PlayableShow Details
Unknown
Works perfectly
By bypassing the launcher, and waiting through "black" splash screens I ware able to play the game.
backup dowser.exe and rename AoWFP.exe into dowser.exe
The game works slowly on my configuration, hard to say if this is Linux fault or original game.
The text is small and slightly hard to read.
The game supports controller input but is set to Mouse by default. You can navigate the menu and play the game with the trackpads and triggers, but I recommend going into the settings and enabling controller input to use buttons and analog sticks.
Game runs at 50-55 fps with these settings:
- Display Mode: Windowed
- Resolution: 1200 x 800
- Vsync: Off
- Resolution Scale: 75%
- Interface Scale: Largest
- Texture Quality: Ultra
- Anti-Aliasing: On
- Soft Particles: On
- Bloom: On
- Reflections: On
gamemoderun %command%
No problems after 4h with Proton 8.0-2
With Proton-ge - installation error Paradox Launcher
protontricks 718850 d3dcompiler_47
You have to doing the protontricks to get some of the images / graphics to show, especially on the loading screen and menu. It also seemed to make the world and combat UI "crisper". Also, disabling SSOA in "Advanced Video" settings was required for me to get rid of a bunch of artifacts / white flickering on-screen, but it works great once those 2 items were done.
Proton 6.x and older threw various errors. Proton 7.x and experimental worked fine with the above changes.
protontricks 718850 d3dcompiler_47
More or less constant white flashing in the world and combat UI in the trees / bushes / grass.
Game works with Proton Experimental or version 7.x . Older version gave me various errors. The game worked fine without the protontricks, but graphics / images were missing in the loading screen and main menu. Graphics seemed to get slightly better in-game as well, although that could be subjective, after running the protontricks as suggested.
The more or less constant white flashing / redraw in the trees / grass / bushes is the only negative I have. It's "playable", but will probably give you a headache.
I've only played the first tutorial mission and a random word at the moment. No crashes.
Everything works by default.
In game installation folder under "steamapps/common":
- Rename dowser.exe into something else
- Rename AoWFP.exe into dowser.exe
The game is not well optimized in Windows either.
- Background on startup screen may not show up, depending on the patch version.
- The initial (sign-in) form in the startup screen may show up but not be visible, you must just blindly press ESC or Enter in order to skip the form and get to the startup screen.
The performance issues may be similar in Windows according to the reviews. The form that pops up might be too annoying for some people. Otherwise, the fact is that the game is fully playable once you press start/continue game.
Requires a minute or two of initial fiddling in the options menu, but runs perfectly afterward.
Game does not recognize gamepad input by default; you will need to use mouse emulation at first in order to change input method to gamepad.
Launcher does not use gamepad support. Touchpad or mouse emulation is required to launch the game.
Text can be difficult to read with default settings. UI is scalable so this issue can be alleviated to some degree.
No issues! Multiplayer was super smooth.
Runs awesome! Cutscenes are great, graphics are great, solid 144 FPS (native vsync'd framerate) with render resolution lowered slightly, multiplayer was smooth.
Had a blackscreen issue until I used this suggestion from prior reports: protontricks 718850 d3dcompiler_47
I often have issues connecting to their server(s) but I don't think I am alone in this. I restart the game a few times and I eventually get into the multiplayer lobby.
d3dcompiler_47.dll fixes the blackscreen issue, if you run into it. Was the only thing I need protontricks for. I didn't rename the launcher as prior suggestions did.
Runs fine out of the box.
I did not play Multiplayer online.
crashes at start play
Applied workarounds mentioned by others here, like installing Protontricks and renaming Aof / dowser etc. Crashes as soon as I choose " Play".
6.21-GE-2 GloriousEggroll
Proton-6.21-GE-2 and protontricks 718850 d3dcompiler_47 and disabled launcher (replaced dowse.ese with AoWFP.exe)
Works as well with 6.3-8 but requires still the launcher to disbale. Menu menues are not shown.
Make sure you install protontricks and then do as suggested from the terminal window: "protontricks 718850 d3dcompiler_47"
As the previous reviewer mentions:
Use Proton Experimental and at
/.steam/steam/steamapps/common/Age of Wonders Planetfall/
(or wherever your steam install is located)
- rename dowser.exe into something else
- rename AoWFP.exe into dowser.exe (I didn't need to keep a file called AoWFP.exe)
in order to bypass the Paradox Launcher (which doesn't work well) and launch the game immediately when Play is hit in Steam
Multiplayer only worked for one turn last time I tried (prior report), participating in MP games (PBEM) seems to work perpetually now, knock on wood. (There may be issues with hosting a new game, haven't tried)
With the latest experimental Proton build. Some tweaks required but otherwise 100% playable.
Initial load times will be affected
The latest experimental Proton build borked the paradox launcher from working. The work around is:
- Navigate to /.steam/steam/steamapps/common/Age of Wonders Planetfall/ (or wherever your steam install is located)
- Make a backup or rename the paradox launcher (dowser.exe)
- Make a copy of AowPF.exe and rename the copy to dowser.exe After making the above changes, you can simply launch from steam as usual and bypass the Paradox Launcher.
