Okay, I am new here, but i Have successfully installed openfreespace via knossos with it working in gaming mode and without owning freespace 1 or 2, and having all the different games as their launchers, in fact i have done it months ago(4-6 months), sorry for not informing
so here are the steps.
1. make sure the deck is unlocked and use the command with konsole:
sudo pacman -S base-devel
2. Make sure to git clone and install the AUR's,(both knossos and the two python dependencies that are not pakages(python-raven, and python token-bucket respectfully)
and make sure to change directory first , i would do these console commands with konsole:
cd /home/deck/ this is my recommended directory
git clone
https://aur.archlinux.org/fs2-knossos.git git clone
https://aur.archlinux.org/python-raven.gitgit clone
https://aur.archlinux.org/python-token-bucket.gitthen i would
cd /home/deck/fs2-knossos/
makepkg -si
this will try to install as many dependencies as possible, install most of those dependencies(which are packages) with konsole by typing:
sudo pacman -S
(note: some of those dependencies might be outdated with this command and must be installed manually via downloading the mirror of the packages manually and typing in konsole
sudo pacman -U
then just drag and drop the file to konsole to finish the rest of the line)
, then it is time to install the aur packages :
cd /home/deck/python-raven/
makepkg -si
then
cd /home/deck/python-token-bucket/
makepkg -si
and finally
cd /home/deck/fs2-knossos/
makepkg -si
now if theses steps work, knossos is successfully installed.
you could now delete these AUR folders and files contained in them
3. now it is time to open knossos and install some games, and the open freespace engine,
a warning would appear, for me anyway, "A critical error occurred! Knossos might not work correctly until you restart it"", and just press okay for around 25 to 100 times until the warning window will not show up anymore,
if you follow these steps, knossos would not be used as a launcher and only just as a installer
first i would change the install directory, i have it set up to the SD card and it the game works, and i made sure the folder was /freespaceopen
so click on the gear icon(settings menu) under the close (x button) to get started, i have the stable version as the engine selected under the knossos tab,
under the Joystick tab, joystick Microsoft X-box 360 Pad 0(the steamdeck pad)
video: 1280 X 800. i keep everything else default., then click on the green Save button
now click explore and install a game,
I installed wing commander saga 0.9.6, seems to be the most stable with the steam deck, and it is a native application.
after it is done installing,
make sure it works by pressing the play button, if the intro works, you have installed it, to close the application, hold the steam button and press B, it would open up the keyboard and you will be sent to back desktop, now right click the freespace application and close
now time to play the game without the knossos application, first click on the settings button(the gear wheel under the x button), click on the dropdown menu on the knossos tab, look in the library Path, and go to that path using the dolphin browser, it should be../freespaceopen, now go to /bin/FSO-22.0.0/Linux/, and right glick the fs2_open_22_0_0x64.AppImage file and go to properties (go to the permission tab and make sure is executable is checked), then copy the file
now go back to the freespaceopen directory and you will see a folder for each game installed, go to the game folder, in my case /Wing_Commander_Saga/Wing_Commander_Saga-0.9.6 and paste the file in that folder, now open the file to test that it works, If so you can now play the game without requring Knossos,(note: you will have to do that with every game you own, A symlink might be possible)
and finally it is time to add the game to steam, so that way it can be played in gaming mode with full controller support, left or right click on the steam icon on the bottom right the the screen and click library, then click add a Non-Steam-game, (note adding a game on linux is not as intuitive on widows, because windows allows us to use explorer, but in linux we cannot use dolphin, so if you have the freespace directory installed in linux, it would generally be in /run/media/and the folder that starts with the m)
find the fs2_open_22_0_0x64.AppImage file that is the specific one you pated to the game directory. and double click and open. make sure the file is checked and click add selected to library , now scroll down in the games tab and find fs2_open_22_0_0x64.AppImage, and right click and select properties, here you can change the name without changing the file*i have changed mine to (Wing_Commander_Saga), and since this a native linux app, make sure steam play compatibility (in the compatibility tab) is disabled
now you have successfully installed and added the game to steam, now it is time for the hard part setting up the controls.
