@sleve_mcdichael though most games seem to work without vfsroot available, I'm not sure it's not internally used somewhere.

If preview.bmp does not already exist in $romdir/ports/cgenius/games/[game], one will be created in ~/.CommanderGenius/games/[game] (since these are no longer linked to the same place.) If it does exist in $romdir, nothing is created in ~/.CommanderGenius.

Is this broken or legit?

I don't think it's broken.