Please support linux, windows sucks
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D2R with RotW is on Steam. It works perfectly. They are not going to go the full distance to create a Linux Native 64-bit Vulkan game client and provide support for it. M$ owns Bli$$ard. Just:
- run your favorite Linux distro
- install Steam
- install ProtonUp-Qt
- install Feral gamemode
- install which ever latest GE-Proton versions into Steam using ProtonUp-Qt
- Buy the game on Steam, install it, set it to use the GE-Proton version you installed, launch it, enjoy all the fun.
If you prefer to NOT buy the game at $40 US on Steam, then after installing Feral gamemode above:
- install WINE
- install Lutris (
www.lutris.net) - use the Lutris installer for D2R (
https://lutris.net/games/diablo-2-ressurected/) - use the launcher entry in Lutris which starts the B Net launcher
- install D2R via the B Net launcher and press the play button when it completes, enjoy the fun
Be aware that if go the Lutris route, there is a chance that the B Net launcher might suffer a minor seizure, when Bli$$ pushes out an update to it. Its mostly a minor annoyance, that requires a few mins of troubleshooting usually. The Steam route does not suffer this problem because it does not rely on the B Net launcher.
Please do NOT get your hopes up or hold your breath thinking that Bli$$ard or M$ is going to support Linux with native ports. Don’t wish for M$ to drag all their slop and bloatware over to your lean and clean Linux installation. Let that crap stay on Win-11.
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You can also just add the bnet launcher to steam and start with proton. You can install all blizzard games from there and it works very well
Yes, you are correct. One can add the B Net launcher executable to Steam as a non-Steam game but you have less control over where the B Net launcher is installed. I don’t install games within my user home folder. It will just eat up massive amounts of space on the “/home” partition, and my user home folder is on a mechanical drive. I install games to a partition on a NVMe SSD. I have the following setup:
- ext4 partition for all game file installs on linux (Steam and Lutris)
- ext4 partition for /home
- ext4 partition for linux root
- NTFS partition for backups of my Saved Game folder
I then mount the following:
- Linux game files partition => /mnt/linux_gaming
- Steam Linux games ==> /mnt/linux_gaming/steam
- Lutris games ==> /mnt/linux_gaming/lutris
- Saved Games backups ==> /mnt/gaming_backups
If I add the B Net launcher to Steam as a non-steam game then it will be dumped within “/home/james”. If I install the B Net Launcher through Lutris then it ends up where I want it. The above setup allows me to nuke the Linux root through a fresh or reinstall of the OS. I can scoop out anything of importance from my user home folder prior to reinstall (a handful of scripts). Post OS install I can just:
- setup the mounts under /mnt
- reinstall Steam, WINE, Lutris
- point Steam and Lutris to my desired directories and my games don’t have to be reinstalled
Its about 10-14 mins from booting from a Ventoy bootable USB stick to having a fully installed and updated OS that is ready for gaming. This includes making a TimeShift snap shot. Bye-bye 4+ windows updates/reboot cycles after reinstall, then going through 11 billion settings to adjust/disable on Windows (40+ mins easy).
you can specify the path, just dont click next without reading?
On my steam deck I didn’t have to do any of that, I just installed the game on steam and clicked launch and it worked flawlessly with whatever default proton settings it had
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The last time I did the install if failed to observe my selected install destination. It could have been a bug with Steam, but it was like 4+ years ago.
You have a custom preconfigured Linux distro. on Steam Deck. It most likely has Feral gamemode by default. If you are installing the Steam version then yes it should work flawlessly. GE-Proton is a custom version of Proton made by Glorious Eggroll. His Proton version has improvement over what Valve releases. ProtonUp-Qt is nice little utility that makes installing and managing GE-Proton version easy and convenient. The Steam Deck comes with Steam preinstalled as well. Otherwise it would be an “Empty Deck”. 
just did it in november, much has changed in the past few years. Steam and Proton work very well with launchers and games now.
Still had a few issues I couldn’t sort out, so I’m not fully on linux yet, but hopefully soon.
