distrowatch used to have this thing where you would recommend similar distro with similar themes; but i guess it disappeared for the last decade or 2; nevertheless, i would start my search there.

reading your post reminded me of myself 25 years long ago; searching google, or articles, or forums with well done informations like yours and my comment was intended for someone like the old version of me tearing his hear out trying to get something like vmware to work, when someone could have just told me that the names of a lazier version that works just as well… so i’m paying it forward. lol

Alternatively: you could just use what’s already preconfigured for your system by using kvm & qemu using nothing but simple “dnf install” commands and I recommend using virt-manager if you want a GUI like VMware

i used dillo back when i only had old, used laptops