Quake 4 on Ubuntu 24.04 that Actually works!

Hello everyone. I hope you are doing well and staying safe. Welcome to another blog entry on gaming on Linux, primarily Ubuntu 24.04.2.

I am a huge id Software fan. Have been since Wolfenstein 3-D in the early 90’s. However, one of my favorites is Quake 4. The story and everything about it is awesome. It’s a direct sequel to Quake 2, which is probably by second favorite Quake game in the series.

So, I wanted to install my copy that I have on DVD that has worked really well in the past, only to my chagrin did I find out that this is was going to be a journey. So if you are having issues setting up Quake 4 on your Ubuntu 24.04 machine, and getting it to run at all with sound included, read on and please like, share and comment so I know that this guide helped you as well.

So, I’ve installed Quake 4 on Linux many times. In fact, it’s one of the first things I install on Linux once everything is all setup. It’s like a reward for a job well done. So here is what I had to do to get it to work.

First thing I did was pull out the old DVD from my desk drawer, and put it in my DVD drive. On my Intel NUC, which is now my primary desktop machine now, I just plugged in a USB one and Ubuntu mounted the DVD with no issues. It was mounted in /media/wililupy/QUAKE4/ directory.

I then created the directory I wanted to install Quake 4 to, which is /usr/local/games/quake4. I have to copy all the pk4 files to this directory, so I opened a terminal and ran the following command:

sudo mkdir -p /usr/local/games/quake4/q4base/
sudo cp /media/wililupy/QUAKE4/Setup/Data/q4base/*.pk4 /usr/local/games/quake4/q4base

This took about 10 minutes to copy all the pk4 files. I then needed to download the quake4 linux binaries. Luckily, I had a copy I previously downloaded because the id software FTP site is no longer online. For those of you in the same boat, here is a link to it off of this web server:

NOTE: Make sure you “right click” and Click Save link as: otherwise it will load this script in the web browser

quake4-linux-1.4.2.x86.run

Once you have downloaded the binaries, you need to enable it to be executable:

chmod a+x quake4-linux-1.4.2.x86.run

Now, here is where I was stuck for a while, but I finally figured out how to get this binary to work correctly.

I had to install the following packages to make sure everything would work, including adding a PPA for libxp6, which isn’t available for 24.04:

sudo add-apt-repository ppa:zeehio/libxp
sudo apt update
sudo apt install libxp6 \
     libssl-dev \
     libasound-plugins:i386 \
     pipewire-alsa:i386

I could then install the quake4 binaries by running the following command:

sudo sh ./quake4-linux-1.4.2.x86.run

I accepted all the licenses, and when it asked where I wanted to install Quake 4, I used the default path, which is where I uploaded the pk4 files:

/usr/local/games/quake4

I also installed Punkbuster, but I don’t think it is even still around, please comment if that is true or not.

Once it finished installing, I started Quake 4, and it failed to start. It appears that the included libraries are not compatible with Ubuntu 24.04.2, so I created a folder in the quake4 directory called temp and moved the lib files there:

cd /usr/local/games/quake4
sudo mkdir -p temp/
sudo mv lib* temp/

I then created symbolic links to the ones installed on my system to the quake4 directory:

sudo ln -s /usr/lib/i386-linux-gnu/libSDL-1.2.so.0 libSDL-1.2.id.so.0
sudo ln -s /usr/lib/i386-linux-gnu/libgcc_s.so.1 libgcc_s.so.1
sudo ln -s /usr/lib/i386-linux-gnu/libstdc++.so.6 libstdc++.so.6

I then ran quake4-smp to run and the game fired up with full audio. The only issue I had now was the game was in Spanish. To fix this I updated the Quake 4 configuration file in my home directory:

vi ~/.quake4/q4base/Quake4Config.cfg

I searched for sys_lang and changed it from "spanish" to "english" and saved the file and then restart Quake 4 and everything started and worked normally. I can now play my favorite Quake title on my favorite OS.

Now, these next few things are optional, but I like them because it makes playing the game a little more seamless. I like to have an icon in the Application Launcher for Gnome. Quake 4 comes with a bitmap icon, but the background is magenta and an eye sore. So I use GIMP to make the background transparent and remove the magenta color and then save it as a PNG file. Then I put this icon png file in /usr/share/icons and call it “quake4.png”

I have a link to the png I use here. You can download it and save it to /usr/share/icons and then it will be the icon when you create the desktop link file.

Next, I create an .desktop file called quake4.desktop and put this file in /usr/share/applications. Below are the contents of the file:

[Desktop Entry]
Name=Quake 4
Comment=First-person shooter - sequel to Quake 2
Icon=quake4
Exec=quake4-smp
Terminal=false
Type=Application
Categories=Game;ActionGame;

Save the file and give ownership to root and make sure it has 644 permissions:

sudo chown root:root quake4.desktop
sudo chmod 644 quake4.desktop

I hope this helps you and everyone else that is running into this and wanting to play a game.

Happy Fragging!