Crosscode refuses to boot on Arch Linux.

[Linker]

I hate to ask for tech support here, but I am at a loss for what is wrong, and I can't see to find any info anywhere online. Basically I click to start the game, Steam claims it's running, then says it isn't.
I am on Arch Linux, and have just done a system update, and on reboot the game stopped working. Though the packages that were updated seemed completely unrelated to the game or steam at all.
Any attempt of help at all is appreciated...

[Cheeseness]

Do you have a list of packages that were updated? That might give some clues.

If you launch Steam from a terminal (all Steam processes need to be entirely closed before doing that), what kind of output do you see when launching the game?

[Linker]

Originally posted by Cheeseness:

Do you have a list of packages that were updated? That might give some clues.

If you launch Steam from a terminal (all Steam processes need to be entirely closed before doing that), what kind of output do you see when launching the game?

From the log file:
[2019-09-28 20:25] [ALPM] upgraded tzdata (2019c-1 -> 2019c-2)
[2019-09-28 20:25] [ALPM] upgraded appstream (0.12.8-1 -> 0.12.9-2)
[2019-09-28 20:25] [ALPM] upgraded fontconfig (2:2.13.1+12+g5f5ec56-1 -> 2:2.13.91+23+g65087ac-1)
[2019-09-28 20:25] [ALPM] upgraded shared-mime-info (1.13.1-2 -> 1.14-1)
[2019-09-28 20:25] [ALPM] upgraded xorgproto (2019.1-1 -> 2019.1-2)
[2019-09-28 20:25] [ALPM] upgraded systemd-libs (243.0-1 -> 243.51-1)
[2019-09-28 20:25] [ALPM] upgraded e2fsprogs (1.45.3-1 -> 1.45.4-1)
[2019-09-28 20:25] [ALPM] upgraded systemd (243.0-1 -> 243.51-1)
[2019-09-28 20:25] [ALPM] upgraded libwacom (1.0-1 -> 1.1-1)
[2019-09-28 20:25] [ALPM] upgraded libtasn1 (4.14-1 -> 4.14-2)
[2019-09-28 20:25] [ALPM] upgraded appstream-qt (0.12.8-1 -> 0.12.9-2)
[2019-09-28 20:25] [ALPM] upgraded libical (3.0.5-1 -> 3.0.6-1)
[2019-09-28 20:25] [ALPM] upgraded bluez (5.50-7 -> 5.51-1)
[2019-09-28 20:25] [ALPM] upgraded bluez-libs (5.50-7 -> 5.51-1)
[2019-09-28 20:25] [ALPM] upgraded gstreamer (1.16.0-2 -> 1.16.1-1)
[2019-09-28 20:25] [ALPM] upgraded pango (1:1.44.6-1 -> 1:1.44.6+2-1)
[2019-09-28 20:25] [ALPM] upgraded mobile-broadband-provider-info (20190116-1 -> 20190618-1)
[2019-09-28 20:25] [ALPM] upgraded enchant (2.2.6-1 -> 2.2.7-1)
[2019-09-28 20:25] [ALPM] upgraded gst-plugins-base-libs (1.16.0-3 -> 1.16.1-1)
[2019-09-28 20:25] [ALPM] upgraded iproute2 (5.2.0-1 -> 5.3.0-1)
[2019-09-28 20:25] [ALPM] upgraded cinnamon (4.2.4-1 -> 4.2.4-2)
[2019-09-28 20:25] [ALPM] upgraded gc (7.6.8-1 -> 8.0.4-2)
[2019-09-28 20:25] [ALPM] upgraded gst-plugins-base (1.16.0-3 -> 1.16.1-1)
[2019-09-28 20:25] [ALPM] upgraded lib32-e2fsprogs (1.45.3-1 -> 1.45.4-1)
[2019-09-28 20:25] [ALPM] upgraded libpwquality (1.4.0-2 -> 1.4.1-1)
[2019-09-28 20:25] [ALPM] upgraded libvirt (5.5.0-1 -> 5.6.0-1)
[2019-09-28 20:25] [ALPM] upgraded libvirt-python (5.3.0-1 -> 5.7.0-1)
[2019-09-28 20:25] [ALPM] upgraded phonon-qt5 (4.11.0-1 -> 4.11.1-1)
[2019-09-28 20:25] [ALPM] upgraded pipewire (0.2.6+1+g37613b67-1 -> 0.2.7-1)
[2019-09-28 20:25] [ALPM] upgraded poppler (0.80.0-1 -> 0.80.0-2)
[2019-09-28 20:25] [ALPM] upgraded poppler-qt5 (0.80.0-1 -> 0.80.0-2)
[2019-09-28 20:25] [ALPM] upgraded qt5-webengine (5.13.1-2 -> 5.13.1-3)
[2019-09-28 20:25] [ALPM] upgraded systemd-sysvcompat (243.0-1 -> 243.51-1)
[2019-09-28 20:25] [ALPM] upgraded virt-install (2.2.0-2 -> 2.2.1-1)
[2019-09-28 20:25] [ALPM] upgraded virt-manager (2.2.0-2 -> 2.2.1-1)

