we need YOU, and users like you, to recreate the educational enviorments that seem so second nature to us with windows.
  Its a very positive feedback loop we make a forum post "hey I have this issue" and either someone would allready have a solution or youd figure it out with help from the community and update the post with your workaround or fix, etc. This still exists obviously but I feel like we dont appreciate enough how many years of this had to happen before we got to the point we are now with windows.
  I can understand not feeling like you have the free time for all of this effort. but to me the only reason we feel that way is because we still have windows as a fallback that works. Where as we didnt see linux or mac os as a viable alternative back then.
- Open question to all: what is your level of profiency?
  I'd say that I'm pretty proficient. I haven't done LFS yet but haven't really spent more than a few mins with windows except for a handful of times for about 15 years. The one time that I did so recently was to try to get a PSVR2 to work. That experience was so awful (driver disks for OS install, ADS FUCKING EVERYWHERE THAT CANNOT BE DISABLED, etc) that I quickly gave up and ended up killing the VM. I'd dinner become a hermit in a cave than abide by OS-level ads that can only be partially disabled by mucking around in the registry.
  Sorry. A bit off-topic. I just really hate ads. Erm... I've done some basic tutorials on writing drivers for the kernel and have been working on reverse engineering a driver for some AR glasses, though I've not made it too far.
  How do you learn about linux?
  My initial learning was because I lost my XP serial in college and decided to give Linux a try. From there, a lot of my learning has been through work, which I got due to my teaching myself how to use Linux.
  Do you think there is a problem or is it a loud minority of users?
  It's both. I'd say that it really is going to vary based upon the sub-community. Unfortunately, there's a lot of toxicity in the gaming community at large, which, in my experience, is reflected in segments of Linux gaming communities. On the other hand, I just last night saw a bunch of people on Lemmy trying to help someone figure out how to get their new GPU to work, which was very much the opposite of toxic.
  
  im with you man, FUCK ads, it was a major motivator moving from windows, as well as DRM and system level 0 anti-cheat.
  you answered my second question but not in the way I intended, I meant to ask for more of a methodology like, do you just read the man pages? do you refer to AI? are you just full trial and error? does your work provide resources? Im asking because I generally want to see why its such an issue for people to find info, personally I use a mix of selfhosted AI and various forums and wikis. I wouldn't be supprised if some users are learning 100% through chatgpt or a single youtube channel.
  Im experiencing much the same with the community it seems to be a 60-40 whether im going to find actual help or have someone just tell me to RTFM and the people who do care are absolutely kind and absurdly helpful. Your observation about the gaming focused linux community being slightly more on the toxic side is probably an apt assessment. and probably skews the initial proportion of 60-40 to the more to the toxic side where as it would otherwise be something like 80-20 helpful and toxic respectively.

It's so weird that people with a huge platform can't seem to get Linux right, but tons of us Joe Schmos have no problems.
- I think people just don't remember how long it took them to "learn" windows. they were forced to because there was no viable alternative. also Im sure these tech tubers don't enjoy feeling stupid in front of their audience. I would not be surprised if comments like this are huge jabs to the ego of someone like linus or jay.

reminds of the linus incident. non linux youtubers need to stop making sweeping claims about linux after they fuck it up
- The Linus incident of Linus showing how bad the Linux experience can be?

This is a shame to see. I haven't watched Jay recently because I feel like his content has kind of gone the Linus route of being more entertainment focused vs a channel like GN where they have very strict and regimented testing methodology. Even as entertainment though, I think this needelessly smears Bazzite. His experience is valid, but the conclusion being "the OS's fault" or "Linux not being there yet" is kinda harmful. Yes, kernal level anti-cheat is a huge problem. But as a lifelong Windows user who myself converted last year and has not had to go back because all the games I want to play work, my experience has been that my games run better through Proton than they do natively on Windows. I hope there's a followup at some point soon where he tries again with a fresh install on its own drive. Even if the reporting isn't scientific (it doesn't have to be), I would expect his experience to be better.

All I know is I finally migrated my gaming desktop to Linux 3 years ago as my last hold out system and the only windows machine I’ve had since 2009. I haven’t noticed anything in terms of reduction in performance. Not to mention the ease of use when compared to getting Debian running on my laptop in 2009.
But more importantly to me, when I click shutdown, my machine shuts down within 5 seconds. When I start up I’m not spammed a million times over with ads and bullshit. And when I update and reboot, my updates are done, no more update, reboot, update some more, reboot, etc.
Let’s say Linux performance is worse than windows (has not been my experience), I would take that and not have all the other bullshit.

Lazy reporting...
Then why post here and get clicks for their shitty youtube channel?
- Because it's important to know what's being told to his very large audience. If you don't want to watch it, I provided a tl;dw in the OP.
- Haven't watched the video, but I think just the conversation this created ended up being interesting to me. A handful of extra views won't do any harm.

