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This list is a little old, so some of the links may not work anymore, but overall it's still a pretty solid compendium for any budget concious Linux (or Windows) gamer!
Know of a game that should be added to the list? Leave a comment below! ^_^
Also check out:
- The LibreGameWiki
- GamingOnLinux's Free Game List
- Itch.io's Free Linux Game Section
- This collection of 500+ games packaged in the portable AppImage format
- The Open-Source Game Clones Repository
- Lee Reilly's Github Games List
- The Linux Games Book
FPS
| Name | Description | Open Source? |
|---|---|---|
| CS:GO | Counter Strike: Global Offensive, the premier online FPS [Free-to-Play] | No |
| Warfork | Fork of Warsaw to continue development, Cel-shaded Quake-like online FPS | CC-SA |
| Cube 2 | Online Quake-like Arena FPS with multiple game modes & level editor | zlib |
| Assault Cube | Counterstrike-like FPS in the Cube engine | Freeware |
| Xonotic | Quake-like arena online FPS | GPL |
| FreeDoom | Open-source implemantation of Doom, best used with Chocolate Doom | Yes |
| Dystopia | Cyberpunk online class-based FPS | ??? |
| Urban Terror | Fast paced online FPS reminiscent of CS | ??? |
| OpenArena | Online arena FPS using the id tech engine | ??? |
| Fistful of Frags | Online Western FPS - Not as good as it used to be | ??? |
| Ravenfield | Singleplayer Battlefield type game | No |
| Alien Arena | Retro Sci-Fi Online FPS | ??? |
| Red Eclipse | Online FPS with parkour | SRC Available |
| ET Legacy | Wolfenstein: Enemy Territory for modern PCs | SRC Available |
| Team Fortress 2 | Class-based online FPS with many game-modes to choose from (Not suitable for weak PC) | No |
| Team Fortress 2 Classic | Sick of hats, nerfs, and other changes to TF2? Than Classic is for you! TF2 Classic is a resurrection of what the game was like in 2013, with restored gamemodes, guns, and classes | No |
| Open Fortress | A total conversion of TF2 with unique characters, weapons, gamemodes, and maps! | No |
| Aleph One | Open Source implementation for Bungie's Marathon series | GPL |
| Double Action Boogaloo | Online 3rd-person shooter with slow motion | No |
| Ultrakill Prelude | Demo for an ultra violent oldschool FPS | No |
| OpenSpades | Clone of Ace of Spades 0.75, featuring fully destructible terrain and plenty of game modes | GPL |
| Blade of Agony | Story-driven FPS inspired by WWII shooters from the 90's and early 2000's - Extremely polished and fun | SRC Available |
RPG
| Name | Description | Open Source? |
|---|---|---|
| Daggerfall Unity | TES: Daggerfall recreated in the Unity engine with tons of improvements (Download the base game from here) | ??? |
| Solarus Games | Game engine for making Zelda-like games w/ many completed games available on their website | SRC Available |
| Flare | Isometric Diablo-like action-RPG | Creative Commons |
| Dungeon Master CSB | Modern Engine for the 1987 First-person dungeon crawler | ??? |
Adventure
| Name | Description | Open Source? |
|---|---|---|
| Beneath a Steel Sky | Classic point'n'click with great art and voice talent - Available in most distro's repos | Source Available |
| ScummVM's Freeware Games | Fantastic point'n'click games here, my favorite being Dreamweb | ??? |
| Aye Fair Lady | Point'n'click combined with a musical | No |
| Heroine's Quest | Excellent Point'n'Click/RPG hybrid inspired by the Quest for Glory series from Sierra | No |
| Black Sect 2 | 1st-person dungeon mystery game where you play as a monk investigating a crypt | No |
| Space Quest II Remake | Excellent VGA remake of SQ2 with voice acting, now available for Linux! | No |
Strategy
