Just Cause 2: black screen but sound is working

[absolutelynothinghere]

When running Just Cause 2, the game starts with a black screen and a visible orange mouse cursor. The audio is working and the game even responds to inputs by playing menu sounds, but there is nothing on the screen.
Without DXVK (i.e. on vanilla Wine) the game runs fine but the framerate is low. I went into the settings on vanilla Wine and disabled Decals/SSAO/AA then tried DXVK again, but there is no difference.
Installing d3dcompiler_47 from winetricks made no difference.

Software information

Just Cause 2: Complete Edition from GOG.
setup_just_cause_2_-_complete_edition_1.0.0.2_(50335).exe

System information

• GPU: NVIDIA GeForce RTX 4050 Max-Q / Mobile
  (my PC also has an integrated GPU, but it is not used)
• Driver: NVIDIA 550.163.01 (proprietary driver)
• Wine version: 10.0
• DXVK version: 2.7.1 and 2.6.2
• OS: Debian 13 Trixie x86_64

Apitrace file(s)

• JustCause2.trace.gz
• JustCause2.1.trace.gz
• The game crashes when using apitrace.

Log files

game.log

[doitsujin]

Lots of weird memory allocation issues in the log that I have never seen before. I'm suspecting that all D3D10/11 games (or at least all such 32-bit games) are going to be broken.

Please try ruinning a more recent driver, the 550 branch is quite old at this point and not really tested anymore. We had this game running more or less fine all the way back in 2018.

[absolutelynothinghere]

I'm suspecting that all D3D10/11 games (or at least all such 32-bit games) are going to be broken.

This seems true. I tried another 32-bit D3D10 game (Shantae and the Pirate's Curse) and indeed it shows a black screen, while a 64-bit D3D11 game (Beyond a Steel Sky) works almost perfectly.

Please try ruinning a more recent driver, the 550 branch is quite old

I just checked Synaptic and unfortunately 550 is the latest version available on Debian Trixie... AFAIK upgrading from different sources is discouraged on Debian, so is there any other alternative you would recommend?

[WinterSnowfall]

AFAIK upgrading from different sources is discouraged on Debian, so is there any other alternative you would recommend?

Your options are either the Nvidia proprietary .run driver package or this repo. Use either at your own peril. That being said, both should generally work fine.

P.S.: The Bookworm repo works on Trixie for now, but they should spin up a separate one soon enough.

[K0bin]

Works fine on my system.

[Blisto91]

@absolutelynothinghere Does it work fine if you remove dxvk and try wined3d's Vulkan backend? It can be selected by launching with WINE_D3D_CONFIG=renderer=vulkan

[absolutelynothinghere]

either the Nvidia proprietary .run driver package or this repo. Use either at your own peril.

I guess I will try the repo, but after backing up my system just in case. There are installation instructions on reddit, could you confirm if they are still valid?

WINE_D3D_CONFIG=renderer=vulkan

That didn't make a difference but thanks for the suggestion.

[WinterSnowfall]

There are installation instructions on reddit, could you confirm if they are still valid?

I can not confirm them unfortunately, as I'm not on Debian at the moment. Please don't use Reddit as a guide though, as it's somewhat misleading. While the outlined approach is generally correct, you don't actually need to install cuda-drivers, you can simply pick a driver package of choice and install that, such as nvidia-open_570.195.03, for example.

P.S.: Mind you, I'm using that same repo, but with Linux Mint (so essentially Ubuntu), and the setup process is a bit different in this case. Haven't had any issues with the repo so far though, in the last, oh, 2-3 years.