osu!

What works

Everything related to gameplay.

What does not

- Upgrading to newer versions. (Stable Latest, Beta, Cutting Edge)

- Map grouping 

- When mapping, the menu bar will disappear.

- When try to type non-iso character in menu screen, osu! will crash.

- OpenGL rendering works, but unstable, and it is disable by osu! by default. Hiding wine version from osu! will allow you to choose OpenGL rendering, but it is very likely to crash.

Workarounds

What was not tested

Hardware tested

Graphics:

• GPU:
• Driver:

Additional Comments

- If native version of gdi+ is installed, all asian characters will display as squares. And sorry for my bad english.

Last update: 2017-11-10.

This section explains how to install Fallback and older versions. If you want to install and run Stable, Beta, Cutting Edge or Lazer, please read its own guide here.

Note: remember to keep Wine up to date. Where you see "$HOME", it's your user folder, just like "/home/«your_user_name»".

Considerations:

• Fallback only needs .NET Framework 2.0 to work, but the installer will try to download and install .NET Framework 3.5 SP1. This download is too big and may fail if your internet connection is slow or unstable. Also, even if .NET 3.5 was successfully downloaded, it could take a long time (~1 hour) to install. The only advantage is that you could install this version using its official installator.

• However, if you don't want to wait until .NET 3.5 is downloaded, you still need to get the corresponding "osu!.exe" for this version (and, if you want to run a very old osu! version, you will need all its required files).

• This version of osu! renders through Direct3D 9. It performs slower than OpenGL on Linux and will not work on all gpus. Always try osu! Stable first because it works way better than Fallback.

In a nutshell, installing Fallback is not worth on most cases. It should be tested only if there's no way to get Stable working.

Here we will describe some ways to install Fallback:

First way: running official installator.

If you take this way, prepare for some hours of waiting until all gets properly installed.

1) As usual, create a new 32-bit Wine prefix (it's highly recomended to not use your default prefix when installing this version):

$ env WINEARCH=win32 WINEPREFIX=$HOME/.wineosufallback winecfg

When winecfg dialog appears, set reported version to Windows XP, and click OK.

2) Make sure that Mono is not installed:

$ env WINEARCH=win32 WINEPREFIX=$HOME/.wineosufallback wine uninstaller --remove '{E45D8920-A758-4088-B6C6-31DBB276992E}'

3) Download and install osu!: There is an "old" installer that comes with all required files for Fallback, but requires .NET Framework 3.5 SP1. It will be automatically downloaded and installed when osu! installer starts:

$ wget 'https://m1.ppy.sh/release/osu!install.exe' --output-document 'osu!fallback.exe'
$ env WINEPREFIX=$HOME/.wineosufallback wine 'osu!fallback.exe'

Only follow each step on the GUI until all get installed. If you're lucky enough, osu! will start without major problem.

Yes, if this method works fine for you, it may be the only chance to mark osu! as Platinum on your report, because you don't need to do anything that would not be necessary on Windows. Good luck trying this way :) .

Second way: getting only the required files.

This method is more tricky. You need to get the osu! files from somewhere.

1) Get the necessary osu! files. There are some ways to do this:

• Install osu! Stable at another place (never on the same Wine prefix on wich you will install Fallback). If Stable doesn't work on your PC, try on another PC (of a friend, for example) or, if you have Windows installed, try there. Then, go to the game's Options menu and select the "Fallback" release stream, and wait until the required files get downloaded. Don't restart the game just now. Open the osu! directory, there should be a folder called "_pending". Copy this folder to your "$HOME" directory.

• Grab a previously installed osu! copy of Fallback, either from Windows (leaving that osu! complete its "update" to Fallback) or using an older and potentially obsolete version (beware that those versions may come with its own bugs and Wine was not always compatible with osu! in the past). If the osu! folder is so big, copy it without its "Songs" and "Skins" subfolders. Save the folder on your "HOME"" directory.

2) Create a new 32-bit Wine prefix:

$ env WINEARCH=win32 WINEPREFIX=$HOME/.wineosufallback winecfg

When winecfg dialog appears, set reported version to Windows XP, and click OK.

3) Make sure that Mono is not installed:

$ env WINEARCH=win32 WINEPREFIX=$HOME/.wineosufallback wine uninstaller --remove '{E45D8920-A758-4088-B6C6-31DBB276992E}'

4) Download and install .NET Framework 2.0:

$ wget 'http://download.microsoft.com/download/5/6/7/567758a3-759e-473e-bf8f-52154438565a/dotnetfx.exe' --output-document 'dotnet20.exe'
$ env WINEPREFIX=$HOME/.wineosufallback wine 'dotnet20.exe'

5) Run osu! Your Wine prefix is now ready to execute osu!.exe:

• If your "osu!" folder was already working before you copied it, simply move it inside your Wine prefix and run osu!.exe:

$ mv 'osu!' '$HOME/.wineosufallback/drive_c'
$ env WINEPREFIX=$HOME/.wineosufallback wine 'C:\osu!\osu!.exe'

• If your copied the "_pending" folder obtained from updating to Fallback release stream, run its osu!.exe; it will act as an installer and will allow you to change the installation directory. osu! will start when all its required files get downloaded:

$ env WINEPREFIX=$HOME/.wineosufallback wine '$HOME/_pending/osu!.exe'

Last update: 2020-12-31.

