RVGL – let’s play Re-Volt natively on Linux

I’m not an avid gamer, but there are a few games that I love to come back to every now and then. One of them is Re-Volt – races of radio-controlled mini-cars. It’s quite an old game, released in 1999, luckily there is a cross platform and modern rewrite / port – RVGL which runs natively in GNU/Linux.

The aim of the game is to race remote-controlled cars in environments such as museums, steamships, construction sites and supermarkets. During the race, cars can collect random weapons that can be used to drive out competitors. Cars and tracks have been unlocked thanks to success in the game’s tournament modes.

Game modes:

  • Single Race
  • Championship
  • Practice
  • Stunt Arena
  • Battle Tag
  • Clockwork Carnag

Installation on Arch/Manjaro/Mabox

Game is available from AUR – Arch Users Repository so installation is easy as:

yay -S rvgl-original

Alternatively, you can install rvgl-basic – without a soundtrack, or rvgl-community – with a community made soundtrack and additional content for playing online.

For other distributions not based on Arch, the game can be installed using an installer written in Python.


Despite the passage of time, the game is still very funny for me and I like to run a single race from time to time and sometimes even play the entire championship.
Enjoy the race!