Arch Linux

yawns

Member

Registered: 2010-05-31

Posts: 68

[Solved] Team Fortress 2 / Steam

Hi, I'm interested in trying to get TF2 running in Wine. I have the following:

AMD Athlon II X2 240
4GB RAM
Nvidia GeForce 7950 GT, using proprietary drivers
OSS 4 sound system (no alsa or pulse stuff installed)

Before I even start messing with it, can anyone with similar specs confirm/deny whether it's even possible to get something playable with this system? I'm willing to buy a new video card if it'll make a difference. Last time I tried with a similar set-up I was only able to get like 15fps at lowest settings with the DX8 switch.

Last edited by yawns (2010-06-13 18:45:07)

xenobrain

Member

From: Lodi, CA

Registered: 2006-05-31

Posts: 91

Re: [Solved] Team Fortress 2 / Steam

AppDB sez "yes"

My system is a Athlon64 4000+, 2GB RAM, GeForce 9600GT (using nvidia driver), ALSA sound, and although I don't have TF2 I have all the other games in the Orange Box, which use the same (or very similar) game engine.  Performance in said games is quite good too.

Last edited by xenobrain (2010-06-12 17:26:00)

Adriano ML

Member

Registered: 2008-12-18

Posts: 38

Re: [Solved] Team Fortress 2 / Steam

If you really want the "just works" way, consider purchasing Crossover Games 9. It's the Commercial version of wine, and it works really damn well with Valve's Source Engine games.

You can download the trial for free in their site, for one week: http://www.codeweavers.com/products/cxgames/

If you're going to use Wine 1.1.44, mind you that this particular version bring some regressions that make many in-game models turn up black in any Source engine game. Also, even if you use some older version of wine, you will need a lot of tweaks to get the same level of quality/performance as in crossover.

And... if you use 64bit, be prepared to install a lot of bin32- packages...

Oh, I just forgot:
My machine is about half as powerfull as yours, and I can run Team Fortress 2 > 30fps @ 1024x768 with everything except HDR turned on.

By the way, don't forget to deactivate your composition effects. Running Windowed might improve your performance for some games.

Last edited by Adriano ML (2010-06-12 21:56:15)

yawns

Member

Registered: 2010-05-31

Posts: 68

Re: [Solved] Team Fortress 2 / Steam

Thanks for the replies. I might give crossover a try. It seems reasonably priced and I'm not overly interested in installing or wrestling with wine if I don't have to.

xenobrain

Member

From: Lodi, CA

Registered: 2006-05-31

Posts: 91

Re: [Solved] Team Fortress 2 / Steam

I'm all for supporting Crossover, they seem good folk and they contribute heavily to Wine, so if you're prepared to buy from you have my encouragement

If, however, you want to try a free method of automating the Wine-wrestling for TF2 first, check out PlayOnLinux.  It has scripts for Steam, TF2 and many, many other games.

Last edited by xenobrain (2010-06-13 13:00:11)

yawns

Member

Registered: 2010-05-31

Posts: 68

Re: [Solved] Team Fortress 2 / Steam

I had some trouble getting crossover to work (I had the wrong 32 bit library installed), but their IRC support was really helpful and got it working for me.  If anyone else is having trouble with wine or just doesn't feel like dealing with it, I totally recommend going this route.

Sheepeh

Member

From: England

Registered: 2009-12-06

Posts: 16

Website

Re: [Solved] Team Fortress 2 / Steam

Hi Yawns, I'm glad Don managed to get you up and going in IRC.

For anyone else that might come across this thread (as you've got it working now, you're probably good to go), you can also just install CXG via the AUR and it'll tell you all the "optional" bits you might need such as suggesting lib32-nvidia-utils if it detects you're on x86_64.

TF2 works pretty well for me on my 8800GT @ 1680x1050; Adriano is correct in that Source games do tend to run really rather well these days.

Hopefully you'll be set to enjoy TF2 for some time to come!

(Full disclosure : I maintain the PKGBUILD and I'm also an Advocate for CodeWeavers)