Snaps, flatpaks, docker etc… are small compressed applications that come with all the dependencies to run in a container. Their advantage is that they can run without installing all the extra dependencies on the host installation. They often suffer from random bugs such as permission errors. Along with many having questionable possibly malicious sources. The Ubuntu devs have went all in on them. Many people enable flatpak on mint to get some application that isn’t included by the package manager. What I was trying to convey is that these differences and the arguments they enable are kinda like watching two old farts at a coffee shop arguing over whether a Ford or a Chevy truck is better. In the end snaps and flatpak have some utility but are often a sore subject for some.

What matters is if you get what you want. For instance on Ubuntu you can install steam as a snap or install the actual application. Both work fairly well. You will be able to play most games by using steam and proton or by using other helper apps to install your games. The names of these are winetricks, lutris or playonlinux. Asking which one is best will often trigger arguments similar to asking what distro is the best.

I personally slowly eliminate snaps from my Ubuntu installations by compiling the applications myself. Not everyone enjoys doing that kind of thing. No matter what you choose you can usually get it working. With Ubuntu you will have quite a bit more support in the form of posted solutions and walk throughs but distros like mint are catching up a bit.