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JustStoppinIn89on Looking Glass: Run a Windows VM on Linux in a window with native performance

This is a non-answer. Steam is not and should not be the sole source of video games on PC. This is a workaround that doesn't even work as well as you imply.

> Just use Windows. Install games from developers directly.

See how silly that sounds to you ?

JustStoppinIn89on Looking Glass: Run a Windows VM on Linux in a window with native performance

Everything about it is fickle. Motherboards and USB controllers present themselves different from maker to maker, and SKU to SKU. Any change in your hardware -- including plugging in something like a USB device -- sets off a chain of fighting the host OS and virtual machines for who gets to use that device, who gets to see that device at all, and the drivers needed for the hardware.

No one is making user software with VFIO in mind. You will get random apps that do not launch in your virtual machine despite everything else running smoothly.

You're screwing with it near daily, certainly weekly. Need to update a driver, such as your GPU on the virtual machine? May god have mercy on your soul that everything works after, or that you can even get the host OS to deal with the GPU correctly at all.

I can sort of tell you haven't really read up on one of these setups because you seem incredulous that running Windows inside Linux is somehow finicky.

It's not ready for prime time, period.

JustStoppinIn89on Looking Glass: Run a Windows VM on Linux in a window with native performance

No, it's nothing like that at all.

It's only that if you wear a fedora unironically and have a Slashdot account with a four digit user ID.

JustStoppinIn89on Looking Glass: Run a Windows VM on Linux in a window with native performance

Not him but I'll echo the same thing. Unless I absolutely have no other choice, I'm not going back to this setup.

It's how I "gamed on Linux" for a couple years. Support is basically you and you alone. The dev for Looking Glass is active but the man isn't your personal tech assistant so often you're just doing A/B testing to make something work.

For me, I just didn't want to fiddle with my home desktop that much. I went back to Windows.

JustStoppinIn89on Looking Glass: Run a Windows VM on Linux in a window with native performance

It provides bare metal access to the entire hardware stack. So for instance you could run Linux via your integrated GPU (the one on many consumer CPUs) while passing through your dedicated GPU to the Windows VM.

This is how I "gamed on Linux" from 2018~2020 when I ran Ubuntu as my primary OS. It's incredibly finicky to set up (shocker, I know!) but if you're able to get it working it's truly amazing. Talking like 1% performance loss in AAA games in that virtual machine on the GPU.

As for me, I abandoned Ubuntu (and Linux, I did try other distros!) in early 2020. I was tired of juggling my home setup just to relax. In a move unpopular with the Slashdot crowd from 1996, I went back to Windows as my host OS.