How to run Soulframe on Steam Deck

Soulframe is a forthcoming MMO title from Digital Extremes. During the Tennocon 2025 weekend, the studio granted access to the ongoing pre-alpha to everyone who registered. Several new gamers joined, including those who want to play the title on their Steam Deck, or at least their handheld with SteamOS. However, the game doesn’t officially support Linux.

Its compatibility for the Steam Deck or Linux is a topic that has been trending on the official Discord. Fortunately, though, some individuals have shared a few ways to play the game on the handheld console.

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Running Soulframe on a Steam Deck

Soulframe can run on your handheld with some effort (Image via Digital Extreme)

Currently, the best way to play Soulframe on your Steam Deck or any other Linux device is through Bottles, an open-source software that lets you run Windows titles on Linux by creating a gaming compatibility layer.

Note: This method does not guarantee the game runs on your Steam Deck.

Follow these steps to install the software and the game on Steam Deck:

1. Download and install Bottles from the official website. You can configure the preferences during this process to install Runners and DLLs. Runners are compatibility layers required to run the game. Krone4k TKG is currently the community favourite, although there are others like Soda and Caffe. DLL, or Dynamic Link Library, contains universal resources for running a game or implementing features like DLSS (Deep Learning Super Sampling) and FSR, so use the latest version.
2. Within the software, you can create a bottle that will give you the option to run a gaming or software environment. Choose a gaming environment.
3. In the bottle settings, enable DXVK, LatencyFleX, DLSS, and change the renderer to Vulkan. Once done, select the “Run Executable” option to locate and launch the Soulframe installer.
4. Once the installer is running, choose the download location for the game and wait for it to complete. Soulframe will require 10 GB of storage. Make sure you have enough space for installation.
5. After the download is complete, you should be able to run the game.

As mentioned, this process doesn't guarantee the game will run. For some, the process worked, while others reported crashes when launching the installer (at the end of step 3).

There is another method you can try if the one above does not work. Follow these steps:

1. Run Steam Deck in Desktop Mode.
2. Add Soulframe.msi as a ‘Non-Steam Game’ within your library. If you cannot find the .msi file, try changing the display to all files.
3. Open the game properties and change the compatibility layer to “Proton Experimental”.
4. Launch the game from the Steam library to select a location and download all required files (do not run the game yet).
5. Once the download is complete, exit Desktop Mode and switch to Gaming Mode. You should then be able to launch and run the game.

A common issue reported is that the title does not launch during step 5. In this case, once the game is downloaded, change the target (within properties) to its launcher instead of the installer.

The game's launcher location should be: "/pfx/dosdevices/c:/users/steamuser/AppData/Local/Soulframe/Downloaded/Public/Tools/launcher.exe"

These are the two ways you can currently play Soulframe on Steam Deck. Currently, there's no information regarding Linux support for the game, possibly because it is in its early stages of development.