For those of us gamers out there who have attempted Linux and were disappointed by the lack of games, the times are now changing. I used Windows for years, with some occasional attempts at using Linux but each time I was unimpressed and removed it. I tried Mandrake (now Mandriva), Fedora Core, and even Gentoo for some strange reason. None of these really worked well for me. Mandrake had bugs (the sound didn't work) and Fedora Core's package system didn't work properly in that it would crash all the time. And don't get started on dependency issues, or compiling things.

        Those days had to end. There is no reason that if somebody wants to use Linux they should have to know the details on how everything works, or how to compile things. The learning curve (or should I say "learning cliff") of Linux was it's main reason that it was being held back.

        Those days are coming to an end. The Ubuntu distribution has made leaps and bounds in terms of usability and is now easy enough for anybody to use. There are still some issues with various programs for it such as OpenOffice.org or the GIMP which are still nowhere near their closed-source equivalents in terms of usability, but for the most part the system is very user-friendly.

        But what about for gaming? The majority of games are written for Windows, and although there are a large number of open-source games available, none of them quite compare to the modern commercial games. With the rare exceptions of games like Neverwinter Nights or Doom 3, most games do not have a Linux version.

        There are some programs that you can install that allow you to run Windows programs under Linux. There are two of these that are popular: Cedega and wine. Cedega is supposedly the best program to run Windows games, however from my personal experience it doesn't work all that well and is not worth the cost (yes, it is a Linux program that is not free). Wine on the other hand is free, and works surprisingly well. Once wine was a nightmare to install only to have simple programs like Notepad work, today it is a breeze. In Ubuntu (both 32-bit and 64-bit), you can use the Wine package repository to have it up and running in no time. They provide updates nearly every two weeks, which fix bugs and add support for new games - it was nice to one day start up a game and realize that one of the bugs was gone.

        The games that I have working perfectly under Wine are mostly older ones, such as Diablo II, Warcraft 3, Battlefield 1942 and Pharaoh. Half-life and its mods mostly work, there are a few glitches here and there. Starcraft works perfectly except for Battle.net and since that is a key feature of the game, it is deemed unplayable (you'd think they'd have gotten this one working by now). However I've tried to install Rise of Nations, Dungeon Siege and Rome: Total War and none of these worked. Dungeon Siege installed fine, but when the game was actually running the performance was so bad that it was unplayable.

        Although the gaming scene here is rather dismal still, this does not mean that things will not change soon. The speed at which the open-source world moves once they get their sights set on something is amazing. I would not be surprised more and more Windows games working fine as time goes by. In conclusion, I would not completely recommend Ubuntu as a gaming platform if you are a cutting-edge, hardcore gamer, but for those of us who still like to play the older ones then it is an excellent platform to use.