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Forsaken Remastered adds Vulkan support to the Linux version

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For those who love testing out games with Vulkan, do take a look at Forsaken Remastered which was updated last night for Linux to add in Vulkan support. To enable it, simply load the game and go into the video options where it will now let you pick your graphics API.

The person who ported it to Linux, Ryan "Icculus" Gordon, mentioned it on his recent Patreon update although it didn't actually go live for Linux until quite a few hours later.

After finding it not working, I spoke with Icculus for a while last night to discover the cause. Currently, the version of SDL shipped with Ubuntu (Debian's package) doesn't have Vulkan enabled. For some reason on Ubuntu 18.04, Steam wants to use the system installed SDL (instead of the Steam runtime) for Forsaken Remastered which causes Vulkan in the game not to work.

Turns out, there's been an open bug report about it for a while and so last night I poked Canonical about it. Today, it seems people are looking into getting it sorted so that's nice. It does need to be solved, otherwise it's going to cause all sorts of issues for people on Ubuntu.

As a reminder on what's new in the remastered edition (apart from official Linux support), it includes things like: support for Widescreen and 4K monitors, smooth interpolated movement for 144hz displays and beyond, MSAA and SMAA anti aliasing, Ambient Occlusion and Motion Blur effects, enhanced and improved particle effects, a new automap feature, unique levels and enemies featured in the N64 version and plenty more.

If you wish to pick up a copy, you can do so from the Humble Store, GOG and Steam.

Article taken from GamingOnLinux.com.
Tags: Action, GOG, Steam, Vulkan
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PieOrCake Sep 13, 2018
Icculus does amazing work.
MayeulC Sep 13, 2018
Quotefor some reason on Ubuntu 18.04 Forsaken Remastered wants to use the system installed SDL (instead of the Steam runtime) which causes Vulkan in the game not to work

Meanwhile, you could try to run steam with
STEAM_RUNTIME_PREFER_HOST_LIBRARIES=0 steam
It just has to do with the LD_LIBRARY_PATH order, that was changed a while back (the current default is 1). Steam should probably get involved a bit more, and could even provide its own loader, I think.

Thanks Icculus!


Last edited by MayeulC on 13 September 2018 at 11:18 am UTC
Shmerl Sep 13, 2018
Very interesting. I was actually planning to buy it, but didn't get to it yet.
Liam Dawe Sep 13, 2018
Quoting: MayeulC
Quotefor some reason on Ubuntu 18.04 Forsaken Remastered wants to use the system installed SDL (instead of the Steam runtime) which causes Vulkan in the game not to work

Meanwhile, you could try to run steam with
STEAM_RUNTIME_PREFER_HOST_LIBRARIES=0 steam
It just has to do with the LD_LIBRARY_PATH order, that was changed a while back (the current default is 1). Steam should probably get involved a bit more, and could even provide its own loader, I think.

Thanks Icculus!
While there's no doubt other things people can tinker with, the point is we shouldn't need to :)
PublicNuisance Sep 13, 2018
If they can add Vulkan to this old game then there is little to no excuse for other devs out there. Well done.
slaapliedje Sep 13, 2018
I was trying to play this game last night with the Steam Controller. Definitely need to tweak the sensitivity.. either that or I just suck. :P
jarhead_h Sep 14, 2018
Already wishlisted and I can't do anymore than that until I get a new job. So if anyone is hiring an almost-RHCSA in Oregon who also can't code yet, please let me know. :)
Phlebiac Sep 14, 2018
Quoting: PublicNuisanceIf they can add Vulkan to this old game

As I understand it, they completely replaced the engine for this game and the two Turok games (they may not even have the old source code?). So they didn't add Vulkan to the old game, they added Vulkan to their new engine that was made compatible with the data from these old games (similar to how ScummVM runs old games on new operating systems).
slaapliedje Sep 14, 2018
Quoting: Phlebiac
Quoting: PublicNuisanceIf they can add Vulkan to this old game

As I understand it, they completely replaced the engine for this game and the two Turok games (they may not even have the old source code?). So they didn't add Vulkan to the old game, they added Vulkan to their new engine that was made compatible with the data from these old games (similar to how ScummVM runs old games on new operating systems).

Probably closer to some of the enhanced Doom/Quake ports, where they use the same data. Sounds like they even pulled in the levels from the N64 version. But to be fair, it is quite possible they still had source code from at least SOME of the stuff. Icculus of course would be the man to ask.

Would be funny if he just used Dolphin as a wrapper. After all, it supports Vulkan.

P.S. Just remembered, Dolphin is Gamecube/Wii. Mupen64 would be the N64 emulator...


Last edited by slaapliedje on 14 September 2018 at 5:35 pm UTC
Liam Dawe Sep 14, 2018
Note: Updated the text to be clearer, it's Steam wanting to use system SDL, not Forsaken. Sorry if that wasn't clear enough.
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