Games do not launch after updating to SteamOS 3.6

[polyzium]

Your system information

• Steam client version: 1726683985
• SteamOS version: 3.6.19
• Opted into Steam client beta?: No
• Opted into SteamOS beta?: No
• Have you checked for updates in Settings > System?: Yes

Please describe your issue in as much detail as possible:

Expected behavior: Games start normally.
Actual behavior: Games will not start unless you do this 10 times. This happens with both Steam and non-Steam games.

Steps for reproducing this issue:

See this video, but in summary:

1. Power on the Steam Deck.
2. Launch a game.
3. Make sure the game doesn't start after 15 seconds or so.
4. Try another game or restart the same game.
5. Repeat steps 3 and 4 until any of the games launch.
6. Try another game.
7. Make sure it launches under 15 seconds.

I contacted Steam support but they said that they don't have a fix and they recommended posting this issue to this GitHub as well as the Steam Deck discussion forums.

[lostgoat]

@polyzium Can I trouble you to do the following:

1. Restart your deck
2. Launch one game
3. Wait for 5 minutes
4. If game doesn't launch in 5 minutes, exit and try the same strategy you used in the video of launching multiple games.
5. Once you are successful at launching a game, submit a system report to steam support.[1]

Once you do that I'll be able to pull your logs to investigate why this is happening. Also let me know your steam account name so I can find the logs in our system.

[1] To submit a system report you can go to Settings->System and scroll all the way down in the page.

[polyzium]

@lostgoat "let me know your steam account name"? How do I know you're a legitimate Valve employee and not a scammer trying to steal my account? Apparently you do work for Valve.

[polyzium]

I tried Ion Fury. The game launched in 1 minute and 43 seconds according to my stopwatch.
For some reason uploading the system report took a long time, around 10 minutes or so, but 2 minutes later it says that the upload has failed for some reason.
Please search for SteamID64 76561198123313325 in your system as I do not feel comfortable sharing my account name/login here. Just in case I'm also gonna send the system report in here (the one made with the "Save to Desktop" button).
systemreport-20241102080648.txt

[polyzium]

I don't know what happened, but after updating to SteamOS 3.6.20 it started happening less often.

[mdunn79]

I'm having the exact same issue. I've even tried removing and reinstalling the linux runtimes (sniper, et al) and nothing works - games will not launch. The only way I have found to fix it is to revert the OS update from 3.6.20 back to 3.5.19, at which point everything works as expected.