Half-Life: Alyx (546560)

[mathew2214]

Compatibility Report

• Name of the game with compatibility issues: Half-Life: Alyx

• Steam AppID of the game:546560

System Information

• GPU: RX5700
  Driver/LLVM version:Mesa 20.1
• Kernel version: 5.4.6
• Link to full system information report as Gist:https://gist.github.com/mathew2214/3f60b30acf8d9020c455cd8f5ada87bc
• Proton version: 5.0-5

I confirm:

• [ X] that I haven't found an existing compatibility report for this game.
• [ X] that I have checked whether there are updates for my system available.

proton log:
https://gist.github.com/mathew2214/a1067ba8bae2d4928c6396b63e14240b

Symptoms

the game does not launch. instead giving the error:

VrOverlay failed initialization with error code
VRInitError_Init_InterfaceNotFound: "Interface Not Found (105)"

[kisak-valve]

Looks like err:steamclient:create_win_interface Don't recognize interface name: STEAMTV_INTERFACE_V001 is the line of interest from the log.

[TECHNOFAB11]

Same Error for me

Edit:
my Steam System Info: https://gist.github.com/TECHNOFAB11/8d479c06f7199b0c0ebf23275b531f2f

[radriaanse]

Not exactly the same error, but also having issues launching the game. Proton log says it's the same error.
Using Proton 5.0-5 and tried the public, beta & linux_temp SteamVR builds.

Log of SteamVR launch:
https://gist.github.com/radriaanse/a13885c86e611e6529507a4500fa163f#file-steamvr_launch

Log of game launch:
https://gist.github.com/radriaanse/a13885c86e611e6529507a4500fa163f#file-hla_launch

Proton log:
https://gist.github.com/radriaanse/6860478d405853fc19aaf39a48cf1ecd

Error screenshot:

System info: https://gist.github.com/radriaanse/8e91a8c6b0fd8a20f12d1af97ba03fe3

[kivoli]

For me it worked once I chose Proton 5.0-5 but performance is abysmal — that can’t just be my Vega 56, I have sometimes frame times of 50 ms and above.

[mathew2214]

For me it worked once I chose Proton 5.0-5 but performance is abysmal — that can’t just be my Vega 56, I have sometimes frame times of 50 ms and above.

system info and proton log please?

[zaggynl]

Starts for me.
PC is struggling with rendering but my god this looks good compared to other VR FPS games I played.
Set these launch options: PROTON_LOG=1 RADV_PERFTEST=ACO
Performance seems to be better now.

Steam system info: https://gist.githubusercontent.com/zaggynl/19d6a81cd78c88066c7be8f132e63a3e/raw/51cf2ba54ad6cedea97c5648222216beb38ba0c2/gistfile1.txt

summary:
ubuntu 20.04 (upgraded for doom eternal, didn't help)
oibaf ppa for mesa-git (not sure if needed?)

streamvr beta screenshot: https://imgur.com/2hVVLfb.png

Proton log: pending

[VurtualRuler98]

I manually chose Proton 5.0-5 and the game ran fairly well, however it always crashes to a black screen(with the headset ostensibly turning off) when entering the train after getting the pistol, where it seems a level change should occur. In some cases the game will display an error complaining about the steamVR library being out of date(even though steamVR is a newer version than the minimum it requests), in others the game will just freeze and must be manually closed.

System info: https://gist.github.com/VurtualRuler98/25db38bf420800016515507a88b32c38
Proton log: https://gist.github.com/VurtualRuler98/de263199e0d8bd6a836b54c679f8479e
vrserver log: https://gist.github.com/VurtualRuler98/a0b8d467f1a8bec8647289d09ce9799d
vrcompositor log: https://gist.github.com/VurtualRuler98/e573aec4e564f268e4b6b8e1e580459b

[kisak-valve]

Hello @VurtualRuler98, err:vrclient:create_win_interface Don't recognize interface name: IVRInputInternal_002 looks like a line of interest from the log.

