Shadow of War failing to launch

Hi all, new to asking for support in this way so I'll try to be as brief as possible:

I installed Shadow of War on my Steam Deck via Heroic and it fails to launch whenever I try, both from desktop mode and from gaming mode.

I have tried using several Wine versions to launch the game, including Wine-GE-Proton7-43, Experimental, and 8.0.

Most recently, I tried checking the install/update box for DXVK-NVAPI on the game's settings but no dice.

Here is the most recent log where I used Proton Experimental (prior to enabling the DXVK-NVAPI setting).

Looking for any guidance on what dumb decision I did or did not make in order to deserve this shameful failure.

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awake-maroon•1/12/25, 3:32 PM

Try using proton-ge-latest (install is using heroic's sidebar).
Make sure umu is enabled (settings > advanced > experimental features)
Then delete the prefix folder /home/deck/Games/Heroic/Prefixes/Middle-earth Shadow of War/home/deck/Games/Heroic/Prefixes/Middle-earth Shadow of War
Try again and share a new log if it fails

(you don't want the nvapi option, that's for nvidia GPUs)

scornful-crimsonOP•1/12/25, 3:38 PM

I believe I followed the instructions faithfully but no luck. Some kinda stack overflow, she says: https://pastebin.com/bLfP7w31

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scornful-crimsonOP•1/12/25, 3:38 PM

Also thank you so much for the lightning fast reply!

sacred-rose•1/12/25, 3:46 PM

your wine version is still wine-ge in the log are you sure its the latest log when you try this fix

scornful-crimsonOP•1/12/25, 3:48 PM

@Caesium ah - I'm using Wine-GE-Latest - should I be using the most recent version with Proton in the version name instead?

scornful-crimsonOP•1/12/25, 3:49 PM

No, I'm stupid. There's a toggle for proton/wine. Please stand by, correcting mistakes.

scornful-crimsonOP•1/12/25, 3:54 PM

@Caesium no luck sir/maam: https://pastebin.com/uGMC0Y2r

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awake-maroon•1/12/25, 4:22 PM

oh wait, it's gog, there's a bug with gog and umu in heroic 2.15.2 failing to install dependencies

try this:

configure the game to use wine-ge-latest
delete the prefix /home/deck/Games/Heroic/Prefixes/Middle-earth Shadow of War/home/deck/Games/Heroic/Prefixes/Middle-earth Shadow of War
run the game once so it installs all the dependencies needed
if it works then it's all good
if it doesn't work, switch back to proton-ge-latest, and run the game (with the wine-ge prefix)

scornful-crimsonOP•1/12/25, 4:23 PM

But keep umu setting on?

awake-maroon•1/12/25, 4:27 PM

yes, umu is never applied to wine-ge

scornful-crimsonOP•1/12/25, 4:32 PM

Tried it but it's still not happy. https://pastebin.com/hMZydgpV

Maybe I messed up this step? All I did was change the Wine Version in game settings to Proton - Proton-GE-latest. Not sure if there's an extra step I'm missing to stay in compliance with the "with the wine-ge prefix" part of this instruction

if it doesn't work, switch back to proton-ge-latest, and run the game (with the wine-ge prefix)

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scornful-crimsonOP•1/12/25, 4:33 PM

Obviously I deleted the prefix folder first, then ran the game with Wine-GE-latest, then followed the last step.

awake-maroon•1/12/25, 4:44 PM

by with the wine-ge prefixwith the wine-ge prefix I mean without deleting the prefix created by wine-ge, which I understand you did

scornful-crimsonOP•1/12/25, 4:45 PM

Correct - I left the folder as-is after running with wine-ge, then ran with proton-ge.

awake-maroon•1/12/25, 4:47 PM

oh wait, I just noticed you have useSteamRuntimeuseSteamRuntime enabled, and that has the same bug as with umu and does apply to wine-ge

try this:

delete the prefix /home/deck/Games/Heroic/Prefixes/Middle-earth Shadow of War
switch to Wine-GE-Latest
uncheck the Use Steam RuntimeUse Steam Runtime option (you don't want this in general, maaaaybe for some linux native game)
run the game
if it works, all good, if it fails, switch to proton-ge and run the game

scornful-crimsonOP•1/12/25, 4:52 PM

Stupid question - where is the Use Steam Runtime checkbox?

Thank you again for your persistence!

awake-maroon•1/12/25, 4:53 PM

in the OtherOther tab

scornful-crimsonOP•1/12/25, 4:55 PM

Can’t see shit captain

awake-maroon•1/12/25, 4:56 PM

looks like it only shows up when proton is select as the wine version, so switch to proton, disable the runtime, switch back to wine-ge and continue the previous steps

scornful-crimsonOP•1/12/25, 4:57 PM

Roger Roger

awake-maroon•1/12/25, 4:57 PM

(now I'm guessing the steam runtime is not applied for wine-ge and I was confused so maybe this test won't make any difference, but I don't know what else to try)

scornful-crimsonOP•1/12/25, 5:02 PM

No luck yet: https://pastebin.com/tGd0BCkT

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dry-scarlet•1/12/25, 7:20 PM

There's a fix for this game in the umu database but it only applies to the Steam version, it installs vcrun2019. Should that be added to the GOG version as well?

foolish-indigo•1/20/25, 9:25 AM

Wasn't able to make this launch with proton. Swithching to WineGE + vcrun2022 worked

dry-scarlet•1/20/25, 7:57 PM

Yeah looks like there's a bug with umu + vcrun2019 that's been fixed in heroic, I PR'd the database to use vcrun2022 instead but that'll be next proton-ge version or next heroic version, whichever happens first

Shadow of War failing to launch

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