Does linux have compatibility problems with games?

I considered getting linux for a pc im hoping to build as oppose to Windows xp professional but was recently dissuaded by a fellow computer enthusiast (who knows rather more than me, I must admit :D). The issue was that with linux, playing computer games on the system may be difficult if not impossible, due to no directx availability. I was just wondering whether this was true because when I looked into using linux I didnt encounter anyone having troubles of this nature. Please can you tell me if this is a problem, and perhaps how it can be bypassed if I felt like reconsidering my OS.

rv13uk

Games can be a little bit of a problem with Linux. That said, there are people here far more experienced than a newbie to linux such as myself that may know ways around the issue. That said, there's nothing at all stopping you having a dual boot system with windows AND linux, linux after all being free. :)

I've never seen any systems running linux or unix that had any games worth a dang on them.... all of those systems were used for industrial work.

You'll see many of the Quake 3 engine games on linux. You'll also see the Unreal Tournament games on linux. For most others you'll have to use something like Wine/WineX/Cedega - but the good versions aren't free.

interesting. I have never come across linux or unix games. I have come across Unix systems at work that had windows 2000 running underneith inside a shell. These however, were Radar systems being used by the Army.

& certainly not the place where you would find gaming systems in the first place. ;)

We'd hope not! But you know us Army guys! :grinthumb

Games that have been made for Linux have no problems ("no problems" in theory) running under Linux.

If you have a game that has been made for Windows then it is pretty obvious that you may run into trouble trying to run it under Linux.

Guess I may as well stick with windows then...as much as I hate their practical monopoly. Thanks for the advice anyway, this site never lets me down :)

The cedega project as well as a free project called wine d3d9 strive to make playing windows games on linux a possibility.

With the latest version of Cedega (formerly winex), it is fairly simple and quite possible to play the majority of Windows games in Linux.

I routinely play games like Starcraft, Guild Wars, Morrowind and others in Linux with little issue.

Then again, I am a pure-linux guy.

never really messed with linux much. I was and old school DOS type a long time ago and really hated memorizing commands to get stuff done.

When windows came along it was great.

This is greater than windows could ever hope to be ;)

http://www.whattheboat.com/kde2.png

And that's just the plain old vanilla desktop.