Windows 11 LTSC vs Linux for piracy (sh.itjust.works)

submitted 8 months ago by [email protected] to c/[email protected]

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Hi,

I recently built a new gaming computer and have been contemplating about the OS.

I prefer to move away from windows given obvious reasons and do like using Linux, but my experience with my steam deck has taught me that pirating games in Linux is hit or miss.

I played around with windows LTSC and honestly, seems like windows without the bloatware.

So question is, how is game pirating on Linux (in a desktop, not steam deck).

Is it as smooth as windows or should I just say fuck it and accept that my gaming computer has to stay windows for another generation?

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[+] [email protected] 53 points 8 months ago* (last edited 1 month ago)

[deleted]

[-] [email protected] 7 points 8 months ago

Also you can run them in a container or a sandbox so a plus for linux

[-] [email protected] 3 points 8 months ago

So I tried to get a couple games working on my steam deck that didn’t work at all. I do remember trying to run thing with wine, but just gave up and installed the game on a windows computer.

So would I just google Lutris and go from there?

[-] [email protected] 9 points 8 months ago

The steam deck is kinda inconvenient when any level of tinkering is required due to switching between game and desktop mode and the input if you dont attach a keyboard and mouse. Non-deck distros lose the quick settings which I really like.

Try bottles too. you may or may not find it easier than lutris. I find the dependencies easier to install. After checking if anyone has already documented what dependencies are needed (directx, dotnet, etc.), I usually start with the default wine bottles uses, then try wine-ge and tkg at least before giving up. I have yet to find a game that cant be made to work but other software can be very finicky especially once dotnet is involved.

[-] [email protected] 3 points 8 months ago

Just to complete the trio, there is also Heroic, which is similiar to lutris but in my opinion a bit nicer to configure :)

[-] [email protected] 2 points 8 months ago

there is also Heroic, which is similiar to lutris but in my opinion a bit nicer to configure :)

Heroic defaults to an ancient version of Wine-GE. They are currently in the process to migrate to a new tech called umu-launcher which allows them to use Valve's Proton and Proton-GE directly. It's basically done, so should appear in Heroic 2.16 but if one tries Heroic today, the compatibility might be worse than Lutris or Bottles.

[-] [email protected] 3 points 8 months ago* (last edited 8 months ago)

Not sure what quick settings you mean, but have you tried Bazzite yet? I've been using it on my laptop for several months now, and it's been fantastic. Built for gaming, and it seems to already have a ton of shit set up correctly that id normally need to do myself on Arch

[-] [email protected] 2 points 8 months ago

yeah bazzite is my daily driver on desktop and deck. you can use the htpc/deck image on non-nvidia systems to get the settigs panel (fps/hz, scaling, etc changed live) but I don't want to have to switch between game and desktop mode on my desktop. I haven't had much time outside of work other than my meager amount of sleeo and doomscrolling so I haven't looked in to if the settings or overlays can be done as cleanly on desktop only images

[-] [email protected] 2 points 8 months ago* (last edited 8 months ago)

Did you try Desktop Mode on the Deck? Makes things a lot easier. Haven't had much issue with things like this with my Steam Deck, but on Linux PC, I've had none. Ever. Try Bazzite, it's built for gaming.

I would just Google, "using bottles/lutris to install game on Linux" and I imagine you could find people walking through it.

[-] [email protected] 2 points 8 months ago

Oh yeah, I really liked desktop mode.

Went a little crazy with my deck and setup things like remote play to my ps5 and a dev environment in case I wanted to do some coding on the go.

I did get some games working, but it wasn’t plug and play like windows, sounds like it just takes some tinkering which is great to hear.

[-] [email protected] 9 points 8 months ago* (last edited 8 months ago)

I used to repack games for a group in Linux pirating. Most of the time, there was no tweaking. Only the badly optimized ones like ragnarok, elden ring new dlc, etc needed some other work.

You can install games from dodi, fitgirl, online-fix, all just fine. You can also download linux repacks from jc141.

[-] [email protected] 8 points 8 months ago

How does one install pirated games (e.g. from fitgirl) on Linux?

