The Steam Deck was a huge hit for Valve, opening up the world of PC gaming on portable console-style PCs. They are wonderful little machines that make great travel companions. Whether he’s headed for a bar or he’s 2,500 feet above the surface, the Steam Deck is ready to go. That is, unless you want to play Ubisoft titles.
A new update to the Ubisoft Connect Launcher has fully packed launching Steam games on the Linux platform.according to Gaming On Linux (opens in new tab), I received an unrecoverable error popup from Ubisoft Connect when trying to launch a Ubi title on desktop Linux or Steam Deck. From there you can[OK]Simply click to accept that you will not be participating in tonight’s Division Raid.
Thankfully, a small fix was made using Proton Experimental. This is a test version of Proton, a compatibility layer that allows Linux to run Steam games written for Windows. Here you can access some upcoming features before they are necessarily stable.
First, Proton developers implemented the fix in the downloadable “cutting edge” beta of Proton Experimental. And now Valve has released a Proton Experimental fix that doesn’t require you to opt-in to the beta.
We’re still working on it, but this is just another example of how frustrating third-party launchers just make everyone’s life more difficult. I don’t even want to know that Ubisoft Connect exists. Let alone not being able to play the game because it’s flashing in front of you and not working properly. I understand these companies want my data, but you have to be smarter and better at getting it than this.
At least there is a workaround for now, and all Ubisoft games I’ve tested on Windows work fine. Hopefully, further issues with third-party launchers will only strengthen the argument for eliminating them altogether. One more thing to add for what you want to see in Steam Deck 2.