[frostworx]

the game works fine here ( i7-8700K, RTX 2080, up2date arch linux, nvidia-dkms-440.64-5)
but it reprodacable crashes when entering the train wagon, probably while loading the next level chapter. In fact SteamVR crashes (including hmd turning off)!

[mkalte666]

the game works fine here ( i7-8700K, RTX 2080, up2date arch linux, nvidia-dkms-440.64-5)
but it reprodacable crashes when entering the train wagon, probably while loading the next level chapter. In fact SteamVR crashes (including hmd turning

Its general level loads as far as i can see. I could progress by saving before the level load, letting it crash (or not). After starting the game again it progresses just fine.
A bit annoying, but i save way to often anyway, so this will probably not remove to much progress for me.

Still, would be nice to have this fixed. Ill try to get a log next crash

[Okxa]

Game launches on proton 5.0-5, but like others have said, performance is bad.

I also the game got stuck on the loading screen after the intro chapter, after the 2nd elevator.

Proton log

sys info

[lostgoat]

The SteamVR beta branch has some fixes related to loading screens for HL:A on linux.

[mkalte666]

The SteamVR beta branch has some fixes related to loading screens for HL:A on linux.

I'm on the beta branch already. Or do you mean linux_temp?

[radriaanse]

I'm probably missing something, but I'm still unable to launch even with the earlier mentioned launch options.
Still get the same error in both the log and gui.

[radriaanse]

The SteamVR beta branch has some fixes related to loading screens for HL:A on linux.

I'm on the beta branch already. Or do you mean linux_temp?

https://steamdb.info/app/250820/depots/
beta seems to be the most recently updated, although ~17 hours old.

[frostworx]

the game works fine here ( i7-8700K, RTX 2080, up2date arch linux, nvidia-dkms-440.64-5)
but it reprodacable crashes when entering the train wagon, probably while loading the next level chapter. In fact SteamVR crashes (including hmd turning

Its general level loads as far as i can see. I could progress by saving before the level load, letting it crash (or not). After starting the game again it progresses just fine.
A bit annoying, but i save way to often anyway, so this will probably not remove to much progress for me.

Still, would be nice to have this fixed. Ill try to get a log next crash
I can confirm that loading immediately after entering the wagon fixes this glitch. thank you for the workaround!
I'm on SteamVR beta branch btw (not linux beta). the game is mostly at playable speed with some hickups here and there. quiet long loading times, but this might be hdd related and no bigger issue (for me)

[FredrikHson]

had to symlink my .local/share/Steam/SteamApps folder to .local/share/Steam/steamapps to get the controllers to work

[Okxa]

After loading the game up again, it works better in the levels that I already had been at. But after going forward in the game (in the courtyard which was featured in the steamvr home previews), the performance tanks again.

At that point I tried saving and loading, but it got stuck on the load screen, while everything was laggy and slow. Even the controllers and view moved in slow motion.

I was using RADV_PERFTEST=ACO on the hl alyx, as well as the beta branch of steamvr.

[Zamundaaa]

I didn't have any launch or even crash problems at all but sometimes HL:A used all of the GPU and had refresh rates and jittering that was horrible. I solved almost all of these by setting the resolution / super sampling of the Index down to 30%. The problem of the loading screen remains: sometimes it uses the GPU to its full extent and takes like 5 minutes to load, while the PC is unresponsive (even the mouse!) and you get 3fps in VR. After that it does recover again though and is completely playable again.
I'm using a 5700 XT with aco, on the beta branch of SteamVR.

[mkalte666]

Found this in my syslog: https://gist.github.com/mkalte666/9eb82820fff62dfc5b9d3e377c042225

[lordkitsuna]

I didn't have any launch or even crash problems at all but sometimes HL:A used all of the GPU and had refresh rates and jittering that was horrible.