| Name | Description | Open Source? |
|---|---|---|
| FreeCiv | Sid Meier's Civilization II Clone | GPL |
| FreeCol | Sid Meier's Colonization Clone | GPL |
| UnCiv | Civlilization 5 style empire buillder | MPL 2.0 |
| FreeOrion | Master of Orion Clone | GPL |
| OpenRA | Modern engine for C&C: Red Alert, Tiberian Sun, and Dune 2000 | GPL |
| Tanks of Freedom | Turn-based strategy, similar to Advance Wars on the GBA | MIT |
| The Battle For Wesnoth | Turn-based fantasy RPG/Strategy hybrid | GPL |
| Hedgewars | Worms Clone | GPL |
| Argentum Age | Fantasy collectable card game | GPL |
| Wyrmsun | Warcraft II-like RTS | GPL |
| 0 A.D. | Superb 3D RTS, professional grade (Not suitable for weak PC) | GPL |
| Total Annihilation Prime | Fan-made prequel to the 1999 RTS Total Annihilation | GPL |
| Zero-K | Polished RTS with multiplayer support, available on Steam | GPL |
| Warzone 2100 | RTS that has campaign, multiplayer & singleplayer skirmish modes | GPL |
| Thrive | Game about the evolution of life | GPL |
| Scorched 3D | Turn-based & real-time artillery strategy game | GPL |
| UFO2000 | X-Com-like with Multiplayer functionality | SRC Available |
| UFO: Alien Invasion | Turn-based tactical combat inspired by X-Com | SRC Available |
| OpenApoc | Open-source implementation of X-Com 3: Apocalypse | GPLv3 |
| The Fertile Crescent | RTS set during the Bronze Age in the Ancient Near East. Manage a delicate balance between food surplus and the maintenance of your army - Multiplayer mode available | No |
| TripleA | Turn-based strategy and board game engine inspired by Axis & Allies or Risk | GPL |
| Star Ruler 2 | Turn-based 4X/RTS Strategy space colonization game - This is a commercial game that was open-sourced, you must compile the game from source code to obtain it for free. Consider buying it on Steam or GOG to support the devs | MIT & CC-BY-NC |
| Beyond All Reason | Open-source remake of Total Annihilation, a Sci-fi RTS | GPL & CC-BY-SA |
Side Scroller
| Name | Description | Open Source? |
|---|---|---|
| Sealed Bite | Game-Jam platformer with nice pixel art | CC-BY-NC-ND |
| Mr. Rescue | Rescuing people from burning buildings while putting out fires | CC-BY-SA |
| Sienna | Fun runner/platformer | CC-BY-SA |
| Super Tux | Super Mario Clone - currently in need of help | GPL |
| Hurrican | 2D Platformer Shooter Inspired by Turrican - Mostly forgotten | SRC Available |
| Abuse | Commercial 2D shooter turned Public Domain | SRC Available |
| Frogatto & Friends | Platformer with great music and graphics. Available in Debian/Ubuntu repos | No |
| Commander Keen 4 | New engine for classic DOS-era platformer | GPL |
| OpenClonk | Commercial 2D Mining game turned freeware, very unique, multiplayer | ISC |
| Mari0 | Mario, but with Portals! | SRC Available |
| Cave Story | Charming platformer, one of the first big indie hits | No |
| VVVVVV | retro platformer w/ level editor | SRC Available |
| Spelunky Classic | Roguelite platformer | No |
| OpenSurge | Sonic the Hedgehog clone with Level editor | GPL |
| Lost Constellation | Travel into the frozen woods in a folktale from the world of Night In The Woods | No |
| Himno | Peaceful 2D platformer game with an infinite number of beautiful procedurally generated maps | No |
City Builder/Tycoon
| Name | Description | Open Source? |
|---|---|---|
| OpenTTD | Clone of Transport Tycoon Deluxe | GPL |
| Unknown Horizons | Village builder inspired by the Anno series | GPL |
| Widelands | Settlers clone | GPL |
| Simutrans | Transportation simulator clone with multiplayer ability | SRC Available |
| Mindustry | Factory builder / Tower Defense hybrid | GPL |
| Terra Nil | Relaxing city builder about ecosystem reconstruction | No |
