I'm pretty sure past dual boot woes and originally learning Linux, when I was confused about efi/uefi or the boot process altogether, is what's getting to me. Most of my VM use is from that time, transitioning to bare metal.
Hopefully one day we can get actual parity in niches like what you need without porting every little thing, and I know I've had devices with firmware updates requiring windows that I probably ignored. Gaming has already come so far though, so maybe there's hope!