0.5.9-mali-alpha-1.4

Mali Edition Alpha 1.4 (0.5.9-mali-alpha-1.4)

An alpha build of LibertyRecompAndroid for ARM Mali GPUs. GTA IV (Xbox 360) runs natively through static recompilation, with no emulator, using the phone's own Mali Vulkan driver.

⚠️ Alpha pre-release. Expect bugs, crashes and low performance. If you have a Snapdragon
(Adreno) device, use the original LibertyRecompAndroid instead.

⚠️ Updating from Alpha 1.3 or older: uninstall the old version once before installing 1.4.
Back up Android/data/com.libertyrecomp/ first if you want to keep your installed game files.
From 1.4 on, every build is signed with the same key, so future updates install normally.

What's new since Alpha 1.3

Based on upstream 0.5.9

Includes vaduur's 0.5.9 performance release: re-optimised recompiled game code, a lighter
renderer recorder and a fresh profile-guided optimisation pass.

Liberty touch controls

A new default touch layout with icon buttons that change with what you're doing: on foot,
driving, on the phone, in the pause menu, and during cutscenes (with a Skip
button). The controls stay hidden on boot and loading screens and appear once the game is loaded.

Customise your layout: hold Pause for 1.5 s to enter edit mode. Drag a button to move it,
pinch with two fingers to resize it, and tap Pause to save. Reset restores the default
layout for that screen. Each screen keeps its own layout.

Switch any time: the gamepad icon at the top switches to a classic Xbox controller layout;
its LIBERTY button switches back.

CPU boost

The performance hint now boosts all of the game's busy threads instead of just one, so the
main game thread stays on fast clocks. A new CPU boost option in the launcher sets how hard
the game asks Android for speed:

• Maximum: highest clocks, warmest
• Steady (default): fewer drops, a little warmer
• Balanced: in between
• Battery: the old behaviour, coolest

Faster texture loading

Mali GPUs can't read the game's compressed textures, so they are decoded when they load. This
decoding now runs on several CPU cores at once, which reduces stutter when driving into new areas.

Launcher

• Touch controls: choose Liberty or Xbox controller
• Button size, Button opacity and Button labels options
• The swipe camera and the old context layout were removed
• GitHub link renamed to prollynotzjay (Mali Support and Extraz)

Fixes

• Black world on some Mali GPUs (Dimensity 8300 / Mali-G615, Google Pixel / Tensor): GPUs
  without 2× MSAA now use 4×, so the 3D world can render.
• "Emulated" renderer crash: choosing Emulated in the game's Renderer setting made every
  launch crash until the app was reinstalled. The option is hidden on Android and the launcher
  always starts the Vulkan renderer, so affected installs recover on their own.
• Updates now install over the previous version (fixed signing key).
• The pause menu shows the menu controls, and the game controls come back when you close it.

Tested on

• MediaTek Dimensity 8400 (Mali-G720 MC7), Android 16, Mali driver r49p1

Other Mali / Immortalis GPUs are untested. Reports are welcome.

Known issues

• Not supported: GPUs without shaderInt64, such as Mali-G68 (Galaxy A35 / A55,
  Dimensity 900 / 1080, Exynos 1280 / 1380). Check in Vulkan Caps Viewer → Features → Core 1.0 →
  shaderInt64.
• About 20–30 FPS in the city on the Dimensity 8400; CPU clocks still vary with heat.
• Some reflections or cut-off geometry may look wrong (clip planes are skipped on Mali).
• Higher memory use, and possible stutter while new textures load.
• Occasional crashes may still happen. Save often.

Requirements

• An arm64 Android phone with a Mali GPU, Vulkan 1.2 with shaderInt64, Android 10 or newer (Android 13+ for the CPU boost)
• Your own USA Xbox 360 GTA IV disc image (.iso) and Title Update 8 (0.0.8.5). No game files are included. See the README for setup.
• About 15 GB free storage during install (about 7 GB afterwards)

Reporting problems

Open an Issue and attach:

• Android/data/com.libertyrecomp/files/last_launch.txt
• If the game starts: a log from Play (Debug Log), found in files/debug_logs/
• A screenshot with the performance overlay on, if it's about performance

Credits

All the hard work of recompiling GTA IV is by the
Liberty Recompiled team and the
ReXGlue SDK. The Android port is by
vaduur. Mali Support and Extraz by
prollynotzjay.

Grand Theft Auto IV is a trademark of Take-Two Interactive. Not affiliated with Rockstar Games.

0.5.8-mali-alpha-1.3

Mali Edition Alpha 1.3 (0.5.8-mali-alpha-1.3)

An alpha build of LibertyRecompAndroid for ARM Mali GPUs. GTA IV (Xbox 360) runs natively through static recompilation, with no emulator, using the phone's own Mali Vulkan driver.

⚠️ Alpha pre-release. Tested on one phone only. Expect bugs, crashes and low
performance. If you have a Snapdragon (Adreno) device, use the
original LibertyRecompAndroid instead.

What's new since Experimental 1

CPU performance boost (Android Performance Hint)

Profiling showed the game is limited by the CPU, yet the phone kept every core at
1.2–1.5 GHz (the Dimensity 8400 can reach 3.25 GHz), because the system did not treat the app as a game. The game now uses Android's Performance Hint API: it reports its frame times and its busiest threads to Android, which raises their clocks when frames run late and lowers them again when the game keeps up. Requires Android 13 or newer; older versions skip it. Turn it off with --android_performance_hint=false in args.txt.

