Thanks to pointers from our community member xpander69, we have found that Dying Light can be played almost acceptably on Linux with some messing around with the files. I have personally tested this, but your performance will vary, and we accept no responsibility for breakage, do this at your own risk. You've been warned, but we hope no one manages to break anything. If you do, you can probably verify the cache on Steam to re-do the files officially.
Here's what we have found so far, if you unpack the Data0.pak in ~/.steam/steam/SteamApps/common/Dying Light/DW/ using your favourite file archive program and place it into the "/DW/out" folder, you then get access to the "varlist_performance.scr" file where you can turn certain features off like this:
QuoteVarFloat("f_lighting_range", 50.0)
VarInt("i_shadows_sun_on", 0)
VarInt("i_indoor_on", 1)
VarFloat("f_alpha_test_value", 0.0)
VarInt("i_clouds_shadows_on", 1)
VarInt("i_lighting_sun_on", 1)
VarInt("i_render_reflection_on", 1)
VarInt("i_out_buffer_on", 1)
VarInt("i_simple_shadows_on", 0)
VarInt("i_shadows_sun_hq_on", 0)
It seems having the files extracted, the game will use the extracted files over the .pak by default.
Setting it like that gave me a performance boost of around 20FPS, and it's extremely noticeable how smooth it now is. There isn't any fancy lighting from the sun, or any shadows, but it is slightly playable now.
It's still not completely acceptable, as we imagine there are other rendering issues, but it's a small find.
So it seems having "VarInt("i_shadows_sun_on", 1)" is what tanks the FPS on Linux.
We haven't yet found a way to turn off the sickly motion blurr yet, as the menu option doesn't work, but we will keep trying. It gave me a very bad headache last night, so I still can't play it with that permanently jacked up. We tried setting every blur option we could find in all files to zero, and it is still permanently turned on.
We have updated our support ticket with the developer in the hopes that it helps them track the issues down for Linux & Windows users, as it affects us all.
The only word we have out of them, is that Linux issues will be sorted in a "future" update.
Update
Techland requested some very detailed system specs from me including "printenv" and details from "hardinfo", looks like I got their attention.
Update #2
I've sent them even more details, and screenshots now too of our missing graphical options, and they replied with:
QuoteThank you for the screenshot. We're working on the performance issues.
They are being responsive, and the Linux "depot" on SteamDB has seen activity for a patch, so fingers crossed. Article taken from GamingOnLinux.com.
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Quoting: Xpanderwhat is chromatic aberation effect? that blur when you sprint? thatone is nasty as hell and makes my head hurt.I saw a substantial gain in framerate when lowering draw distance to minimum. I guess it's on a case by case basis whether it helps people or not.
also the draw distance on linux doesnt really change much.. disabling the shadows from that file is the key.. rest of the stuff can be even on high.
View video on youtube.com
As for chromatic aberration, it's the colored glow around objects like this:
It occurs naturally sometimes when you look through a lens, such as a pair of glasses. As someone who's worn glasses most of his life, I'm well familiar with the effect, though in my experiences it's generally been far more subdued and not nearly as ridiculously pronounced as in this game.
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ahh ok.. i didnt have issues with chromatic aberration myself it was distant enough for me..
what i cant stand is the constant blurr when sprinting.. yesterday i had to lay down after i played only 15 min because i nearly threw up ... that was so bad...
edit: now if i see that picture you show here about chromatic aberration, it might be the thing that makes me sick actually.. even though i dont even realize it
what i cant stand is the constant blurr when sprinting.. yesterday i had to lay down after i played only 15 min because i nearly threw up ... that was so bad...
edit: now if i see that picture you show here about chromatic aberration, it might be the thing that makes me sick actually.. even though i dont even realize it
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https://steamdb.info/app/239140/history/?changeid=869493
They are testing linux patch now!
They are testing linux patch now!
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Quoting: SeredA rather "stupid" question, but does the filesystem you use change anything? For some games *I heard* it's bad to use anything but ext4. (Although I'm not sure how or why you would optimize stuff for a certain filesystem.)Well if you use xfs you can't use mods in Don't starve
I personally am running btrfs exclusively since a few months. May this be a problem with dying light?
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Quoting: Xpanderwhat is chromatic aberation effect? that blur when you sprint? thatone is nasty as hell and makes my head hurt.
also the draw distance on linux doesnt really change much.. disabling the shadows from that file is the key.. rest of the stuff can be even on high.
View video on youtube.com
In game settings cant disable shadows only editing file solve fps issue?
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Quoting: plazmaIn game settings cant disable shadows only editing file solve fps issue?
correct.
ingame option allows you to make the shadow quality lower only
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You can also remove the film grain. Doubt it will really make much of a fps difference, but if you hate it like me then it is nice to get rid of it. I'm on mobile right now or I would type up a how to.. but duckduckgo is your friend.
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Quick note - I originally struggled with this on Ubuntu 14.04 and even switching desktop to Gnome-Classic or openbox didn't make much of a difference.
However, when I ran it from a SteamOS session, the difference was pretty pleasing. I followed this guide and logged into my SteamOS from the Ubuntu login prompt.
My specs aren't too fantastic, but the framerate is generally playable, even outside. I'm about 3 hours into the game so far. Specs are 2010 i7 (dunno the model, sorry, but it's nearly five years old now), GTX670 and 8Gb RAM. No particular tweaks other than running in a SteamOS session. I think I did turn off AA and... was it called occlusion? Something like that. Running at 1920x1024.
I'll see if I can add the FPS counter from the steam client and do a comparison of SteamOS vs Ubuntu vs Openbox. Hopefully it's not all in my head.
However, when I ran it from a SteamOS session, the difference was pretty pleasing. I followed this guide and logged into my SteamOS from the Ubuntu login prompt.
My specs aren't too fantastic, but the framerate is generally playable, even outside. I'm about 3 hours into the game so far. Specs are 2010 i7 (dunno the model, sorry, but it's nearly five years old now), GTX670 and 8Gb RAM. No particular tweaks other than running in a SteamOS session. I think I did turn off AA and... was it called occlusion? Something like that. Running at 1920x1024.
I'll see if I can add the FPS counter from the steam client and do a comparison of SteamOS vs Ubuntu vs Openbox. Hopefully it's not all in my head.
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First off, yuck. I'm not playing without shadows, it's already bad enough that your character has none. Second while it boosts the frame rate it's not the cause of nor the fix for the major frame drops (which seems to be due to a lack of geometry culling).
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