Gaming
This page contains information about running games and related system configuration tips.
Game environments
Different environments exist to play games in Linux:
- Native – games written for Linux.
- Web – games running in a web browser.
- HTML5 games use canvas and WebGL technologies and work in all modern browsers.
- Flash-based – you need to install the plugin to play.
- Video game platform emulators – required for running software designed for other architectures and systems.
- Wine – Windows compatibility layer, allows to run Windows applications on Unix-like operating systems.
- Virtual machines – can be used to install compatible operating systems (such as Windows). VirtualBox has good 3D support. As an extension of this, if you have compatible hardware you can consider VGA passthrough to a Windows KVM guest, keyword is "virtual function I/O" (VFIO), or PCI passthrough via OVMF.
Getting games
Just because games are available for Linux does not mean that they are native, they might be pre-packaged with Wine or DOSBox.
For list of games packaged for Arch in official repositories / the AUR see List of games.
- Flathub — Central Flatpak repository, has small but growing game section.
- GOG.com — DRM-free game store.
- https://www.gog.com || lgogdownloaderAUR, wyvernAUR
- itch.io — Indie game store.
- https://itch.io || itchAUR
- Legendary — A free and open-source replacement for the Epic Games Launcher.
- Lutris — Open gaming platform for Linux. Gets games from GOG, Steam, Battle.net, Origin, Uplay and many other sources. Lutris utilizes various runners to launch the games with fully customizable configuration options.
- Steam — Digital distribution and communications platform developed by Valve.
- Athenaeum — A libre replacement to Steam.
- https://www.dotslashplay.it/ || play.itAUR, play.it-gitAUR
Running games
Certain games or game types may need special configuration to run or to run as expected. For the most part, games will work right out of the box in Arch Linux with possibly better performance than on other distributions due to compile time optimizations. However, some special setups may require a bit of configuration or scripting to make games run as smoothly as desired.
Multi-screen setups
Running a multi-screen setup may lead to problems with fullscreen games. In such a case, running a second X server is one possible solution. Another solution may be found in the NVIDIA article (may also apply to non-NVIDIA users).
Keyboard grabbing
Many games grab the keyboard, noticeably preventing you from switching windows (also known as alt-tabbing).
Some SDL games (e.g. Guacamelee) let you disable grabbing by pressing Ctrl-g.
Starting games in a separate X server
In some cases like those mentioned above, it may be necessary or desired to run a second X server. Running a second X server has multiple advantages such as better performance, the ability to "tab" out of your game by using Ctrl+Alt+F7/Ctrl+Alt+F8, no crashing your primary X session (which may have open work on) in case a game conflicts with the graphics driver. The new X server will be akin a remote access login for the ALSA, so your user need to be part of the audio group to be able to hear any sound.
To start a second X server (using the free first person shooter game Xonotic as an example) you can simply do:
$ xinit /usr/bin/xonotic-glx -- :1 vt$XDG_VTNR
This can further be spiced up by using a separate X configuration file:
$ xinit /usr/bin/xonotic-glx -- :1 -xf86config xorg-game.conf vt$XDG_VTNR
A good reason to provide an alternative xorg.conf here may be that your primary configuration makes use of NVIDIA's Twinview which would render your 3D games like Xonotic in the middle of your multiscreen setup, spanned across all screens. This is undesirable, thus starting a second X with an alternative config where the second screen is disabled is advised. Please note, that the X config file location is relative to the /etc/X11 directory.
A game starting script making use of Openbox for your home directory or /usr/local/bin may look like this:
~/game.sh
if [ $# -ge 1 ]; then
game="$(which $1)"
openbox="$(which openbox)"
tmpgame="/tmp/tmpgame.sh"
DISPLAY=:1.0
echo -e "${openbox} &\n${game}" > ${tmpgame}
echo "starting ${game}"
xinit ${tmpgame} -- :1 -xf86config xorg-game.conf || exit 1
else
echo "not a valid argument"
fi
So after a chmod +x you would be able to use this script like:
$ ~/game.sh xonotic-glx
Adjusting mouse detections
For games that require exceptional amount of mouse skill, adjusting the mouse polling rate can help improve accuracy.