There is still the multiplayer issue where when hosting, joining, or loading a save... you will have to hit the button a few times to actually get to the next menu. A slight inconvenience but not the end of the world.
All features are working including steam workshop content/mods. Tested with Colonial Marines and The Revenant faction mods.
SPECIAL NOTE There is a chance (not needed in my case) you will need to download d3dcompiler_47.dll and manually put this file into the Planetfall directory or use the protontrick equivalent of this.
With latest proton, extremely playable with caveats
Initial loading times will be worse than windows but not unreasonable
This is an update to my previous posting.
Launcher will not update (not a huge issue).
Mods are working (tried with mods that do not affect base game files... colonial marines for example).
You will notice slightly longer load times on initial start from launcher and a little while generating random maps.
Multiplayer is now functioning properly and the only issues encountered were ones related to the native experience. The caveat is that it may take a retry or two for hosting/joining games. I thought I had fudged up my port forwarding and alt-tabbed to check. They were fine. When I tabbed back in.. 2 re-click retries later and all was well.
With no winetricks or protontricks, this is very playable OOB if you keep in mind the caveats mentioned.
Single player will work, but multiplayer will require a windows based host.
Multiplayer saves cannot be rejoined unless other people are already loaded in
Compared to native Windows, there is a long delay in initial loading and some minor performance loss noticed during gameplay
Launcher will not update (not a big issue) and Multiplayer functionality is janky. You cannot host but can join a friend on a windows host if you continually try to keep connecting/loading until it takes. When starting a multiplayer game from a windows host, have the host invite the linux user through steam's invite as opposed to trying to join the ingame lobby.
protontricks 718850 d3dcompiler_47
You can also just download d3dcompiler_47.dll (from https://lutris.net/files/tools/dll/d3dcompiler_47.dll for example) and drop it into the game folder, no protontricks necessary.
With current proton 6.3-5, the game (including the launcher) will start but when you press "play" on the launcher it will give you a dialog with "Failed to initialize render module". This occurs because the game tries to compile using vertex shader 4.1, which wine doesn't currently support. So, to fix that, use the command "protontricks 718850 d3dcompiler_47" (install protontricks before, of course). I would also advise to change the initial program from the launcher to the game itself. Go to the /steamapps/common/"Age of Wonders Planetfall" directory and "mv dowser.exe dowser.orig.exe && ln -s AowPF.exe dowser.exe". You'll likely have to do this again after every update, though. After that, everything should work. I can't guarantee, of course, because a new update can break things again.
As a curiosity, the previous installment of the game series, Age of Wonders III, is linux native. On the Paradox forums, the developer took a long time to acknowledge there would not be a linux version, and gave no good reasons for that. It seems that paradox's long history of linux support has been dwindling. But at least we have proton now.
Needed to install the native d3dcompiler_47 with protontricks (protontricks 718850 d3dcompiler_47)
Incompatible DirectX 11 card
I tried everything I could find, including changing the EXE files, but only the Paradox launcher works. The game installs normally, but it produces a Rendering Engine error. I just bought the game, so I did not experience it working in a previous version.
Doesn't run
After installing, it does not run.
Only launcher working
The game worked perfectly until the Star Kings update. Now the best I can is that I see the launcher, but then the game complains about my graphics card not being DirectX11 compatible, same as another comment here. The only version of Proton who game me this was Proton 4.11-13, with the others I had nothing. If I rename the executables, the games tries to launch directly and gives me the same error message
Previous update from Dec 2020 works.
No longer runs after May 10, 2021 update. Complains I don't have a DX 11 compatible gpu.
I used a btrfs snapshot to rollback the update after finding out I couldn't download the previous version w/ steam console or through the betas tab. It runs like normal if you are on the previous version but I'm giving it a thumbs down since you can't run the newest version.
If you are looking at this game and you don't have access to the version that shipped prior to May 10th BEWARE. There is no legal way I'm aware of to get it unless you have backups!
Was perfect until the May 10th 2021 update.
No longer runs after May 10, 2021 update. Complains I don't have a DX 11 compatible gpu.
It could be a specific problem with my install but I don't know because no one else has commented here and the number of linux players of this 2 year old game is most likely very small.
It seems like it could be fixable but I'm not sure how. Tried spoofing different gpus in the dxvk.conf, tried PROTON_USE_WINE3D11=1 and it didn't seem to make any difference.
I just wanna play some more :(
No longer runs after Star Kings expansion
The game had been working fine with the renaming dowswer.exe trick described by others, but after installing Star Kings, it no longer works. After pressing Play there's a "preparing to launch" dialog that pops up for a few seconds. Then it closes and nothing else happens.
Fails to start launcher since newest addon "Star Kings"
Installs within Steam successfully, fails to start then
It worked out of the box
As other users pointed out I also had a strange error on first install, saying that the launcher failed to install, though everything seems to work fine regardless - all launcher features are available and working.
