Roblox's Internal build running under Arch Linux under Wine on August 20th, 2023.
Roblox Player working on Arch Linux under Wine on June 13, 2021
Roblox does not allow natively running Roblox Player on Linux. An update to the Roblox Client on May 4, 2023, implementing the Hyperion anti-cheat into the Roblox client globally has made the live/Public build of Roblox Player nonfunctional on Linux; this was an intentional change to block the use of Wine, a windows-app compatibility layer for linux and other similar software such as Proton.[1] Wine is still able to run Roblox Studio, though this is not officially supported.
Roblox Player can still be played through Waydroid on Linux, but support for games will be limited to ones that support mobile. This also comes with the catch that Nvidia GPU users are currently limited to software rendering only in Waydroid, and for acceptable performance AMD GPU users have to use a custom libndk patch made by Slappy826 to be able to play with libndk for acceptable performance, Intel iGPU users should have an acceptable experience with libhoudini.
History[]
On July 28, 2012, John Shedletsky confirmed that progress on Roblox on Linux was 97% complete. Shedletsky claimed that the problem with Linux is the poor driver support. Another blog post by Shedletsky claimed that they could spend months on Linux or they could work on a highly requested feature.
We’re probably 97% of the way to a Linux port, now that we’ve all the work necessary to port ROBLOX to OSX – which, as you probably know, is based on the UNIX kernel. I think the problem that we would likely run into on Linux is poor video driver support. I’ve heard horror stories from other developers. However, as Linux becomes more popular, I expect this hurdle to disappear.
We could spend six months porting ROBLOX to Linux, or we could deliver other highly requested features. If we’re going to be porting ROBLOX to another platform, Android is definitely next in line. Consoles are a close second–maybe that would involve a Linux port, particularly if the Steam OS takes off. We’ll see.
John Shedletsky, Feedback Loop: BLOXcast Edition
During the RDC 2020 Q&A session, it was confirmed that there were currently no plans to bring Roblox to Linux due to its small desktop market share. However, Arseny Kapoulkine has said that there will be plans if "Linux becomes the platform of choice for gamers".[2][3] It is extremely unlikely that FreeBSD will ever get a Roblox port, due to a very tiny playerbase.
Roblox has been tested multiple times, with success until 2015. On May 15, 2015, Roblox received a "Gold" rating in the Wine App Database.[4]
From 2015 to 2021, it was not possible to run Roblox Player on Linux, as joining a game resulted in the connection being dropped with the error "This game has shut down."[5] This was originally assumed to be due to anti-cheat software, but Kalen Alwardt later stated this "was not the cause of the issue."[6]
On June 11, 2021, a user by the name of ImSlappy826 created a one-line patch for Wine that allowed the Roblox Player to work again on a GNU/Linux or FreeBSD system. The patch implements the ZwFilterToken function, which was supposed to be implemented along NtFilterToken, into ntdll. The patch has been committed to the Wine development tree[7] and is included in Wine 6.11.[8] User Brinker released a pre-patched version for Arch-based Linux distributions, while user robigan created a patch for Debian-based distros.
On January 18, 2022, the Wine development team released Wine version 7.0, bringing the patch to Wine's "Stable" release.[9]
In April 2023, Roblox began the rollout of their new Hyperion anti-cheat system into the Roblox Client, which blocks Wine, therefore making it so that Roblox can no longer be playable on any Linux distro. However, a Roblox admin confirmed that the development team will look into working on Linux/Wine compatibility in the future.[10]
On August 14th, 2023, Roblox began experimenting with bringing back Linux support on their Internal builds of Roblox. Support is hit or miss as some updates break compatibility while others work mostly fine. The client is also a hit or miss and tends to segfault and random times.[citation needed]
As the Wine API evolved its Windows compatibility, they were starting to prove a hazard by 2024. Increased detection of cheating on Wine exposed the exploit to developers, staff and general users. This factor coupled with the floundering of Wine-based Roblox exploits on different Discord/Guilded servers, and the question of maintainability lead to the Roblox staff to yet again block the use of Wine. The blocking update was released on March 2024.
Roblox running through Waydroid on Kubuntu 23.10 with Slappy826's libndk patch on March 8th 2024
After the anticheat update, users have chosen another way to run Roblox on Linux, through the use of Waydroid, a compatibility layer to run Android apps on a GNU/Linux system, users have reported having success in making the Android version of Roblox work there, however Waydroid requires the Wayland display server to work, which makes it impossible to use for users with older NVIDIA GPUs, and has limited support on NVIDIA GPUs in general.
In August 2024, the creators of VinegarHQ made Sober, a software that converts x86_64 Android APK of Roblox into an specialized runtime without compatibility layers, emulators, or virtual machines, making it up to twice the performance of native Windows version, and unlike Waydroid where it requires Wayland to work, Sober will also work on X11, improving the compatibility of older NVIDIA drivers. At the time, Sober is only available on official website, due to being closed-source. It requires the distribution to support Flatpak, the only method of installing Sober.
See also[]
References[]
- ↑ https://devforum.roblox.com/t/the-new-roblox-64-bit-byfron-client-forbids-wine-users-from-using-it-most-likely-unintentional/2305528/2
- ↑ Roblox (2020, July 31). Roblox Panel | RDC2020 [Video]. YouTube.
- ↑ Bloxy News [@Bloxy_News] (2020, July 26). "Q: Will Roblox ever be available on Linux? A: Short answer is no." [Tweet]. Twitter.
- ↑ (n.d.) . "Roblox Player". From Wine Application Database. WineHQ. Archived from the original on October 10, 2022.
- ↑ (2015, July 17). ""You have been kicked due to unexpected client behavior. (Error Code: 268)" message after attempting to join a game". From roblox-linux-wrapper. GitHub. Accessed June 19, 2021. Archived from the original on January 25, 2021.
- ↑ (2015, August 24). "Bug 39142 — Roblox Client/Server connection is dropped with error "This server has shut down."". From WineHQ Bugzilla. Archived from the original on June 19, 2021.
- ↑ Alwardt, Kalen (2021, June 14). "ntdll: Export ZwFilterToken().". From source.winehq.org. Archived from the original on June 19, 2021.
- ↑ Julliard, Alexandre (n.d.) . "The Wine development release 6.11 is now available.". From WineHQ. Archived from the original on June 19, 2021.
- ↑ Julliard, Alexandre (2022, January 18). "The Wine team is proud to announce that the stable release Wine 7.0 is now available.". From WineHQ. Archived from the original on January 20, 2022.
- ↑ (2023, April 21). ""The new Roblox 64-bit Byfron client forbids Wine users from using it. (Most likely unintentional)"". From DevForum. Archived from the original on 5 May 2023.