Valve dev teases HDR support for Linux Gaming

From what I gather, so far it's very gamescope specific, so it's not yet the year of HDR for the Linux desktop.

gamescope is under Valve's direct control and is the piece of tech behind the Steam Deck's "Gaming Mode" (the one where Steam and every game you play run fullscreen)

It's not surprising that this was where they put the initial effort, but I expect GNOME's mutter and KDE's whatever-it's-called will move to support it soon too

A lot of work is in parts of Linux that are used by all DEs in all distros, so things should be much easier to close the gap once it's all upstreamed

ps: using HDR in monitors without good backlight intensity variation per screen region or pseudo-HDR where not even software-controlled backlighting exists is IMHO a trap... you end up with faded colors, almost totally blackened and whitened areas, or with ugly wide stripes of bright and dark across the monitor/tv...


Last edited by Marlock on 4 January 2023 at 9:38 am UTC

I hope it gets merged soon, this is the only thing I am really missing in linux atm.

To be honest having used HDR on windows in the Past and films ect on my LG oled I cant say it's that impressive. For the most part it resembles some turning the Saturation and colours up to full.

Dare say it's a personnel preference thing at the end of the day.

What I find amusing is that the first Far Cry basically had a software version of HDR in it. So when you'd go into a cave, it'd be really dark, then it was like your eyes would adjust, then when you left a cave, it'd be really bright...

I think Fallout III did something like this when leaving the bunker vault for the first time (in your life).

Yeah, seems a few games here and there since then had similar things going on. I just remember the CryTek engine being one of the first ones to attempt to do a lot of crazy lighting things like that. Granted it'd also choke on the lava areas!

I can't remember it from other games, but I found it so suiting the situation: All your life in a vault, and then you see the sun for the first time...

It's like me finally emerging from my house after the holiday weekend of getting a foot of snow... it was definitely blinding. I should have stayed in my dungeon.

https://www.phoronix.com/news/Red-Hat-2023-HDR-Hackfest

This sounds like it's proper support rather than just a game compositor/overlay.

I am curious about HDR and movie playback as that seems to be getting more and more popular.

That sounds lik

https://www.phoronix.com/news/Red-Hat-2023-HDR-Hackfest

This sounds like it's proper support rather than just a game compositor/overlay.

I am curious about HDR and movie playback as that seems to be getting more and more popular.

Nice, that finally sounds like a concentrated effort. I hope it wouldn't be too Gnome centric and general Wayland compositors needs will be addressed.

To be honest having used HDR on windows in the Past and films ect on my LG oled I cant say it's that impressive. For the most part it resembles some turning the Saturation and colours up to full.

Dare say it's a personnel preference thing at the end of the day.

HDR implementation quality wildly varies across games, with some games having known busted implementations like RDR2 or Horizon Zero Dawn. Some games with known good HDR support are Cyberpunk 2077 (to an extent), Ori and the Will of the Wisps, maybe Spider-Man Remastered or Death Stranding too. You may also have to fiddle with tonemapping settings (HGiG vs DTM, there is no true winner but some people will prefer one or the other).

One common issue with HDR in games is that it's not well-tested by developers or not used as a daily driver, so there is little incentive to make it truly worthwhile. Most engine developers (or even environment artists) aren't using OLED/miniLED displays for development just yet.


Last edited by Calinou on 4 January 2023 at 11:29 pm UTC

HDR in general is not some kind of "stronger saturation" idea, it means wider color range. How games actually use it and how it looks in result is totally up to games.

Here was a good talk about it: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=nDnbWaIMJJA


Last edited by Shmerl on 4 January 2023 at 11:33 pm UTC

Having Steam not die when you're using anything other than 8—bit colour would probably be a good start.

Its probably a limitation of your DE/Chromium on Linux, which is used as basis for Steam Client.

Its probably a limitation of your DE/Chromium on Linux, which is used as basis for Steam Client.

Most everything else is fine with it, including Chromium. Just conky - which is kinda understandable because it's old and a bit on the janky side - and Steam. I guess for the same reason; although they've the resources to fix it if they bothered to.

Its probably a limitation of your DE/Chromium on Linux, which is used as basis for Steam Client.

Most everything else is fine with it, including Chromium. Just conky - which is kinda understandable because it's old and a bit on the janky side - and Steam. I guess for the same reason; although they've the resources to fix it if they bothered to.

At least (in my experience) the Steam Client on Linux is far more stable / less problematic than the Mac version on the M1 I have. It is constantly needing refreshes if I go to the store, or simply stops working and needs to be killed / started again.

Not sure how much of that is the 'Rosetta' stuff, or what, but seems it at least needs to be 64bit there or it wouldn't launch anymore.

This is awesome, HDR looked great back in Windows, hope we get it going on Nvidia as well :)

According to discord, the HDR implementation is on Gamescope, so we might need Nvidia proper support for it first.

So I'll have games running on my Steam Deck that would look better on my monitor than on my 3060ti PC lmaooo