Software
Steam
Proton-CachyOS 11.0-20260602
Proton Experimental (same behaviour)
VKD3D-Proton bundled with Proton
Stalker 2 latest Steam version
Description
The game periodically freezes for approximately 20–30 seconds.
During these freezes:
game audio continues;
the entire KDE desktop appears visually frozen;
moving the mouse still produces menu sounds;
after the stall, the game resumes by itself without crashing.
The issue is intermittent but reproducible.
Reproduction
The problem most commonly appears:
during the opening real-time cinematic;
while the in-game PDA/menu is open;
less frequently during gameplay.
Interestingly:
When the freeze happens inside the PDA, closing the PDA immediately ends the freeze, but is followed by several seconds of heavy stuttering before normal gameplay resumes.
Observations
Kernel:
No GPU reset.
No VM fault.
No ring timeout.
No amdgpu errors.
KWin:
The only graphics-related message found is:
kwin_wayland:
atomic commit failed:
Device or resource busy
This message appears during sessions where freezes occur.
Proton:
No relevant errors.
VKD3D:
No fatal warnings.
Swapchain creation succeeds.
Pipeline cache is enabled.
KHR_present_wait is used.
No device lost.
GPU behaviour:
Monitoring with amdgpu_top shows:
VRAM remains well below available capacity.
GTT usage remains very low.
GPU continues working normally.
No evidence of VRAM leak.
MangoHud:
Captured frame-time spikes exceeding one second while:
GPU load remains high;
VRAM usage remains stable.
The GPU does not appear to reset or become idle.
Things already tested
Changing Proton:
Proton Experimental
Proton-CachyOS
No difference.
Disabled:
Steam Shader Pre-Caching
VRR
No difference.
VKD3D tests:
VKD3D_DISABLE_EXTENSIONS=VK_KHR_present_wait
No difference.
VKD3D_CONFIG=no_upload_hvv
No difference.
Graphics settings:
Changing:
Global Illumination
Reflections
between Low and Epic
no observable effect.
Changing TSR resolution:
TSR 50%
freezes disappear during testing.
TSR 80%
freezes return.
TSR 100%
similar behaviour to 80%.
What does not happen
No GPU crash.
No device lost.
No driver reset.
No VRAM exhaustion.
No GTT exhaustion.
No application crash.
The game always recovers by itself.
Additional information
The behaviour appears closer to a long rendering/presentation stall than to a GPU hang.
Because:
audio continues,
GPU remains active,
driver reports no fault,
rendering eventually resumes without recovery actions.
Hardware
GPU: AMD Radeon RX 9070 XT (Navi48 / GFX1201)
Driver: RADV
Mesa: 26.1.2-arch3.1
Kernel: Linux CachyOS 7.1.1
Desktop: KDE Plasma 6.7.1
Session: Wayland
Display: 2560×1440
Software
Steam
Proton-CachyOS 11.0-20260602
Proton Experimental (same behaviour)
VKD3D-Proton bundled with Proton
Stalker 2 latest Steam version
Description
The game periodically freezes for approximately 20–30 seconds.
During these freezes:
game audio continues;
the entire KDE desktop appears visually frozen;
moving the mouse still produces menu sounds;
after the stall, the game resumes by itself without crashing.
The issue is intermittent but reproducible.
Reproduction
The problem most commonly appears:
during the opening real-time cinematic;
while the in-game PDA/menu is open;
less frequently during gameplay.
Interestingly:
When the freeze happens inside the PDA, closing the PDA immediately ends the freeze, but is followed by several seconds of heavy stuttering before normal gameplay resumes.
Observations
Kernel:
No GPU reset.
No VM fault.
No ring timeout.
No amdgpu errors.
KWin:
The only graphics-related message found is:
This message appears during sessions where freezes occur.
Proton:
No relevant errors.
VKD3D:
No fatal warnings.
Swapchain creation succeeds.
Pipeline cache is enabled.
KHR_present_wait is used.
No device lost.
GPU behaviour:
Monitoring with amdgpu_top shows:
VRAM remains well below available capacity.
GTT usage remains very low.
GPU continues working normally.
No evidence of VRAM leak.
MangoHud:
Captured frame-time spikes exceeding one second while:
GPU load remains high;
VRAM usage remains stable.
The GPU does not appear to reset or become idle.
Things already tested
Changing Proton:
Proton Experimental
Proton-CachyOS
No difference.
Disabled:
Steam Shader Pre-Caching
VRR
No difference.
VKD3D tests:
VKD3D_DISABLE_EXTENSIONS=VK_KHR_present_wait
No difference.
VKD3D_CONFIG=no_upload_hvv
No difference.
Graphics settings:
Changing:
Global Illumination
Reflections
between Low and Epic
no observable effect.
Changing TSR resolution:
TSR 50%
freezes disappear during testing.
TSR 80%
freezes return.
TSR 100%
similar behaviour to 80%.
What does not happen
No GPU crash.
No device lost.
No driver reset.
No VRAM exhaustion.
No GTT exhaustion.
No application crash.
The game always recovers by itself.
Additional information
The behaviour appears closer to a long rendering/presentation stall than to a GPU hang.
Because:
audio continues,
GPU remains active,
driver reports no fault,
rendering eventually resumes without recovery actions.
Files available:
Stalker2-Win64-Shipping_2026-06-26_18-55-37.csv
stalker_amdgpu.json
stalker_kernel.log
stalker_kernel(1).log
steam-1643320.log
stalker_vkd3d_github_minimal.log