They absolutely didn’t work. I didn’t try removing the compatibility files afaik, but switching versions should basically have had the same result as that did trigger an first-time setup each time. The Ubisoft installer wasn’t part of that install for as far as I could see, or failed for each proton version without any visible signs.

Understood, my bad for assuming! It sounds like you had some really bad luck, as I couldn’t find users with the same issues on ProtonDB.

The problem here is mostly that the information offered on various locations differs and it is a question of trial and error to find out what works and what not, especially if you’re still figuring out the gaming ecosystem.

I definitely agree that this is a big issue. ProtonDB is generally the best source, and besides that a lot of the best resources are unfortunately in difficult to search Discords. I would love to see a more organized resource for this kinda stuff. This issue extends beyond gaming on Linux, too. Looking up any Linux issues results in a ton of super outdated or just bad info.

It was Linux Mint, on an Nvidia Prime-based laptop.

Linux Mint is a great distro, but one that I personally recommend against for gaming. People recommending distros that aren’t great for some use cases is also a problem with Linux gaming. Mint’s stability means using outdated Nvidia drivers, something that I would absolutely try to avoid.

I already saw somebody else mentioning Bazzite, so my next attempt will be to try that distribution.

I do love Bazzite, it is easily the distro I recommend most to users trying Linux for gaming. The only warning I have is that if you use hardware that needs kernel drivers that aren’t upstream, and they aren’t packaged by Bazzite, you will probably run into trouble. I wanted to use a steering wheel that needed a custom driver and just had to give up on getting it working. The only solutions seemed to require a ton of knowledge about ublue and all the containerization technology they use. It’s not my main distro, so I really didn’t feel like dedicating the time to learning all that.

However, that’s the only issue I’ve ever run into with Bazzite, and otherwise it is super user-friendly and Just Works™.

Steam is supposed to handle installing the Ubisoft launcher during the first-time setup, it sounds like for whatever reason it failed to do that. It’s very likely that verifying the game files would’ve fixed the issue easily, as it re-runs the first time setup. If that didn’t work, deleting the compatibility files would probably have been the next step. I’d be very surprised if one of these didn’t fix it.

The rest of the troubleshooting steps you took until the GPU stuff were unnecessary, as they were basically Windows troubleshooting steps, not Linux ones. It’s completely expected to have to relearn how to troubleshoot stuff on a different OS and I’d really recommend asking in a Linux gaming community when you run into issues like that, until you’ve gotten the troubleshooting steps down.

Install Ubi launcher using method ‘add installer as game, set compatibility layer, install and change executable for application executable’ … Install Lutris and install Ubi launcher through that

Wine/Proton games are run in their own individual “prefixes”, which are essentially individual Windows instances. Both of these steps just installed Ubisoft launcher in a different instance. This would be a fine fix on Windows, but this is a different OS. The correct fix isn’t necessarily harder either, just different.

Install Protontricks through Flatpack instead of system package, as the Flatpack version is slightly newer. Accept that this will result in a much larger installation due to not using system-provided libraries.

“much larger” is relative, software is pretty small in general, especially compared to any modern games. It’s really not much space, and the flatpak runtimes will be reused for other flatpaks you install.

As much as I want to like it, this experience makes me feel that Linux is not fully ready for the masses yet.

I don’t even entirely disagree, but also don’t think the issues you faced completely demonstrate that. The Ubisoft installation issue was most likely a Steam client bug. First-time installations failing is 100% something that has happened on Windows, that’s why verifying game files is often the first recommended step when troubleshooting a game. Most distros that get recommended now have features to easily install Nvidia drivers. My personal recommendation for gaming, Bazzite, has an Nvidia ISO, which would’ve had them set up from the beginning.

Do you mind sharing what distro you were using? It sounds like whatever it is has bad instructions for setting up Nvidia drivers, I’d like to avoid recommending it.