Yeah that’s the way to go. If not on steam deck just get bazzite or smth. SteamOS is not just preconfigured, it also has a custom kernel. Gaming on the regular linux kernel is miserable
False. I game with no issues on:
- raw Arch
- EndeavourOS
- Manjaro
- Linux Mint Cinnamon, MATE, XFCE
- MX Linux
- Pop_OS
- Tuxedo OS
- Fedora
- Nobara (gaming focused)
- and several others
Have I distro hopped and tested a lot? Absolutely. Gaming distros are unnecessary. There is a marginal difference in performance between general purpose distros and gaming focused distros. In D2R RotW I’m getting 200+ FPS at 1440p resolution (native). To be clear I’m getting 200+ FPS through the Steam version of the game using GE-Proton10-30 and a few less FPS through WINE/Lutris with lutris-GE-Proton7-35 (older). If I switch to GE-Proton10-30 on Lutris I get the same FPS.
I’m on Linux Mint Cinnamon v22.3 right now ==> https://i.imgur.com/pjcQKKW.png
Proton is great but Vulkan is better. Linux 64-bit native Vulkan games are noticeably faster than through Proton. There are many games that run faster on Linux than on Win-10/11.
Valve customized the OS/kernel on Steam Deck and they should since its their product. It would be terrible to pay money for zero benefit. I’ve considered getting a Steam Deck.
Bazzite is mostly eye-candy and for turning one’s PC into a gaming console like the Xbox and PS-5. Its immutable as well which adds a layer of idiot proofing much like gaming consoles.
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give Gaben and Co. some more time and i’m sure SteamOS (and linux in general) will rival Windows out of existance 
A fresh installation of Windows is overbloated, I’ll definitely agree to that. However it is possible to debloat the installation considerably and make it very lean using NTlite. While I’m certainly a fan of Linux gaming and admire the strides that Steam has made making gaming on linux more of a reality, it’s hard to ignore the massive advantage that Windows has with overall compatibility.
Back in the XP days using a modified installer made with Nlite, I got a clean install down to using only 96 megabytes of RAM usage after boot, which a clean install with a retail disk would use around ~300 megabytes.
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cachyOS, but maybe with any arch linux distro
Folks are welcome to following your suggestion but I do NOT recommend it. Most, if not all, real debloating tools and guides will have the user significantly alter the OS. In many cases, the OS no longer performs regular Windows updates without the user having to undo those changes. Some debloaters alter the OS to the point that anti-virus software will not run. If the user needs to perform a surgical procedure to block/disable a multitude of features, then either the users needs/expectations are unrealistic, or there is something wrong the OS and its feature set. Folks are welcome to run Windows.
I don’t recommend CachyOS, especially for Linux newbies. Let me explain:
- Cachy is relatively new (first released between mid 2021 and early 2022)
- Cachy has small user base that is immature with respect to Linux knowledge and experience… this is due to hype men/women promoting the distro to Linux newbies (turning newbies into beta testers without their knowledge)
- Cachy is a fancier rendition of Manjaro Linux with the amount of convenience included into it by default
- Folks recommend that distro to others, and most have no idea what tweaks and customizations are included in the disto. Further still the recommending party has no idea if the user even needs those tweaks and customizations, or if the user even understands the consequence of choosing that distro.
- Running custom or other non-standard kernels puts the user into niche scenarios. Custom and non-standard kernels are the defaults with CachyOS.
- Solutions that work on standard kernels may not work on custom/non-standard kernels. It is way better to stick with the main group, until one is prepared to walk the unbeaten path.
- Gaming focused distros are unnecessary. They mostly save the user between 10 and 60 minutes of time post install. There are marginal performance differences between general purpose distros and gaming focused distros
- Cachy is NOT a gaming focused distro. It is a performance focused distro. However, many are repurposing the distro for gaming without realizing it.
I don’t recommend Bazzite for many of the reasons stated above.
I’m not talking about framerate. The stock kernel has significantly more input lag and audio latency. Probably not a big deal for diablo specifically but it made rhythm games unplayable to me.
