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Valve, CodeWeavers and the community have continued updating Steam Play's Proton and now the beta version of Proton has another new build out.

Don't know what Steam Play is? See Valve's official announcement. In short: It will allow you to play some Windows games on Linux through the Steam client as if they were any other Linux game.

To avoid some confusion: The Steam Play system as a whole is still in Beta, Proton (Valve's Wine fork) which Steam Play uses has a "3.7-3" version which is the default, but you can also switch to the Beta version of Proton itself in Steam's settings (compatibility tool dropdown box) to get Proton "3.7-5" which was just released today.

Here's the highlights of what's new in 3.7-5:

  • Performance improvements for timing APIs in CPU-limited scenarios
  • Automatically capture mouse in fullscreen windows is enabled by default.
  • More display ratios have smaller resolutions available.
  • Fix a crash on old versions of SDL.
  • Fix for mouse cursor drifting in Deus Ex.
  • Debug script dump directory can be configured with "PROTON_DEBUG_DIR".
  • Further improvements to fullscreen focus and python3 compatibility.

See the changelog here.

Honestly, it's really fun to watch this progress. There's been such a huge amount of excitement in the entire PC industry over this, it's crazy. It's going to be a while before we see what kind of impact it has, but this does give it time to mature for any scenario.

If you're after help with it, you can join our Discord Server which has a dedicated "proton-gaming" channel. We also have an IRC channel which is #gamingonlinux on freenode. Other social links can be found in our website footer.

As a reminder, Valve did state to report issues with games running in Proton to them and not to the developer of the game.

Article taken from GamingOnLinux.com.
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86 comments
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anarchist_tomato Aug 31, 2018
Oooh, if they've fixed that mouse thing in general (not just for Deus Ex), that would be awesome. It's a weird bug Wine has always had. I'm in the middle of Mirror's Edge, and whenever I play it, there's a minute or two when I have to hit escape and use some random menus and go back into the game, otherwise I can't turn around properly. I think that's happened in most first person games, in fact.
jarhead_h Aug 31, 2018
QuoteHonestly, it's really fun to watch this progress. There's been such a huge amount of excitement in the entire PC industry over this, it's crazy. It's going to be a while before we see what kind of impact it has, but this does give it time to mature for any scenario.

Well, I spent all day playing DOOM rather than setting up my ipa-server lab to practice for my upcoming RHCSA, and Steam just updated to 3.7-5 so I am kinda worried to start it up again lol. Anyway, this is going to be bumpy for a while. After all, how many times has a new version of WINE broken compatibility with a game? Figure by this time next year we it should be kind of difficult to find a game that doesn't work with Proton.

I found an article on Forbes about this the other day. FORBES. Microsoft can only interpret this as a shot against them, and anybody looking at it knows it. Valve may just be keeping Microsoft in check with Proton, but I'll take it. All I've been seeing over on overclock.net are people cheering about being able to ditch Windows.


Last edited by jarhead_h on 31 August 2018 at 4:50 am UTC
gojul Aug 31, 2018
Skyrim works like a charm on my box but in windowed mode (to survive to Alt-Tab like every other game) and crashes if you exit it "cleanly", creating a zombie process. Sooo you have to terminate it using kill -9.
vlademir1 Aug 31, 2018
Quoting: jarhead_hAll I've been seeing over on overclock.net are people cheering about being able to ditch Windows.
That made me grin way more than anything else related to Proton has thus far.
Liam Dawe Aug 31, 2018
Quoting: PatolaAnd Darwin Project suddenly started kicking ALL linux/steam play users.
Please help complaining about that: https://www.easy.ac/en-us/support/darwinproject/contact/tech/ (needs a steam ID authentication). The error message is (when you enter the hub): YOU HAVE BEEN KICKED. EAC Kicked: EAC Sandbox not active (dummy client).
Valve did say in their original announcement that anti-cheat probably wont work with Proton.
Quoting: GuestProton 3.7-5beta caused an issue in Doom (2016) where my max selectable resolution was 640x480 (my native regular is 1920x1080). Proton 3.7.3 stable made it run perfectly.

Also, and I don't think it's related, but today the Insurgency: Sandstorm beta hit and I was able to play that in 3.7-4beta (before 3.7-5beta came out) and it runs flawlessly; except stupid EAC (EasyAntiCheat) wont allow me to join in any servers. I have to play local vs bots with AI teammates (AI opponents are decently challenging, AI Teammates are dumber than a bag of hammers).

Report of that here:

https://steamcommunity.com/app/581320/discussions/0/1736589519992360890/

And added to google docs @ github master compat report.
Same as my above comment. Also, anti-cheat is there for a reason. Your post to the developer sounds like you don't really understand why it's used.
From your steam post:
QuoteI don't know why it's such a big deal to have EAC there for that in a beta, especially when this beta will have all in-game stats/unlocks wiped clean at the end.
People do all sorts of shitty hacks to ruin games. It's not just about gaming progression, it's about the experience for players.

And also, Valve did ask people to send issues to them, not the game developer.
jens Aug 31, 2018
  • Supporter
Quoting: legluondunetI'm waiting for a Proton version with:
--> DXVK directx10
--> Faudio integration: https://github.com/FNA-XNA/FNA/issues/90#issuecomment-415503383
--> windows media player replacement for video and music in games in MS format.

What I'm missing is a pre-installed dotnet framework (essentially 'winetrick dotnet452'*) and
nvapi support (the one that is in wine staging, to not need workarounds like https://github.com/ValveSoftware/Proton/issues/37#issuecomment-415833819).

*Actually did somebody tried to do 'winetrick dotnet452' in a Proton prefix? Proton is wine 3.7 afaik, does installing dotnet452 x64 works on that version?

PS: Could somebody with a Windows installation please help out here: https://github.com/doitsujin/dxvk/issues/580


Last edited by jens on 31 August 2018 at 9:24 am UTC
TheRiddick Aug 31, 2018
Quoting: mrdeathjrAlso add fix for .net issues (mono modified?)

^_^

Mono is like .NET 2.1, we need .NET compatibility 4.7 or something for applications to stop being annoying to get working.
lucifertdark Aug 31, 2018
Quoting: Guestunreal gold actually works in proton stable and while yes i know it has a linux launcher of sorts it's still cool that all you have to do is install directX 9 and then play the game over having to do all that tedious crap to get the linux launcher working

hexen 2 does not work as it tries to load gl hexen 2 and well dxvk not glvk

quake 2 did not work neither but that also has a linux launcher

these were all tested on the stable build of proton as i am a stable person i promise
If you grab the darkplaces mod for Quake 2 & rename the executable to Quake2.exe it'll work with Proton just right.

https://www.moddb.com/engines/darkplaces-engine
coeseta Aug 31, 2018
Played some Witcher 3 GotY yesterday, it just works out of the box for me. Runs @60FPS stable on Ultra settings without nvidia hairworks. Proton seems to be really nice :)
Frostysky Aug 31, 2018
Quoting: Comandante ÑoñardoAnyone know to disable the proton logs. They are eating more than 500MB of my almost full SSD.

There is a Proton Configuration file in
$HOME/.steam/steam/steamapps/common/Proton\ 3.7/
There is a user_settings_sample.py, maybe you can deactivate it/ decrease the log level in there.
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