I am having this issue as well, however i have determined it is a VRAM issue and possibly a memory leak. I have tried turning res per eye down and in game fidelity as well all the way down. These help but it only extends the time to VRAM starve. System specs as follow
OS: Arch Linux x86_64
Kernel: 5.6.0-rc2-1
CPU: 5820K OC to 4.6GHz
GPU:/5700 XT
Memory: 48182MiB (48GB)
Driver: mesa-git 20.0.0_devel.119657.58ba7b696dd-1
SteamVR: Version 1.10.32 (1584924836)
HMD: Index

Here is a shot of the desktop view with DXVK HUD showing the overloaded VRAM

I can trigger this overload even if i just stay in once spot it just takes much longer. Please let me know if there is anything else i can provide to help track this down.

[fabiankranewitter]

For me it also crashes when a new level is loaded, sometimes during a train or when arrested. But also when selecting saves.
It's going well but the performance could be better.

System:
i7-4770k
Nvidia 2060 super (8gb) [440.64]
32 GB Ram
HTC Vive

Syslog
dmesg:
RenderThread[3829]: segfault at 8 ip 000000000058ef9d sp 00007f5ad0faaee0 error 4 in vrcompositor[400000+36b000]
[ 737.625405] Code: 01 00 00 00 0f 84 73 02 00 00 8b 80 10 01 00 00 48 8d 44 10 10 48 8b 44 c7 10 48 85 c0 48 89 85 40 ff ff ff 0f 84 6a 02 00 00 <41> 8b 47 08 83 f8 14 0f 87 76 02 00 00 48 8d 15 cf ff 11 00 45 8b

[mkalte666]

I also just lost some saves to god-knows where (basically all reset to the launch before the one that crashed/newer ones just gone). I think that might be a steam cloud issue, but no idea how i should approach this

[Zamundaaa]

@lordkitsuna well, the problem only appears after two or three loading screens so that sounds like it is the issue. Weirdly though right now I have only 4038MB of 8 gigs used and got the problem.

[rnd-ash]

This happens to me at every level after getting in the train. No matter how quickly a level is completed.

[kivoli]

@mathew2214 Sorry for being a bad reporter earlier:

System Information

• GPU: Vega 56
• Driver/LLVM version: DRM 3.36.0, LLVM 9.0.1, Mesa 19.3.4
• Kernel version: 5.5.10-arch1-1
• Link to full system information report as Gist
• Proton version: 5.0-5
• SteamVR: beta (1.10.32)
• Proton log

I crashed on me now after a nice hour of game play just after successfully loading the next level (just after fighting the head crabs), probably because I set down my HMD during the loading. Unfortunately I did not have PROTON_LOG=1 set yet. :-/

The real bummer though is that there was a hot fix release for SteamVR beta just twenty minutes ago and now SteamVR won’t start — I’ll reboot to check if I did something to break things. I had to kill SteamVR due to the earlier crash after all.

//edit: I don’t know if it’s the hot fix but my frame times are a lot better now. Still not the desirable 11 ms but absolutely bearable 13-15 ms with better reprojection, too, as it seems. No more frasnell effect — but let’s see, maybe it’s just the level. I’ll keep you posted.

//edit2: Added log of latest gameplay which crashed after loading a save — for the second time, due to dying twice …

[radriaanse]

@kivoli Seeing that you are on Arch as well, did you do anything special besides adding that launch option to be able to start?
I've been playing around with some settings and other kernels/mesa-git packages but I'm still not able to get past that first error.

[llamasking]

@stevenlafl Thank you. Now I can do this instead of launching the tools hackily through Lutris!

[kivoli]

Sadly Alyx doesn’t want to start with Proton for me anymore.

Encountered accessviolation.
Wrote minidump to hlvr_2020_0607_154704_0_accessviolation.mdmp

The log and memory dump (base64 encoded) may be found here:
https://gist.github.com/kivoli/f87f3ddc00c09e999a21bc488d67b256

The native version works just fine but mods often don’t work with Vulkan which is why I wanted to run the Windows version via Proton again. I tried to get Windows and Vulkan version to run simultaneously but it didn’t work - probably due to this more generic issue.

I tried 5.0-8, 4.11-13 and 5.8-GE-2-MF — it crashes during startup, never leading the loading area of SteamVR.

