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Launchers. Gotta love 'em right? Major publishers just love to make Steam Deck and Linux gaming that little bit more difficult. Ubisoft Connect broke again but Valve is here to save the day.

You might have noticed recently your Ubisoft games stopped working with some kind of error message when trying to load. Thankfully it didn't take Valve long to solve, with a new release of Proton Experimental now live from August 1st with the single fix noted being "Fixed Ubisoft Connect not working after its recent update". So you'll just need to switch your Ubisoft games over to Proton Experimental to get them working again.

Just head to your Downloads and you should see an update ready for Proton Experimental.

Here is For Honor now working for example:

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How to change your Proton version:

Steam Deck:

  • Pick a game in your Library and head to the little cog icon on the right.
  • Click Properties, then Compatibility on the left.
  • Make sure the tickbox is done, then select Proton Experimental from the dropdown.

On a Linux desktop:

  • Right click a game, go to Properties.
  • Compatibility on the left.
  • Make sure the tickbox is done, then select Proton Experimental from the dropdown.
Article taken from GamingOnLinux.com.
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scaine Aug 2, 2023
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Brand and product launchers add nothing of value to the consumer experience. Absolutely infuriating that backward companies like Ubi and EA, or game-specific franchises like Rockstar, Frontier or Blizzard require them and think this is a good idea. It's just a thinly veiled excuse for telemetry, cross-product marketing and/or DRM.

Not gonna lie, if a game forces a launcher, there's an incredibly high chance I'll refund it instantly.
trinukso Aug 2, 2023
It is possible to trick Ubisoft Connect not to update it. In %PROGRAMFILES(X86)%\Ubisoft\Ubisoft Game Launcher\version.txt it is enough to modify the version to the current one. In this case from 10894 to 10906.
ShabbyX Aug 2, 2023
Quoting: trinuksoIt is possible to trick Ubisoft Connect not to update it. In %PROGRAMFILES(X86)%\Ubisoft\Ubisoft Game Launcher\version.txt it is enough to modify the version to the current one. In this case from 10894 to 10906.

FYI, / is the directory separator, \ is the escape character. Even windows finally caught up to that.
trinukso Aug 2, 2023
[quote=ShabbyX]
Quoting: ShabbyXFYI, / is the directory separator, \ is the escape character. Even windows finally caught up to that.

Oh, thank you! I didn't know that. I haven't used Windows for 23 years. I got that information from pcgamingwiki.

https://www.pcgamingwiki.com/wiki/Store:Ubisoft_Connect#Client_data
jams3223 Aug 2, 2023
[quote=trinukso]
Quoting: ShabbyX
Quoting: ShabbyXFYI, / is the directory separator, \ is the escape character. Even windows finally caught up to that.

Oh, thank you! I didn't know that. I haven't used Windows for 23 years. I got that information from pcgamingwiki.

https://www.pcgamingwiki.com/wiki/Store:Ubisoft_Connect#Client_data

I am actually a contributor of pcgamingwiki
Pengling Aug 2, 2023
Ubisoft Connect? More like Ubisoft Inept, amirite?
Mountain Man Aug 2, 2023
This is the one problem I have with Proton, that other companies can break it, and it falls on Valve to fix it. I have trouble believing this will be sustainable over the long-term.
Grogan Aug 2, 2023
Yeah, I noticed last night. I spent my whole night working on software upgrades, finished and "ahh... game time". I went to play some Far Cry 5 Arcade and Ubibooby got an update. After it restarted, it downloaded another update, which resulted in its demise. It would start to draw the outline of a little window and stall there.

I physically deleted it, verified integrity of game files to force it to re-up runtimes etc. The original Ubisoft client worked to download the updated client. Same thing though, a second update and after that the client wouldn't launch. Again no error message, just the outline of a window and no launch.

I was hoping Valve was going to commit something today.
Dr_Cox1911 Aug 2, 2023
Hm, how would I do this if I run e.g. Anno 1800 in Lutris? I currently use the `lutris-GE-Proton8-12-x86_64`.
Grogan Aug 2, 2023
Quoting: Mountain ManThis is the one problem I have with Proton, that other companies can break it, and it falls on Valve to fix it. I have trouble believing this will be sustainable over the long-term.

Other companies don't break anything but their own shitware. It's trial and error programming on Windows. Silly, bloated, fragile Chrome browser UI's wrapped in shame, these game store clients.

Epic game client: Never for me

Don't buy shitware.

Far Cry 5 was the last Ubisoft game I ever bought, because of things like this and that was a long time ago when I used Windows for such games.

I refunded Assassin's Creed Odyssey due to Ubisoft activation problems (which Ubisoft said wasn't their problem) and never bought another again. I was tempted to try again, but they wanted $79 for a 5 year old game, which was insulting. Also insulting, since I couldn't play their games I wasn't using it, and I got an email saying they were going to delete my account and all my property if I didn't jump through their hoops. Now, I had nothing bought directly from them (only stuff tied to Steam account and older Ubisoft games that predate the client) so I didn't have much to worry about, but that's intolerable.

It's only been in the last year or so that Far Cry 5 Arcade mode has worked. Ubisoft is garbage. They used to be one of my favourite game companies too, back around 2008'ish before they went off the rails with DRM (Assassin's Creed 2 in 2009 was the end for me)

It isn't Proton that's the problem. Besides, that's fixable by more than Valve.


Last edited by Grogan on 2 August 2023 at 5:59 pm UTC
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