As possibly the last feature to be accepted and implemented before the big release, Feral Interactive's GameMode performance tool has been added officially into Ubuntu 20.04 LTS.
What the heck is GameMode? It's a Linux "daemon", otherwise known as a background process and a library that games can hook into. Enabling games to request things like a little more power from your CPU, I/O priority, screensaver inhibiting and other optimizations. The goal is to make Linux gaming smoother. Games can integrate it (like newer Feral Linux ports) to use it automatically, or you can manually tell games to use it. You can see GameMode on GitHub.
For Ubuntu 20.04, the upcoming LTS (Long Term Support) release, it will be installed by default so you don't need to do any messing around. So you will be able to run any game with "gamemoderun ./game-exectuable" or for Steam add a launch option of "gamemoderun %command%" right out of the box and hopefully get the best experience. It's also been confirmed for default inclusion in Ubuntu MATE 20.04.
You can see the now solved report for GameMode in Ubuntu on Launchpad, where you can see the folks at Canonical giving it a security review and ensuring the Ubuntu and Debian packaging for it is nicely sorted.
Ubuntu 20.04 is due to release on April 23.
Article taken from GamingOnLinux.com.
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16 comments
Good news this one. Hope its valid for other flavours as well.
0 Likes
Good news this one. Hope its valid for other flavours as well.Well, it is a repackage from Debian, so I don't see why it wouldn't work on other flavors as well.
2 Likes, Who?
no_information_here Apr 19, 2020
Interesting. Nice to see Feral's work get pulled into the official OS.
I am curious, as someone who has never used the daemon: Does anyone here use this much? Are there any non-Feral games you have found that benefit significantly from GameMode?
I am curious, as someone who has never used the daemon: Does anyone here use this much? Are there any non-Feral games you have found that benefit significantly from GameMode?
5 Likes, Who?
I am curious, as someone who has never used the daemon: Does anyone here use this much? Are there any non-Feral games you have found that benefit significantly from GameMode?
At the very least it disables the screensaver for games only being played with a controller (since they usually aren't considered "user input devices" by the display).
Last edited by TehFreek on 19 April 2020 at 4:40 pm UTC
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Gamemode has been in Ubuntu since 19.04 in the community supported universe. The new thing is that it is now in main and the last change that it is installed automatically in a full desktop install.
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Good news this one. Hope its valid for other flavours as well.The flavours all use the same repositories so the have the package available. If they also install it as default is up to them.
To check without installing you can look at the flavour meta package and search for gamemode.
https://packages.ubuntu.com/focal/ubuntu-desktop and https://packages.ubuntu.com/focal/ubuntu-mate-desktop include gamemode
Last edited by Redface on 19 April 2020 at 5:35 pm UTC
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This is awesome! I do need to report a bug I am running into with Gamemode. When I activate it for Metro 2033 REDUX, the games frame rates drop into single digits, which is odd as that is against the whole reason for Gamemode.
I use Gamemode on every fullscreen game, Feral based or not. It helps to prevent any FPS drops that are just below desired levels.
Last edited by Audi on 19 April 2020 at 7:13 pm UTC
Interesting. Nice to see Feral's work get pulled into the official OS.
I am curious, as someone who has never used the daemon: Does anyone here use this much? Are there any non-Feral games you have found that benefit significantly from GameMode?
I use Gamemode on every fullscreen game, Feral based or not. It helps to prevent any FPS drops that are just below desired levels.
Last edited by Audi on 19 April 2020 at 7:13 pm UTC
1 Likes, Who?
Can somebody give me some benchmark results with and without gamemode?
4 Likes, Who?
Great news!
While there is not tat big a difference, it can help a bit.
There is also a handy GNOME Shell extension available.
And, if you use Lutris, you can turn it on automatically for all your games (System Options -> Enable Feral gamemode).
While there is not tat big a difference, it can help a bit.
There is also a handy GNOME Shell extension available.
And, if you use Lutris, you can turn it on automatically for all your games (System Options -> Enable Feral gamemode).
0 Likes
So, on the one hand they try to have Ubuntu's 32bit support gutted, indicating a lack of understanding regarding the requirements for properly gaming on Linux, and on the other hand they implement Feral's GameMode as part of the default setup, indicating a desire to make Ubuntu into a valid gaming distribution. Have they learned from their past mistakes and done a turnabout? Or am I missing something here?
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This program sets the game process to high priority and disable all power saving features of the GPU by calling nvidia-settings. 
1 Likes, Who?
no_information_here Apr 21, 2020
Hmm. I almost exclusively play with the steam controller and have only ever had proton games start the screensaver. That seems to have been fixed for a while, though. Is the screensaver still a problem for many people?I am curious, as someone who has never used the daemon: Does anyone here use this much? Are there any non-Feral games you have found that benefit significantly from GameMode?
At the very least it disables the screensaver for games only being played with a controller (since they usually aren't considered "user input devices" by the display).
2 Likes, Who?
Can’t say for sure with Proton but I still had it on Mint two months ago playing through Lutris/Wine.Hmm. I almost exclusively play with the steam controller and have only ever had proton games start the screensaver. That seems to have been fixed for a while, though. Is the screensaver still a problem for many people?I am curious, as someone who has never used the daemon: Does anyone here use this much? Are there any non-Feral games you have found that benefit significantly from GameMode?
At the very least it disables the screensaver for games only being played with a controller (since they usually aren't considered "user input devices" by the display).
0 Likes
...Is the screensaver still a problem for many people?My the only "screensaver" is a red power button on my TV's remote control.
Last edited by axredneck on 21 April 2020 at 6:24 pm UTC
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Hmm. I almost exclusively play with the steam controller and have only ever had proton games start the screensaver. That seems to have been fixed for a while, though. Is the screensaver still a problem for many people?
Not for me, but that is because all my games launch with GameMode, and it disables the screensaver.
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Can somebody give me some benchmark results with and without gamemode?
Here is a benchmark on YouTube:)
https://youtu.be/zN8by3wchVw
1 Likes, Who?
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