After reading and doing some research online I've decided that it has time for me to move away from Windows due to the direction of which Microsoft has been going does not please me anymore. On multiple times I have noticed of how superior Linux was, but because I am hardcore gamer I couldn't switch. I have witnessed how games for windows are being pushed to Linux especially these few years. Now I'm ready to make some sacrifices in gaming in order to try and contribute to the open source community, granted I can't code at all (for now) but I will be reporting bugs and do what ever I can do to help. What pushed me to switch faster is that I'm in college right now in a programming course and being familiar with Linux quicker will just help me in my studies. I settled on Ubuntu as my starting out distro and I would like to ask you for any tips and short-cuts, helpful sites.
+1, learn the ropes first, you'll have to change the way you think about operating systems if you're only familiar with windows. Only install packages from the repositories, don't download & execute. In linux everything is a textfile, and everything can be easily altered, equally everything can easily be misconfigured if you don't know what your doing. You're in control now, not the OS. Setup a virtual machine for experimentation, and once you're getting the hang of things you can optimize your system for your metal and achieve wonders.
Also don't think of it as a windows replacement, all the 'noob-friendly' distros are just pre-configured environments to suit most needs out of the box, but in the end the same DIY principle applies.
For simple help you've got the ubuntu docs, and for more detailed information one option is the arch wiki, eg if you want to optimize performance, but remember it's not a step-by-step guide since you're using ubuntu, alter the directories and commands to suit your system.