Edit: Just read this back and wanted to add that I wasn’t trying to be rude or condescending at any point, or blaming you for the issues. I don’t think gaming on Linux is difficult, but I think people do need to do a better job preparing new users when they recommend it. It isn’t, and never will or even should be, the exact same as Windows. You have to learn the differences to be able to troubleshoot effectively, which just takes some time. Nobody knows how to troubleshoot correctly the first time they use Windows either.

Neat, I haven’t tried the Jitsi integration so I wasn’t aware it had persistent rooms. That’s the main thing I need to exist, I’ll have to give it a try. Although, I do still greatly prefer the format of servers and channels, rather than spaces and rooms.

Channels that function similar to discords? You can start a voice call in a room or create voice calls, but those function pretty differently from Discord voice channels.

I love Matrix but it really isnt a good discord replacement. It’s much closer to Telegram or Lemmy. It doesnt even have voice channels, the main reason everyone I know uses Discord. I hope we do get a proper decentralized discord alternative at some point.

Ive seen a staggering amount of students who relied entirely on AI fail out of the masters program I’m in. Cheating only gets you so far.

I’ve met many neurodivergent trans puppygirls in the FOSS world, but the job history is definitely weird.

Yes, as long as you’re using Wayland. It will be the default on most popular distros that use GNOME or KDE.

there is no server component running

What the hell are you talking about? Just look at the Dockerfile.

CMD [“node”, “server.js”]

You think that line isn’t running a server?

Thr repo makes it very obvious that it runs a server that the webgui connects to. Its fine if you dont know shit but dont be a dick while being stupid.

Yep, didnt make a single sensible point. Just anecdotes and irrelevant examples. I’m bad at ignoring an argument so I went and blocked lol

That’s not what a false equivalency is, but ok.

FOSS has this reputation among most people.

Most people don’t have any clue what FOSS is. They just want software, and if its free and works, they’ll like it.

I am genuinely curious why you think people pay money for worse software though…

I provided two reasons in my post. Superior marketing and professional support.

That was my entire point. The person I was originally replying to seemed to suggest exactly that.

Ok, but thats not what you went on to say.

You are not arguing in good faith, I don’t care to continue going in circles.

How is that false equivalency? Comparing fdroid to the play store is about as close as you can get.

Like I said, there is bad FOSS software, but that doesnt make it generally false. People pay for software that doesnt have a good free alternative, they pay for support, and often they will pay to use software that has good marketing because they are simply unaware of the alternatives.

I’m not saying all FOSS software is great, but lots of software does have great FOSS options, for example, Firefox, Blender, and Bevy. Obviously there are also examples of proprietary software without a great alternative, like Photoshop. I like FOSS, but I don’t avoid proprietary solutions that do a better job. Believe it or not, I still end up using mostly FOSS software.

You’re not backing your points up with any actual reasoning or examples while also being condescending about it.

You can also go on the play store and find a huge list of proprietary apps that haven’t been updated.

You need some actual stats to back up this point. Plenty of proprietary software is unsuccessful because it fails to profit, so its shut down. At least FOSS software will continue as long as someone finds it useful enough to keep it going. Plus the obvious, that if you like a piece of software you can maintain it yourself.

Also saying that FOSS software is “notoriously low quality” is silly. There’s tons of great and important FOSS software and plenty of shit FOSS software, just like proprietary software. Your comments just ignore how much proprietary shovelware exists.

That comment about their security updates is a couple of months old. Zen has made significant changes to how they handle releases to stay up to date with Firefox, some of which were mentioned in the thread.

The Nix package is functional. Nixpkgs sometimes chooses not to add beta software that is receiving very frequent updates, especially if the package takes a lot of resources to build. In those cases, it makes more sense for the package to be maintained outside Nixpkgs for the time being. NixOS users can get Zen from this Flake, which patches the official binary. COSMIC Desktop is another example of this.

Pages not looking sharp sounds like it’s probably a font or scaling issue.