Linux Support

From Flashpoint Datahub
Revision as of 00:26, 28 July 2024 by Mathgeniuszach (talk | contribs) (Updates and Nix details)
(diff) ← Older revision | Latest revision (diff) | Newer revision → (diff)
Jump to navigation Jump to search

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 everything is supported, such as DevalVR and Viscape. 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:

Otherwise, if you do not need support for those platforms, try any of the methods of launching Flashpoint listed below.

Immutable Version

Notes

This is an old build is designed for use on distros with an immutable rootfs, such as SteamOS, NixOS, Fedora Silverblue, etc. Most of the dependencies, including Wine, PHP and GTK3, are already included within the installation directory. No packages should need to be installed in order for this version to work, but due to compatibility issues with specific configurations, your system may still complain about missing libraries. More space will be needed to run this compared to the mutable version, so if you are able and willing to install a couple packages to save space, use the mutable version instead.

If you have Nix on your system, you can also launch the mutable version of Flashpoint under a Nix shell or with steam-run (nix-shell -p steam-run --run "steam-run ./start-flashpoint.sh").

Installation

  1. Download this archive file.
  2. Extract the contents of the file to an empty folder that your user has read & write permissions for. This can be done graphically, or in the terminal by entering the following in the directory the file is in:
    $ 7zr x fp13_linux_*.7z -oFlashpoint
  3. Open the folder you extracted Flashpoint to, then run start-flashpoint.sh to open the launcher.

After the installation is complete, you should not move any files in the Flashpoint folder at all. Moving the wrong file/folder could break the entire program until it is moved back.

A README document is provided that has some additional notes.

Mutable Version

Compatibility

Since the Flashpoint launcher is based on Electron, the minimum requirements are identical to Chromium. According to Google, they are as follows:

  • 64-bit Ubuntu 18.04+, Debian 10+, or Fedora 32+
  • An Intel Pentium 4 or later processor that's SSE3 capable

Rolling-release distros like Arch and Gentoo are also supported.

It is possible for a distro that doesn't meet these requirements to still be able to run Flashpoint if the system packages are new enough. If you use an older distro than the listed minimums and are unable to open the launcher, you could try adding a repository from a newer, supported version of the same distro and updating your packages that way. Beware though, because doing so could cause damage to your system if not done carefully.

Dependencies

This version of Flashpoint for Linux requires the following dependencies to be installed at runtime:

Dependency package names on various distros
Distro PulseAudio1 X112 32-bit Xcomposite GTK3 NSS PHP Wine bash
Debian-likea pulseaudio xserver-xorg-core libxcomposite1:i386 libgtk-3-0 libnss3 php (see this page) bash
Ubuntu-likeb pulseaudio xserver-xorg-core libxcomposite1:i386 libgtk-3-0 libnss3 php (see this page) bash
Fedora-like pulseaudio xorg-x11-server-Xorg libXcomposite.i686 gtk3 nss php (see this page) bash
Arch-likec pulseaudio xorg-server lib32-libxcomposite gtk3 nss php wine bash

a: E.g. ChromeOS Terminal, MX Linux | b: E.g. Linux Mint, Pop!_OS, Zorin OS | c: E.g. Manjaro, EndeavourOS

Note: Chances are that Wine and PHP will be the only packages that you'll need to install, as most distributions come with the rest of the packages already pre-installed.

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

Optional dependencies
Distro GTK23 LibXt3
Debian-like libgtk2.0-0 libxt6
Fedora-like gtk2 libXt
Arch-like gtk2 libxt

1: PipeWire can also be used in place of PulseAudio by installing the pipewire-pulse package on Ubuntu-like and Arch-like distros, or pipewire-pulseaudio on Fedora-like distros. For Debian-like distros, see this link.

2: X11 can also be used within Wayland by installing the xwayland package on Debian-like and Ubuntu-like distros, xorg-x11-server-Xwayland on Fedora-like distros, or xorg-xwayland on Arch-like distros.

3: Required for native Flash support. To support versions <27, the 32-bit version of this package must be installed instead.

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

Distro Package manager install command
Debian-like sudo apt-get install {PACKAGE}
Fedora-like sudo dnf install {PACKAGE}
Arch-like sudo pacman -S {PACKAGE}

Setup

Make sure you have at least 4 GB of free space, and that you have p7zip installed to be able to extract from 7z files.

Installation

  1. Download this archive file.
  2. Extract the contents of the file to an empty folder that your user has read & write permissions for. This can be done graphically, or in the terminal by entering the following in the directory the file is in:
    $ 7zr x fp13_linux_*.7z -oFlashpoint
  3. Open the folder you extracted Flashpoint to, then run start-flashpoint.sh to open the launcher.

After the installation is complete, you should not move any files in the Flashpoint folder at all. Moving the wrong file/folder could break the entire program until it is moved back.

A README document is provided that has a recap of some instructions shown in this section, as well as some additional notes.

Nix Shell

The mutable version of Flashpoint 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

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.

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.

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 Windows compatibility layer. 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. Additionally, 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 the .NET framework via 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 folder. An example of a proper installation path would be Z:\home\$USER\Flashpoint, where you replace $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 folder with the files that are extracted from it. You may need to install the p7zip package to be able to extract the contents of 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! Note that not all platforms will work when installing Flashpoint this way, as Wine is not a perfect simulation of a typical Windows environment.

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 applied that aren't in mainline Wine. Users of Arch-based distros can install Wine GE as a package from the AUR, however no binary is provided, so the package must be compiled.

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, a display driver was added that can be used to run Windows programs through Wayland instead of X11/Xwayland. To enable it, run the following command to modify the registry of the Wine prefix you want to use it on: 

$ WINEPREFIX=/path/to/wine/prefix wine reg add "HKCU\\Software\\Wine\\Drivers" /v "Graphics" /d "wayland,x11"

Make sure to replace /path/to/wine/prefix with the actual path of the prefix you wish to modify. For examples, the default path is $HOME/.wine and the mutable version's path relative to the location of the Flashpoint directory is FPSoftware/Wine. After making this change, all programs running in Wine from now on should be using Wayland.

Retrieved from "https://flashpointarchive.org/w/index.php?title=Linux_Support&oldid=10531"