Warframe Steam Proton Ubuntu

Run Warframe on Proton on Ubuntu (tested on Ubuntu 18.04, 20.04, 20.10+)
Install Warframe via proton

Intro

[ Remember to always try the default proton version first to see if any future updates to proton has possibly fixed the current issues outlined in the guide]

At the start of 2021 Warframe works fine with default Proton, but still have some issues, full list can be found here[github.com].

Also you can install a custom proton version created by Github user Thomas Crider
(GloriousEggroll[github.com]) and it should work better in some cases.
In addition, on the Github page[github.com] of Proton GE posted useful info about Warframe tweaking, especially about playing with Nvidia GPU and it's updated quite often.

After some updates (either game, Steam or your OS) you can stumble upon constant game crashes after around 5 min in game. An easy workaround is to install the xboxdrv, which is a xbox controller driver which can "emulate" xbox-like controller and is required by the game it seems[github.com] and you should start it with --daemon flag. But beware: xboxdrv is supporting only Xbox and Xbox 360 controllers, and if you using xpadneo[github.com] with your controller game still can crash even if xboxdrv installed along with it.
The other way is to connect your controller before launching the game and, if you don't need it, disconnect it after game loads.

There are other options available too that might get your game to work like the launch options specified on ProtonDB page[www.protondb.com] but i chose the custom proton version route and it worked for me, thus this guide will be based on the route I have taken to get it to work...

Install Custom Proton GE Version

[ 1 ] Download custom proton Proton-GE (6.5-GE-2 in this case)

latest version can be found on the github page of GloriousEggroll.
Proton GE Custom[github.com]

install wget if you want to download the Proton GE Custom version via the command line

sudo apt-get install wget

cd ~/Downloads/ && wget https://github.com/GloriousEggroll/proton-ge-custom/releases/download/6.5-GE-2/Proton-6.5-GE-2.tar.gz 

[ 2 ] extract Proton-6.5-GE-2 to your Downloads folder

tar xvzf Proton-6.5-GE-2.tar.gz

[ 3 ] create directory if it does not exist

mkdir ~/.steam/root/compatibilitytools.d/

[ 4 ] copy Proton-6.5-GE-2

cp -a Proton-6.5-GE-2 ~/.steam/root/compatibilitytools.d/

Select custom Proton Version

[ 5 ] Select the custom proton version by right clicking on Warframe in your steam library.



On the Compatability tab:
1) Check "Force the use of a specific Steam Play compatibility tool"
2) Select Proton version, e.g. Proton-6.5-GE-2



After all of the above you can now register your Warframe account and play the game, YAY!

Install xboxdrv (optional)

(Optional) We can install the xbox controller driver to avoid game crashes.

Ubuntu 18.04:

Add the repository

sudo apt-add-repository -y ppa:rael-gc/ubuntu-xboxdrv

Update the repositories

sudo apt-get update

Install the xboxdrv package

sudo apt-get install ubuntu-xboxdrv

Start the xboxdrv service

systemctl start xboxdrv

On Ubuntu 20.04 and 20.10 xboxdrv is already in repositories, so you just need to:

Update the repositories

sudo apt-get update

Install the xboxdrv package (it named differently to example above)

sudo apt-get install xboxdrv

In Ubuntu 20.04 and 20.10 xboxdrv installs without service, so you can make simple service yourself, or open a terminal and type in next command

xboxdrv --daemon

and close terminal as soon as game loads.

But we will make simple service and use it only for emulating presence of controller in system:

sudo touch /etc/systemd/system/xboxdrv.service
sudo chmod 666 /etc/systemd/system/xboxdrv.service
sudo cat <<EOF > /etc/systemd/system/xboxdrv.service
[Unit]
Description=Xbox controller driver daemon simplified
 
[Service]
Type=simple
User=root
PIDFile=/run/xboxdrv.pid
ExecStart=/usr/bin/xboxdrv --daemon --silent --pid-file /run/xboxdrv.pid --dbus disabled
 
[Install]
WantedBy=multi-user.target
EOF
sudo chmod 644 /etc/systemd/system/xboxdrv.service

First chmod needed to us to be able to write into service file with sudo, second chmod needed to correspond other services access rights.

Now we must reload systemd in order it to see our new service:

sudo systemctl daemon-reload

And finally starting service

sudo systemctl start xboxdrv

At this point if console produces no output it means that everything should work as intended, but check service status with

sudo systemctl status xboxdrv

and it should show active (running).

Also you can make that service start automatically with OS

sudo systemctl enable xboxdrv

[lasagna larry]

If you're trying to run this on ubuntu you already fucked up because you have ubuntu

[Shadows]

Ok but why

[Blipp]

Can you please upgrade the installation format please!

[Osaris]

Awesomeness, Thanks @ -=MasterØfLeave=- for updating the guide! (Updates made on 17-04-2021)

[Osaris]

Hi @-=MasterØfLeave=- , currently i do not have time to test this out. if you can please provide the suggested changes you would like to see on this guide. If proton is running it by default without any issue, i can remove the guide. think is prob quite a bit dated by now. Many thanks for the feedback.

[Micky Destiny]

Hi, I'm using Proton 6.3-2 on Pop! OS 20.10 (Ubuntu based distro) with Nvidia GPU and able to run Warframe with some little tweaking. So, @Osaris, you can update your guide. Also I'm using xpadneo instead of xboxdrv, because of deprecation of python 2, it may be important.

[Osaris]

@Linkus i am not really active any more with gaming etc, time is becoming a scarce thing for me at this moment. can anyone confirm that either 5.9-GE-6-ST https://github.com/GloriousEggroll/proton-ge-custom/releases/tag/5.9-GE-6-ST or steam's latest proton version works for warframe? ill then just update this guide in the hopes it helps someone else in the community. cheers!

[HAX]

@Linkus (Senior Immortal Dao)
i cant find proton ge 6.3
only 5.6 on github

[dunaedine]

@ParaPsychic not really a valid point if you don't have a Windows Licence, or dislike Windows and use it due to some constraints. And this is the profile of people interested in Proton.

[ParaPsychic]

@Osaris I just raised a valid point, why would it fire you?