| Arcane Fortune | Inspired by Civilization, SimCity and Dwarf Fortress, Arcane Fortune is a game of empire building, diplomacy, conquest, construction, and deconstruction. Whether or not you build a utopia, or a hell on earth is entirely up to you | AGPL |
MMO
| Name | Description | Open Source? |
|---|---|---|
| Ryzom | Open-source MMO with a unique world [Free-to-Play] | Affero GPL |
| Isleward | Browser-based MMO Roguelike that's moddable & open-source! | LGPL |
Roguelikes
| Name | Description | Open Source? |
|---|---|---|
| Dwarf Fortress | Famous RL that has both a City-builder/management sim mode, as well as a more traditional RL experience in adventurer mode (you can even visit the ruins of fortresses you've built in the sim mode) | No |
| Roguebox Adventures | Graphical RL with focus on survival | GPL |
| Cataclysm: Dark Days Ahead | Unique zombie survival RL that's quite thrilling to play | CC BY-SA |
| UnReal World | Crazy In-depth survival-sim RL based in iron age Finland | No |
| Dungeon Crawl Soup | Fairly standard RL to find the Orb of Zot | No |
| NetHack | Dungeon crawler RL continually updated since 1987 | N-GPL |
| Brogue | RL distilled to fundamentals, terminal-like UI | No? |
| Tales of Maj'Eyal (ToME) | Very polished graphical-heavy RL/RPG | GPL |
| ASCII Sector | Excellent RL Demake of Wing Commander Privateer | No |
| ADOM (Ancient Domains of Mystery) | Extremely polished graphical RL with multiplayer | No |
| DoomRL | DOOM, but as a Roguelike! | No |
| Sil & Angband | Tolkien Roguelikes | SRC Available |
| Pixel Dungeon | RL with a nice pixel-art | GPL |
| HyperRogue | RL built on a mathematically rigorous hyperbolic surface, with an infinite and space-bending world | GPL |
| Basingstoke | Uniquely free to Linux users only. A tense roguelike that mixes stealth and arcade action. Explore the smouldering ruins of apocalyptic Basingstoke, UK, a world of extreme peril where reanimated undead and ferocious alien monsters roam! | No? |
Space Sim/Trader
| Name | Description | Open Source? |
|---|---|---|
| Ur-Quan Masters | Updated version of Star Control II. Be sure to get the Voice Pack! (Alternative HD version available here) | SRC Available |
| Endless Sky | 2D space trading/combat game similar to Escape Velocity | GPL |
| Oolite | Elite remake, huge mod support | SRC Available |
| Pioneer | Frontier: Elite II Remake | GPL & CC BY-SA |
| Naev | Space exploration, trade and combat | ??? |
| Race Into Space | Re-implementation of 1989's Liftoff! | GPL |
Puzzle
| Name | Description | Open Source? |
|---|---|---|
| FloboPuyo | PuyoPuyo Clone | SRC Available |
| Frozen Bubble | Puzzle Bobble Clone with level editor & multiplayer | GPL |
| Duck Marines | Chu Chu Rocket Clone | Multi-License |
| Pingus | Lemmings Clone | SRC Available |
| Portable Puzzle Collection | 39 Old-school puzzle games | MIT |
| Blockout2 | 3D Tetris-like Game | GPL |
| Enigma | Inspired by Oxyd on the Atari ST and Rock'n'Roll on the Amiga - The object of the game is to find uncover pairs of identically colored Oxyd stones | GPL |
| Lix | Action-puzzle game inspired by Lemmings with over 700 levels, multiplayer, and a level editor | CC0 Public Domain |
Arcade / 2D
| Name | Description | Open Source? |
|---|---|---|
| AstroMenace | Hardcore 3D space scroll-shooter with spaceship upgrade possibilities | GPL |
| Leapoundary | Arcade-y Puzzle Shooter | SRC Available |
| SSVOpenHexagon | Super Hexagon Clone | AFL |
| LBreakout2 | Breakout Clone | Source Available |
| Witch Blast | Binding of Isaac Clone | GPL |
| TeeWorlds | Online 2D shooter | CC BY-SA |
| OpenTyrian | Polished Shmup with excellent visuals and music | SRC Available |
