[Games] Horrible performance on games.

[dogukans]

Hey all! I am new to Kubuntu (and Linux for that matter) and get bad performance on games. I know Intel HD graphics aren't good at all but I'm talking about games like Deus Ex GOTY, Hitman Codename 47 and other ancient games. Running games in OpenGL clearly improves the performance but not all games have it.

If it helps, graphics card is HD 500, CPU is Celeron N3350, RAM is 4GB. Kubuntu 20.10, using Steam with Proton 5.13.

[claydoh]

Poor-ish graphics drivers on a meager cpu. yeah, I know tha these are old gamer, but they are also running under an emulator (sort of). While Intel video drivers are usually pretty solid, they are not as tweakable, and not as performant in Linux. Especially on low-end Chromebook-spec hardware.
Having said that, I have had a blast playing Half Life 2 on my similarly spec'd Chromebook on Linux, But that is the native Linux port.

Have you tried older versions of proton? You can specify a specific version per-game.

This website may be useful, even if everyone seems to run gaming hardware.
https://www.protondb.com/app/6910

[oshunluvr]

Are you comparing your system performance to a Windows install or something?

I'm not trying to be harsh, but that's a very low-end system. Maybe your expectations are a little high? For example, the HD 500 gets an Geekbench OpenCL score of 1031 while the #1 score is 237214. The CPU is just a low - nearly bottom of currently available Intel products. Then add in only 4gb RAM, you're really at the low end performance wise.

I'm a former Hitman madman and I never had troubles running it in Linux with WINE but I haven't tried it on Steam yet. However, I've always had a dedicated GPU. nVidia in the past but currently AMD, and a high-end system.

Here's my point: You're running in layers: Windows games on a platform fairly new to Linux (Steam) with a low-end GPU, CPU and available RAM. The idea you'll get the same performance as you might running without those layers - Windows OS and a Windows game natively (rather than through Steam) is at best overly optimistic. I'm not trying to dissuade you from Linux, but there are realities to your situation. Computer gaming is historically the Windows market and only recently started to shift toward Linux. Steam is the first real attempt (IMO) to bring desktop gaming to the Linux world.

I suggest you start by researching how to optimize what you have - the proper kernel , best video driver, reduce memory footprint, etc. In the old days, I would have suggested compiling your own kernel but almost no one does that anymore. The latest kernel may not be the best choice for your CPU so get on the internet and see what you can find.

You might try some less intense - computing power wise - games until you can lay hands on something more powerful.

[oshunluvr]

Try 0 A.D for some fun that runs very well on lower-end hardware. I love it.

[TWPonKubuntu]

I second that vote for the 0 A.D. game. I also play Endless Sky, a space trading game with plenty of hidden missions.

[woodsmoke]

Hi dogukans!

And welcome to the Kubuntu forums! Don't be a stranger!
woodsmoke