this post was submitted on 09 Apr 2024
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I'm a disabled gamer with lots of time on my hands. I'm considering dual booting Linux Mint (or something else equally easy to transition to) with Windows 10. My plan would be to entirely swap to Linux, but keep Windows for the few games that require it. However, I have some concerns.
Do I need to worry about certain niche programs I use not being Linux compatible, or do things like Wine make that irrelevant? I'm especially curious about 3rd party game/mod launchers, like GW2Launcher and XIVLauncher, or Overwolf/Curseforge.
What about Windows store apps-- is there any way to use them while in Linux? Sounds like a dumb question, but figured I'd ask just in case. This part isn't a deal breaker either way.
Thanks in advance for any replies!
Microsoft store apps don’t work in wine.
Guild wars used to work in Linux, idk about two but it seems to.
What you might consider, since you have the time, is using Linux as a main os and run windows in a vm inside it with gpu passthrough.
The idea is that you boot Linux all the time and when you need windows you “turn on” the virtual machine running it which gets direct control over a video card connected to a monitor.
It’s like having two computers with two monitors right next to each other except with only one computer.
The big benefit is that you get damn near 100% compatibility with even games that have windows only anti-cheat because… you’re running windows. It’s also nice to not make a choice to “switch” because windows is always right there when you need it!
The cons are that it takes a little time and learning to set up and you need to make sure your hardware works with it and that you have enough of it to make such a setup work (both onboard and discrete video cards, two monitors or a kvm switch, etc.).
But for a certifried gamer it’s a good move.
This isn't necessarily true - most anti-cheat programs detect VMs, and depending on the game, some may prevent you from launching the game (eg games using Vanguard), others may flag you and cause you to get kicked out of the game, or even get you banned (Battleye is pretty notorious for this, from what I hear).
Now there are some tricks you can use, such as editing the XML for your VM to mimic your host machine's SMBIOS data / vendor strings etc, but it's a bit of work and can be a hit-or-miss.
Of course, the best option would be to not support games which use invasive anti-cheat in the first place. :)
And if you're on nVidia, it can be a bit of a pain to get it all going, since you need to patch your GPU's vBIOS. You can see how much work is involved in setting it all up over here: https://gitlab.com/Mageas/single-gup-passthrough - so not for the faint-hearted. :)
cc: @JinxLuckless@beehaw.org
Thanks so much for the info, both of you!
I do in fact have Nvidia... bummer! I'm not too worried about AntiCheats that don't support Linux since that mostly seems to be for PvP-heavy games, which are not usually a thing I'm into. Ark & Rust were about the only games like that I liked, & I played on PvE servers. But I do think some MMOs use AntiCheats, right? Though for sure not GW2 or FFXIV, which are my current obsessions.
My current plan is, since support for Windows 10 is being dropped in October 2025, maybe I'll upgrade to Windows 11 so I can keep getting security updates, and then dual-boot to Linux, but have Linux as the main. Like 90% of the time I'll be in Linux Mint (or whichever one I pick), and then just swap over to Windows briefly if/when I need to.
The VM plan sounded really awesome, but I think the nVidia fix looks beyond my ability. I'm someone who can't code & only knows like 3 DOS commands, but can set up a Minecraft modpack (without changing any recipes) & upload the files to servers others run, or otherwise handle setting up mods for games in general. I'm saying all that to try and give some idea of my expertise or lack thereof. I'd consider myself a low-end power user, maybe? So given that, does this plan sound reasonable, re the dual booting & mostly swapping to Linux Mint (or whatever distro)?
Yes, I mostly agree with your conclusions. MMOs do generally employ anti-cheat, so I wouldn't attempt running them in a VM unless you want to take a risk. So dual-booting is an acceptable compromise.
The good news is though that gaming on Wine keeps improving every day. From the games you've mentioned, only Rust isn't compatible with Linux (due to EasyAntiCheat), but the others are gold rated - and GW2 is even platinum rated!
You can use ProtonDB to check the game compatibility, and the user reports are usually helpful to see if they've encountered any issues or had to employ any tweaks to get it going. But do keep an eye out on this space, as Wine/Proton keeps improving constantly, so you never know, maybe some day even Rust might work!
Edit: Actually, reading the reviews for Rust, looks like you can actually get it to work if you connect to a server that doesn't use anti-cheat!
Oh wow, nice! I especially appreciate the ProtonDB link-- I'd known about Proton, but not ProtonDB. :) And that's awesome, re GW2 especially!
I'm thinking I'm going to try Pop!OS... I was reading reviews etc. of various gaming/newbie Linux stuff on [https://itsfoss.com/](It's Foss) and they're a big fan, and Pop seems pretty readymade for gaming stuff. I plan to put it on a flash drive & test it before dual booting to it, and if I'm not a fan, Linux Mint it is! I tried that once before, years ago.