| Kobo Deluxe | 8-Way space shooter | SRC Available |
| Altitude | 2D online plane combat | No |
| Liero | Real-time Worms | SRC Available |
| Frets on Fire | Guitar Hero clone | GPL |
| Eat the Whistle | Sensible Soccer Clone | GPL |
| NeverBall | Super Monkey Ball Clone | GPL |
| NeverPutt | Mini-Golf with hot-seat multiplayer | GPL |
| Shootout Inc | If Hotline Miami and SuperHot had a baby, this would be the result. Also check out Super Hotline | No |
| Hammer Dongers | 4-Player top-down party game | No |
| C-Dogs SDL | a classic overhead run-and-gun from the DOS era updated for modern systems, supports up to 4 players in co-op and deathmatch modes - Installer Downloads | GPL |
Racing
| Name | Description | Open Source? |
|---|---|---|
| SuperTuxKart | 3D Kart Racer, similar to e.g. Mario Kart | Multi-License |
| Yorg | Top-down racer in the Micro Machine's style | No |
| Speed Dreams | Realistic racing sim | SRC Available |
| Max Downforce | F1 style arcade racing game inspired by Pole Position | SRC Available |
| Sonic Robo Blast 2 Kart | Mario Kart style racer with characters from Sonic the Hedgehog | GPL |
| Pixel Wheels | Top-down 2D Racer similar to Micro Machines | CC BY-SA |
Stealth
| Name | Description | Open Source? |
|---|---|---|
| The Dark Mod | Incredible Fan-made spin-off of the Thief series using the Doom 3 Engine (Not suitable for weak PC) | GPL, BSD & CC BY-NC-SA |
Sandbox
| Name | Description | Open Source? |
|---|---|---|
| Minetest | Minecraft clone written in C++ instead of Java for better performance. Base game is purposefully lacking in features, instead relying on mods from the community to flesh out the experience | CC BY-SA |
| TrueCraft | Clean-room implementation of Minecraft 1.7.3 | MIT |
| PyCraft | 2D Terraria-like ASCII game played in the terminal | GPLv2 |
| The Powder Toy | Complete physics and material simulaton sandbox in a 2D environment | GPLv3 |
Surreal
| Name | Description | Open Source? |
|---|---|---|
| Orchids to Dust | Wandering alone on strange worlds | No |
| Off-Peak | Searching for a ticket in a head-trippy world | No |
| Emily is Away | Branching narrative in an online chat | No |
| CHYRZA | First-person flash-fiction horror story, explore a surreal desert while collecting fragments of a memoir | No |
| Dagdrom | Weird and colorful platformer thing | No |
| Naut | Explore mars in a convertible - Short little exploring game | No |
| Leive-Oma | Walk through the woods with your grandma | No |
| No Players Online | Short psychological horror | No |
| Out of The Game | The self claimed 'Inception' of video games | No |
| Sacramento | Explore a watercolor world | No |
| David Lynch Teaches Typing | It's exactly what it sounds like | No |
| A Museum of Dubious Splendors | Explore a storybook from the world of Somewhere. A visual feast for the eyes | No |
Vehicle Combat
| Name | Description | Open Source? |
|---|---|---|
| Warthunder | WWII to Cold War Multiplayer Dogfighter/Tanker/Warship Sim (Not suitable for weak PC) [Free-to-Play] | No |
MOBA
| Name | Description | Open Source? |
|---|---|---|
| Dota 2 | Valve's entry into the MOBA genre, with native Linux support [Free-to-Play] | No |
MS-DOS
| Name | Description |
|---|---|
| Archive.org | Archive.org has uploaded over 6000 MS-DOS games to their library for future preservation, all fully playable for free right in your browser! |
That seems really odd to me. I don't expect people to qualify use of the word free in a montery sense in a Linux community, I expect people to avoid using the word free in a monetary sense entirely. And it doesn't seem a little much, it seems blindingly obvious if one's goal is to communicate effectively.