What I think:
If i install Windows, latest drivers and steam I am set. No need to know what i am doing, no need to consult an expert. Just: Next, next finish, yes yes, sure, here is the soul of my first born, next yes, sure. Fuck off with that edge update. Yes next end.
The moment bootloaders etc can break, whatever the cause, is the moment you lose 60% of your users.
The moment you need to consult an expert to game you lose another 20%.
That's what he's doing. He is not catering or talking to you, the experienced Linux user, he's talking to your nephew who just finished building his first game pc. He's saying: You little guy... don't bother just yet. Get acquainted with everything and then try this.
- Last time I helped my mother with her laptop Windows had ruined her updater and it took me ages to sort out. Win11 is not a user friendly OS out of the box, with horrible experience searching for fixes. On the other hand Linux has a ton of friendly people ready to help or who posts guides (with datestamps!)
- But what are the odds of having these issues? It's a bit disingenuous to tell a large audience that this is what they can expect if the reality is the problems may only effect one in a thousand.

A few months ago, I switched from gaming on Windows to full time gaming on Linux. I have the same hardware for both but my Linux gaming experience is much jankier than it was on Windows. I have more available resources (Mint is much leaner than 11, even with cutting out Windows bloat), but games have odd hang ups and crashes that never happened before my switch.
Discord also works poorer in Linux, so I have to mess with that during gaming sessions as well. It worked much better after I removed the version I installed through snap but now I have to manually download and install an update every time it wants an update, which is frequently. Discord definitely worked better on Windows.
Also, my buddy and I built identical gaming computers at the same time and he stayed on Windows. My computer will crash or stutter on lower settings in games while his doesn't at the default detected settings, which are usually higher since I had to back mine off to ward off the issues.
That all said, it feels like I am gaming on XP in 2003-4. Games mostly work but GPU (NVIDIA) drivers are a pain in the ass and I occasionally have to do some troubleshooting to get things to work and and deal with crashes that I did not have before the switch.
I think the switch is for the best overall but I won't pretend like Linux gaming is equal (or better) to gaming on Windows. I am learning a ton about Linux but overall, out of the box, I miss Windows features and accessories and Linux needs a lot more configuration to do the same things. And even then, it is still not at the same quality for quite a few features.
- GPU (NVIDIA) drivers are a pain
  hmmmm i wonder what the issue could be
  
  Doesn't matter for everyday Joe ^^ Linux ain't just workin -> it just ain't worth it
  
  Nvidia gpus are in a huge amount of PCs out there right now. many users are going to make the switch to linux not knowing about the closed source drivers. yes its obviously Nvidias fault but dont be so brazenly "WELL DUH" when most people arent going to buy a new GPU just to test out an different OS. or even think to buy from a particular company due to business practices that only affect people on linux.
  that being said im currently on a Nvidia GPU and for the most part Im having minimal issues. If @hobowillie needs some help I will gladly offer my limited knowledge but I understand if you've given up on Linux for the foreseeable future.
- Discord also works poorer in Linux
  Certainly not Linux' fault if developers write shitty Electron apps and then put a bunch of OS-specific stuff in it.
  Also, try Vesktop? I like that I can customize my experience a little more with the plugins.
  Snap
  All my homies hate Snap.
  
  I didn't say it was any fault of Linux that Discord doesn't work as well. Just that it's a fact that it doesn't work as well, regardless of the reason. It has issues in Windows, too.
  I'd never heard of Vesktop. I read up on it a bit and I might swap over to it today if I have some time to work on it.
  I was trying out different installation types and Discord was my only foray into Snap. Probably not using it again. haha
- Discord being worse on Linux is entirely Discord's fault, there has been a thread on their forums for literal years asking for proper support. Just use Vesktop, use it on Windows and Linux, it's a direct upgrade.
  
  I'll check out Vesktop. Will it stream my games/desktop (I use this sporadically depending on with group of friends I'm gaming with) just fine to people using Discord? Can I still use it for quests (very rarely do I do this but the occasional game pops up on there)?

Their critic seem fair? Sure the benchmarks are a bit unfortunate for Linux because all except Cyberpunk 2077 are games not very popular and not optimized well in Proton, but they don't seem to have selected them specifically to make Linux look bad.
And the boot error... well yes those things sometimes happen, especially when you dual boot and are a Linux noob 🤷
- I didn't suggest that it was unfair. I said it was lazy and irresponsible.
  
  How? The point is to show the average windows gamer what the experience might be like to switch to Linux. They did that.

I agree, if anyone did some surface level research they would quickly find out they should buy a second ssd if they want to dual boot Linux.
- they should buy a second ssd if they want to dual boot Linux
  It's actually not necessary, I've been dual-booting on the same system drive for years without any issues at all.
  The only thing that's strictly necessary in that case is knowing darn well what you're doing.
- I don't necessarily expect them to research everything, I just expect them to figure out what happened before reporting it to the public.

Linux should work out of the box. Besides installing drivers no effort should be required. Especially with stuff like Bazzite which has all gaming stuff preinstalled.
This is a great and much needed video to show an actual user experience.

Its fine reporting IMO. We had so many switching to linux Ws this year it was about time someone had a subpar experience.

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