I‘ve checked a few of the resources I found here but I seem to be unable to wrap my head around this.

I want to play one specific game purchased from GoG on my Steam Deck. It only has a windows installer. I don’t need a fancy launcher (at the moment). The game has low hardware requirements so should run fine via emulation/proton…

What’s the easiest way to install and add this game to game mode?

Edit: clarification on the launcher. I don’t necessarily need one. If it is the easiest way to get it done I still would consider installing one.

  • gabmus@retrolemmy.com
    30·
    3 days ago

    Easiest way is to use heroic. You can easily install it from the discover store, log in with your gog account and click install. Then right click and add to steam directly from the heroic interface, this way it will show up in the deck game mode.

    Ps: I know you wrote you don’t need a fancy launcher, but this is legitimately the absolute easiest way to go about it.

  • artyom@piefed.socialEnglish
    17·
    2 days ago

    Install Heroic. Log into GOG account from Heroic. Go into settings and click “automatically add games to Steam”. Click install. Exit and go back into Steam. Click launch. Cross your fingers.

  • Björn@swg-empire.de
    9·
    2 days ago

    If you don’t want to go the Heroic route (you really should go the Heroic route) you can

    1. download the offline installer from GoG
    2. add the installer as a none-Steam-game to Steam
    3. select Proton for compatibility
    4. run the installer
    5. add the installed game’s exe to Steam as a none-Steam-game
    6. select Proton for compatibility

    Trouble with that method is that Steam always creates a new Wine prefix (a kind of fake Windows drive) every time you run a new none-Steam-game with Proton. They can pile up and take unnecessary space away. It also makes it harder to install dependencies or mods or add ons.

    So yeah, Heroic is the way.

  • gustofwind@lemmy.worldEnglish
    3·
    2 days ago

    Add the exe to steam

    Right click it and set force compatibility to proton

    Run it and install into steam

    Should run after

    Or do the heroic launcher method other people suggest

    • Auster@thebrainbin.org
      3·
      2 days ago

      Adding to that, iirc the user needs to change the EXE on Steam after the install, else Steam will keep trying to open the installer.

      • gustofwind@lemmy.worldEnglish
        1·
        2 days ago

        Funnily enough I tried to do this with battlenet and it didn’t work but if I just run the original added installer on steam it auto runs properly

        • Björn@swg-empire.de
          1·
          2 days ago

          That’s because every time you run a new program with Proton on Steam it creates a new Wine-prefix (fake Windows drive). So when you run the installed battlenet.exe it creates a new Windows environment where Battle.net is not installed.

          But the installer is using the environment where Battle.net is installed and apparently it has a function to run Battle.net when it detects that it’s already installed.

        • Auster@thebrainbin.org
          1·
          2 days ago

          Unfamiliar with Battle.net, but the problem sounds like a case of DRM and the solution sounds like the installer tries to normalize launchers and you are able to leverage it.

          • gustofwind@lemmy.worldEnglish
            1·
            2 days ago

            I think I run guildwars1 off the original installer as well which also just autolaunches properly but I believe that installer has always properly supported launching an installed exe if found

            Battlenet works just fine and I play StarCraft through it perfectly but I was totally stumped why following the instructions failed and running it off the installer works.

            Neither even shows the installer it just directly runs the client