Oh yeah the older games work great on Linux, either with drm gone as you described or a no-cd or something. The windows issues with old games I was referencing mostly stem from old graphics driver requirements (things like dgvoodoo), compatibility mode, having more CPU cores than a game can handle, etc, but I’ve found very little of those issues on Linux.

On Linux I was referring to having to run like the EA launcher, Ubisoft launcher, rockstar launcher, etc for modern games. They are so finicky and such a hassle to set up, and because they are electron apps with custom code, so basically web browsers with embedded drm. You have to get the right combination of winetricks and proton versions to make them work without issue. I don’t blame Linux at all, I blame the stupid launchers and overwhelming drm