Binaural Audio with OpenAL
For games using OpenAL, if you use headphones you may get much better positional audio using OpenAL's HRTF filters. To enable, run the following command:
echo "hrtf = true" >> ~/.alsoftrc
Alternatively, install openal-hrtfAUR from the AUR, and edit the options in /etc/openal/alsoftrc.conf
For Source games, the ingame setting `dsp_slow_cpu` must be set to `1` to enable HRTF, otherwise the game will enable its own processing instead. You will also either need to set up Steam to use native runtime, or link its copy of openal.so to your own local copy. For completeness, also use the following options:
dsp_slow_cpu 1 # Disable in-game spatialiazation snd_spatialize_roundrobin 1 # Disable spatialization 1.0*100% of sounds dsp_enhance_stereo 0 # Disable DSP sound effects. You may want to leave this on, if you find it does not interfere with your perception of the sound effects. snd_pitchquality 1 # Use high quality sounds
Tuning PulseAudio
If you are using PulseAudio, you may wish to tweak some default settings to make sure it is running optimally.
Enabling realtime priority and negative nice level
Pulseaudio is built to be run with realtime priority, being an audio daemon. However, because of security risks of it locking up the system, it is scheduled as a regular thread by default. To adjust this, first make sure you are in the audio group. Then, uncomment and edit the following lines in /etc/pulse/daemon.conf:
/etc/pulse/daemon.conf
high-priority = yes nice-level = -11 realtime-scheduling = yes realtime-priority = 5
and restart pulseaudio.
Using higher quality remixing for better sound
PulseAudio on Arch uses speex-float-1 by default to remix channels, which is considered a 'medium-low' quality remixing. If your system can handle the extra load, you may benefit from setting it to one of the following instead:
resample-method = speex-float-10
Matching hardware buffers to Pulse's buffering
Matching the buffers can reduce stuttering and increase performance marginally. See here for more details.
Double check your CPU frequency scaling settings
If your system is currently configured to properly insert its own cpu frequency scaling driver, the system sets the default governor to Ondemand. By default, this governor only adjusts the clock if the system is utilizing 95% of its CPU, and then only for a very short period of time. This saves power and reduces heat, but has a noticeable impact on performance. You can instead only have the system downclock when it is idle, by tuning the system governor. To do so, see Cpufrequtils#Tuning the ondemand governor. Recent Intel CPU (SandyBridge +) use frequency scaling driver `intel_pstate` that does not work with ondemand governor. You can switch from "powersave" (default) to "performance", but the difference is minimal.
Remote gaming
Cloud gaming has gained a lot of popularity in the last few years, because of low client-side hardware requirements. The only important thing is stable internet connection (over the ethernet cable or 5 GHz WiFi recommended) with a minimum speed of 5–10 Mbit/s (depending on the video quality and framerate).
| Service | Installer | In browser client | Use your own host | Offers host renting | Full desktop support | Controller support | Remarks |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Dixper | – | Yes | Windows-only | ? | ? | ? | – |
| Geforce Now | – | Yes | No | No | Yes | Yes | You must have games on Steam, Epic Client or GOG to use this service. Not all games are available. |
| Moonlight | moonlight-qtAUR | No | Windows-only | No | Yes | Yes | This is only a client. Host machine needs GeForce experience installed. |
| Parsec | parsec-binAUR | Yes (experimental) | Windows-only | No | Yes | Yes | Cloud hosting no longer available |
| Playkey | playkey-linuxAUR | ? | ? | ? | ? | ? | – |
| PlayStation Now | Runs under Wine or Steam's proton | No | No | – | No | Yes | Play PS4, PS3 and PS2 games on PC. Alternatively, you can use emulators. |
| Rainway | Coming in 2019 Q3 | Yes | Windows-only | No | Yes | ? | – |
| Shadow | Stable: shadow-techAUR Beta: shadow-betaAUR |
No | No | Yes | Yes | Yes | Controller support is dependent on USB over IP, and currently AVC only as HEVC is not supported |
| Steam Remote Play | Part of steam | No | Yes | No | No | Yes | – |
| Stadia | – | Yes | No | No | Yes | Yes | – |
| Vortex | – | Yes | No | – | No | ? | – |
Improving performance
See also main article: Improving performance. For Wine programs, see Wine#Performance.
