Note plenty FitGirl repacks are lossless; as in, she isn’t taking less important files out of the game, she’s compressing it better. 90GB→35GB seems accurate; you often see ~1/3 of the original size, like this. And it shows plenty game devs

1. do an extremely bad job at basic tasks like compression.
2. give no flying fucks about players, who might have really slow connections.

And then those same developers get amazed at the fact FitGirl is so popular. “Maybe we’re doing something wrong? …nah.”

If you can afford it

IsThereAnyDeal

IsThereAnyDeal (isthereanydeal.com)

Might be a better option, or least send the devs some support while using repacks. It’s sort of like a thrift store when you find something you really wanted maybe a game you didn’t even know of, and it means a lot more because it feels like finding a treasure.

I actually didn’t know that the whole point of fitgirl was for compression, I’ve been blessed with massive hard drives. I think I took my 4tb ssd for granted. Not everyone has even an extra $5 .

They crack, she repacks

This is just not true. Both DODI and ElAmigos are Repackers.

For the setup:

Final Edit: The wine prefix is the same for the games and the installer, just a windows subsystem that has all the dependencies.

First I install the wine-cachyos package, create a WINEPREFIX variable for the folder i want to put the prefix in, then i run winecfg to start the prefix, then I install the dotnet packages and vcredist packages through (before, when the repos existed) these links for the vcredist and dotnet (maybe archive.org or somewhere else still have the executables), or using winetricks too, but these are nicer to use as they install everything in one go.

Then I install the dxvk and vkd3d (you can install through lutris, so this is kinda useless hahaha).

Then I run the fitgirl repack through lutris and click to install the vcredist or .net when asked.

Then I just run the game with a runner or wine-cachyos.

I’ll update this with valid links when I find them.

Edit: last time I used this and this, installing just the .net runtimes, not directx, java, silverlight, etc.

What’s your process for running the unpacker executable? Maybe it depends on the game, but I set up a wineprefix through Lutris and always seem to run into issues getting it to complete properly without any unpacking errors.

Proton can handle the game files but not the installer. So you have to install in wine and it’s a hassle. I install the games on my windows pc, zip them and then transfer them to my deck.

winetricks should be able to install all of those dependencies, including versions of .net and vcredist. But it’s a terminal script, so requires the environment variables that Wine uses for the paths and stuff.

I have zero trust installing pirated software, especially when they go out of their way to break it when using wine on Linux or running it in a vm.

I’ve had a lot less of a desire to pirate games after moving to Linux full time a few years ago. But FitGirl has been the one reliable place for public torrents, compaed to chancing it on the third Google Link or scrolling through the Russian CS-Rin-Rulette forum to find links.

The thing about compression is you have to process it to decompress it. It may be benificial to people with limited bandwidth, or for peer-to-peer sharing, but it’s probably better for most users for someone like Valve to share the uncompressed version. Bandwidth isn’t the issue it used to be.

It also makes progressive updates harder. The best you can do is compress each update individually, not the whole package.

do an extremely bad job at basic tasks like compression

I’ve installed one game from FitGirl so far. It took three hours to unpack while hammering all the cpu cores, failed, and required another three-hour go to install properly.

So you’re saying that all games should install like this?

No it’s making a choice. Faster decompress times. Considering a lot of their customers have fast speeds it doesn’t really matter.

I’m aware that compression rates are a trade-off between space and processing time, and that there’s some balance to be had. However, I don’t see this balance from plenty commercial games; what I see instead is disregard.

Here’s a made up example. Suppose you have a choice between compressing a game:

• to 10 GiB, and it takes 2min to unpack it in a certain machine
• to 3 GiB, and it takes 8min to unpack it in a certain machine

FitGirl will consistently pick the later option. And it would be fine if devs picked the former, or a middle ground… but they don’t. Instead, often you get a 10 GiB file that takes 10 min to unpack, the worst of both worlds.

And it isn’t just a matter of the compression algorithm. The developers also have the freedom to choose how they split files; but they often create 9001 files the size of an ant, that is going to hurt decompression times. (Paradox Interactive, I’m looking at you.)

Tagging @fiestorra@discuss.tchncs.de, as it addresses what they said too.

The best option is piracy. Do not engage in capitalism where you can avoid it.

So you’re saying that all games should install like this?

Given other people addressed the same point, but unlike you they aren’t disingenuously assuming words into my mouth, I think it’s pretty safe to block you as dead weight.

I don’t know any that take a long time to unpack from developers. They do have to pre-compile shaders, but that’s different. Maybe I just don’t pay enough attention, or maybe it’s just because I don’t play many big budget games.

From the top of my mind, Europa Universalis 4. Even the base game takes ages to install, and I don’t think it’s just the Linux version.

Incidentally, I checked it in FitGirl’s site, found EU5 instead, and she’s complaining about the exact same thing:

Installation takes 5-12 minutes (depending on your system, mostly on your drive speed – the game has more than 49000 small files, Paradox never learn from their mistakes)

I did play EU5 (and 4 ages ago) and didn’t notice the issue. I guess I just don’t pay attention to it.