I missed the lib32 packages in there, and am wondering if they had anything to do with it now.

Additionally, when I run the game, steam reports a whole heap of "Fontconfig errors". I'll include the first 3 (there really are a lot)
>Fontconfig warning: "/etc/fonts/fonts.conf", line 5: unknown element "its:rules"
>Fontconfig warning: "/etc/fonts/fonts.conf", line 6: unknown element "its:translateRule"
>Fontconfig error: "/etc/fonts/fonts.conf", line 6: invalid attribute 'translate

Is this really not booting for font issues? That'd be a little funny.

[Cheeseness]

Thanks. Nothing immediately stands out as being problematic from the package list, but it's good to have on hand to compare to any other future reports that might come in.

Originally posted by Linker:

Is this really not booting for font issues? That'd be a little funny.

I see those fontconfig warnings/errors. They're non-fatal.

Originally posted by Linker:

I missed the lib32 packages in there, and am wondering if they had anything to do with it now.

CrossCode has 32 and 64 bit versions. I'm guessing you'd have the 64 bit version installed, but you can check by running the "file" command on the CrossCode binary.


Want to stick the full terminal output from launching the game up to somewhere like pastebin and maybe we can see what's going on?

[Linker]

Originally posted by Cheeseness:

Want to stick the full terminal output from launching the game up to somewhere like pastebin and maybe we can see what's going on?

I've copied all the output since I click start. Sorry for not doing it earlier, I went to bed.
https://pastebin.com/0Cwkf3Ru
Thanks again.

[Cheeseness]

Originally posted by Linker:

Originally posted by Cheeseness:

Want to stick the full terminal output from launching the game up to somewhere like pastebin and maybe we can see what's going on?

I've copied all the output since I click start. Sorry for not doing it earlier, I went to bed.
https://pastebin.com/0Cwkf3Ru
Thanks again.

Hmm! So the font errors you'd pasted to begin with aren't fatal, but this one probably is

[16035:16035:0929/082856.807690:FATAL:platform_font_linux.cc(83)] Check failed: InitDefaultFont(). Could not find the default font

Reading up, I wonder if the problem might be this might be the problem (this game uses NW.js, which uses Chromium): https://bugs.archlinux.org/task/18353

I've come across a couple of other threads with people having trouble launching Chromium-using projects due to not having ttf-liberation (that and a few other common fonts look like they're installed via the ttf-font meta package on Arch).

I'm off to bed as well. Fingers crossed that that helps.

[Linker]

Originally posted by Cheeseness:

Originally posted by Linker:

I've copied all the output since I click start. Sorry for not doing it earlier, I went to bed.
https://pastebin.com/0Cwkf3Ru
Thanks again.

Hmm! So the font errors you'd pasted to begin with aren't fatal, but this one probably is

[16035:16035:0929/082856.807690:FATAL:platform_font_linux.cc(83)] Check failed: InitDefaultFont(). Could not find the default font

Reading up, I wonder if the problem might be this might be the problem (this game uses NW.js, which uses Chromium): https://bugs.archlinux.org/task/18353

I've come across a couple of other threads with people having trouble launching Chromium-using projects due to not having ttf-liberation (that and a few other common fonts look like they're installed via the ttf-font meta package on Arch).

I'm off to bed as well. Fingers crossed that that helps.

I've tried installing both ttf-liberation (replacement for Microsoft fonts), (then restarted etc.), and then actually copying the windows fonts from my windows boot (then restarted, etc.) Still nothing... ugh.

[tℨopc]

If it was working before the update which is what I'm understanding, then maybe downgrading 1+ packages might work.

Might be that one or more of them are incompatible with the chromium version the game uses or that one of the packages changes something, or has bug, problem, etc. Obviously, though if it was working before the update then the easiest thing to do could be to downgrade one at a time or all of them then upgrade one at a time if it works after downgrading them all... then check/file bug report.