But the reason I’d say bazzite really is because of ease of use. Anyone who isn’t a Linux nerd can just use it like a console (which is the whole appeal of steam os to me too, I don’t wanna do a bunch of configs and install a bunch of launchers and things just to get a game like project diva to be playable. I want it to be as plug and play as my console or Windows.
I have no experience with Rhythm games. Is this the place to go for Rhythm games ==> https://rhythm-plus.com/
The vast majority of games work well with stock kernels. Its not like we are in a use custom or real time kernel or imminent doom scenario.
To be fair I rarely ever play first person shooter games. I don’t know the details about the setups of the people playing those games thus it would be difficult for me and most folks to make generalized claims about performance or issues. The reason I say this is some folks run setups with so much bling and fluff that it bogs down performance and raises the likelihood of performance problems. Bazzite I believe comes with HuDs and overlays installed and enabled by default. These performance diagnostics utilities are not needed to play games. However, it feeds e-peen stroking and strokes the egos of FPS junkies.
I have yet to see a comprehensive, methodical analysis and comparisons between the performance of first person shooter games on Win-10, Win-11, general purpose Linux distros with stock kernels and Mesa drivers (Mint, Pop, Ubuntu, raw Arch, Endeavour OS, Fedora, Manjaro, MX Linux and others), and gaming focused distros (Bazzite, CachyOS, Nobara, Chimera OS, etc). This needs to be done with the last 2 or 3 generations of AMD and Nvidia GPUs. What I’m describing is not a simple test because special instruments may be needed to identify and measure input lag, audio lag, stuttering, other visual anomalies, and potentially other issues. This is also not a low cost endeavor. So while some are reporting issues with first person shooter games, it remains somewhat anecdotal because of what I stated above.
The overload of convenience to the point of bloat is precisely the problem I have with distros like Bazzite/CachyOS and those that try to push that toward newbies. Most Windows gamers have limited PC and Windows knowledge. They arrive on the Linux shores as Linux newbies in an ignorant state (lacking Linux knowledge and experience). Someone promotes Bazzite/CachyOS to the newbies touting, convenience/ease of use, speed, windows/console/steam deck like experience on a desktop. Once they see Bazzite/CachyOS and all the bling/eye candy most of them are sold. They install the OS and go from OS install to gaming in under 15 mins. The newbie’s Linux ignorance is preserved. They have no desire to move beyond the point in which they started. The newbie is stuck at square zero in their Linux journey and are almost completely dependent on the community to solve any problems they encounter. There will be issues on any OS (Bazzite, CachyOS, Win-10/11, etc).
The most important thing at the start of one’s Linux journey is to gain experience with using, managing, customizing, and maintaining a Linux system. This of course includes using the apps. one wants/needs.
Ignorance + convenience is a trap and promotes dependence on others. One need not be a Linux/computer nerd (aka expert) to use Linux, but moving beyond the default ignorant state is critically important. Most of those coming from Windows have no idea that they were already in a trap. This issue of ignorance + convenience is a layered/multifaceted. We have morons trying to capitalize on said ignorance like the “Toasty Bros”. They put out a migrating to Linux video on youtube using 2 identical computers and the video becomes a grand demonstration of ignorance, and the blind attempting to lead the blind, while trying to grift (paid sponsorship). The 2 clowns had no idea why the performance was bad, when there was a setting right in their faces showing Vsync was locked at 60hz. Of course they do a terrible editing job of trying to cover up their F up, making it even worse. Its like child who eats the chocolate chip cookies, denies doing so, but has chocolate smeered all over their face, hands, and clothing. The ignorant in the audience are easily fooled/manipulated and will end up with a skewed/tainted view of Linux. What distro did the Toasty Bros use in their demonstration? Bazzite. Worse than a tainted view, the clowns had 2 identical PCs to work with. A newbie with only 1 PC, who watched that video, could try to follow the Toasty Bros and screw up so bad that they have no way of getting any OS installed and booted on their PC. No knowledge, no preparation, no bootable OS, no support, and seemingly no way out. Once a newbie falls into the above trap and is stuck. They aren’t trying to reinstall Linux, they are going right back to Windows. They aren’t coming back to Linux and worse they are going share their terrible experience with everyone they come in contact with, thus tainting the view of folks before they even try Linux. The negative rep. is permanent.
