That’s what I did with Fallout 4, but obviously the regular unpatched Windows game files won’t work right away since Proton has to do its magic beforehand which you can do by using the Windows files on Linux and running the game file validator. Turns out it decided to redownload half the game anyway.
MS’ unethical business strategies have started long before that, but if we’re talking usability then I have to say Windows 8.1 was surprisingly not all that terrible. Still generally the wrong direction to go in but the system didn’t actively try to commit suicide.