I recently picked up a VR headset and am having a blast playing Fallout and Skyrim in a totally new way, as well as a couple of other games. AFAIK I have to play these games in Windows because Oculus does not support Linux, and even if I had a HTC/Valve headset I’m not sure it would be possible to use VR on Linux.
TL;DR Is there any way to game in VR on Linux?
The HTC vive and Valve index both work on Linux with SteamVR, at least to some extent.
There is also OpenHMD, which is working on providing open-source drivers for both Linux and Windows. For the Oculus Rift CV1, they have rotation working, but not position (yet), and it is being actively developed.
http://www.openhmd.net/
Too bad recent Oculus devices are not supported. At least Sidequest exists for Linux, but there doesn’t seem to be any way to get a full-fat PC VR experience in Linux for the Oculus Quest 2.
So, it’s worth noting that like all other devices, Linux support lag is proportional to the complexity.
As far as steamvr for Linux, I haven’t had a chance to try it out, but I’ll take a stab at it soon.
Few games natively support Linux and there, it only really works with Vive based headsets including the Index.
What I did was to passthrough my Windows SSD and games drive to a VM alongside my 5700 to play games while running Linux.
It stinks somehow but at least things work.
That will eventually be my plan. Still waiting on GPU stock and waterblocks for a shorty card. shakes fist at sky
It works kinda. Wouldn’t recommend it.
This is a job for easy VFIO or multiboot setup.
Regarding if ever we get the support - answer is unlikely. The HW has been here for long and is focusing more on runtime than the actual platform. This means that unofficial platforms will be behind artificially. Oculus Quest is a great example as it is not even running windows…
You might be able to use RiftCat type SW to stream VR into your headset. This would increase complexity and latency to a point that I would just skip most SteamVR games.
Should native linux support for VR come about [eventually], I would anticipate the likes of HTC Vive and Valve Index, being series to get 1st dibs [… First big viable firmware for OG Vive?]
The software that drives it for steam is already native. Its games that are the issue first, and good usb 3.0 support second.
Wireless VR complicates things further, since the VIVE wireless kit uses a dedicated PCI-E Wireless card. More Linux driver complexity there.
It uses Intel WiGig. (60Ghz MMW) It’s an optional part of the 802.11 standard and is different from 2.4Ghz and 5Ghz frequency bands.
DXVK also aren’t even trying to optimize for VRChat, which is super inefficient from the get go. It would have been a losing battle so it’s not worth optimizing for.
I run an Occulus Rift S in a Windows 10 vm with no issues.
See details of my hardware & configuration on Reddit.
(spending money on hardware will be less problematic & more performant than trying to do things in software)
I run HL Alyx / Walking Dead Saints & Sinners / Arizona Sunshine / Contractors with no issues.
I’ve used GPU pass through on a couple of other systems successfully. The problem for me is that my current PC has a messy IOMMU map. Supposedly there are ways around it, but I haven’t bothered since my last failure a while back.