As a video game, DOOM has achieved cult status not just for its legendary gameplay and milestone developments but also because it’s the piece of software that’s likely been ported to the most number of platforms. Almost everything with a processor can run the 1993 shooter, but as it ages, this becomes less of a challenge. More modern games are starting to move into this position, and Factorio may be taking a leading position. [Point Substantial] has gotten this game to run on a mobile phone.
The minimum system requirements for Factorio are enough to make this a challenge, especially compared to vintage title like DOOM. For Linux systems a dual-core processor and 8 GB of memory are needed, as well as something with at least 1 GB of VRAM. [Point_Substantial]’s Xiaomi Mi 9T almost meets these official minimum requirements, with the notable exception of RAM. This problem was solved by adding 6 GB of swap space to make up for the difference.
The real key to getting this running is that this phone doesn’t run Android, it runs the Linux-only postmarketOS. Since it’s a full-fledged Linux distribution rather than Android, it can run any software any other Linux computer can, including Steam. And it can also easily handle inputs for periphreals including a Switch Pro controller, which is important because this game doesn’t have touch inputs programmed natively.
The other tool that [Point_Substantial] needed was box86/box64, a translation layer to run x86 code on ARM. But with all the pieces in place it’s quite possible to run plenty of games semi-natively on a system like this. In fact, we’d argue it’s a shame that more phones don’t have support for Linux distributions like postmarketOS based on the latest news about Android.
Thanks to [Keith] for the tip!
There is a better alternative to Factorio. It is Mindustry ( https://mindustrygame.github.io/ ) and it runs in any device (maybe a N64 not) and it is free software.
The red-stone/logic wires in Mindustry is so neat it’s actually triggering my OCD in a good way. Because the Factorio’s old wooden power poles and mess of wires stress me out.
And the colour pallette Mindustry is so beatiful and sunny like as old games.
One of the reasons there aren’t a lot of more modern games to follow doom is there aren’t a lot of open source games anymore. Maybe something like amnesia the dark decent? The devs graciously open sourced their game engine, though they didn’t make the game art available afaik. Half life might be another option, with various attempts at an open source engine and plenty of 3rd party levels floating around.
You can download Unreal 5 for free, compared to crap like Quake or Source engine it’s one of the best platforms ever created for developing AAA games, even for indie developers. The main reason why people complain about UE5 games is they live in shitholes like Pakistan where people still use Pentium 4 PCs as daily drivers 🤡
With modern GPU you’ll never match its visuals and gameplay.
Didn’t realise someone had ripped off Mega-lo-Mania and improved upon it quite so well.
Bet it doesn’t have the voices tho.