How to play Dark Souls III on Linux
Dark Souls III is an action RPG video game developed by FromSoftware and published by Bandai Namco. It is the fourth game in the Souls series and the final game in the Souls trilogy. Here’s how to get the game working on Linux.
Dark Souls III on Linux
Dark Souls III works on Linux with the help of Steam Play, a feature of the Steam for Linux client that makes it possible for Windows video games to run on the Linux platform. To use this feature, we must go over how to install Steam.
Install Steam
To start the installation of Steam on your Linux PC, open up a terminal window on the desktop. Once the terminal window is open and ready to go, follow the command-line installation instructions below that corresponds with the operating system, you use.
Ubuntu
To get Steam on Ubuntu, you can run the following Apt command in a terminal.
sudo apt install steam
Debian
Those on Debian can use Steam, but it should be noted that Steam is best installed by downloading the Steam DEB package from the Steam website, as the Steam package in the Debian software repository is only available to users after some tinkering with software sources.
Using the wget command below, download the latest release of the Steam package to your computer.
wget https://steamcdn-a.akamaihd.net/client/installer/steam.deb
When the Steam package is done downloading to your computer, the installation can begin. Using the dpkg command below, install Steam on your Debian Linux PC.
sudo dpkg -i steam.deb
During the installation of the Steam DEB package on your computer, you may run into some dependency issues. To correct this issue, execute the apt-get install -f command below.
sudo apt-get install -f
Arch Linux
Steam is available to all Arch Linux users so long as they have the “Multilib” software repository enabled. To start the installation process, open up your Pacman.conf file, enable “mutilib,” and re-sync Pacman. Once that’s taken care of, install Steam with the command below.
sudo pacman -S steam
Fedora/OpenSUSE
If you’re using Fedora Linux or OpenSUSE, it is possible to install Steam, though it’s a tedious process. You need to enable a third-party software repository on Fedora Linux, and OpenSUSE isn’t much better. Instead, we highly recommend installing Steam on your Linux PC using the Flatpak instructions.
Flatpak
You can install the official Steam for Linux client through the Flathub app store as a Flatpak package. The Flatpak version of Steam is a godsend to those on Linux who are running Linux operating systems that do not officially support Steam.
To start the installation of Steam on your Linux PC via Flatpak, open up a terminal window. Once the terminal window is open, follow our guide to learn how to set up the Flatpak runtime. Then, execute the flatpak remote-add command below to add the Flathub app store to your computer.
flatpak remote-add --if-not-exists flathub https://flathub.org/repo/flathub.flatpakrepo
With Flathub set up on your system, you’ll be able to install the Steam Flatpak package with the flatpak install command below.
flatpak install flathub com.valvesoftware.Steam
Install Dark Souls III on Linux
After installing the Steam for Linux client on your PC, open up the app, sign in and follow the step-by-step instructions below to learn how to get Dark Souls III running on Linux.
Step 1: Open up the “Steam” menu in Steam and select “Settings.” After selecting the “Settings” button, you will be in the Steam settings area. From there, find “Steam Play” and select it to go to the Steam Play area.
In the Steam Play area, locate “Enable Steam Play for supported titles” and “Enable Steam Play for all other titles” and check the boxes next to each of them. Then, click “OK” to apply the changes. These options, once enabled, will allow Dark Souls III to run on Linux.
Step 2: Find the “STORE” button in Steam, and select it with the mouse. After clicking on “STORE,” you’ll see the Steam Storefront. From here, click on the search box, type in “Dark Souls III,” and press the Enter key to search.
Look through the search results for “Dark Souls III” and select it with the mouse to go to the Dark Souls III Storefront page.
Step 3: On the Dark Souls III Storefront page, look for the green “Add to cart” button, and select it with the mouse to purchase the game. After buying the game, click on the “LIBRARY” button, go to your Steam library.
Step 4: Locate the blue “INSTALL” button, and select it with the mouse to download and install Dark Souls III to your Linux PC. Keep in mind that this installation will take some time as the game is quite large.
Step 5: When the downloading process for Dark Souls III is done, the blue “INSTALL” button will become a green “PLAY” button. From here, click on the green “PLAY” button to start up the game.
As you start up the game, Steam will notify you that it is configuring Dark Souls III to run with Steam Play. Please sit back and allow it to configure everything. When done, the game should startup. Enjoy!
Having issues running Dark Souls III? Check out the ProtonDB page on it for help.
