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Comment by bentcorner | Hacker News Reader

Let's get some concrete facts out then - how is it better? A (selfish) practical example for myself - I play a lot of Overwatch. It works just fine in windows. I get low load times and usually maintain 177fps at full resolution. I have no complaints but I am open to switching. Am I guaranteed of seeing no issues in Linux?

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I play Overwatch on Linux. After you compile shaders (takes 2-3 minutes on a good CPU) it runs fine. Almost unnoticeable from a performance standpoint: I was getting ~120-130 frames at 1440p on my GTX 1050ti. On my new 3070ti it's so fast I don't even think about it.

This is an old benchmark, but still shows how good DXVK is for this title: https://youtu.be/voXc1nCD4IA

And yes, it still works with Overwatch 2. Did from Day 1, Blizzard must have had a Steam Deck dev kit or something.

Thanks! Were there any useful resources you used to make sure everything was configured correctly? I'm a relative Linux noob - I've used it here and there but never as my main home desktop, and most certainly never for gaming.

There's a well-maintained Lutris script[0] that's probably your most painless option. It's also possible to run it with Proton/Steam if you put in enough elbow grease, but... you've probably got better things to do. My only other advice would be to put in the work for getting Wayland to run so your framerate is as smooth as your GPU says it is.

I hope my last comment didn't come off as too hostile, it's a great time to experiment with Linux gaming now that the Deck is moving units! :)

[0] https://lutris.net/games/overwatch-2/

I suspect you already know this, but for anyone curious: for many of the big live service games, Linux/Proton is usually no substitute for Windows - anti-cheat renders them unplayable. MW2, Fortnite, Tarkov, Hunt, PUBG, Day Z and Cycle are some examples. By contrast, Apex and Halo work fine.

I do quite a lot of my gaming on the Steam Deck these days, but have to keep a windows box around for this reason.

Sort of relatedly: does anyone know how well the Unreal Engine 5 editor works on Linux?

Hunt, Dayz(as does Arma3 and Reforger), and The Cycle all work on Linux.

Ha, had no idea. You’re right, they’re Silver, Gold and Gold respectively on ProtonDB. Don’t know if that’s a recent development or what, but it’s fantastic.

Gonna install Hunt and Day Z on the Deck today so I can stare at them in the launcher and imagine how much fun I would have if I could find the time to play them.

If you care DayZ was BE enabled back in like October if my memory serves me correctly. The Cycle always supported it through Proton. Hunt recently enabled it like a month ago(finally, HMMMMing on linux is good).

No. Overwatch is not on Steam. So you would need to mess around with Wine or Proton separately. Maybe it works, but it's not a single click installation.

It's single-click if you use Lutris.

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