Utilities
Gamemode
Gamemode is a Daemon/lib combo for Linux that allows games to request a set of optimisations be temporarily applied to the host OS. This can improve game performance.
ACO compiler
Fsync patch
See Steam#Fsync patch.
Improving frame rates and responsiveness with scheduling policies
Most games can benefit if given the correct scheduling policies for the kernel to prioritize the task. These policies should ideally be set per-thread by the application itself.
For programs which do not implement scheduling policies on their own, application known as schedtool, and its associated daemon schedtooldAUR can handle many of these tasks automatically.
To edit what programs relieve what policies, simply edit /etc/schedtoold.conf and add the program followed by the schedtool arguments desired.
Policies
SCHED_ISO (only implemented in BFS/MuQSSPDS schedulers found in -pf and -ck kernels) – will not only allow the process to use a maximum of 80 percent of the CPU, but will attempt to reduce latency and stuttering wherever possible. Most if not all games will benefit from this:
bit.trip.runner -I
SCHED_FIFO provides an alternative, that can even work better. You should test to see if your applications run more smoothly with SCHED_FIFO, in which case by all means use it instead. Be warned though, as SCHED_FIFO runs the risk of starving the system! Use this in cases where -I is used below:
bit.trip.runner -F -p 15
Nice levels
Secondly, the nice level sets which tasks are processed first, in ascending order. A nice level of -4 is recommended for most multimedia tasks, including games:
bit.trip.runner -n -4
Core affinity
There is some confusion in development as to whether the driver should be multithreading, or the program. Allowing both the driver and program to simultaneously multithread can result in significant performance reductions, such as framerate loss and increased risk of crashes. Examples of this include a number of modern games, and any Wine program which is running with GLSL enabled. To select a single core and allow only the driver to handle this process, simply use the -a 0x# flag, where # is the core number, e.g.:
bit.trip.runner -a 0x1
uses first core.
Some CPUs are hyperthreaded and have only 2 or 4 cores but show up as 4 or 8, and are best accounted for:
bit.trip.runner -a 0x5
which use virtual cores 0101, or 1 and 3.
General case
For most games which require high framerates and low latency, usage of all of these flags seems to work best. Affinity should be checked per-program, however, as most native games can understand the correct usage. For a general case:
bit.trip.runner -I -n -4 Amnesia.bin64 -I -n -4 hl2.exe -I -n -4 -a 0x1 #Wine with GLSL enabled
etc.
Optimus, and other helping programs
As a general rule, any other process which the game requires to operate should be reniced to a level above that of the game itself. Strangely, Wine has a problem known as reverse scheduling, it can often have benefits when the more important processes are set to a higher nice level. Wineserver also seems unconditionally to benefit from SCHED_FIFO, since it rarely consumes the whole CPU and needs higher prioritization when possible.
optirun -I -n -5 wineserver -F -p 20 -n 19 steam.exe -I -n -5
Peripherals
Mouse
You might want to set your mouse acceleration to control your mouse more accurately.
If your mouse have more than 3 buttons, you might want to see Mouse buttons.
If you are using a gaming mouse (especially Logitech and Steelseries), you may want configure your mouse such as DPI, LED... using piper. See this page for a full list of supported devices.