how do you keep your lutris settings, games and save files when you distro hop? (hexbear.net)

submitted 7 months ago by blakeus12@hexbear.net to c/linux_gaming@lemmy.ml

6 comments fedilink hide all child comments

going from linux mint to fedora because i really miss gnome, and i would like to keep my data and games from lutris. 99% of my games are just gog installers running from wine and preinstalled steamunlocked games, so i doubt it'd be too hard to get it all back but to save some time i'd really rather do this. i can't find shit on google or youtube since SEO and Ai garbage has just flooded everything, and looking for anything via youtube search is just a futile mission. does anyone know how to do this process? thanks in advance, everyone have a great day!

you are viewing a single comment's thread
view the rest of the comments

[-] Awe@lemmy.ml 10 points 7 months ago

While I don't know about lutris specifically, usually the easier strategy is to have your home folder as its own partition and map the new install into your old home folder. Then, once you install your programs again (lutris), it all just maps up properly like you never changed os'.

If you wanted a smaller version of that, backup your lutris configuration and install directories and restore them (in the exact same place) on the new install.

[-] blakeus12@hexbear.net 3 points 7 months ago

ah, gotcha. thank you!

[-] Awe@lemmy.ml 4 points 7 months ago

No problem. Don't forget to try and do a test before nuking the original data, especially if you can't find a guide online!

[-] addie@feddit.uk 2 points 7 months ago

Can confirm that this does work perfectly for Lutris, for upgrades at least. I've got my home directory on an NVMe drive and my games installed on a slower disk; as long as you don't move or rename any of the partitions, it just keeps rocking along.

My laptop and desktop have a different list of games installed, but because Lutris uses SQLite as its backing store, it's not terribly easy to keep 'some parts' synchronised and others not. I've spent a bit of time getting all of the icons, banners, release dates, etc all correct and looking pretty, and it's a shame that it's tough to reuse. (Lutris does this automatically for Wine installs if you get the name 'just right' to start with, but not for all your other emulated stuff - all the DOS games and things.)

[-] bjoern_tantau@swg-empire.de 2 points 7 months ago

BTW, your home doesn't even have to be on its own partition for that. You can just as easily delete everything except home from the drive and install the new distribution. Never found one that couldn't work with that.

this post was submitted on 09 Mar 2024

14 points (93.8% liked)

Linux Gaming

15736 readers

23 users here now

Gaming on the GNU/Linux operating system.