On Windows, the go-to emulators are Bluestacks and NoxPlayer (both closed source), especially when gaming is concerned. Unfortunately they are not available on Linux, and the Nox devs’ dismissive attitude towards Linux also makes it unlikely they’ll ever make a Linux port:

screenshot showing Nox support staff stating: "94% of our market is on PC. 4.999999% are on Mac. 0.000001 are on Linux. It makes no economic sense for us to dedicated man hours to build a Linux version."

So apart from trying to run these two using Wine, what emulators are out there on Linux that yield a sufficiently decent performance to make Android games playable?

EDIT: looks like Waydroid is a winner, see the comments.

  • AlmightySnoo 🐢🇮🇱🇺🇦@lemmy.worldOPEnglish
    11·
    1 year ago

    Just tried it out and the 3D performance is amazing!

    Installed it on Arch Linux following the wiki (https://wiki.archlinux.org/title/Waydroid) and didn’t need to do anything regarding the binder module as I have the linux-zen kernel installed.

    Need to initialize it with the GApps image and then certify the emulated device by following the instructions on their doc (https://docs.waydro.id/faq/google-play-certification) in order to have access to the Play Store. Some games like Genshin Impact cannot be installed as they’re marked as incompatible but many are installable.

    EDIT: Actually Genshin Impact and similar games also work, it’s just that they are ARM64 apps and you need an ARM -> x86 translation layer for them to work. In particular you need to add libhoudini to your Waydroid install. There’s a script that simplifies this: https://github.com/casualsnek/waydroid_script. However, games that have only ARM64 binaries, like Genshin Impact, will be slow. Games like Asphalt 8 & 9 and League of Angels run at native speeds because they have x86 binaries.

    A few screenshots:

    Obligatory SuperTuxKart

    screenshot of SuperTuxKart on an emulated Android

    Asphalt 8

    screenshot of Asphalt 8 on an emulated Android

    Asphalt 9

    screenshot of Asphalt 9 on an emulated Android

    League of Angels: Chaos

    screenshot of League of Angels Chaos on an emulated Android

    The physical keyboard isn’t detected by Asphalt 8 though, however it is properly handled by Asphalt 9. So I guess it’s going to really depend on the game.