Graphics settings in the launcher

A new Graphics settings card: resolution, FSR 1 upscaling and its quality, anti-aliasing, frame limit, draw distance, population density, shadow quality, motion blur, reflection anti-aliasing and run-ahead frames. Default keeps your args.txt value. Press Save changes, then Play (Play also saves pending changes). Reset to default is there if you want to start over.

Tip: the game is CPU-bound on Mali, so Population density and Draw distance make the biggest difference. Resolution and FSR barely change the frame rate.

Performance overlay

A small box in the top-left corner during gameplay, with a checkbox for each line in the launcher, so you only see what you want:

• FPS: the game's real frame rate (green / yellow / red)
• Frame time in milliseconds
• CPU usage and the fastest core's clock
• GPU usage (n/a on phones that don't allow apps to read it)
• Memory used by the game
• Temperature (battery; -- on phones that don't allow it)

Note: system counters such as Xiaomi's Game Turbo count every frame sent to the screen, including repeated ones, and can show 35–40 FPS while the game actually runs far slower. Use the overlay's FPS counter instead.

Launcher

• New Mali Edition look under the logo
• Save changes button with an "Unsaved changes" indicator
• Links to both the original project and this fork

Fixes

• Launcher settings are now applied reliably. Before, a setting set in both the launcher and args.txt made the game ignore all settings and fall back to full resolution and high quality.
• Profile captures (for developers) are saved to the visible Android/data/com.libertyrecomp/files/LibertyRecomp/Diagnostics/ folder and can start after a delay, so they record gameplay instead of loading screens.

Tested on

• MediaTek Dimensity 8400 (Mali-G720 MC7), Android 16, Mali driver r49p1

Other Mali / Immortalis GPUs are untested. Reports are welcome.

Known issues

• Performance is still low in the city. Before the performance hint the city ran at about 10 FPS on the Dimensity 8400; how much the hint helps on your phone may vary. Please report your FPS and CPU clock from the overlay.
• Some reflections or cut-off geometry may look wrong (clip planes are skipped on Mali)
• Higher memory use, and possible stutter while new textures load
• Occasional crashes may still happen. Save often.

Requirements

• An arm64 Android phone with a Mali GPU and Vulkan 1.2, Android 10 or newer (Android 13+ for the performance hint)
• Your own USA Xbox 360 GTA IV disc image (.iso) and Title Update 8 (0.0.8.5). No game files are included. See the README for setup.
• About 15 GB free storage during install (about 7 GB afterwards)

Reporting problems

Open an Issue and attach:

• Android/data/com.libertyrecomp/files/last_launch.txt
• If the game starts: a log from Play (Debug Log), found in files/debug_logs/
• A screenshot with the performance overlay on, if it's about performance

Credits

All the hard work of recompiling GTA IV is by the
Liberty Recompiled team and the
ReXGlue SDK. The Android port is by
vaduur. Mali Edition by
prollynotzjay.

Grand Theft Auto IV is a trademark of Take-Two Interactive. Not affiliated with Rockstar Games.

0.5.8-mali-alpha-0.8

Mali Experimental 1 — Dimensity 8400

The first build of LibertyRecompAndroid that runs on ARM Mali GPUs. GTA IV (Xbox 360) runs
natively through static recompilation, with no emulator, using the phone's own Mali Vulkan driver.

⚠️ Experimental pre-release. Tested on one phone only. Expect bugs, crashes and low
performance. If you have a Snapdragon (Adreno) device, use the
original LibertyRecompAndroid instead.

Tested on

• Xiaomi phone with MediaTek Dimensity 8400 (Mali-G720 MC7)
• Android 16, Mali driver r49p1

Other Mali / Immortalis GPUs are untested. Reports are welcome.

What works

• The game installs, boots and runs
• The world renders with textures; HUD, subtitles, lights and audio work
• On-screen gamepad and Xbox-layout controllers

Changes for Mali

• Android build fixes: fallbacks for C++ features missing from the Android NDK
  (std::jthread, floating-point std::from_chars, std::atomic_ref)
• Clip-distance workaround: Mali drivers lack shaderClipDistance, so the game's shaders are
  adjusted as they load instead of the game refusing to start
• Texture fix: Mali can't read the game's DXT (BC) compressed textures, which left almost the
  whole world invisible. They're now decoded on load into a format Mali supports.

None of these change anything on Adreno devices.

Known issues

• Low performance: about 10–25 FPS on the Dimensity 8400, not tuned for Mali yet
• Some reflections or cut-off geometry may look wrong (clip planes are skipped)
• Higher memory use, and possible stutter while new textures load
• Occasional crashes may still happen. Save often.

Requirements

• An arm64 Android phone with a Mali GPU and Vulkan 1.2, Android 10 or newer
• Your own USA Xbox 360 GTA IV disc image (.iso) and Title Update 8 (0.0.8.5).
  No game files are included. See the README for setup.
• About 15 GB free storage during install (about 7 GB afterwards)

Reporting problems

Open an Issue and attach:

• Android/data/com.libertyrecomp/files/last_launch.txt
• If the game starts: a log from Play (Debug Log), found in files/debug_logs/

Credits

All the hard work of recompiling GTA IV is by the
Liberty Recompiled team and the
ReXGlue SDK. The Android port is by
vaduur. This fork adds Mali support.

Grand Theft Auto IV is a trademark of Take-Two Interactive. Not affiliated with Rockstar Games.