Just putting an important note here: Don't use the yes to all option when dealing with packages like you may find all round the internet. People do silly things that can mess your computer right up. Always look to see what package changes will do. If it looks like something unrelated and important then decline.

[Cheeseness]

Originally posted by tℨopc:

If it was working before the update which is what I'm understanding, then maybe downgrading 1+ packages might work.

Yeah, if grabbing what's supposed to be the default font it's complaining about doesn't help, I'd probably roll back that entire update, confirm that it works again, and then work through looking for the culprit.

Based on what we've read in the meantime, the fontconfig package might be a good place to start.

[Jefffafa]

I'm getting the same error. Still looking into it, but so far after downgrading fontconfig and pango the game still crashes with the same error. I'm also on arch but I'm not sure what update broke the game. I tried downgrading the game to the older engine but still have an error. But for some reason the april fools version works.

[Jefffafa]

As an update to this, I got the older version of nw.js running. I had to downgrade Pango, but it runs with the current version of fontconfig installed and I didn't see font config errors.

Is there any way to check what version of chromium is shipped in nw.js? These errors looked very similar to when chrome first embedded the fontconfig library a year ago and was incompatible with the new fontconfig confgs.

see here:
https://bugs.chromium.org/p/chromium/issues/detail?id=829890&can=2&q=fontconfig
and here:
https://bbs.archlinux.org/viewtopic.php?id=235643

[Cheeseness]

Good sleuthing!

Best guess is that it's 66.0.3359.181. The CrossCode binary returns that when run with --version, and while that's not a valid NW.js version, it is a valid Chromium version, and it seems to fit with the timelines of the issues you've found (matches what's in the release notes for NW.js 0.30.5 from June 2018).

[hagabaka]

I'm also having this problem on Arch Linux. I tried renaming the /etc/fonts directory before running the game, and that got rid of the fontconfig warnings/errors, but it still exits with the "fatal" error

[639337:639337:1009/231305.753849:FATAL:platform_font_linux.cc(83)] Check failed: InitDefaultFont(). Could not find the default font

Maybe someone with a system where the game runs could share their /etc/fonts files, to see if using those will work for us?

The game runs with version 0.41.2 of nwjs which is in AUR (nwjs-bin). No Steam integration though.
nw ~/.local/share/Steam/steamapps/common/CrossCode

[Linker]

Originally posted by hagabaka:

I'm also having this problem on Arch Linux. I tried renaming the /etc/fonts directory before running the game, and that got rid of the fontconfig warnings/errors, but it still exits with the "fatal" error

[639337:639337:1009/231305.753849:FATAL:platform_font_linux.cc(83)] Check failed: InitDefaultFont(). Could not find the default font

Maybe someone with a system where the game runs could share their /etc/fonts files, to see if using those will work for us?

The game runs with version 0.41.2 of nwjs which is in AUR (nwjs-bin). No Steam integration though.
nw ~/.local/share/Steam/steamapps/common/CrossCode

Jeesh glad to know I'm not the only one.

Crosscode still runs on my (crap) laptop, and I've held off on running any updates as to not ruin it. (Yeah I know it's bad practice but if I bork my install "oh no" I can just reinstall it) I've tried copying various font files, I don't quite remember what, but it fixed nothing. I have, and will continue being too busy to continue troubleshooting, however I'd be happy to share any system files you need.
Do you have any preference for where to upload them?

[hagabaka]

Originally posted by Linker:

Crosscode still runs on my (crap) laptop, and I've held off on running any updates as to not ruin it. (Yeah I know it's bad practice but if I bork my install "oh no" I can just reinstall it) I've tried copying various font files, I don't quite remember what, but it fixed nothing. I have, and will continue being too busy to continue troubleshooting, however I'd be happy to share any system files you need.
Do you have any preference for where to upload them?

Anywhere is fine with me. Thanks. Since the issue is with parsing the config files, I think we just need to try the files in /etc/fonts, and not any actual font files.

[tℨopc]

There are at least 3 locations of fonts on my system but Fedora is behind on font related package versions compared to Arch.

If downgrading doesn't work then problem just wasn't fixed by that which gets more complicated depending on how attached the package is.

When copy/pasting or similar it would probably be best practice to get it from a working Arch system than Fedora as there could be differences so I won't upload anything.

Doing a Google search for "Arch could not find the default font" or similar maybe including Steam in that or something else like swapping Arch with Linux could get you a result that might work.