Borderlands 2 Linux Guide how to play the new updates (including newest DLC) and Coop with windows users

This is guide for updating and configuring Borderlands 2 to newest version on Linux.
This will allow you to Coop with your friends on windows.
Also if you have Commander Lilith & the Fight for Sanctuary DLC on your account you can play that too with this guide.

This guide also works for Borderlands: The Pre-Sequel.

Introduction

Due to version differences Linux and Windows users can't play coop together currently.
Also Commander Lilith & the Fight for Sanctuary DLC doesn't have Linux version.
Borderlands: The Pre-Sequel crossplay is also broken.

Our option is to upgrade to Windows version on Linux.
Don't know about Mac crossplay, sorry!

We are gonna use Steam Proton compatibility tool, which allows running windows games on Linux using WINE. So we are basically gonna download windows version of the game on Steam. This works for both BL2 and TPS, but I will cover BL2 here, but TPS is the basically same (just minor path changes). You can also play Borderlands 1 through proton.

Backup your saves!

First I would recommend backing up your saves, at least for me steam cloud did not sync my saves.

On Linux saves should be located in:

~/.local/share/aspyr-media/borderlands 2/willowgame/savedata/[some long number]/

same as

/home/[user]/.local/share/aspyr-media/borderlands 2/willowgame/savedata/[some long number]/

backup your saves somewhere else on your drive. I will be using ~ for home directory convention from now on in this guide.

Actual Full Guide

If you backed up your saves now firstly uninstall BL2 from Steam.

Then we need to enable Steam Proton if you haven't already:
Steam Settings -> Steam Play -> Enable Steam Play for supported titles -> Enable Steam Play for all other titles
and restart Steam.

Then go to:
Borderlands 2 -> Properties -> Force the use of specific Steam Play compatibility tool
































You may need to restart Steam again.


You should see Runs on this computer via Steam Play if you click on Show more details:
In old steam library you should see it next to hours played:











You can now reinstall BL2, it should download the windows version of the game.

We can't play the game yet, since windows version launches launcher first, which doesn't work on Linux, we have to make the game launch the game straight away. To do this navigate to:

cd ~/.local/share/Steam/steamapps/common/Borderlands 2/Binaries/Win32

or you can get there by Bordelands 2 -> Properties -> Local Files -> Browse Local Files...

Now we need to rename Launcher.exe to something arbitrary like Launcher.exe.bak, or you can remove it, but we rename it for backup. Since when you click Play it tries to launch Launcher.exe, you can launch BL2 straigh away with Bordelands2.exe, so we just rename the Bordelands2.exe to Launcher.exe.

mv Launcher.exe Launcher.exe.bak
mv Bordelands2.exe Launcher.exe

BL2 should work right now, but we need to copy back our saves. These are stored in:

 ~/.local/share/Steam/steamapps/compatdata/49520/pfx/drive_c/users/steamuser/My Documents/My Games/Borderlands 2/WillowGame/SaveData/[some long number]/

Game should now launch fine.

Closing

You can play BL2 now with your windows friends and the new DLC. While running on max settings I only notice rare fps drops, otherwise it runs pretty similar, some things I noticed is sometimes I get invisible water but nothing major. You can also boost the performance (same as playing in windows natively) by using D9VK[github.com], but I won't go into that here.

Hope it helped

If you have any other questions, ask in comments

[Race(imaztion)]

Apparently they've fixed a lot recently.

I copied in a backup of an older Linux version (including the appmanifest file), and it updated but not far enough. All I did was tell it to use Proton, and it automatically converted it to the Windows version, downloading about 4GB of extra files, and has run the launcher successfully every single time.

In case it helps, I'm using Proton 7.0-1.

[Potato-pc]

As far as i realized, saves should be names starting with upper case letter. So i had to rename my linux saves from save5.sav to Save5.sav to make i not lose progress (while testing i lost my siren progress again... twice...)

[Potato-pc]

Save game files should be started with upper or lower case letter using this method? Seems like that's the problem why i keep losing my progress when i switch characters. Linux treats files separatedly unlike windows. I finished new dlc, quit the game. Started game again - everything fine. Switched to other char and back - everything lost, character again lvl 72 and DLC not started.

[ThePejlka]

You need to enable proton before you download/reinstall the game, so it will download the windows version. Otherwise you have linux version downloaded which doesn't work with proton and it isn't the latest patch.

[lemonti]

I just can't launch the game if I'm using proton. Without it, the game starts normally.

[ThePejlka]

Don't know if they changed anything, but I just checked and still works. Maybe try different proton version? Don't know what would be your problem

[lemonti]

Unfortunately, it doesn't work for me.

[NECROMANCERFORLIFE]

Thank you for the Guide, i tried this morning with Proton 6.0-3. And the Laucher of Presequel could be started. I guess its fixed now. I did not need to move the "Launcher.exe2 anymore.

[Luward]

I finally got to the main menu and have social listed. Preliminary results indicate this works.

[ThePejlka]

Weird, should be there in all Linux steam installations, what distro are you using?