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Today is the day to prepare your spare pants, as the cyberpunk horror game Observer [Steam, Official Site] from Bloober Team and Aspyr Media is launching. Sadly it seems no AMD support at launch.

Aspyr Media tweeted out that the system requirements for the Linux version are now up, here's what you will need:

  • Operating System: 16.04, 17.04, SteamOS 2.0
  • Processor: Intel Core i3 / AMD A8-6700
  • Processor Speed: Intel (3.4 GHz), AMD (3.1 GHz)
  • Memory: 8 GB
  • Hard Drive Space: 10 GB
  • Video Card (NVIDIA): GeForce GT 680
  • VRAM: 2 GB
  • NOTICE: INTEL and ATI* video cards are NOT SUPPORTED to run Observer Linux

*It's AMD, ATI hasn't been a thing since around 2010.

I've reached out to Aspyr Media today, to see if we can find out what the deal is with the AMD support. However, I've only recently emailed them so I don't expect a reply for a number of hours yet. I'm hoping to have an answer I can share by the time it actually releases.

Hopefully, it's a case of a few simple bugs in Mesa that can get solved with a fresh Mesa release. Hopefully it won't take too long for you AMD GPU folks.

I haven't been told on the time of the release, but it will be today as already reported. We should have a livestream tonight to check it out, as long as no issues come up. Be sure to follow us on Twitch to get in on the fun.

Article taken from GamingOnLinux.com.
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pete910 Oct 24, 2017
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Quoting: F.Ultra
Quoting: LinasAnybody brave enough to try it on AMD and post the results here, so I can make a risk-free purchase? ;)

Works flawless for me on my RX480 and Mesa 17.2.2

So basically they just aint bothered testing it


Which also goes to show the problems when developing with one vendors hardware!
Samsai Oct 24, 2017
Quoting: GuestLast I checked AMD bails on their driver support faster than you can say New iPhone! They haven't made drivers for my card in like 2 years nor will they. Of course I could go back to 15.04...you know like going back to Windows ME (remember that pile?) to get functionality back. Point is I can install current drivers on all platforms for my nVidia cards...mean while I can install current drivers for my AMD cards in Windows or Mac OS but not Linux because as always AMD has left anything not bleeding edge to die.
Found your problem. You are obviously trying to use the worse drivers AKA the proprietary drivers. Switch to Mesa and you'll get regular updates and a better performance in basically most games, not to mention a more stable experience in general.
beniwtv Oct 24, 2017
Quoting: GuestLast I checked AMD bails on their driver support faster than you can say New iPhone! They haven't made drivers for my card in like 2 years nor will they. Of course I could go back to 15.04...you know like going back to Windows ME (remember that pile?) to get functionality back. Point is I can install current drivers on all platforms for my nVidia cards...mean while I can install current drivers for my AMD cards in Windows or Mac OS but not Linux because as always AMD has left anything not bleeding edge to die.

If I read this correctly, you seem to be talking about the open Mesa driver not performing good on this card (I believe there were/still are some regressions?), and AMD not providing an official proprietary driver for this card on Linux anymore.

That situation sucks, I kinda have to agree with you on that.

However - I believe this card was released in 2013, if I'm not mistaken. You kinda have to look at the situation the Linux graphics stack and GPU support was in at the time: We had a TON of features to catch up on OpenGL. Gaming wasn't much of a thing either, yet. Nvidia drivers still broke from time to time on kernel update, unless you used Ubuntu. Intel mostly worked, but were fairly slow. Still, some things that were out at the time worked, I remember playing Star Trek Online on Mesa in Wine on a AMD 7830M (or something along those lines...) on a hybrid Intel/AMD GPU laptop.

We have come a very long way since then. Catching up to OpenGL, and fixing these issues took a lot of effort. Effort that then couldn't be put into good driver support for all cards. Manpower was also shorter back then.

Now that we basically have good GPU support, good OpenGL support, and not all that bad Vulkan support for the most part - can you really blame the devs working on the FOSS drivers wanting to prioritize current-gen cards as supposed to cards from 2013?
fabertawe Oct 25, 2017
This is going to the top of my wishlist. Just behind SteamWorld Dig 2, which I still haven't had the chance to buy. "Embarrassment of riches" is the phrase that comes to mind these days, who'd have thought that a few years ago?
johndoe86x Oct 25, 2017
Quoting: beniwtv
Quoting: GuestLast I checked AMD bails on their driver support faster than you can say New iPhone! They haven't made drivers for my card in like 2 years nor will they. Of course I could go back to 15.04...you know like going back to Windows ME (remember that pile?) to get functionality back. Point is I can install current drivers on all platforms for my nVidia cards...mean while I can install current drivers for my AMD cards in Windows or Mac OS but not Linux because as always AMD has left anything not bleeding edge to die.

If I read this correctly, you seem to be talking about the open Mesa driver not performing good on this card (I believe there were/still are some regressions?), and AMD not providing an official proprietary driver for this card on Linux anymore.

That situation sucks, I kinda have to agree with you on that.

Yes, that is a bad situation, but have the Mesa drivers not drastically improved even on the 270X as of late? A year ago, Penguin Recordings did a comparison video of the 260X on Ubuntu and Windows in Dota 2. While it wasn't on par with Windows it had vastly improved since its inception. Is the 270X just that much of a bastard card?
ripper Oct 25, 2017
Quoting: johndoe86xYes, that is a bad situation, but have the Mesa drivers not drastically improved even on the 270X as of late? A year ago, Penguin Recordings did a comparison video of the 260X on Ubuntu and Windows in Dota 2. While it wasn't on par with Windows it had vastly improved since its inception. Is the 270X just that much of a bastard card?

If you use recent enough drivers (a modern distribution) the performance is close enough to Windows performance. Of course some games are just crappy ports, in that case it's not the driver's fault.
F.Ultra Oct 29, 2017
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Quoting: F.Ultra
Quoting: LinasAnybody brave enough to try it on AMD and post the results here, so I can make a risk-free purchase? ;)

Works flawless for me on my RX480 and Mesa 17.2.2

Unfortunately I hadn't tested as far as that first door where everyone else get stuck when I wrote the above. It breaks for me there as well. I wonder if any of the mesa devs would accept a steam gift of this game in order to see why it breaks on mesa at that point?! If so I have no problem providing that.
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