I thought this way in the beginning, but the way gog never even built a Linux client while valve literally made Linux a viable gaming platform from proton to steam deck, I buy all my games from steam now.
this post was submitted on 19 Aug 2023
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@nieceandtows Yeah, I love GOG's DRM-free ethos and I'd love to support them, but they sure don't seem interested in supporting me.
I'd like for Steam to have good competition because monoculture is bad and competition is good for everybody. But if you're a Linux gamer, nobody else compares to Valve.
Itch.io is really the only other game store that shows anything like Valve's level of support for Linux, and it's great but it's not a Steam competitor.
True. Linux client is a must for me. Their Windows launcher is kinda crap too. It has so much focus on trying to get all your games in one launcher but it's not great as a launcher for any platform..
So, do you use Lutris instead?
I use Windows on Desktop and I use Steam Deck OS on my Steam Deck. On my Deck I usually just don't play GOG games lol
From what I've heard, the Steam version also lacks DRM. Once you've downloaded it you can close Steam and just launch the game with the exe. Obviously GOG or Steam is still handy for updates.
That’s good to know, my sons were interested in it, now we can all have a good gaming session together before they decide if they want to buy it. Sadly there is no PS5 cross play (although saves can be linked) so I am going to have to buy the PS5 version to play with friends. Still I don’t mind giving Larian some more money as the game is just fantastic, relatively bug free and even performs pretty well on the steam deck.
You should be able to add it to your steam library as a non-steam game and then in game options in Steam set up using Proton as long as you have Proton enabled for all games, not just verified games.
I recommend Heroic Games Launcher for GOG games, it's much nicer to use, IMO.
You can log into GOG through Lutris too, and install and launch games through that.
That doesn't allow you to update the game though, so it doesn't work out great for new games with frequent updates and a large download file size.
I have only used it to download older games, so I have no idea how it handles updates.
@Dubious_Fart @Raincloud I get this error when I play some games from GOG through heroic which happens on steam deck. Also, controller support is not great on gog through heroic. So, this makes me stay on steam to play games. Anyway, I hear that steam has drm free games so if BG3 and Star field are drm free then it doesn’t matter if it’s on steam or gog.
I thought Heroic was an alternative launcher for Epic Games, I guess I didn't consider that it would work for GOG games as well.
Heroic supports Epic, GoG, and now Amazon games. Supports installs, updates, file validation, and uninstalls perfectly. I think for Epic it supports cloud saves as well, but I don't use that feature and have heard horror stories from early adopters of it.
They added support for gog platform for a while now.
Plays fine for me on Arch using the wine-ge-custom AUR package on a WINEPREFIX set up with winetricks dxvk. I had a little bit more success with the _dx11 version for some odd reason.
BG3ModManager is... probably don't try it just yet.
I have it. Installed/updated using Heroic. Works perfectly. I use the latest Proton-GE with it, and run the Vulkan backend (seems to have fewer bugs for me on AMD GPU than the DX11 version).
Running the latest Mint with the 6.1 OEM kernel and kisak-mesa drivers.
My wife has it installed with Galaxy on Windows. DRM-free means we can play co-op over LAN instead of being stuck with split-screen.
The steam version is also DRM free IIRC.
Why does that make you able to play co-op over LAN?
Because she has my copy of the game installed on her PC too, so with one copy we're able to play together on two different computers instead of sharing a screen.
The lack of DRM means GoG doesn't care about whether I'm online on more than one PC. Steam does, meaning one of us would need to be in offline mode. In games that implement the Steam DRM this would mean that the person in offline mode wouldn't be able to play multiplayer.
Apparently that isn't the case with this game but I didn't realize that.
The steam version is also DRM free IIRC.
steam IS drm...
No, Steam is a store and a content delivery mechanism. It has the option to add DRM, which developers may choose to do, but don't have to. There are games which can be purchased on Steam and which can be launched without the Steam client, just like any normal program.
@schizosfera @endDRM could use your thoughts on this.
Are you being sarcastic or are you asking for assistance? Please clarify.
I bought BG3 on Steam and Divinity Original Sin 2 (previous Larian game) on GOG, running it through Lutris. They both have the same quirks, but work perfectly on Linux (Arch, GE-Proton, RTX 2060 Super with proprietary driver).
The one serious issue I've seen is flickering when the game window is not focused. Using Gamescope fixed it completely, it's a simple toggle in Lutris and a wrapper in Heroic.
I was able to run it with Lutris from GOG, Arch
Great experience with lutris.
So I installed Galaxy and run it through lutris...next I installed bg3 through Galaxy.
Now I open lutris, open Galaxy through it, launch the larian launcher and launch the game 😅
It seems an extra step, but running Galaxy through lutris works with the cloud saving and multiplayer flawlessly.
Playing without problems around 200hours now with Vulkan and dx11
Why do you do it this way instead of using the heroic launcher?
@Gnorv I don't have any problem with GoG really, it works fine. Even better than Steam, as I could see from my brother who bought it on steam