[Seam RT3] Launch failure for emojies-in-game-folder-named: steam-runtime-launch-client "E: Invalid byte sequence in conversion input"

steamclosed runtimeDistro Family: Debian

ValveSoftware/steam-for-linux#13107 · opened 2026-04-22 by galkinvv · updated 2026-05-19 · 3 comments · github

Ggalkinvv 2026-04-22 github

Your system information

Steam client version:

Steam Beta Branch: Steam Beta Update
Steam Version: 1776728408
Steam Client Build Date: Tue, Apr 21, 2026 02:19 UTC +03:00
Steam Web Build Date: Tue, Apr 21, 2026 00:41 UTC +03:00
Steam API Version: SteamClient023

Distribution (e.g. Ubuntu): Debian 13, Gnome Wayland
Opted into Steam client beta?: Yes
Have you checked for system updates?: Yes
Steam Logs: not attached I have 200MB of them, I collect the 5-line log from terminal running steam, looks like more useful for this case
GPU: Nvidia

Just tried to run game with id 4414250. It has a native build.

Expected result: starts fine

Actual result: immediate exit (PLAY button turns back green after 0.5 second after pressing it). Enforcing Proton usage instead of native build didn't change anything.

Opening steam from terminal shows that after pressing "Play" button the following output occures:

ERROR: ld.so: object '/media/games/SteamLinux/steamrt32/gameoverlayrenderer.so' from LD_PRELOAD cannot be preloaded (wrong ELF class: ELFCLASS32): ignored.
steam-runtime-launch-client[518918]: E: Invalid byte sequence in conversion input
Game Recording - would start recording game 4414250, but recording for this game is disabled
Adding process 518918 for gameID 4414250
Game Recording - game stopped [gameid=4414250]
Removing process 518918 for gameID 4414250

It turnes out that name of this game folder in steamapps ends with emoji and it seems that Steam RT3 launching system has problems with it.

As a first workaround try I created a launch.sh in the games folder and added it as "non-steam game". Didn't help, same behaviour.

But when I adjusted the .sh launcher and placed it one level upper - directly in the steamapps/common folder and adding this launcher as "non-steam game" - the issue immediately resolves, game launches fine. So I think that it really depends on having emoji in folder name

Here is an example of the workaround script - that resides in the normal folder without emojies and cd's to problematically named folder during execution

#!/bin/bash
SELF=`realpath "$BASH_SOURCE"`
SELF_DIR=`dirname "$SELF"`
cd "$SELF_DIR/Sisters in Sin 🔞"
exec ./SistersInSin.x86_64

Ssmcv 2026-04-24 github

We've seen similar issues before (ValveSoftware/steam-runtime#349). The arguments parsing in steam-runtime-launch-client probably needs to flag some more arguments as G_OPTION_ARG_FILENAME or G_OPTION_FLAG_FILENAME.

Thanks for providing a concrete example of a game-ID that triggers this - that will make it a lot easier to reproduce!

It's not just emoji, any non-ASCII will probably cause this. Last time we had similar issues, it was Everspace 2, which installs into steamapps/common/EVERSPACE™ 2.

We do advise against non-ASCII installation folders but for pre-existing games it's too late to change this.

Tracked as steamrt/tasks#1003 internally.

Ssmcv 2026-05-18 github

The arguments parsing in steam-runtime-launch-client probably needs to flag some more arguments as G_OPTION_ARG_FILENAME or G_OPTION_FLAG_FILENAME.

Yes, it was this.

Games that install into non-ASCII folders should work as intended since the 2026-05-13 public beta.

Ggalkinvv 2026-05-19 github

Retested with 2026-05-15 beta client - the problem is fixed.

Closing as resolved.

Nothing extracted yet.