[lboklin]

Yeah I have been unable to get it working through Proton too, so I can't get past the point at which it crashes. Does anyone have a save file from beyond that specific part or know how much further until chapter 3 (or is it 2?)? I just want to continue my playthough.

[llamasking]

Sadly Alyx doesn’t want to start with Proton for me anymore.

@kivoli Use @stevenlafl's patched Proton.

I can't get past the point at which it crashes

@lboklin If you're talking about the crashes when loading a new level, the workaround for the bug is to save and quit the game. Then restart the game. Once you load in, immediately jump into the loading screen. Alternatively, the native version does not experience the crash bug at all.

[kivoli]

@llamasking Right - works nicely and apparently I totally overlooked one directory when following your list of files to copy. Thanks again for providing it!

[llamasking]

@kivoli No problem. I added a script to the gist. It just makes it so I don't have to manually dig out the files I need to copy whenever the game updates.

I'll be keeping the list updated for as long as is necessary. Updates tend to add and remove some files, but never anything that should ever need a change to the files list.

[lboklin]

@llamasking Sorry I forgot which issue I was in. This is the crash apparently affecting everyone: ValveSoftware/SteamVR-for-Linux#356 and the only way to bypass it is to just load the level that comes after (chapter 3).

[Okxa]

Gathering info from these posts, I created a simple setup script to create a separate install of the Windows version of HL:A and tools, if you want to keep using the linux version too.

https://github.com/Okxa/hl_alyx_tools_proton_install

It is mostly automated (downloads the game, downloads & installs the patched proton by stevenlafl), but you must manually create a shortcut on steam like in this comment, but the script tells you what you need to do.

Ofc it doubles the disk usage, but if you have the space there it is, the script atleast copies the files to save download time/bandwidth.

[Okxa]

It seems that the hammer editor crashes when setting the center panes to Four-view quad.

Also it crashes if you resize the right pane while having a map open, perhaps related.

Do not know how to log this, as env vars like PROTON_LOG=1 wont work on non-steam games.

Maybe there is a log somewhere? Or otherwise would need to switch the native linux version on normal steam client to proton and debug with that.

[mkalte666]

Do not know how to log this, as env vars like PROTON_LOG=1 wont work on non-steam games.

AFAIK, you can create a user_settings.py next to the proton executable. There is a template (called user_settings.sample.py), which you can just copy and rename that one. Proton then should create logs for everything you run with it.

$ cd /media/fastGames/STEAM/steamapps/common/Proton\ 5.0/
$ ls -l
[...]
-rwxr-xr-x 1 mkalte      30010 Jun  6 15:28 proton
-rwxr-xr-x 1 mkalte      90540 Mar 11 19:03 proton_3.7_tracked_files
-rwxr-xr-x 1 mkalte 1036380160 Jun 14 10:46 proton_dist.tar
-rwxr-xr-x 1 mkalte        215 Mar 11 19:06 toolmanifest.vdf
-rwxr-xr-x 1 mkalte       1033 Jul 24 22:14 user_settings.py <<<<<<<
-rwxr-xr-x 1 mkalte       1033 Mar 11 19:06 user_settings.sample.py <<<<<<<<
-rwxr-xr-x 1 mkalte         24 Jun 14 10:46 version

[Okxa]

So here is the proton log for the tools, using this proton: https://github.com/stevenlafl/Proton/releases/tag/proton-5.0-7-alyx-2 by @stevenlafl

Hammer crashes when switching to four view quad, same results happen when resizing the right pane smaller when a map is opened. (It does not crash when the right pane is dragged wider)

https://gist.github.com/Okxa/70e5776da7754d567b4e4b2505ebecda

[Okxa]

For some reason the game crashes when I am trying to load my map. But when loading a map compiled from one of the template maps, most of the time it does not crash, but I have gotten that to crash the game too once. So maybe not an issue with the map itself.

