protonscr

Big Picture Mode/Tenfoot - incorrect power menu when running under Gamescope

steamopen Big Picture
ValveSoftware/steam-for-linux#11241 · opened 2024-09-05 by ghost · updated 2026-03-18 · 5 comments · github
?ghost 2024-09-05 github

Your system information

  • Steam client version (build number or date): July 17th 2024
  • Distribution (e.g. Ubuntu): Arch Linux via CachyOS repositories
  • Opted into Steam client beta?: No
  • Have you checked for system updates?: Yes
  • GPU: AMD Radeon 780M

Please describe your issue in as much detail as possible:

When running Steam using Gamescope, the power menu transforms to its SteamOS variant despite not specifying -steamos3 in the launch options

The left version is expected as I'm not running in SteamOS mode, yet the right version of the menu appears when using Gamescope.

image

This is especially problematic because when the right version of the power menu is displayed, the functionality is unavailable on most systems due to this portion of code in steamui, making it impossible to use "Switch to Desktop". Using -steamos3 and making the steamos-session-select binary execute steam -shutdown circumvents this; but then desktop Steam functionality such as the ability to use SHIFT-TAB to open the in-game overlay no longer works.

image

The culprit is the webpacked code for the Tenfoot UI checking if we're IN_GAMESCOPE rather than ON_STEAMOS (or using both conditions together):

image

Steps for reproducing this issue:

  1. Run Steam with the env var GAMESCOPE_WAYLAND_DISPLAY=1
  2. Enable Big Picture Mode
  3. The power menu will now display the SteamOS version rather than the desktop one

https://github.com/user-attachments/assets/d0b4bb06-8d0f-4162-be05-50d85ee5816d

Mmatte-schwartz 2024-09-23 github

+1 to this, adding something like a "Exit Steam" button would be immensely helpful, especially when running Steam embedded within Gamescope via a VT as there is no "clean" way of shutting down the session

Aanmolsekhon590 2025-02-11 github

@kisak-valve having similar issue https://github.com/ValveSoftware/steam-for-linux/issues/11749

You can follow these steps for a workaround:

  1. create a script kill-gamescope.sh with contents:
#!/bin/bash

/usr/bin/pkill -9 gamescope
  1. give it executable permission using:
chmod +x kill-gamescope.sh
  1. Then add it as a Non-Steam game from steam menu. It should kill your gamescope session.

I hope this helps till we get an official fix.

Yyaomtc 2025-07-15 github

I have this issue on Plasma (Wayland) but I can right-click the Steam icon in the system tray where "Exit Big Picture" and "Exit Steam" work correctly, with one exception: after exiting Big Picture mode, the Steam/View/Friends/Games/Help buttons at the top of the window no longer function until I restart Steam.

Fflying-sheep 2026-01-14 github

For Arch Linux users: I created a very simple package that makes “Switch to Desktop” work: steamos-session-select. Just install it, and launch steam through gamescope [options] -- steam -steamos3 -gamepadui

@anmolsekhon590 Don’t do (p)kill -9 unless a process is unresponsive! Definitely don’t do it by default! (p)kill without the “9” is enough.

@kisak-valve this is a one-line fix presented on a silver platter by someone diving into your code. Could you please forward this to the devs so they can fix it within a minute?

Hhphilm 2026-03-18 github

Seems with Steam-Client stable-2026-03-13 (version 1773426488) the dbus call dbus-send --system --print-reply --dest=org.freedesktop.DisplayManager /org/freedesktop/DisplayManager/Seat0 org.freedesktop.DisplayManager.Seat.SwitchToUser string:'$s' string:'$s' is not sent anymore. Something changed in code in that regard ...

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