Battlefield 3

What works

• DXVK patch (together with esync)
• Game Installation
• Campaign
• Multiplayer (See "What does not work")

Everything seems to be playable + performance isn't that bad (no spikes). I am on UX430UQ ultrabook under nvidia-xrun (Nvidia GT940MX), so even on Windows I would have terrible performance that does not consistently stay over 60fps...

Using wine-4.0-rc4 (Staging), 32bit, with DXVK under Arch Linux (4.19.12-arch1-1-ARCH), XFCE4, with compositor disabled.

What does not

1. I was unable to get working PunkBuster service for multiplayer. That means you can't play in punkbuster enabled servers (getting kicked after a minute or two). I've tried downloading punkbuster, updating it, reinstalling it, but nothing helped.
2. Servers do not display ping in the browser (it's Origin running under Wine issue).
3. 64bit wine installation gives "BF3WebHelper.exe has encountered a serious problem and needs to close." error and nothing else happens.

The following has workarounds:

• Mouse is just unplayably laggy (see workarounds).
• Connect to the server from the browser (see workarounds).

Workarounds

Unable to launch the game from this device

http://battlelog.battlefield.com/bf3/ won't allow you to connect to any server and says that you are using unsupported platform. Just trick the website by changing your browser user-agent to something Windows-like - Internet Explorer. For Chrome users, User-Agent Switcher for Chrome works just fine.

Mouse controls are unusable

• FIX 1: When in the game, go to settings and set "RAW MOUSE INPUT" to "Off". In Wine settings, leave mouse warp override unchanged.
• FIX 2 (my preferred): Go to wine settings (winetricks) and set mouse warp override to disabled. In Battlefield 3 in-game settings, leave "raw mouse input" enabled.

BF3WebHelper.exe has encountered a serious problem and needs to close. 

See notes - this is what happens when you install in 64bit wine prefix. Use 32bit.

What was not tested

• Multiplayer for more than 1-2 minutes. Due to punkbuster issues being kicked out.
• Any DLCs, but 100% confident they would work just fine.
• Using latest up-to-date Origin client to install & run BF3 game (legacy Origin client was used).

Hardware tested

Graphics:

• GPU: Nvidia
• Driver: proprietary

Additional Comments

How to install

I will describe how I installed it on Arch Linux. On other distributions steps might be slightly different.

1. Create new 32bit wine prefix:

$ WINEARCH=win32 winecfg

2. Set-up DXVK:

$ WINEPREFIX=~/.wine setup_dxvk32

3. Install legacy Origin client. When going to Origin download page, you will be noted that you are using unsupported platform and you will get an offer to download legacy installers instead - download it. I did not use current (latest) Origin client and don't know if it even works.

4. Install Battlefield 3 through Origin like you normally do.

5. Disable annoying stuff in Origin settings (Origin helper service, In-game service...). Not sure if needed, but I did.

6. Happy game! See workarounds section on how to deal with various issues.

Try FIX 1 first. If this does not help, then try FIX 2:

FIX 1: Go to wine settings (winetricks) and set "mouse warp override" to "disabled". In Battlefield 3 in-game settings, set "raw mouse input" to "On".

FIX 2: Go to Wine settings (winetricks) and set "mouse warp override" to default value ("Enabled'). In Battlefield 3 in-game settings, set "raw mouse input" to "Off".

This error shows up during game launch when using 64bit wine prefix. You need to use 32bit wine prefix in order to fix it.

1. Change your preferred browser's user agent to something Windows-like (e.g. Internet Explorer 10). For Chrome users, User-Agent Switcher for Chrome works just fine.
2. Instead of clicking "Play" in origin, go to http://battlelog.battlefield.com/bf3/, login using Origin's (EA) credentials and connect to your favourite server. Game will start in minimized mode as expected.