Maybe some kind of memory issues, as sometimes I have gotten messages like: ***** OUT OF MEMORY! /+/ attempted allocation size: 17664 **** in vConsole, yet I have 32GB of ram. (And my map did run in engine if I compiled it using fast settings, which skips lightmap generation)

Still using the @stevenlafl 's precompiled proton.

Proton log: steam-546560.log

mdmp: hlvr_2021_0927_000547_0_accessviolation.mdmp.zip

UPDATE:

If I quickly open hammer and load the map in engine, it loads. But if I load it afterwards again, or reload it multiple times, the game crashes with "Out of Memory".

UPDATE2: The tools now run with Proton Experimental; however they still crash most of the time when loading a map.

Proton Experimental log: steam-546560.log

[master-caster]

Maybe I'm a little late to the party 😁

after getting my first VR gear Half Life: Alyx is a must have.
I managed to get through the game once but you need to be very tolerant to frustration in my case.
While loading into a level there is a 50/50 (or even worse) chance that the game hangs up my entire PC.

It feels like it was getting better after installing a more capable CPU. Something
that may also improve stability seems to be playing with low details. Last but not least
the first levels of the campaign do not hang that often while loading into them than the later level do.

Does anyone had the same issue with this game? It is probably an AMD Graphics library/hardware
issue rather than a game issue. I'm using an AMD Radeon RX 5700 (the non XT version).
Beside this, other VR games run flawlessly. (Walking Dead S&S, Beat saber, Arizona Sunshine etc.)

I'm using Ubuntu/Fedora Linux for this. I don't use any self compiled drivers. Only "vanilla" distributions.

If you're interested in I will post all my stuff in detail but since this behaviour is the same on ubuntu 22.04, 24.04 and
Fedora 39, 40 it doesn't feal like it is a general software library problem.

[yaomtc]

I have an RX 5700 XT which crashed the last time I played. I think the first gen RDNA cards are just more prone to crashes when there's a lot going on, like in HL:A. I hope the newer AMD cards are more stable...

[fuzunspm]

Game won't start on either proton or native versions with an error message of

CRenderDeviceMgrDx11::Init():Failed to create Dx11 render device

I have 7900xt and this is the only vr game it won't open

[OzzyHelix]

I have a 7800 XT and cant launch it
steam-546560.log

[OzzyHelix]

someone is doing a test for me on a 7900 XTX but I am worried that Half Life Alyx might be broken on AMD RX 7000 series GPUs when running over proton or even the Linux native version.

[OzzyHelix]

I do not want to refund my copy of Half Life Alyx I just want to play the game and I am having a hard time doing so

[Zamundaaa]

The game works mostly fine for me with a rx 7900XTX, both Proton and native. The native version has caused three GPU resets (all recovered from at least) in my last play session, but it starts and runs fine otherwise

[OzzyHelix]

I keep getting this error I can't make it work on Arch Linux and I am getting very frustrated

[OzzyHelix]

I have reinstalled Arch Linux at this point and still I can't get past this error

[OzzyHelix]

I have tried everything I can think of and can't get past this error I am very angry and need to walk away from this for now

[mmcnutt]

I would suggest launching steam through a console it see if it yields any other information about what is happening and dumping proton logs - is there any commonality between the errors generated with the native version vs proton.

Since the game is giving a directx error, have you tried launching it with the -vulkan option to work around it?

Reinstalling your OS is probably overkill

[OzzyHelix]

I had success getting it to work in a distrobox of fedora 41 so I think it might just be broken on Arch Linux I will try running steam in the console tho

[OzzyHelix]

running it in distrobox has fixed it for the main arch install idk how but running it in distrobox and then running it on the main arch install magically fixed it

[OzzyHelix]

Half Life Alyx is working after a day of trying to make it work I'm not sure why running it in distrobox fixed it but it did. and the reason I reinstalled from CachyOS was because I thought maybe CachyOS was screwing with it. so I went to reinstall standard Arch Linux

[OzzyHelix]

I believe what happened is steam native runtime on Arch Linux wasn't configuring the proton prefix correctly and when I ran steam in a fedora distrobox it cured my proton prefix making the game launch