Linux Support

Linux support in Flashpoint is currently experimental due to a lack of maintainers. This page describes the current state of our Linux support. If you need assistance with installing or playing, ask in the #help channel on the Discord server.

Flashpoint for Linux supports Flash, HTML5, Shockwave, Unity, Java and various other web platforms. Not every platform is supported, such as DevalVR and Viscape, because some may rely too heavily on Windows features and can't run through Wine. If you want support for platforms that are Windows-exclusive, there are a few options to get the Windows version of Flashpoint running on Linux:

• Download the Windows version of Flashpoint and run it in a Windows virtual machine. This is the recommended non-native option.
• Run the Windows version of Flashpoint with Wine. This works well on some computers, but does not work consistently.

Otherwise, if you do not need support for those platforms, you may continue reading through this page.

Compatibility

Flashpoint for Linux only officially supports the x86_64 architecture. This is because the launcher uses Electron, which does not support 32-bit x86 for Linux, and several included binaries only have x86_64 versions. If you want to run Flashpoint on other architectures, like ARM or RISC-V, you must use an emulator like Box64.

The current Linux version of Flashpoint is built on Debian 11, which uses glibc 2.31, making it the minimum supported version. Flashpoint cannot be built on older Debian versions without significant changes to the launcher, due to some dependencies being incompatible. Any distro that uses glibc 2.31+ should also be supported, including, but not limited to:

• Ubuntu 20.04+
• Fedora 32+
• openSUSE Leap 15.3+
• Any distro based on the above, including by proxy
• Any rolling release distro maintained after February 2020

If you use a distro older than those listed, you must upgrade to a newer version to run Flashpoint.

Main Version

This version of Flashpoint for Linux is split up into 3 different parts; the main files, which contain everything that Flashpoint itself and the platforms need to work; the libraries, which can be used to run Flashpoint in a known-working container (like an immutable version); and the Wine runtime, which has everything that the Windows-only programs need to run and nothing more.

If you are using an immutable distro, like SteamOS, NixOS, or Fedora Silverblue, you must install all 3 of the components below for Flashpoint to work. If you don't, you will most likely have errors complaining about missing programs or libraries. If you ask for help and are using an immutable distro, you will be told this again and pointed back here unless you've said you already installed everything.

It's recommended to have at least 4 GB of free space for the smoothest experience with all the components. You can possibly get away with less if you already have the dependencies installed on your system.

Components

Main Files

To install the main Flashpoint files, follow these steps:

1. Download this archive file.
2. Extract the contents of the file to an empty directory that your user has read & write permissions for. This can be done graphically, or in the terminal by entering the following at the file's directory:

   7zr x fp14.0.1_lin_main_*.7z -oFlashpoint

3. Open the directory you extracted Flashpoint to, then run setup-desktop-entry.sh to generate a desktop entry that opens the launcher. Alternatively, if you are unable to run desktop entries, run start-flashpoint.sh instead.

Once you've done that, the main Flashpoint files are now installed. If you don't want to or can't install the dependencies, you should also download the other components below.

Libraries

If you already have all the dependencies listed in the Dependencies section installed, you can skip this.

This section will assume you've already downloaded and extracted the main files as described above.

To install the libraries, follow these steps:

1. Download this archive file.
2. Extract the contents of the file to the Libraries directory of your Flashpoint install.
3. If you already have a desktop entry, rerun setup-desktop-entry.sh to generate a new one that'll load the binaries and libraries from the Libraries directory instead.

When finished, your Flashpoint install should automatically use the binaries and libraries you've extracted instead of your system ones.

Wine Runtime

If you already have all the dependencies listed in the Dependencies section installed, you can skip this.

This section will assume you've already downloaded and extracted the main files as described above.

To install the Wine runtime to run Windows programs, follow these steps:

1. Download this archive file.
2. Extract the contents of the file to the FPSoftware/Wine directory of your Flashpoint install.

If done correctly, Flashpoint should detect the Wine install you've extracted and use that instead of the one on your system, if applicable. The advantage of doing this over just using the system Wine is that the custom runtime is fine-tuned for Flashpoint; it only contains the executables and DLLs needed to run Flashpoint's Windows-only programs. Doing this reduces overall load times for Wine applications, and reduces the size of the prefix that Wine generates/updates.

