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After a short Beta period that saw a few issues, the team behind Portal Stories: Mel have now release the latest stable build which includes Vulkan support for Linux.

Just like the updates to Portal 2, the Vulkan support is thanks to a special native build of DXVK that (when enabled) skips over Valve's ToGL that translates Direct 3D to OpenGL and gives us the Vulkan goodies. This should enable weaker systems to enjoy a smooth experience. Even in my own testing, it seems overall the performance was quite a bit higher.

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Here's the full list of what's new:

  • Fixed lighting issues with modern AMD GPUs.
  • Added Vulkan support for the Linux build.
  • Fixed wrong icon showing up on windows.
  • Removed confirmation prompts for graphics settings.
  • Removed the outdated libSDL2-2.0 from the linux build.

To launch it with Vulkan, simply add "-vulkan" to the launch options.

You can play Portal Stories: Mel on Steam and you should because it's fantastic. Over 16,000 people have rated it giving it a nice Overwhelmingly Positive score.

Article taken from GamingOnLinux.com.
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7 comments

TheRiddick Apr 28, 2021
Still waiting for Black Mesa to come with vulkan support because its OGL support for the Linux version is sketchy at best (and missing features). I know its a different dev, but their using same engine!
Philadelphus Apr 29, 2021
I was just thinking recently of going back and trying this again; I didn't enjoy it enough to finish it when it released, but maybe now that I'm older and (hopefully) wiser I'll see it differently. Could be interesting to try it with Vulkan, too.
Vasya Sovari Apr 29, 2021
Hot damn
Just realised I never played Portal 2. That shall be remedied shortly
Vasya Sovari Apr 29, 2021
Still waiting for Black Mesa to come with vulkan support because its OGL support for the Linux version is sketchy at best (and missing features). I know its a different dev, but their using same engine!

Indeed. I very nearly refunded the game cos the performance felt so clunky (borderline inexcusable on my very recent and pretty decent rig)... then figured with the backlog I have already, it'll probably be fixed before I'm remotely ready to play it
M@GOid Apr 29, 2021
Still waiting for Black Mesa to come with vulkan support because its OGL support for the Linux version is sketchy at best (and missing features). I know its a different dev, but their using same engine!

Indeed. I very nearly refunded the game cos the performance felt so clunky (borderline inexcusable on my very recent and pretty decent rig)... then figured with the backlog I have already, it'll probably be fixed before I'm remotely ready to play it

I should had refunded myself when I had the chance. But at the time it was a greenlight title, so I decided to give them a chance...

As I see it, their Linux port is so bad that it didn't even have CPU multi-core support. So disappointed with that. Run like crap on my system.

From now on, if the game doesn't run right by the time of the release, is a sure refund to me. The market is too flooded with options for me to support bad developers.
grigi Apr 30, 2021
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Thanks for bringing this to my attention Liam, It's a great game that I didn't know about it. I'm really enjoying it.
t3g May 1, 2021
Still waiting for Black Mesa to come with vulkan support because its OGL support for the Linux version is sketchy at best (and missing features). I know its a different dev, but their using same engine!

I saw a video a little while back where running the Windows version of Black Mesa ran better with DXVK than native. Is this still the case? I belive this was the launch option too:

 
PROTON_USE_D9VK=1 %command% -oldgameui



Last edited by t3g on 1 May 2021 at 3:09 am UTC
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