Proton Experimental: Game does not launch, game crashes on start
I am making this report because of this post:
https://timberborn.featureupvote.com/suggestions/671883/unable-to-drag-and-move-camera-or-selection-with-mouse-button-hold-on-linux-stea#comment747404
Gin Fuyou Admin Pinned
I've confirmed with devs - there are no plans to further address the issue. Proton Experimental has the fix.
If PE causes crashes for you - please share details in a *separate* topic and prepare *crash logs*. Devs doubt crashes are related to the dragging problem.
I am using Linux Mint on AMD hardware. When I launch the game using Proton Experimental, Steam gives me two options: Play Timberborn, and Play Safe Mode. Both options result in launching the Unity splash screen, and then immediately closing. This process takes about 8 seconds.
Unfortunately, I don't see an Error reports folder in this directory:
*Log files:
~/.steam/steam/steamapps/compatdata/1062090/pfx/drive_c/users/steamuser/My Documents/Timberborn/Error reports/
Comments: 6
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14 Nov, '25
Gin Fuyou AdminDo you mean a unity crash window? Because first game screen you should see is mod loader or game menu itself.
If so please check unity logs in AppData. It will be at same windows path stated in the pinned topic but inside your proton prefix, e.g. typical location with Steam would be <Your Steam Library>/steamapps/compatdata/1062090/pfx/drive_c/ -
15 Nov, '25
MattYup, looks like it was a crash window, just a rectangle with an icon in the middle. I found the logs and sent one by email, also attached it here. Thanks.
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21 Nov, '25
MattFYI, after trying to reinstall my OS several times, and eventually replacing my RAM... Looks like the game works on Linux Mint 22.2 with Proton Experimental. Winning!
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19 Mar
StepanI'm having the same issue, though mine doesn't show anything, instead the screen just flashes as if trying to open a fullscreen window and then the game closes, no error messages.
I attached the Player and Player-prev logs (I had to change the .log to .txt for the upload), same directory as the post:
~/.steam/steam/steamapps/compatdata/1062090/pfx/drive_c/users/steamuser/My Documents/Timberborn/Error reports/
I also tried looking for other issues by searching for log in Drive_c, it seems like DirectX and the dd_vcredist files had no issues either. -
19 Mar
Gin Fuyou Admin@ Stepan since there is no crash these logs also don't have any error information? Which proton versions you've tried? I recommend checking 10 and experimental.
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19 Mar
StepanI fixed it! My NVIDIA drivers were very out of date, and for some reason didn't auto update to the newest version. I also installed Proton-GE and one of those (or both) did the trick. Very cute intro video, I wasn't even able to see that when I was using Proton 9. I'm not very good with terminal so I had Claude walk me through most of the process, it's basically this:
In Terminal use command,
nvidia-smi
it should be something like 570.XXX.XX, you can also look up the newest version for Linux
If it's not that, use commands
apt-cache search nvidia-driver | grep "^nvidia-driver"
those should show the driver versions you can upgrade too.
next,
sudo apt install nvidia-driver-570
sudo reboot
(or whatever the most recent version is, anything 570+ should work)
then
If it's still not working, you can install ProtonUp-Qt from the Software Manager and get GE-Proton
Player_yfxcfi.txt