Dependencies

If you already downloaded and extracted all the components, you can skip this.

If you are on a mutable distro and not using the optional components provided above, you'll need to install the following packages for Flashpoint to work properly. A dependency listed with more than one package for a given distro means you can choose any one package from that distro according to your needs.

Distro	X11	GTK3	NSS	PulseAudio	PHP	7-Zip	Wine	32-bit Xcomposite*	32-bit LibPulse*
Debian-like	xserver-xorg-core / xwayland	libgtk-3-0	libnss3	pulseaudio / pipewire-pulse	php	7zip	(link)	libxcomposite1:i386	libpulse0:i386
Arch-like	xorg-server / xorg-xwayland	gtk3	nss				wine	lib32-libxcomposite	lib32-libpulse
Fedora-like	xorg-x11-server-Xorg / xorg-x11-server-Xwayland			pulseaudio / pipewire-pulseaudio		p7zip	(link)	libXcomposite.i686	pulseaudio-libs.i686
SUSE-like	xorg-x11-server / xwayland	libgtk-3-0	mozilla-nss		php7	7zip	wine	libXcomposite1-32bit	libpulse0-32bit

* Not required on Fedora 40+ and its derivatives

There are also some packages that aren't required, but can enhance your experience:

Distro	GTK2	LibXt
Debian-like	libgtk2.0-0	libxt6
Arch-like	gtk2	libxt
Fedora-like		libXt
SUSE-like	libgtk-2_0-0	libXt6

To install them, use your distro's package manager:

Distro	Package manager install command
Debian-like	sudo apt-get install $PKG
Arch-like	sudo pacman -S $PKG
Fedora-like	sudo dnf install $PKG
SUSE-like	sudo zypper install $PKG

Nix Shell

The main Flashpoint files can also be launched under a Nix shell if Nix is installed:

{ pkgs ? import <nixpkgs> {} }:

(pkgs.buildFHSEnv {
    name = "flashpoint";
    targetPkgs = pkgs: (with pkgs; [
        # Shell utils
        toybox
        # Electron for the launcher.
        electron
        # Flashpoint requirements
        pipewire pulseaudio
        gtk3 gtk2 nss php wine
        xorg.libX11 xorg.libXt xorg.libXcomposite
        # ldd requirements
        mesa #libgbm
        glib nspr at-spi2-atk cups dbus libdrm pango cairo expat libxkbcommon alsa-lib
        xorg.libXdamage xorg.libXext xorg.libXfixes xorg.libXrandr xorg.libxcb
        udev
    ]);
}).env

Simply save this code into a .nix file and run it with nix-shell {file}.nix --run ./start-flashpoint.sh.

You can also use steam-run (nix-shell -p steam-run --run "steam-run ./start-flashpoint.sh").

Minimal-Dependency Version

Due to the inherently barebones nature of this option, do not expect to receive help in the Discord if a specific game does not work.

If you are looking for a fully-native or minimal setup Flashpoint experience on Linux, Flashpoint Nano exists as a lightweight (albeit heavily limited) script-based alternative to the other installation options.

Only two platforms are supported: Flash (using Ruffle; non-embedded entries only) and HTML5 (using Pale Moon). Each software is Linux-native, downloaded upon first launch and updated automatically.

Dependencies

Only a few command-line utilities that may not be available on your system by default are required: tar, curl, sqlite3, and unxz (from XZ Utils). You should be able to install these using your distro's package manager.

Installation

1. Download Nano from the GitHub repository by clicking the Code button and then Download ZIP. Alternatively, if you have git installed, you can use the git clone https://github.com/WumboSpasm/flashpoint-nano.git command to download the repository. The latter option may be preferable so you can download updates to the scripts using git pull.
2. If you downloaded the ZIP archive, extract it using your method of choice.
3. Enter the created directory and run the following command in the terminal: ./flashpoint.sh <entry-id>. You can find the ID of the desired entry using the Flashpoint Database search tool. If you wish to launch an additional application, simply append its ID to the end of your command (with a space separating it from the entry ID).

