CDEmu

CDEmu, or CDEmulation is needed to virtually mount your games on Linux for those pesky VNs without a digital version.

Installation

Steam Deck

Requirements

SteamOS read-only mode disabled.

To disable read-only mode on your Steam Deck, run the following commands:

passwd # use this command only if you've never run the below command.
sudo steamos-readonly disable

If you make a mistake, simply press CTRL + C to cancel the command.

  1. To install CDEmu on the Deck, just run these commands in the Konsole:
​
pacman-key --init # run these two commands if the below doesn't work
pacman-key --populate

sudo pacman -S linux-neptune-61-headers libmirage libao cdemu-client cdemu-daemon vhba-module-dkms

sudo modprobe vhba
pacman-key --init # run these two commands if the below doesn't work
pacman-key --populate

sudo pacman -S linux-neptune-headers libmirage libao cdemu-client cdemu-daemon vhba-module-dkms

sudo modprobe vhba

When that’s finished running, and you’ve pressed y to everything, you’ll get a new menu to Open with CDEmu client when you right click certain files, or double click to open.

Info

If you don’t see any context menus, press F5 while in the folder of your game’s MDF/MDS/ISO files, and the icon should change. You can also refresh manually by clicking on the menu icon ☰ on the top right > More > View > Refresh. You may need to run this everytime SteamOS updates, or whenever it disappears, because the Steam Deck has an immutable OS.

Usage

  • Mount a disc image: cdemu load 0 ~/image.iso
  • Unmount a disc image: cdemu unload 0

More information on the CDEmu ArchWiki page