Here's a potentially unpopular opinion... Games that target the Proton API are actually native Linux games. Proton isn't virtualization or emulation, it's just an API that happens to be mostly compatible on both Windows and Linux. Other than the kernel itself, Linux has never had one true API to do anything... there's always more than one option to target (as you note with your Wayland/x11 example, but also pulse, alsa, pipewire, the list is endless). Proton is an API that's available on Linux, and programs that target the Proton API are Linux programs in every way that matters.

The question isn't native vs proton. The question is whether proton is a good API. At the moment, it's an API that offers pretty good cross platform compatibility with windows, which is hugely valuable to developers and they're using Proton for that reason and even testing against it. That's good for us as users and for gaming on Linux.

If Windows evolves their versions of the proton APIs in ways that break compatibility and are difficult to fix, we may find that game devs complain on our behalf to avoid breaking their Linux builds. If Proton begins to suck compared to alternatives, and enough people are playing games on Linux with Proton, devs will organically start to look at other porting options more seriously. But Proton is both a way to kickstart the chicken/egg problem, and itself may just actually be a good API to develop Linux games against.

I have seen native versions tank as the default distro setups change over the years. As weird as it sounds it feels more reliable to use the windows version under proton/wine. Often game modding communities stick to the windows version.

Once M$ inevitably introduces Windows Cloud with subscriptions and the lowest tier being ad supported with anti-adblock and a registration fee, then Linux will become the preferred experience native or otherwise.

For the time being though wine and proton are good enough. I have been doing all my gaming on the steam deck and there haven't been any games that make me feel like it's a lesser experience in any way. The few games I have any difficulty running tend to be shitty games with micro transactions and kernel anticheat that doesn't even prevent cheaters. Several can be made to work anyways. You can even install poorly made games and mods using the case folding toggle in ext4 that steam deck does have access to.

I am admittedly still waiting for someone to tell me that Wayland incompatibilities are a thing of the past...

Proton is great but it has killed native ports.

At the same time some native ports are old enough to not work as well as proton (XCOM EU) so this might be better? Mixed feelings.

right now i’d rather devs focus on making proton-friendly games than native linux builds. mirroring your experience, i can think of several native ports that were completely non-functional while proton ran them with no problem.

anecdotally, i’ve personally had some games run better on linux with proton than they did on the same system in native windows. i’m unsure if this is due to regular windows background bloat eating too many resources, or if linux just does a better job of multithreading. average cpu usage per core is very nominal, whereas on windows 1 or 2 cores are frequently seeing spikes in the 80-90% when i’m just browsing.

I don't think native Linux games are necessary anymore. It's the antycheat stuff that is the hurdle for now... not technical of course... it's political.

Team Fortress 2 runs sweet native linux just got an udate too ;) The steam deck accelerated the development of proton so much, if they released another linux based product it would probably encourage more native games or at least better support with proton.

The only native games I've tried are Ark: Survival Evolved, Hollow Knight, Slay the Spire, and Borderlands 2, and they all played flawlessly.

I started to look at wine/Proton as just another linux runtime. At least now game devs have sth (mostly) stable and backwards compatible that they can target. It is really important since in Linux world, things are much more prone to experience breaking changes. Also the fact that game devs just need to develop one version for both Linux and Windows makes it super easy to target proton - you even don't need to have a separate build process. Hence we get a more 'refined' version than just half-assed port made by a small team or third-party.

So I'm quite happy with how things are now. It just shows how flexible and capable Linux really is. And who knows maybe in the distant utopian future, Linux (or sth based on it similar to chomebooks, but maybe not as gimped) will pick up market and we will have much more "native" runtime.

Yeah I'm happy with whatever works and performs best. If that means a proton version that plays nicely in Linux I'm all for it, and if it's a native version that will be supported and/or improve across many years of releases, even better.

I used to be really big on native games but honestly my experience with Proton have been pretty positive

Tbh.. I cant even tell. When it works, it works perfectly. Proton is just that good in my experience

At this point, the only way I see a game being native is with it being an AppImage or equivalent. The resources to keep up a Windows flavor along a native port would be wasteful. The only thing I would like to see is companies stop using launchers and kernel based anti-cheat systems.

I tend to avoid linux native, although i do give it a go when possible to see if it doesn't suck(which it usually does.)

Usually you get a much more uniform and smooth experience with wine or proton. Which makes sense given how there are a ridiculous amount of distros out there.