Windows Version Using Wine

Alternatively, you can attempt to run the Windows version of Flashpoint using Wine, which is a compatibility layer for Windows programs. There are several advantages to doing this, like being able to run more up-to-date versions of Flashpoint that have only been made for Windows. However, it is not guaranteed that Wine will work properly, as the experience varies greatly depending on the hardware, choice of distribution, and packages you have installed. For this to work, you currently need to install either the development or staging versions of Wine running a completely fresh prefix. How to install them depends on the distro, so consult WineHQ's download page for instructions on yours. You will also need the php package for Flashpoint to work post-install.

As of now, you can install the latest Windows version of Flashpoint Infinity by running the installer through Wine. To be able to run the installer, you need to install a recent version of Wine Mono, which should be provided upon creating a new Wine prefix or installed as a package on most distros. The process for installing Flashpoint this way is similar to how it is on Windows, except you may have to change the installation path to a location that can be written to, like your home directory. An example of a proper installation path would be Z:\home\$USER\Flashpoint, replacing $USER with your username. You may get an error upon finishing the installation; this is expected behavior. Quit the installer and kill it from your process manager if needed, and all of the files should be where you installed them.

At this point, you can try to run the Windows version of the launcher through Wine, but it's recommended that you download the native Linux launcher as a 7z file and replace everything in the Launcher directory with the files extracted from it. You may need to install the p7zip package to be able to extract from the file. Once done, you can then run Launcher/flashpoint-launcher and set the "Flashpoint Path" in the launcher's config to .., then click "Save and Restart" on the bottom of the page. If everything has been done correctly, you should now have a working Flashpoint install!

If you are having issues running Flashpoint with Wine, you can instead try using various other "flavors" such as Wine GE, which has extra patches that aren't upstream. Users of Arch-like distros can install Wine GE as a package from the AUR, however no binary is provided, so it must be compiled.

Troubleshooting

Audio Glitches in Wine

Some users may experience audio glitches when running programs through Wine, like constant crackling or distortions. If this is happening to you, you may have to switch to a different audio driver. As of writing, Wine currently uses PulseAudio as the default preferred backend, but other backends are available. For example, to enable the ALSA driver, run the following command, replacing $DIR with the full path of the prefix you wish to modify:

WINEPREFIX=$DIR wine reg add 'HKCU\Software\Wine\Drivers' /v Audio /d alsa

To modify the default prefix, don't set WINEPREFIX. For reference, Flashpoint's prefix location relative to the installation directory is FPSoftware/Wine.

Switching audio drivers may or may not fix the problem right away. If you are still experiencing glitchy audio, please ask for help in the Discord server.

Launcher Sandbox Errors

Some users may receive the following error when attempting to run the launcher:

The SUID sandbox helper binary was found, but is not configured correctly.

To fix this, the permissions and owner of the sandbox have to be changed. Open a terminal in the Launcher directory on your Flashpoint install, and run the following:

chmod 4755 chrome-sandbox
sudo chown root:root chrome-sandbox

The first command will allow the owner of the sandbox to read, write and execute it; other users will only be able to read and execute. The second will set the root user and group as the owner of the sandbox. The root group should only contain the root user by default.

Afterwards, the launcher should now be able to open without issue. If you still encounter errors, try adding the --no-sandbox flag to the end of the command that runs the launcher, either in the desktop entry or in the start script.

Optional Enhancements

Wine Wayland Support

Enabling this feature could cause unforeseen bugs and break compatibility with some games/animations. Do so at your own risk.

Starting with Wine 8.4 and being officially added in Wine 10.0, a new display driver can be used to run Windows programs through Wayland instead of X11/Xwayland. To enable it, run the following command, replacing $DIR with the full path of the prefix you wish to modify:

WINEPREFIX=$DIR wine reg add 'HKCU\Software\Wine\Drivers' /v Graphics /d wayland,x11

To modify the default prefix, don't set WINEPREFIX. For reference, Flashpoint's prefix location relative to the installation directory is FPSoftware/Wine.

After making this change, all programs running in Wine from now on should be using Wayland.