I’m on Windows 10, but I like Linux. But I run many obscure indie Windows games that are often times pretty old, not in english, or has no active community. But with the recent developments from Valve with Proton (and therefore Wine), I’m interested in how my games will run nowadays, and I would like to test it out.

So I ask, is running a game on a Linux VM an accurate representation of what Wine can run, or is it very hardware dependent so using a Linux VM is not a great represenation?

Also I don’t consider dual booting or “Windows VM on Linux” as good solutions, and I want to avoid going with these solutions as much as possible, due to their inconvenience.

EDIT: I also forgot to clarify: I just want to see if these games run. In other words, seeing if they don’t crash. I’m not looking for a particular performance like “Can this game hit 60fps?”, but rather “Does this game actually work?”.

  • EranStockdaleBEnglish
    1·
    1 year ago

    No, it won’t be an accurate representation or the performance of Proton/Wine. The only way to get it to be somewhat accurate would be to do a GPU pass through, even then it would probably still be quite inaccurate.

    What I would recommend is to create a partition on your drive and install a Linux distro such as Ubuntu. I wouldn’t recommend installing it to an external drive as the speeds will be horribly slow, and I also wouldn’t recommend trying it in a live “test it out before you install” environment. Make sure you get the correct, up to date drivers for your graphics card. I know it seems obvious but I once spent three days trying to get Minecraft to stop screen tearing and lagging and my drivers were the issue.

    My final point: this is one of the most well written questions on Reddit, you thought of everything! I wish I was capable of writing such well thought out questions!