Linux Gaming Has Come a Long Way

Any of you longtime readers who have followed me here from Aspect of the Hare, that blog I started writing some seven years ago or so (any of you guys left? One, maybe two of you there in the back? Hi!) will remember that my operating system of choice was Linux and I was very proud of the fact that I played World of Warcraft exclusively on that system. As a matter of fact I continued to use Linux either exclusively or near-exclusively for a very long time, until probably about a year or two back when I realized that Windows 7 was actually a pretty good OS and I switched to that– largely for the ease of gaming.

Well, on a whim I decided to reinstall Linux today. The first thing I noticed is how easily Steam installs, and the second thing I noticed is that I have over 80 games in my Steam list that I can install on Linux.

Damn.

I remember when Linux gaming involved either playing copious amounts of Frozen Bubble, KSolitaire and SuperTux and then calling it good, or wrangling with Wine for hours on end. And here I am, able to play fantastic games like Europa Universalis IV, Crusader Kings II, and Awesomenauts natively on Linux! And what’s more, they run beautifully too!

Pretty much.
Pretty much.

So if any of you guys out there maybe gave Linux a shot once upon a time and then decided that it wasn’t worth the effort because you wanted to play games, now’s a good time to give it another whirl. And as far as I’m concerned, the future is only bright – now that Steam and the SteamBox are really pushing Linux gaming, things are really starting to get super exciting. Just think where we’ll be in a few more years!

Hail the penguin!

2 thoughts on “Linux Gaming Has Come a Long Way”

  1. I’m thinking of installing a Linux distro on my laptop. I want to go with Mint but many say that Ubuntu is the way to go for gaming. Which do you use?

    1. I use Kubuntu, which is a variant of Ubuntu. Honestly, Linux Mint is a variant of Ubuntu as well, so they’re very similar. Ubuntu might have the slightly larger help community… but ultimately they are both solid choices for a beginner.

Comments are closed.