Tips & Tricks for Gaming on Linux

Get Wine.

The Windows-to-Linux compatibility layer, not the beverage. Like most things on Linux, it's free and open source. Fortunately, it's not too fussy to use. Once it's been installed (be sure to follow the installer guide!), right click on the .exe application you would like to use, and in the bottom bar that allows you to set a custom command, type "wine" in all lowercase. Click "Okay," and it should now appear as an option in the list.

This will work for the majority of games, with very few exceptions. Notably, the only games that I've seen that don't seem compatible are RPGMaker games (which hang on "Now Loading" upon starting them), and the music in games made using Wolf RPG Editor, which seems to be completely disabled for some reason. Everything else, though, seems to be completely functional, including Unreal Engine and Unity games. It's worth noting, though, that custom game engines may not function properly, and unfortunately I haven't been able to try any games made with Godot.

This is usually my step-one for people who are getting into gaming on Linux from Windows. This lets ~80% of their games work right away on their new system, which is great. No reset save files, no tediously redownloading things, it's the perfect situation.

If Wine Doesn't Work...

Try using Steam's Proton compatibility layer instead. Unfortunately, unlike Wine, Proton is proprietary, and I don't believe Valve packages it on its own. All this means is that you'll need to make a Steam account in order to use it. It's free, and you don't need to make any purchases to use Proton, but I can understand that needing to do this would rub some people the wrong way, and it is sort of inconvenient. Unfortunately, I haven't found a better solution if you want to stay entirely in Linux.

To use Proton with non-Steam games, log into your account, and navigate to your library. In the bottom left, there should be a plus (+) icon, with text that reads "Add a Game." Clicking it will pop up a little menu, choose "Add a Non-Steam Game..." and pick your game out from the list. If it's not there, click "Browse" and navigate to your game's .exe file. After selecting it, it should appear in the list. If you try to run the game at this point, you'll see that it still probably doesn't work. This is normal and expected. Go to "Manage" (the little gear icon) -> Properties -> Compatibility, checkmark "Force the use of a specific Steam Play compatibility tool," and finally choose the latest version of Proton (as of writing, Proton 10.0-3.)

In some Unity games, I've noticed that Proton can cause some graphical glitching. If this happens, and the game doesn't work in Wine for some reason, try using a different (read: older) version of Proton. Keep in mind, though, that most pre-packaged game engines (Unity, Godot, and Unreal Engine, to name a few) usually natively export to Linux systems, so there may also be a Linux-compatible version of your game available, possibly tucked away in another download link.

If all else fails...?

Just run the thing natively, ya dingus!

Okay, let me explain. Politely, this time. Technically, if you don't care about customizing Windows (which I don't--and chances are you don't either), Windows 10--and 11, but that one sucks <3--installs are basically free. Sure, it's not the most ideal solution, but it is a solution.

Dual-booting Windows is super easy, especially if you have a secondary drive to boot from; it all but guarantees compatibility with whatever you're trying to run, and if you're really committed to running this game without installing Windows to your hard drive for realsies, you can always look into Virtual Machines (but that's a bit outside the scope of this slapdash tips & tricks guide.)

You should also look into Wine/Proton improvement patches for your game, as some may be available (but not always.)

If Using Multiple Displays, Make Sure There is Exactly One Display to the Left of your Main Monitor.

This is a strange one.

Linux Mint seems to be pretty unhappy with opening certain fullscreen games on the monitor you want them to appear on. This, as far as I can tell, has to do with the way Cinnamon handles the positioning of apps relative to the displays.

This is going to get a bit technical, and it is basically just speculation, so I'll do my best to keep it simple and brief:

Linux Mint Cinnamon seems to decide where to place a fullscreen application based on how far the fullscreen application is from (0,0), which is the bottom left corner of the leftmost display. Because fullscreen applications always appear in the center of all currently-active displays, the fullscreen application will snap to the monitor to the right of the leftmost monitor. (so, in a two-monitor setup, it will exclusively appear on the right monitor unless you move it to the left one manually.)

This issue kind of goes away if you have exactly one monitor to the left of your main display. Technically, it still happens, but since the center of all displays is closest to your main monitor, it snaps to said monitor, effectively eliminating the issue.

Like I said, super weird, and it doesn't happen with all games, either.

But if you run into this issue, that's how you fix it. To be clear, you probably don't actually need a completely new monitor, you could probably just use a program of some kind to trick Linux Mint into thinking there is another monitor. This monitor doesn't even need to be active, either, it just needs to be present in the Display settings, and placed to the left of your main monitor.

UPDATE: I recently discovered Mint Fullscreen Fix by IrishBruse, which is a github repository that seems to fix this issue. It's not perfect; I noticed that the program handling the fix seems to crash after closing certain games, but otherwise it seems to be a decent solution.

Be Ready to Accept That Some Games Just Aren't Going to Work on Linux.

Unfortunately, Linux is seen as a minority in the OS market, and a lot of the big players--namely, Microsoft--have an incentive to try and muscle you into using their OS as much as they can. So things like Xbox apps, and notably Minecraft: Bedrock Edition, simply don't work on Linux. There probably are workarounds, but I highly doubt that it will be the same experience as simply booting it up and having it work.

This is less-so the developer's fault, and more to do with how locked-down Linux is (which is a good thing!!): Certain Anti-Cheat software (Kernel-Level Anti-Cheat) simply won't work on Linux. Full stop. So, some games such as Counter-Strike 2, ARK: Survival Evolved, most games in the Call of Duty and Battlefield series, to name a few, will either not allow you to connect online or will have some level of restriction applied to you.

In a perfect world, there would simply be a better, more all-encompassing solution to the problem than Kernel-Level Anti-Cheat, but, unfortunately, we're not in that perfect world. this list by Dan Alder of Levvvel seems to be a pretty good compilation of games that have Kernel-Level Anti-Cheat.