protonscr

Steam client update broke Half Life 2: Update game

steamclosed 3rd party gameSteam database
ValveSoftware/steam-for-linux#5425 · opened 2018-03-25 by jgandert · updated 2025-08-12 · 8 comments · github
Jjgandert 2018-03-25 github

Your system information

  • Steam client version (build number or date):
    Steam Client Beta Update - March 23

  • Distribution (e.g. Ubuntu):
    Ubuntu 16.04 (up to date)

  • Opted into Steam client beta?: [Yes/No]
    Yes

  • Have you checked for system updates?: [Yes/No]
    Yes

Please describe your issue in as much detail as possible:

Basically the game doesn't start anymore.

This "quickfix" described by UJC did work:

I had the same problem, Linux Mint 18 or so, the way I fixed it was to rename hl2_linux to hl2_linexe, hl2.sh to hl2_linux, and edit hl2_linux (formerly hl2.sh) to replace "hl2_linux" with "hl2_linexe." No library installation neccessary, at least for me.

To add a little more info to the mix: It seems that Steam is launching hl2_linux when it should be launching hl2.sh. As is apparent from OP's output, a library isn't getting loaded, this is due to hl2.sh setting the LD_LIBRARY_PATH to search in the game's bin/ directory, and since steam launches the executable directly the run-time linker doesn't know to look in bin/ to find the missing library.

https://steamcommunity.com/app/290930/discussions/2/2549465882916976872/#c1620600279674449297

Steps for reproducing this issue:

Run Half Life 2: Update on Linux.

Kkisak-valve maintainer 2018-03-25 github

Hello @CreamyCookie, this looks like what gets called to start the game should be adjusted by the game's dev. It's fairly obvious that the issue has already been brought to his attention as indicated by the pinned forum thread you linked.

Jjgandert 2018-03-26 github

@kisak-valve Oh okay.. but isn't that still a bug in Steam or its database if the game itself wasn't updated (I'm not aware of any updates) and worked before that Steam update?

Jjgandert 2018-03-27 github

Or am I missing something?

Kkisak-valve maintainer 2020-06-19 github

Hello @CreamyCookie, are you still experiencing this issue on an up to date system? It looks like this was fixed last November.

Jjgandert 2020-06-19 github

@kisak-valve Don't have time atm to test this, so I'm closing this for now. If anyone experiences the same, feel free to to comment here and I'll reopen.

Xxcom169 2025-02-07 github

It's broken again:
/hl2_linux: error while loading shared libraries: libtcmalloc_minimal.so.4: cannot open shared object file: No such file or directory

Tteihome 2025-08-12 github 
shared-library-guard active for /var/srv/games/steam_home/steamapps/common/Black Mesa/bms_linux
Blocked library /var/srv/games/steam_home/steamapps/common/Black Mesa/bin/libtcmalloc_minimal.so.4
/var/srv/games/steam_home/steamapps/common/Black Mesa/bms_linux: error while loading shared libraries: libtcmalloc_minimal.so.4: cannot open shared object file: No such file or directory
Game Recording - game stopped [gameid=362890]
Tteihome 2025-08-12 github

for flatpak, I found this work around to be successful: https://github.com/flathub/com.valvesoftware.Steam/issues/1361#issuecomment-2699483277

Nothing extracted yet.