Anyone managed to get it run on Steam Deck and/or Linux?

[schM0ggi]

Hi,

title

I tried to get it run on the Steam Deck and a Linux Desktop PC. I also tried different Proton versions including Proton-GE. No luck so far.

On the Steam Deck, it's trying to start the game and stays on the "launching game" screen for en endless time.
On my Linux PC, it starts for ~1 sec and then closes itself. Starting it with Gamescope in the launch parameters, the Gamescope window stays black, no sound.

[Creamative]

Hi There,

Sorry to hear that and our late reply but we don't have Steam Deck so can't check what is going on, although think that it would be fantastic to play Clan N on a handheld . One guess we might make is that whether there is no .Net Runtime available for that environment, as our game depends on it, do you know a way to ensure that it's available?

Regards,

Creamative

[schM0ggi]

Originally posted by Creamative:

Hi There,

Sorry to hear that and our late reply but we don't have Steam Deck so can't check what is going on, although think that it would be fantastic to play Clan N on a handheld . One guess we might make is that whether there is no .Net Runtime available for that environment, as our game depends on it, do you know a way to ensure that it's available?

Regards,

Creamative

Hi, thanks for the kind reply. Better late than never. :D
Yes, there is absolutely a way to try things out. As Proton, the compatibility layer Steam Deck does use, is based on Wine, I can tinker a bit on my Linux desktop and the Steam Deck. As you mentioned .Net Runtime, it's possible to install several things via winetricks for the compatibility layer like different .Net versions (.Net40 or .Net48 for example). If you can provide some details about the version the game is depending on, I can try it out. Would be very cool.

[Creamative]

Hi There,

You could try out .Net48 as our game depends on v4.7.2. Let us know how it goes!

Regards,

Creamative

[schM0ggi]

Hi,

so after some tinkering because of Protons strange behavior around dotnet, I finally managed to get dotnet48 installed. Then I went this road:

1. With standard Proton version, the game starts and the logo splash screens appears, then crash.
2. With GE-Proton version, a community bleeding edge made version with several fixes for games and some added media compatibility things, the game starts and is playable. But there is no music (intro and levels), sound is fine.

Is there anything else specific the game depends on regarding music? I know you are not officially supporting Linux/Proton, so I don't blame you if you don't want to investigate this further. I mean, though I only played the first minutes, it seems the game is running and that's already something. :)

[Creamative]

Hey There,

Kudos and great to hear that you made significant progress . Regarding music, the engine we use relies on XAudio2 and Windows Media Foundation libraries for sound/music. You might try to search if there are specific updates/fixes for them. We'll try to check things on our side as well but as you know we don't have any setup to test it.

Thanks again for all your efforts, really appreciated!

Regards,

Creamative

[schM0ggi]

Hi,

hurray! After some heavy tinkering, I finally managed to get it working with music. Your hint about the Media Foundation libraries was gold.

Tested with Proton 6.3 and 7.0 (current is 7.0.6). Both works. I don't know if anyone else is interested in playing this game on Linux, but in case, here are the steps to get it working (should also work on Steam Deck but didn't test it yet):

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1. Install game with Proton compatibility set to 6.3 (that's important for the dotnet48 installation)
2. If not already available, install Wine (I recommend staging) and Winetricks
3. Open terminal and install dotnet48 via Winetricks (important: Protontricks does not work here) into the pfx folder of the game. Like:

WINEPREFIX=~/.steam/steam/steamapps/compatdata/982670/pfx/ winetricks dotnet48

It should install dotnet40 and then dotnet48. If you have problems, try with --force

4. Download the following two Media Foundation packages and extract them, each into their own folder:

https://github.com/z0z0z/mf-install
https://github.com/z0z0z/mf-installcab

5. In the terminal, cd into their respective folder, beginning with mf-install-master and type the following (yes, absolute paths are needed because the scripts have problems with symlinks):

PROTON=/home/*your_user*/.local/share/Steam/steamapps/common/Proton\ 6.3 WINEPREFIX=/home/*your_user*/.local/share/Steam/steamapps/compatdata/982670/pfx ./mf-install -proton

6. Repeat the same procedure for the mf-installcab-master folder and use the following command:

PROTON=/home/*your_user*/.local/share/Steam/steamapps/common/Proton\ 6.3 WINEPREFIX=/home/*your_user*/.local/share/Steam/steamapps/compatdata/982670/pfx ./install-mf-64.sh -proton

7. Copy the mfplat.dll, found in the mf-installcab-master folder, into the game folder where the ClanN.exe resides. It should go there:

~/.local/.steam/steam/steamapps/common/Clan N/

8. run the game and enjoy.


Some notes about other Proton versions:

It does also work with the current Proton version, which is 7.0.6 at the moment. I recommend to just use 6.3 but if you like to use 7.0, you have to change it in the compatibility settings in the game properties. But do this only after the installation of dotnet48, because dotnet48 can't be installed with a Proton version > 6.3.
You also have to change the Proton version in the two commands mentioned above if Proton 7.0 is used. So instead of "Proton\ 6.3" you would have "Proton\ 7.0".

GE-Proton does only work without music. I had no luck installing the Media Foundation packages with it. As the game works with Valves Proton versions, that's okay.

---

Thank you very much for the kind support!

EDIT:

Did some test on Steam Deck. Works fine, though there are some hoops to jump through first.

- Because installing dotnet48 doesn't work with Protontricks, you have to install the Wine flatpak via Discover. Winetricks is integrated.
- Flatseal is needed, to allow Wine flatpak to access user/system files.
- Because one of the Media Foundation package does some cab file extract, the package cabextract is needed but SteamOS doesn't have it pre-installed. To get it, type the following commands:

1. sudo steamos-readonly disable
2. sudo pacman-key --init
3. sudo pacman-key --populate archlinux
4. sudo pacman -S cabextract

After the Media Foundation packages are installed and the game works, the changes regarding read-only mode can be reverted. For this, type the following commands:

1. sudo pacman -R cabextract
2. sudo rm -fr /etc/pacman.d/gnupg
3. sudo steamos-readonly enable

Step 1. isn't really needed, it might be good to leave cabextract installed for other games with similar steps involved. But I think, a new SteamOS update would remove it anyway.

Controller isn't working right from the beginning for some reason. But after the short intro and a few moments on the start screen, controller magically starts to work.

[Creamative]

Hi There,

Congratulations once again and we are really happy to hear that it now works with full feature set on Steam Deck.

To give you a bit of a hint of the history of the game, it was actually designed with Sony PS Vita in mind but unfortunately was very late to reach the lifespan of that neat device. So far our consolation was to be able to create Nintendo Switch port but with you effort now that makes 2 great handhelds that Clan N runs .

Thanks again for all your efforts and also sharing them in here. Hopefully there'll be more people to enjoy it as you do!

Warm Regards,

Creamative

[Spoonster]

Thank you for taking the time to share this information with such detail. I’m going to give this a try later today.