box86

Linux Userspace x86 Emulator with a twist

Box86 lets you run x86 Linux programs (such as games) on non-x86 Linux, like ARM (host system needs to be 32bit little-endian).

You NEED a 32-bit subsystem to run and build Box86. Box86 is useless on 64-bit only systems. Also, you NEED a 32-bit toolchain to build Box86. A toolchain that only support 64-bit will not compile Box86, and you'll get errors (typically on aarch64, you get "-marm" not recognized, and you'll need a multiarch or chroot environnement).

Because Box86 uses the native versions of some "system" libraries, like libc, libm, SDL, and OpenGL, it's easy to integrate and use, and performance can be surprisingly high in some cases.

Most x86 Games need OpenGL, so on ARM platforms a solution like gl4es is usually necessary.

Box86 now integrates a DynaRec (dynamic recompiler) for the ARM platform, providing a speed boost between 5 to 10 times faster than only using the interpreter.

Many games already work, for example: WorldOfGoo, Airline Tycoon Deluxe, and FTL. Many of the GameMaker Linux games also run fine (there a long list, among them are UNDERTALE, A Risk of Rain, and Cook Server Delicious)

If you are serious about developing Box86, you should install ccache and activate its support in the cmake project (use ccmake for example) To enable TRACE (i.e. dumping to stdout all individual x86 instructions executed, with dump of registers), you'll also need Zydis library available on your system.

Some x86 internal opcodes use parts of "Realmode X86 Emulator Library", see x86primop.c for copyright details

Here are 6 videos, the first 2 of "Airline Tycoon Deluxe" and "Heretic 2" running on a gigahertz OpenPandora (the second one use the dynarec), and the next 2 of "Bit.Trip.Runner" and "Neverwinter Night" running on an ODroid XU4 (without dynarec), and the last 2 on a Pi4: Shovel Knight (video from @ITotalJustice) and Freedom Planet (video from @djazz), also without dynarec.

You can find many more Box86 video on PI Lab Channel .

Compatibility list is there: https://github.com/ptitSeb/box86-compatibility-list/issues

Logo and Icon made by @grayduck, thanks!

Note that this project is not to be mystaken with 86box, a nice "Full system" emulator specialized in early (to fairly recent) PC hardware.

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Discord

If you want to discuss about box86 on Discord, there is a frendly server there: PI Lab Discord

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Compiling

Compilation instructions can be found here

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Usage

There are a few environment variables avaiable to control the behaviour of Box86.

See here for all variables and what they do.

Note that now the Dynarec of Box86 uses a mecanism with Memory Protection and a SegFault signal handler to handle JIT code. That means if you want to use gdb to debug running a program that use JIT'd code (like mono/Unity3D), you will have many "normal" segfaults triggering. I suggest you use something like handle SIGSEGV nostop in gdb to not stop at each segfault, and maybe put a breakpoint inside my_memprotectionhandler in signals.c if you want to trap SegFaults.

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Version history

The change log is available here

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A note about 64-bit platforms

Because Box86 works by directly translating function calls from x86 to host system, the host system (the one Box86 is running on) needs to have 32-bit libraries. Box86 doesn't include any 32-bit <-> 64-bit translation. So basically, to run Box86 on, for example, an ARM64 platform, you will need to build Box86 for ARM 32-bit, and also need to have a chroot with 32-bit libraries.

Also note that, even if, on day, there is a Box86_64, this one will only be able to run x86_64 binaries on 64-bit platforms. You will still need Box86 (and see 32-bit chroot) to run x86 binaries (in fact, the same is the case on actual x86_64 Linux).

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A note about Unity game emulation

Running Unity games is a hit or miss for now. Unity uses Mono (which uses signals that are not well emulated enough), and a runtime embedded in the main binary. A solution would be to use a native version of the libmono library used by Unity (it can be found here: https://github.com/Unity-Technologies/mono and needs to be built from source). But the wrapping of this lib is tricky, and not done for now, so the only solution is to emulate everything. The tricky part is to emulate the "JIT" code emitted by Mono, however with he new "protected memory" mechanism implemented it is running with correct performance now. You should also note that some Unity3D games require OpenGL 3+ which can be tricky to provide on ARM SBC (single-board computers) for now.

TL;DR: Not all Unity games work and can require a high OpenGL profile, but the speed, for the ones running, should be correct now.

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A note about Steam

Linux Steam can run now with box86. But it's still a bit unstable., and not everything works. First is steam crashes after the Sign in, you may need to add libappindicator. On debian it's sudo apt install libappindicator1. Once open, Steam will only work on "Small mode" and in "Big Picture", not in the regular "Browser mode". So go in the "View" menu and witch to Small view (or Compact view?), else the list will stay empty (this is because some steam component used in the browser view are only 64bits now). Final word, to avoid the "libc.so.6 is absent" message, you can use STEAMOS=1 and STEAM_RUNTIME=1 export. (Steam for Windows install fine but doesn't work yet) Some steam games (most of Source engine one, like "Portal" or "Half-Life 2") use libtcmalloc. Box86 will detect it's use and will try to LD_PRELOAD it, for better compatibility. While it should work without, it is better to add it to your system if you intend to play those game (something like sudo apt install libtcmalloc-minimal4 on debian familly)

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A note about Wine

Wine is now partly supported. Wine integreted program all runs, annd some windows program and games now run fine. Don't forget most Windows games use Direct3D, that may require a complete OpenGL driver and as high profile as possible (and gl4es with ES2 backend have issue with Wine for now). Also, vulkan is not wrapped on box86, so vk3d is not usable yet, even if supported by the hardware. A not if you plan to use box86 with wine on Raspberry PI 3 or earlier: those model use a default OS that have a kernle with a 2/2 Split (meaning 2G of space for user program, and 2G of space for Kernel). This is not compatible with wine, that need to access memory > 2Gb address. So you'll need to reconfigure your kernel for a 3G/1G split. Use your favorite search engine to find tutos on how to do that.

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Final words

(If you use Box86 in your project, please don't forget to mention Box86)