This is the video ==> https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=MJFY60eRHvk. There is a much longer detailed critique of this video with time point references and explanations.
Mint has been the undisputed champ of newbie friendliness and convenience, but it does not pre-install Steam, WINE, Lutris, ROM/console emulators, HuDs and overlays, and doesn’t alter the desktop UI to mimic nearly every aspect of a gaming console. Bazzite does the above by default. Newbies have no understanding of the interaction between the software packages. Therefore less is better then bling and bloat piled on. I’m not against having some bling and eye-candy on the desktop, nor am I minimalist. A balance needs to be achieved between running bling, performance, and maintenance. Again, there is no need not be a PC/Linux expert or aspire to be one, to use Linux. Building healthy habits at the start is way less painful than some might imagine. One typically doesn’t have to tinker with a bunch of configs and launchers, unless they are using a distro such as raw Arch.
As I stated earlier, its about 10-14 mins from booting from a Ventoy bootable USB stick to having a fully installed and updated OS that is ready for gaming. This includes making a TimeShift snap shot. Healthy habits include:
- putting one’s personal data/documents outside of one’s user home folder (so as to not balloon said folder)
- regular data backups (personal data/documents/saved games)
- regular OS backups before running updates
- having a reinstall plan
- documenting one’s customizations
- having an OS recovery plan, which might involve chroot
- being involved in the Linux community
- knowing some basic Linux commands
- knowing where to go for accurate and reliable info. (don’t depend on Ai chat bots)
Trust me. The above is surface level, basic stuff that requires very little effort, and won’t prohibit one from gaming.
I know it’s hard to grasp for the 0815 Linux nerd, but not everybody wants to dedicate his life to his pc/OS. Most people just use it for the preferred application to run. Either gaming office or other entertainment is the goal, not diving deep into the OS.
That’s why Linux isn’t popular on desktops for end users.
most long term versions of the best linux distros are easier to install… ubuntu for example… they are also much easier to add and manage programs… also, it can be converted to server instantly… linux does have a desktop now… people do not know this… tech people cannot live without linux
they also come with zero cost that’s all users see
everybody make their choice… the alternative cost a license for every component
: )
Windows costs less than 100$ for your lifetime and often comes with most offered notebooks anyway. I strongly believe that most people won’t care about that as long as they have something that just works and they don’t have to care about it much.
I also don’t advocate for any distro or for windows, but I have to deal with endusers on a daily basis, even if just through some proxies, but it’s delusional to think that most people try linux because they want to optimise or learn more about their computer/OS. They try it because they don’t have the money to buy a windows 11 compatible computer and got scared by the media about windows 10 EOL. Most people just want a device that works and they don’t have to maintain it. That’s why consoles are popular. No fiddling around, occasional automatic update is already annoying, but they don’t have to deal with it. It just works. If they buy a game for it, it just works. The biggest issue to a console user is that they have to delete a game because they run out of space. If a linux distro offers to set up everything for those people and they can just install the game from steam or where ever, they will use it. If they have to do a lot of configs and install dependencies manually, they will just quit and use something else.
That’s why those gaming distros are popular. You install them, you install your game and in most cases it just works. People don’t think about broken updates until they have that issue and usually they have a “friend” that will reinstall it or fix it.
Windows has many issues, but most of the times it just works for people, that’s why they never thought about switching to linux anyway.
well the office is an extra cost, the mail maybe
plus, if you want to run any major program you need to buy it or you will be using it illegaly
if you are a programmer or an IT person, it is not even a debate…
and ofc, above all, this commercial logic is not open and inclusive, it is not of the same quality and ethos as the one of linux, FSF, research, etc…