[-] [email protected] 16 points 8 months ago

Open it with wine, no other tweaks.

[-] [email protected] 4 points 8 months ago

What others said... I think I've even run the installer as a non-steam app through Steam using proton and that worked as well. Unless I'm misremembering.

[-] [email protected] 3 points 8 months ago

I used Lutris before but I do Bottles now, fitgirl worked on both fantastic for me

[-] [email protected] 8 points 8 months ago* (last edited 8 months ago)

I still dual boot with Windows for gaming, so I can't comment on the next gaming as much, but I will say that LTSC is everything that it seems to be (or not be).

Windows without any bullshit, I used it for years.

I use windows solely for ease of gaming so I haven't bothered to replace the stock, but if you do keep using Windows, LTSC is definitely the way to go.

as far as the articles going around, Linux is catching up but is not yet as effortless less as Windows for gaming specifically.

[-] [email protected] 7 points 8 months ago

You can run the same translation layer that Steam uses for your pirated games, compatibility will be similar to what protondb reports.

[-] [email protected] 4 points 8 months ago

Once installed, I think you can often even run the exe of the pirated game through Steam as a "non-steam app" using Proton

[-] [email protected] 4 points 8 months ago

Where do you get installation media for Windows LTSC?

[-] [email protected] 11 points 8 months ago

From Microsoft. They actually provide ISO downloads for the 11 LTSC versions, so there's not really any reason to go grab some random one off totally-legit-software-and-totatlly-not-malware.com or whatever.

[-] [email protected] 8 points 8 months ago

Imagine I'm an idiot, do you have a link or description for where to find those? I looked for them some time ago and found nothing. 🥹

[-] [email protected] 8 points 8 months ago

https://www.microsoft.com/en-us/evalcenter/evaluate-windows-11-iot-enterprise-ltsc

Keep in mind, though, that you'll still have to do some activation and KMS hackery to make them usable, but you can at least use an installer that's going to be clean.

[-] [email protected] 3 points 8 months ago

Thank you!

[-] [email protected] 3 points 8 months ago

I found a torrent that had windows 11 LTSC, pre activated and with office.

When I made the bootable usb, it had options where I could just opt out of the data collection and all that so it wouldn’t even show that during install.

Pretty good experience. Feels weird to say that about a Microsoft product.

[-] [email protected] 1 points 8 months ago

Thanks!

[-] [email protected] 4 points 8 months ago

Use Bottles with the Sandbox option enabled (and sound enabled). So, native performance but without access to files outside the Wine prefix (virtual Windows folder where the game is installed) and without network access. This way, you don't have to worry about games phoning home, containing a crypto miner or ransomware.

Also, forget about FitGirl repacks on Linux, most don't unpack correctly.

[-] [email protected] 1 points 8 months ago

I just installed skyrim from fitgirl using bottles. Required no tinkering.

[-] [email protected] 1 points 8 months ago

Well, probably depends on the tools used to uncompress and compress the files. Some old releases just unpack hundreds of GB without stopping.

[-] [email protected] 3 points 8 months ago* (last edited 8 months ago)

If it's a steam pirated game and already extracted, you can just create a dummy steam account, add the executable as non-steam game and run proton from steam (I had good success with proton experimental).

Everything else should be run via Lutris + wine prefixes (or whatever windows subsystem emulator you chose).

It's fairly easy when you know what you're doing but still not as easy as you imagine on Windows itself. I would say, most game run all right? I recently played The last of us I via lutris+wine prefixes. Some fps drops and 1 crash on a 5 hour session, seems pretty reasonable.

However, lutris + wine prefixes are harder to get right depending the wine version installed and what graphic options you want, it can get frustrating specially if you don't know what game needs what windows trick (directx9, vscru2015...).

I had mostly good success rate with the staging version of wine (I think that's what proton experimental on steam is) and doing it wrong, you can go from a burning messsy non playable game to something as smooth as on Windows.

So yeah, it involves more personal implication to get it right and yes it's still harder to play pirated games on Linux than on Windows but easier than 5 years ago!