Some games also store save games into various locations, like that $HOME/.local/share/... If you want to purge really thoroughly, probably google the game name + save game location to see where it landed. Some games/companies even create folder directly in $HOME, like "$HOME/Almost Human" (Legend of Grimrock 2), or the hidden ones like "$HOME/.q3a" - although that is actually product of the linux quake3 binary from my distro repository, I didn't run any GOG provided executable, just used the installer to extract data files ... and those hidden folder in $HOME are very common to distro based packages, I see at least 3 another (.quakespasm,.toppler,.freegish)...

So basically you can find remnants of particular game anywhere, where it did bother to store something, but nothing of that should be of considerable size (hmm... that said, some games lately have quite huge save-game files), and you should be capable to track those down by file name...

You may try after uninstall something like "ls -alR ~/ | grep game_name" or "company_name" to see if there are some obvious ones.

And about Q3, one thing somewhat annoyed me, I tend to keep my GOG game installs on different disk (symbolic link from $HOME/gog) and only available to my user, but Q3 with binary from distro works in a way, that one has to install Q3 binary and game-data-packager system wide, then process the GOG installer to extract game data and create ".deb" packages with data only, and then install those again system-wide, so they land into folders like /usr/share/games/... on my main disk :/ ... I can move it afterwards and create just symlinks there, but overall I don't like this "install game into OS" way of dealing, would prefer the game data being just files somewhere in user $HOME and configuring game client where it will find it (and I'm pretty sure that's actually possible to do with Quake1 and Quake3 source ports, but all the guides I found were using the system wide packages, so I just gave up).

So YMMV, there's no universal guide how to prune any unwanted game from system in some general way.

Thank you both for the information!

Easy way to track saves, is to save something, and right away search for files which were modified in the last minute or so.

@linuxvangog: I noticed one consistent issue with GOG installers. Besides creating completely obsolete $HOME/.gnome, they also create this file:

$HOME/.config/menus/applications-merged/xdg-desktop-menu-dummy.menu

which is empty. KDE always complains about it if you run updating icons cache from the terminal:

kbuildsycoca5
kbuildsycoca5 running...
kf5.kservice.sycoca: Parse error in "/home/user/.config/menus/applications-merged/xdg-desktop-menu-dummy.menu" , line 1 , col 1 : "unexpected end of file"

Simply deleting it, fixes the issue. I suppose that file isn't even needed (besides being invalid to begin with).

I want to build my first PC, but I found Windows too expensive, so I'm thinking about Linux: how is the game compatibility situation? And which distro should I use? I hear there are discussions about Ubuntu vs Mint

Thinking Linux can be a substitute for Windows is a grave mistake.

In order to truly appreciate Linux you must be open-minded and tolerant to learning new things and breaking familiar paradigms. Linux is entirely different beast than Windows and no matter the means, The Big Switch will cost you, big time. Be ready to say "Good Bye" to your entire games library and all of the familiar software. I'm not kidding here.

True, some Linux proponents may say I'm too pessimistic and you can recoup some of your losses using WINE (+DXVK) and not all of your software is Windows-exclusive, but trust me, OK, there will be that one game you desperately want to play again but it does not work and there is no substitute (how can you even subtitute love and passion?). IMO, it is better to be prepared for the worst and find out not everything is grim, than the other way around. The "optimistic" approach will soon force you to think Linux is "lacking" compared to Windows and is a nerds' toy, unsuitable for "normal users with normal needs".

If gaming is your prime PC activity, then anything besides the Windows is not for you. It is not the matter of price! Don't do yourself a disservice. Get yourself a Windows license and be done with it.

But if you think you can handle it (and tolerate the initial shock), then sure, why not, pick your red pill. No matter the initial distro, you will have to learn the entire ecosystem and after some time of distro-hopping, you'll find out there is little difference (you can customize and install everything) and the "Ubuntu xx.yy" in the system requirements is just a formality.

It's best to start with Linux Mint or Ubuntu, or something else Ubuntu based, since those are the most widely used and supported. In particular I recommend Mint - I wrote a beginner's guide for it that you might find helpful: https://www.gog.com/forum/general/adamhms_linux_mint_beginners_guide

The situation with game compatibility isn't as bad as Alm888 suggests, but he's right you will almost certainly encounter some Windows games that will be difficult to get running or won't run at all. It is constantly getting better though, as more games get native ports & Wine+DXVK improves, but it's impossible to say when or if something will start working.

As Alm888 says you need to keep an open mind too, don't expect everything to work the same; Linux is quite different and this can be confusing & make it seem more difficult at first but once you're more familiar with how things work it isn't much different in terms of difficulty as using Windows is.

I would not recommend vanilla Ubuntu any more, as their recent push for "snap" installation preferred instead of classic deb packages is causing some new kind of technical issues (while it bring very specific advantages).

In my personal opinion it's a wrong trade-off: "snap" allows for simpler upgrades to new versions of apps (less behind the bleeding edge than package system based repositories) + and it allows to sandbox them (which I find particularly weird, as it's my desktop PC, so I indeed want all apps interoperate, the security perimeter for me is on the network card, but I generally give trust to the apps running). Also it's new technology in development, so it's far from the level of polish which classic package management brings (and that one is not perfect either).

While with classic packaging you get usually a bit dated versions of SW, but cooperating in harmony with other packages and whole OS, and it's now tens of years of work and polish in it, so there are fewer mishaps happening.

For a newcomer to linux I would probably stay with the known and tried, there will be enough to learn and enough surprises any way.

So I would probably go to Kubuntu (because I personally like KDE5 desktop) or some spin-off like Mint. Still the user base of Ubuntu (and Debian) based distros is huge, so by picking one of those you have high chance to find on internet somebody with the same issue which you will encounter, and some meaningful ways how to resolve it.

Other distributions are certainly interesting and valid choice, with some advantages here and there, but the less known the distribution is, the more experience and knowledge is expected from user to handle some situations.

Also picking up initial distro is probably no big deal... you can try other distributions in virtual machine first, and if you will find something particularly more to your taste, just reinstall the PC. You will probably switch distros over years any way naturally, as you will buy new HW and you will be curious about trying out some other one.

will echo what was mentioned above. Linux is not windows for free, you may even run into some software that will detect your OS isn't windows and refuse to run/install.

while most will argue for a Debian/Ubuntu based distro for ease of use i would ask what kind of user you are. do you like a set and forget kind of system, do you like to try new software that just came out? i would recommend you use something like Manjaro.

depending on which version of Ubuntu you end up using, you may have to reinstall your software twice a year to stay up to date or every four+ years. there is a way to get new software on Ubuntu as well but it complicates things.

Linux is not like it was 5-10 years ago. pick almost any desktop distro (not Gentoo or pure Arch) and you will be fine.

Looks like @linuxvangog is leaving / has left GOG?

https://twitter.com/hardpenguin13/status/1100015883311869952

I wouldn't worry about that, last year/two it's so low and hidden, that if it will cease to exist, maybe we will not even notice... :D

Yeah, I'm worried GOG are cutting already understaffed Linux support team.

They should start paying you and adamhm :P

Maybe it already has, and we've just not noticed? Last I heard, they were not working on the Linux version of Galaxy, and that was quite a while ago now. When was the last time anything happened on the Linux front here? I mean aside from the occasional game being released with a Linux version.

Regardless, I'm sad to hear about the departure of linuxvangog. I hope it was by choice and not due to the recent layoffs. I guess this thread will be pretty dead then. Let see how long it remains stickied.