Thank you for being the sane one.

I've recently stumbled upon a lot of people like whoever wrote the article, rampaging all over the place, going "Linux is more user-friendly than Windows", which is just an insane thing to say.

Linux is great, I love my Garuda to bits. But games are still optimised for Windows, we still need to use compatibility layers to get them running, and even though it's gotten MUCH easier these days, there's still a lot of titles that require tweaking/hacking. And some just refuse to run, period.

And then you have all the hardware compatibility issues that come with manufacturers just not supporting stuff. I can't turn my GPU's RGB off without Windows. I had to distro-hop to get the GPU drivers working correctly (it might be a "skill issue", but that just proves the point, I think). Even titles that are marked as Gold on ProtonDB sometimes crash or refuse to run randomly.

If it is not the best, we will make it the best

More people need to say that if you're going to want ring 0, I'm not going to give you my money.

If you exclusively play bootysoft games then thats where your problem lies your problem

Ubisoft isn't ready for the masses yet. Linux works just fine

Steam is supposed to handle installing the Ubisoft launcher during the first-time setup, it sounds like for whatever reason it failed to do that. It's very likely that verifying the game files would've fixed the issue easily, as it re-runs the first time setup. If that didn't work, deleting the compatibility files would probably have been the next step. I'd be very surprised if one of these didn't fix it.

The rest of the troubleshooting steps you took until the GPU stuff were unnecessary, as they were basically Windows troubleshooting steps, not Linux ones. It's completely expected to have to relearn how to troubleshoot stuff on a different OS and I'd really recommend asking in a Linux gaming community when you run into issues like that, until you've gotten the troubleshooting steps down.

Install Ubi launcher using method 'add installer as game, set compatibility layer, install and change executable for application executable' ... Install Lutris and install Ubi launcher through that

Wine/Proton games are run in their own individual "prefixes", which are essentially individual Windows instances. Both of these steps just installed Ubisoft launcher in a different instance. This would be a fine fix on Windows, but this is a different OS. The correct fix isn't necessarily harder either, just different.

Install Protontricks through Flatpack instead of system package, as the Flatpack version is slightly newer. Accept that this will result in a much larger installation due to not using system-provided libraries.

"much larger" is relative, software is pretty small in general, especially compared to any modern games. It's really not much space, and the flatpak runtimes will be reused for other flatpaks you install.

As much as I want to like it, this experience makes me feel that Linux is not fully ready for the masses yet.

I don't even entirely disagree, but also don't think the issues you faced completely demonstrate that. The Ubisoft installation issue was most likely a Steam client bug. First-time installations failing is 100% something that has happened on Windows, that's why verifying game files is often the first recommended step when troubleshooting a game. Most distros that get recommended now have features to easily install Nvidia drivers. My personal recommendation for gaming, Bazzite, has an Nvidia ISO, which would've had them set up from the beginning.

Do you mind sharing what distro you were using? It sounds like whatever it is has bad instructions for setting up Nvidia drivers, I'd like to avoid recommending it.

Edit: Just read this back and wanted to add that I wasn't trying to be rude or condescending at any point, or blaming you for the issues. I don't think gaming on Linux is difficult, but I think people do need to do a better job preparing new users when they recommend it. It isn't, and never will or even should be, the exact same as Windows. You have to learn the differences to be able to troubleshoot effectively, which just takes some time. Nobody knows how to troubleshoot correctly the first time they use Windows either.

Well, there are games you can't play on current Windows. Like I couldn't get Fahrenheit work on it at all. On Linux it worked first try no modifications.

Probably not as many as 20% of games, though.

I agree with your comment....except for the part about a small learning curve. The learning curve is steep and difficult. You've got to be willing to jump in as an enthusiast and not a casual user. This is not the choice for the vast majority of normies (as you rightly conclude). The saving grace for Linux will be pre-installed systems with extremely polished UI's (like the Steam Deck).

I'm highly motivated to stay on Linux, but there's still a list of open issues for me (this is a year and a half after adoption....I'm just living with these limitations now, and there are a couple more I've added to my list of unsolvable problems since).

The counter argument is that some games don't run on Windows anymore either. All the software, all the time is the classic disingenuous argument that is always levied against Linux. It has to do something that not even windows does anymore. Then people ignore the fact that Linux sometimes offer greater compatibility with old games than windows itself.

On the other hand, one of the major gpu manufacturer's still has terrible driver support.

Major PC GPU manufacturers and their drivers:

Major phone GPU developers and their drivers:

Anti-cheat is allowed. There are a handful of anti-cheat systems that can't work on Linux, but IIRC, they are in the minority.

@Mossheart @cm0002

If the pain is not enough to replace a headphone with a new one , you most likely aren't ready to change for linux right now. There will be more you need to learn, more which feels different and more which won't work first try or even requiere you to rethink or replace things.

Man if only Linux was open source and manufacturers could easily create drivers for it at any time...

Not sure. Usually having BlueZ(Linux bluetooth audio stack) and glue in audio server or bluez-alsa should be enough.