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Linux gaming hardware/software

Background

I use Mac as my daily driver for my work and personal machines, but for gaming I use my Playstation 5 for online or supposedly AAA games (think Call of Duty or Helldivers 2) and I use my Steam Deck for more indie titles. I've got some Linux experience, primarily via my old Mac Mini running Proxmox with mostly Debian VMs and messing around briefly with NixOS.

I love our Steam Deck, but it does feel a little underpowered, the battery isn't as strong as it once was and I don't love the docking experience with the official dock.

My wife is really into Civilization and similar games and I'd love to setup a desktop connected to our TV to use with a keyboard and mouse on our LG CX. Although I'm tech savvy, I'm not great with knowing what hardware/software to get. It's especially more complicated with the looming tariffs and trying to make sure I don't overspend on something I don't need.

Question

Looking for some guidance on hardware and software to setup for this living room gaming desktop. It's only purpose is to play games, primarily from Steam and it should have hardware which would benefit speed and performance for the type of games I'm going to list. Obviously we want the graphics to be good, but I don't need a beast RTX 5090.

What are some hardware and software recommendations in today's financial climate for playing these games on Linux?

What other accessories would you recommend for couch based keyboard and mouse gaming?

Honestly the game I'm most eager to get into is Dwarf Fortress, but for my wife it's having a smooth experience with Civ6 (she was playing the Switch version for far too long!)

Games

  • Civilization games
    • My wife loves 6 and I'm a fan of 5, but we do want to eventually try 7, hoping it'll improve with DLC updates
  • Dwarf Fortress
  • Rimworld
  • Battletech
  • Into the Breach
  • Brotato
  • Vampire Survivors
  • Balatro
  • FTL
  • Caves of Qud
  • Persona 5 Royal (although I'm struggling to get into it, pushing through)
  • Blue Prince
  • ANIMAL WELL
  • Factorio
  • Return of the Obra Dinn
  • Anno 1800
  • Project Zomboid

This is a partial list of some of our libraries and wishlists. As you can see, some of them are more graphically, memory and processor intensive, but a lot of them are low performance indies.

38 comments

  • When choosing a graphics card, I've generally found AMD/Radeon to be a reliable option. I’ve used several different Radeon GPUs in various builds, and they’ve consistently performed well. Nvidia users sometimes encounter compatibility issues, though that isn't universally the case. Vulkan is a strong API and provides a good experience.

  • Listing the games isn't really helpful without specific resolution/FPS/Quality you're looking for. I'm assuming 4k/60 for living room setup? What about your budget for hardware? Also kind of a long list, can you narrow it down to the 5 or so that you play most often? A $350 Steam Deck would play all of those at minimum settings.

  • Considering you play a lot of simulation and strategy games, the CPU you pick will probably influence your experience a lot more than usual. This chart can give you an idea of how they stack.

    I will say, other than Civ7, you'll probably have a good time with whatever build people have linked here.

  • If you were planning to buy parts new and build the computer yourself, I threw together a parts list for an all-AMD system that's appropriate for Linux (I recommend Bazzite) and has a good price-to-performance ratio; $1200 to beat the pants off a Steam Deck and be very future-proof in terms of hardware features, platform support, and general performance.

    If you're thinking about buying used older-gen parts or a prebuilt system, compare gaming benchmarks of the GPU or CPU you're looking at to the components in this build to see if it's an upgrade or downgrade. This is probably the best price-to-performance prebuilt I've found in a few minutes on Amazon, couple hundred less than the parts list above, but it's on the older AM4 platform (5000-series Ryzen), an older generation GPU (6600), and much less storage.

    Lastly, obligatory mention of the last PC build guide you'll ever need. Good luck!

  • Bazzite is probably the best Linux distribution for this purpose. It's practically made for it. In terms of hardware, get an AMD GPU. Intel might also be ok, but they are pretty new so might have hidden caveats.

    CPU, whatever you can afford I guess.

    Do you have a budget?

    • Thank you for the reply!

      Yeah I've seen Bazzite come up frequently and it sounds promising, essentially it's Steam OS. I was also leaning towards AMD GPU due to the compatibility, heard the NVIDIA drivers aren't the best.

      I'm going to be irritating and say "I don't really know" as far as budget, I'd like to avoid spending $2-3k on something to play Indies. But I'm also ok with under $2k or even less for something that is fairly future proof.

      Am I right in thinking CPU/RAM are more critical for games like Civ or Dwarf Fortress? More simulation than graphics intensive tasks?

      • Just FYI: I've never had an AMD Gpu (thanks to Blender's support seeming poor) and while it j5as been spotty in the past, I've used Fedora, PopOS and Bazzite with zero Problems on NVIDIA. Drivers have come a long way in the last years.

  • If you feel most familiar with Debian, I recommend looking at Mint. It has great compatibility and is otherwise easy to use, and it handles GPUs well (including Nvidia). In terms of hardware, I'll agree with the others here--used is the way to go, you'll get a lot more for your money than buying new.

    That being said, you can also look for clearance and/or refurbished PCs. This one would probably be powerful enough.

    • Anecdotal, but Mint stuttered in games occasionally for me and I had the odd audio blip. I switched to EndeavorOS and its been flawless.

    • Thanks for the advice! I feel like I will have some flexibility with distros and can switch things out as long as game data is backed up and it works with the hardware.

      Unfortunately the Amazon link doesn’t seem to work for me. Can you give me a brief description of what it included?

      • They were trying to send this link and I'm going to strongly disagree with them - that system is a substantial downgrade from a Steam Deck. The GPU is a GT 1030; on top of being Nvidia, it's 8 years and 4 generations old and was bottom-tier when it was new.

        That said, the idea is sound. Buying an actual gaming desktop PC from a few generations ago can be a very budget-friendly option, but shipping an assembled PC is a nightmare for multiple reasons, and even more risky secondhand. If you're going to buy a used prebuilt PC, find one locally and pick it up yourself, don't have it shipped to you.

38 comments