Arch Linux specific:

• osu! doesn't render anything on screen and exits with some X server error message: install lib32-libxcomposite package:

  $ sudo pacman -S lib32-libxcomposite

• osu! can't connect to internet: install lib32-gnutls package:

  $ sudo pacman -S lib32-gnutls

Japanese characters no displaying correctly: install MS Meiryo font:

$ env WINEPREFIX=$HOME/.wineosu winetricks meiryo

Set language to Japanese to correctly display all kanjis.

This font doesn't include Korean glyphs.

Options menu symbols and audio controls are missing: install GDI+:

$ env WINEPREFIX=$HOME/.wineosu winetricks gdiplus

GDI+ installer is a ~538MB file. If your internet connection is slow or limited, consider instead taking a copy of gdiplus.dll from a Windows 7 installation and copying it to your Wine prefix, and then add manually a Native override for gdiplus.

Open winecfg:

$ env WINEPREFIX=$HOME/.wineosu winecfg

Go to Libraries tab, add gdiplus and set it to Native Then Builtin. Close all dialogs by clicking OK.

Some unusual image formats are not shown when using native GDI+: install windowscodecs through winetricks:

$ env WINEPREFIX=$HOME/.wineosu winetricks windowscodecs

Note: this workaround may break screenshots and interfere with other windows applications installed on the osu! wineprefix when trying to save files. If you need to disable it:

$ env WINEPREFIX=$HOME/.wineosu winecfg

Go to Libraries tab, find windowscodecs and set it to Builtin (Wine). Close all dialogs by clicking OK.

Audio latency, sound distortion or no audio at all: first try setting PULSE_LATENCY_MSEC environment variable to "40" before running osu!:

$ env PULSE_LATENCY_MSEC=40 WINEPREFIX=$HOME/.wineosu wine 'osu!/osu!.exe'

Other values could be tested in order to get lower latency or fix sound distortion/crackling.

Enabling "Audio compatibility mode" in the osu!'s options menu will switch to legacy DirectSound-based audio engine (osu! is now using WASAPI). It can solve some problems but has higher latency and some audio stuttering.

Also check out The Poon's guide and Franc[e]sco's guide.

Frame limiter is permanently locked at 60 fps:

Disable vertical sync by setting vblank_mode environment variable to "0 " before running osu!:

$ env vblank_mode=0 WINEPREFIX=$HOME/.wineosu wine 'osu!/osu!.exe'

This way osu! will not be able to enable VSync at runtime.

Video latency: 

Desktop environments usually draw on screen through a compositor than enable fancy window effects. This may cause lag that you can feel when moving the cursor.

Note: you will prefer to run osu! under X.org since Wayland is not fully supported by most window managers.

• GNOME 3 (Mutter): it should disable it automatically when running at borderless/fullscreen. If you're running on windowed mode or have many monitors, compositing may remain enabled unless osu! window fills all the screen output area.

• KDE Plasma 5 (KWin): press Ctrl+Alt+F12 to disable/enable compositing.You can also add a window rule to block compositing when osu! starts and re-enable when it close.

• Xfce 4 (Xfwm):

  Disable compositing:
  

  $ xfconf-query -c xfwm4 -p /general/use_compositing -s false

  Re-enable compositing:
  

  $ xfconf-query -c xfwm4 -p /general/use_compositing -s true

Other known problems:

• My system is frozen!: if osu! freezes and you lose the control of your system, press Ctrl+Alt+F2 (to enter to a tty) login and enter the following to force closing osu!:

  $ pkill osu

  Press Ctrl+Alt+F1 (or Ctrl+Alt+F7 on some systems) to return to your desktop environment.

• I ran osu but my cpu usage is at 100% and nothing happens: same as frozen system. Open a terminal and run:

  $ pkill osu

  Wait 10 seconds and try again.

• Alt+tab doesn't work when Fullscreen is enabled: if you can't use Alt+Tab hotkey, disable Fullscreen mode inside osu!.

• I can't switch to Windowed mode from Fullscreen/Borderless/Letterbox: close the game. Open osu!.�your_user_name�.cfg in the osu! folder, and edit the next fields:
  Fullscreen = 0
  Letterboxing = 0
  Width = 800
  Height = 600
  

Please leave us a comment in Comments section below if you still have problems installing or running osu!.