Argon (Ashframe's Cubyz Client)

Lightweight Modification that brings improved game & network performance along with some cool multiplayer / singleplayer features.

What it does

• Chunks & Lighting are cached in RAM & DISK.
• Performance: uses a fast multi-core allocator instead of the engine's debug allocator; right-sized GPU buffers; cached chunk-visibility traversal with per-frame frustum culling. Much higher FPS at large render distances, and far less VRAM/RAM use.
• Clean join: a logo + progress screen with staged status ("loading chunks", "syncing time") that holds the world hidden until it is actually ready, so there are no dark/bare first frames or flashes.
• Shop signs: item icons & click a sign to open the buy menu.
• Chat: tab-completion for commands and subcommands, @name completion, and gold @mention pings.
• MTU path discovery (RFC 8899): sizes packets to your connection on high-latency / lossy links for fewer stalls.
• faster handshake on high-latency links, stable ping.
• Skips re-unpacking server addons when unchanged.
• Fixes flashing translucent (water/glass) squares on some GPUs/drivers.
• Delete ~/.cubyz/serverCache/ anytime to force a full redownload.
• Set ashframeDebug = false in launchConfig.zon to silence the [fps]/cache debug logging.

Comparison (live Ashframe server, Sep–Oct 2026)

Timings are measured session averages (~ = approximate); behaviour rows (marked ✳) are qualitative/verified by testing, not timed.

Task	Vanilla + Vanilla	Vanilla + Ashframe	Argon + Vanilla	Argon + Ashframe
Repeat join	~35 s ❌	~12 s 🟡	~10 s 🟡	~9 s ✅
Asset pack transfer (per join)	~23 s ❌	~0 s ✅	~23 s ❌	~0 s ✅
Chunk download rate	~7.6 MB/s ❌	~11.1 MB/s ✅	~7.6 MB/s 🟡	~11.1 MB/s ✅
Terrain-gen stall	~162 ms/chunk ❌	~5 ms/chunk ✅	~162 ms/chunk ❌	~5 ms/chunk ✅
Revisit / teleport back	full re-stream ❌	full re-stream ❌	~0.16 s ✅	~0.16 s ✅
High render-distance FPS ✳	stock ❌	stock ❌	high ✅	high ✅
Join first frame (dark/flash) ✳	flash ❌	flash ❌	clean ✅	clean ✅
Flashing water/glass (some GPUs) ✳	yes ❌	yes ❌	fixed ✅	fixed ✅
Background network traffic ✳	high ❌	reduced ✅	high ❌	reduced ✅
Startup GPU memory ✳	stock 🟡	stock 🟡	lower ✅	lower ✅
Stalls on high-latency / lossy links ✳	— ➖	— ➖	— ➖	fewer ✅
Shop icons / click-to-buy	no ❌	no ❌	yes ✅	yes ✅
Mentions / autocomplete	no ❌	partial 🟡	yes ✅	yes ✅
Extra RAM	— ➖	— ➖	~128 MB 🟡	~128 MB 🟡

Vanilla + Ashframe = server optimisations only. Argon + Vanilla = client-only (cache, performance, clean join, icons, chat, shops). The high-latency/lossy-link row needs both: the Ashframe server probes and the Argon client answers.

First join downloads everything once; repeats skip it.

Install

Linux

git clone -b ashframe https://github.com/ashframe-org/argon.git
cd argon
./run_linux.sh -Doptimize=ReleaseSafe

Windows

git clone -b ashframe https://github.com/ashframe-org/argon.git
cd argon
run_windows.bat -Doptimize=ReleaseSafe

Keeping it up to date

cd argon
git pull
./run_linux.sh -Doptimize=ReleaseSafe

Optional config

launchConfig.zon tweaks (defaults work out of the box; our keys are serverCache, serverCacheTTLHours, serverCacheFlushMaxMB, serverCacheFlushIntervalMinutes, serverCacheMaxMB, serverCacheReadCacheMB, ashframeDebug, ashframeLoadingScreen, ashframeClickSignShop, mtuProbing, chatWidth). Set ashframeLoadingScreen = false for vanilla-style instant joining instead of the clean-join screen. Older ashframeCache* settings remain accepted as fallbacks.

Notes

• Fork of Cubyz tag 0.4.1 (GPLv3, see LICENSE).
• Custom changes marked ASHFRAME CUSTOM CLIENT in the source.