Happy birthday, Proton!
I am on Linux even longer than you and native Linux gaming was not trash at all, it worked great, just the selection of games was very small (edit: before Steam was even a thing on Linux). WINE was always a bit hit or miss, but once you got something working, it was usually ok. Sure Proton made it more convenient, but it was more of an gradual improvement than the quantum leap some people claim it to be.
Going from a miniscule library of games that could work (I remember Linux Steam back before Proton having almost nothing of note) to opening up something pretty close to the entire Windows library and running Linux on Valve/Steam’s own handheld console for their games is indeed a quantum leap. That’s what Proton has done for Linux gaming. It may have gotten there eventually just with Wine and community contributions, but it would have taken possibly quite a few years longer to get there without Proton.
I think that is very subjective to the types of games you are interested in. For me Steam before Proton had so many native (indie) games that I literally couldn’t find the time to play all of those I was interested in.
So you agree that your interpretation was very subjective, and many people didn’t have the ease that you had?
The quantum leap for linux gaming was that one guy who wanted to make nier automata work and developed dxvk.
I would probably agree to that more than for Proton, but the truth is also that DXVK’s further development was largely funded by Valve.
Yes, they just started to pay who already worked on all that stuff and had the know how. They paid CodeWeavers to work on proton, started to pay the DXVK person, I’m not sure if the D9VK fork person was paid but I think so, paid the FNA person.
Though DXVK wouldn’t be possible without Vulkan and Valve was involved in Vulkan since the beginning. They also pay people to work on linux drivers since 2014.