Linux Support

@Brutus5000 I know it's late but, your guide :

@tatsu what is just delete the config? What file?

~/.steam/debian-installation/steamapps/compatdata/9420/pfx/drive_c/users/steamuser/Local Settings/Application Data/Gas\ Powered\ Games/Supreme\ Commander\ Forged\ Alliance/game.prefs

I have a weird issue (also if launched via steam): when I set windowed mode in the ui it works. But after a restart it goes fullscreen again. Then I need to choose a resolution, apply, choose windowed again, apply. But this is not possible for launched games ofc... any ideas?

wow I've never seen this before.

windowed works if you resize the window border with the mouse? for me there's a big chance it blackscreens when I do that.

Anyways I'd recommend you also delete the game.prefs file and relaunch from steam once. (set it to windowed then if you must)

why do you play windowed?

Installing windows fixed my issues XD

From my experience the game is more stable in windowed mode.

on windows. yes. I'm a big proponent of that idea as attested by my fullscreen script.

again on linux the opposite is sorta true considering the fullscreen issues you might get, the one you have for example.

If we can fix those and correctly fake fullscreen then maybe we can align linux a bit more with windows.

I actually don't know how to do this.

I'm sure fake-fullscreeing wine has been done before but I don't know how to do it

Thanks for the video tatsu; it was a big help

I did hit a snag when trying to launch the client however where it gives error:

Error: Could not find or load main class install4j.com.faforever.client.Main
Caused by: java.lang.ClassNotFoundException: install4j.com.faforever.client.Main

I'm on Ubuntu 20.04 and tried using both PPA as well as openjdk (made sure to set environment variable both times) and both gave same error. This is v1.2.0 stable unix release extracted to same folder as the Steam run file as shown in video.

Any ideas?

Got it. There's a hidden .install4j folder in the unix download which didn't get copied when I first extracted the pack and moved the files to where I wanted them. This time I just extracted and copied the run file into the folder without moving anything else and it launched fine so did the ol' ls -a to check for hidden files and found it.

@s3rvant or ctrl-H in file browser. glad you sorted it.

And my pleasure for the vid.

Finally tested the windowed mode and resizing is garbage just as you said. While the resizing works, it just "stretches" the windowed-resolution but does not increase the field of view as it does on Windows

@Brutus5000 said in Linux Support:

Finally tested the windowed mode and resizing is garbage just as you said. While the resizing works, it just "stretches" the windowed-resolution but does not increase the field of view as it does on Windows

https://forum.winehq.org/viewtopic.php?t=2255
have you tried Emulate Virtual Desktop?

how you access it is in the wiki:
https://wiki.faforever.com/index.php?title=Setting_Up_FAF_Linux#No_sound_when_the_game_is_minimized

@Brutus5000 said in Linux Support:

Finally tested the windowed mode and resizing is garbage just as you said. While the resizing works, it just "stretches" the windowed-resolution but does not increase the field of view as it does on Windows

exactly.

you have to remember it's a windows desktop being emulated basically.

So expecting the important app running within it to be determining the resolution of the whole desktop is kinda funky. (could probably be hacked together but yeah)

I followed all steps in the youtube tutorial recorded by tatsu.
And I'm thankfull to report that all steps except one went welll.
However when I launch the game from steam or downlords client (to watch an online replay for example).
It launches to a grey box covering some part of the upper left corner of the screen and freezes.
Once I after a while try to alt-tab I get an error message as you can see on the attached screenshot.

So steps that I followed.
1 Installing oracle java14 SUCCES (allthough a tip for future readers to accept the license agreement you have to hit TAB to select the OK button and then hit enter to accept, this is not shown in the tutorial. I assume because it is considered basic knowledge but I had to look it up)
2 Installing steam+setting up the steamplay settings proton 5.0-9. SUCCES
3a Launching the FA from steam to get a run file and get steam to install Directx etc SUCCES
3b The game actually opening FAILED (I got the screenshot below)
4 Installing downlords faf client SUCCES
5 Inputting the given options into the client and setting up a shortcut SUCCES

If there is anything else I can provide that you guys I'll be happy to try and provide.

@PA4SAM
it's not a java or FAF client problem.
it will be something about Steam and Proton...

try a different proton version.
did you force proton version for the game in Steam properties?
what is in your SET LAUNCH OPTIONS?

@Brutus5000
just try that what i wrote. probably it can fix your problem if you set the resolution of the virtual desktop high enough.

Launch options:
PROTON_NO_ESYNC=1, PROTON_DUMP_DEBUG_COMMANDS=1 %command%
These I copied from tatsu's video

then my steamplay PROTON version:

(this was adviced in tatsu's video)

When I try proton 4.11-3 I suprisingly get "better" results

The game launches and what was a grey box for proton 5.0-9 is now the only portion of the screen that works.

@PA4SAM what graphics card & what driver version are you using?

also what linux distribution and what Desktop Environment?

(from your screenshot it looks like ubuntu 20.04 with ubuntu's gnome 3)

also just in case could you confirm that you right-clicked on forged alliance in the games list (and not another game),
selected "properties" and under "general" found the launch options put :

 PROTON_NO_ESYNC=1, PROTON_DUMP_DEBUG_COMMANDS=1 %command%

?

most likely is that you haven't installed any graphic driver.

could you also try with only one screen plugged in?

Microsoft buys Bethesda
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=W7qI6kR2Ua4

i laughed when i commented under John Carmack tweet about this and all the MS NPCs appeared. I had to mute them because im not interested in their confused world.
https://twitter.com/foodlfg/status/1308078362972295176

Hello it is quite delayed but I found the solution to my problem.
I'll post it here now in case anybody has the same problem in the future.

Proton 5.0-9 didn't work for me however 4.11-13 did kind of work as I showed in the previous post. I (wrongly) assumed that the fact that most of the screen was black meant I couldn't click there. But it turns out you can, so the solution is to make a username and confirm it by clicking around in the black until you hit the confirm button. Then go to settings (by clicking around in the black) and change your primary adapter settings to any non windowed resolution (again by clicking around in the black) that will fix the visual glitch. From there you can actually set up the settings and resolution you want, which will carry over when you launch using the FAF client.

So @tatsu nothing is wrong with the tutorial, it seems maybe proton has some trouble with my unusual graphics card (quadro K1100M). You might however add some comment referring to this post in the description because I assume I won't be the only one who will experience this problem.

As for your previous troubleshooting questions:

1. yes I do have a graphics driver this was not the issue (it is a good thing to check if you have the same problem though. I'm no linux expert but I used this stackexchange post to figure it out.
2. Unplugging one screen made no difference.
3. I followed your tutorial to the letter so naturally I had the launch options put in correctly already. One thing I found that is nice though is that you can setup steamplay to launch with a particular version of proton on the same screen. Just go to the bottom of the same tab that contain the launch options and set it to the protonversion that you want. That way I can still have the new proton 5.0-9 version as my default and only use 4.11-13 for FA. For anybody with the same problem you do have to change out the generated runfile when you switch protonversions. So if you follow this fix and launching from faf doesn't work anymore, that is because the runfile is still the 5.0-9 version while steam is setup for the 4.11-13 version.

One thing I wonder about but couldn't figure out is if you could force faf to launch full screen instead of windowed mode from the launch options. If this is possible all the clicking around in the dark could be circumvented.