How To Install SuperTuxKart On Linux
There are many excellent free games on Linux. One of the best ones out there is SuperTuxKart. It’s a cartoonish kart racing game similar to games like Mario Kart. The game is completely free, and open source. Best of all, it’s available for installation on the Linux platform completely free! In this guide, we’ll go over exactly how to get it working on your distribution of choice.
Ubuntu
Ubuntu users looking to play SuperTuxKart can find it in the Software Center. To install it, open up the Ubuntu Software Center and search for “Super Tux Kart”. It’ll show up in the search results. Click on it in the search results to go to the game’s installation page. Once there, click “Install”. Selecting the “Install” button will automatically bring up an “enter password” prompt. Enter your username’s password and the installation will begin.
Note: if you can’t find “Super Tux Kart” in the software center, you’ll need to enable the Ubuntu Universe repository. Search for “Software & updates” in the dash and enable it in the “repositories” section, or follow the command instructions below.
Alternatively, it’s possible to install SuperTuxKart on Ubuntu via the apt command. To start the installation via the command line, open up a terminal and enter the following commands.
First, enable the Universe repository, where the game is hosted.
sudo add-apt-repository universe
Next, update Ubuntu so that the Universe repository is accessible to the system.
sudo apt update
After running the update, install any upgrades to ensure your Ubuntu PC is up to date.
sudo apt upgrade -y
Lastly, install SuperTuxKart with:
sudo apt install supertuxkart
Debian
On Debian and interested in playing SuperTuxKart? Lucky for you, all Debian versions support it. There is no need to enable alternative software repositories. To get the game, open up a terminal and use the apt-get command to install the game.
sudo apt-get install supertuxkart
Arch Linux
Arch Linux is known for having very up to date programs. As a result, those looking to play SuperTuxKart will be happy to know that Arch has a very recent version of the game, complete with new levels, characters and etc. To install it, be sure that you’ve enabled the Community software source inside of /etc/pacman.conf. Once enabled, refresh the repos and install the game!
sudo pacman -Syy sudo pacman -S supertuxkart
Fedora
Fedora isn’t known for video games, as it’s more of a “Workstation” distribution. Despite this, it’s possible to install a fairly recent version of the game. Like Arch Linux and Debian, Fedora users won’t need to enable any software repositories. Instead, open up Gnome Software, search for “Super Tux Kart”, and click the “install” button to get going.
Alternatively, open up a terminal and use the DNF package management tool to install it:
sudo dnf install supertuxkart -y
OpenSUSE
All versions of OpenSUSE have recent versions of SuperTuxKart available. Unfortunately, you’ll need to enable a third-party repo to get the latest version working.
Leap 15.0
sudo zypper addrepo https://ftp.gwdg.de/pub/opensuse/repositories/games/openSUSE_Leap_15.0/ opensuse-games sudo zypper in supertuxkart
Leap 42.3
sudo zypper addrepo https://ftp.gwdg.de/pub/opensuse/repositories/games/openSUSE_Leap_42.3/ opensuse-games sudo zypper in supertuxkart
Tumbleweed
sudo zypper addrepo https://ftp.gwdg.de/pub/opensuse/repositories/games/openSUSE_Tumbleweed/ opensuse-games sudo zypper in supertuxkart
Generic Instructions
Many Linux distributions have support for SuperTuxKart, as it’s a great way to bring games to their operating system. Still, if you find yourself on a Linux distro that doesn’t have an immediate way of installing the latest version of the game, there’s another way to get it. Open up a terminal and use the Wget tool to download the game files.
wget https://sourceforge.net/projects/supertuxkart/files/SuperTuxKart/0.9.3/supertuxkart-0.9.3-linux.tar.xz/download -O supertuxkart-0.9.3-linux.tar.xz
This is a large game, so wget is going to run for a while. When it completes, move the compressed archive to /home/username/. Keeping extracted game files in ~/Downloads is a great way to accidentally delete them!
mv supertuxkart-0.9.3-linux.tar.xz ~/
Once the game files are in your Home directory, it’s safe to extract the contents of the archive. Using the Tar command, begin the extraction.
tar -xvJf supertuxkart-0.9.3-linux.tar.xz
Next, use the cp command to move the included shortcut to the Desktop.
cp ~/supertuxkart-0.9.3-linux/data/supertuxkart.desktop ~/Desktop
Edit the shortcut with Nano.
nano ~/Desktop/supertuxkart.desktop
Find “Exec=supertuxkart”, and change it to the following.
Note: be sure to change “username” to your PC’s username.
Exec=sh /home/username/supertuxkart-0.9.3-linux/run_game.sh
Save the edits with Ctrl + O, and exit Nano with Ctrl + X.
Install To App Menu
Looking to get SuperTuxKart on your desktop environment’s application menu? Do the following:
cd ~/Desktop
sudo chmod +x supertuxkart.desktop sudo cp supertuxkart.desktop /usr/share/applications/
