After doing some more testing, I've found that the game takes significantly longer to crash when using GE-Proton8-32 (consistently 2-4 hours).
Newer GE versions are crashing after 30 minutes to an hour just like vanilla Proton.
The game seems to have a pretty nasty bug that can be caused by using GE-Proton7-55. From my testing, if the bug is triggered, It will cause any character save currently loaded to be rendered unplayable on any version of wine/Proton, no matter the device you try to play on.
A consistent way to replicate the bug is to launch into the game using GE-Proton7-55, then enter and exit the FireStation at any point (this can be done right after doing a quick tutorial at the start of the game by ignoring any quests given and running straight north of AdaminHQ). Wait for your game to crash, this usually happens a few minutes after leaving the FireStation, then after this crash occurs, any future login to that character using any version of wine or Proton will cause the game to crash either immediately, or around 45 seconds after loading into the world. The game will not crash when using the affected character on Windows, however, the trait causing the crash with wine/Proton will remain, making the character unplayable on Linux. NOTE: The FireStation is not the exclusive way of activating this bug, and it can happen at any point when using this version of Proton.
I have tested logging into an affected account on multiple different computers with fresh installs of the game, as well as many different Linux VMs and containers using various kernel and mesa versions. It is not hardware dependent, or caused by any driver that I can tell, I instead believe this to be some form of data saved server-side for your character, either some arbitrary junk that got into the database which somehow only affects Linux when called (loading some content that was not intended, causing corrupt data in memory, etc), or maybe a form of Anti-Cheat that is closing out/freezing the game due to this flag being set (these are obviously just speculation as I have no knowledge of any workings of the game's server). I have been able to fix a single character account affected by this bug, however, I do not know how I did this, I was just messing with java flags for the garbage collector (it's a java game with a custom JVM based on java 9) using wine-10.12 with Windows native Steam, and it somehow got rid of it. The fix also could have been completely unrelated to what I was doing and just a coincidence that the data stored for my player server-side was just amended somehow from the random actions I was preforming in game.
I am going to attempt to reach out to the developers of Stalcraft to see if they can find out what data is being saved on their end that could be causing the bug, hopefully this will help give some clarity as to what's happening, and maybe provide a lead for fixing the main crashing problem addressed above.
The game used to run with no crashes when using Proton 6, however, it required that you first launch the game using the latest Proton Experimental, then version 6 every time you start the game. As of now I can no longer get Proton 6 to start at all, however, 6.4-GE-1 does but within the last few weeks (around November 26 I believe) the game received an update that causes 6.4-GE-1 to trigger a debugger check for the game so it can't be used to play the game any longer.
I have the exact same issue ( it may take a few mins/hours or it may never happen ), using experimental or hotfix although it also happens on GE proton.
System Information
GPU: RX 9070
CPU: Ryzen 9700x
Ram: 32gb
Video driver version: Mesa 25.3.3-5
Kernel version: Linux 6.18.5-2-cachyos
Stalcraft:X (1818450)
Issue transferred from https://github.com/ValveSoftware/Proton/issues/9650.
@MatvaiCross posted on 2026-04-08T15:59:05:
Transparent environment objects do not render or show in the environment, causing many locations that have these objects hard to work around, or impossible to deal with.
These environment objects are used during the Inside Out Event of the game that occurs once a year.
Start up game, go into Inside Out area of Northern Faction Zone, run around areas, run into invisible walls and objects place around or block areas.
Through testing and asking those who play on linux with Proton. The problem with the Inside Out environment objects is amd only problem. Nvidia cards are rendering the objects while amd cards are unable to do so.
Hello @MatvaiCross, it may be worthwhile to also mention your findings to your video driver vendor.
@MatvaiCross while I see mentions of the event in the game's menu, I couldn't find a way to actually trigger it or see how to get to the zones related to the event. I'm in some place called firebase, can you give step by step instructions about reaching the offending locaitons?
Hi @kisak-valve, can this issue be renamed to STALZONE as the game changed its name: https://store.steampowered.com/app/1818450/STALZONE/
Is someone able to attach a savefile that can get me to the problem area in the game?
i've noticed that this game for some reason cannot (or doesnt want to ?) use DXVK/VKD3D, mangohud reports WineD3D being used
@Kyr4l those projects require the game to use a recent enough directx version, while stalzone uses opengl afaik
proton experimentalx2 2026-04ge-proton8-32x2 2025-09ge-proton7-55x1 2025-09proton 8.0-5x1 2025-09
Compatibility Report
System Information
I confirm:
Symptoms
The game is freezing randomly, this usually happens anywhere from a few minutes to an hour of playing. The game stays open on the last frame and I have to manually kill the process. This happens regardless of hardware or Linux distro.
I looked over the games log file and it just abruptly cuts off when it freezes, and I've replicated the crash when using Zink, as well as many different versions of Proton, primarily from 9 and 10.
steam-1818450.zip
Reproduction
Start the game and load into the main area, not sure if the tutorial will trigger it, but It may.
I've attached two proton log files, each was the result of the game freezing.