VK_KHR_wayland_surface extension is not enabled in the Vulkan instance

[colutti]

I am trying to use gamescope to run steam games on my AMD CPU/GPU. I am getting the following error. It does work on KDE, so I am assuming this is a missing feature or a bug on hyprland.

Versions:

gamescope version 3.16.9+ (gcc 15.1.1)

Hyprland 0.49.0 built from branch at commit 9958d29 (version: bump to 0.49.0).
Date: Thu May 8 20:15:18 2025
Tag: v0.49.0, commits: 6098
built against:
aquamarine 0.8.0
hyprlang 0.6.3
hyprutils 0.7.1
hyprcursor 0.1.12
hyprgraphics 0.1.3

Error:

[gamescope] [Info] console: gamescope version 3.16.9+ (gcc 15.1.1) [gamescope] [Info] scriptmgr: Loading scripts from: '/usr/share/gamescope/scripts' [gamescope] [Info] scriptmgr: Loading scripts from: '/usr/share/gamescope/scripts/00-gamescope' [gamescope] [Info] scriptmgr: Loading scripts from: '/usr/share/gamescope/scripts/00-gamescope/common' [gamescope] [Info] scriptmgr: Running script file '/usr/share/gamescope/scripts/00-gamescope/common/inspect.lua' (id: 0) [gamescope] [Info] scriptmgr: Running script file '/usr/share/gamescope/scripts/00-gamescope/common/modegen.lua' (id: 1) [gamescope] [Info] scriptmgr: Running script file '/usr/share/gamescope/scripts/00-gamescope/common/util.lua' (id: 2) [gamescope] [Info] scriptmgr: Loading scripts from: '/usr/share/gamescope/scripts/00-gamescope/displays' [gamescope] [Info] scriptmgr: Running script file '/usr/share/gamescope/scripts/00-gamescope/displays/asus.rogally.lcd.lua' (id: 3) [gamescope] [Info] scriptmgr: Running script file '/usr/share/gamescope/scripts/00-gamescope/displays/deckhd.steamdeck.deckhd-lcd.lua' (id: 4) [gamescope] [Info] scriptmgr: Running script file '/usr/share/gamescope/scripts/00-gamescope/displays/gpd.win4.lcd.lua' (id: 5) [gamescope] [Info] scriptmgr: Running script file '/usr/share/gamescope/scripts/00-gamescope/displays/lenovo.legiongo.lcd.lua' (id: 6) [gamescope] [Info] scriptmgr: Running script file '/usr/share/gamescope/scripts/00-gamescope/displays/lenovo.legiongos.lcd.lua' (id: 7) [gamescope] [Info] scriptmgr: Running script file '/usr/share/gamescope/scripts/00-gamescope/displays/valve.steamdeck.lcd.lua' (id: 8) [gamescope] [Info] scriptmgr: Running script file '/usr/share/gamescope/scripts/00-gamescope/displays/valve.steamdeck.oled.lua' (id: 9) [gamescope] [Info] scriptmgr: Loading scripts from: '/etc/gamescope/scripts' [gamescope] [Warn] scriptmgr: Directory '/etc/gamescope/scripts' does not exist [gamescope] [Info] scriptmgr: Loading scripts from: '/home/colutti/.config/gamescope/scripts' [gamescope] [Warn] scriptmgr: Directory '/home/colutti/.config/gamescope/scripts' does not exist wp_color_manager_v1#17: error 0: Windows scRGB profiles are not supported libdecor-gtk-WARNING: Could not get required globals Failed to load plugin 'libdecor-gtk.so': failed to init libdecor-cairo-WARNING: Could not get required globals Failed to load plugin 'libdecor-cairo.so': failed to init No plugins found, falling back on no decorations ATTENTION: default value of option vk_khr_present_wait overridden by environment. [gamescope] [Info] vulkan: selecting physical device 'AMD Radeon RX 7900 XTX (RADV NAVI31)': queue family 1 (general queue family 0) [gamescope] [Info] vulkan: physical device supports DRM format modifiers [gamescope] [Info] wlserver: [backend/headless/backend.c:67] Creating headless backend [gamescope] [Error] xdg_backend: Couldn't create Wayland input objects. [gamescope] [Error] xdg_backend: Failed to initialize input thread **SDL_Vulkan_CreateSurface failed: VK_KHR_wayland_surface extension is not enabled in the Vulkan instance.terminate called without an active exception** zsh: IOT instruction (core dumped) gamescope -W 3840 -H 2160 -f

[vaxerski]

IIRC gamescope requires full cm to be enabled in the hl config

[colutti]

Could you please tell me how to enable that? I was not able to find it on the docs.

[Zebra2711]

@colutti #9064 (comment)

[colutti]

I am still lost on what to do, but I will try googling it a little bit more.

[leon-erd]

Hey @colutti I ran into the same issue and the setting I needed to set in the hl config was debug:full_cm_proto.
Im not really sure what it does exactly maybe someone else can elaborate?

[LionHeartP]

As far as I am aware, gamescope HDR no longer works with Hyprland. There are a few gamescope commits that broke it which are no longer able to be reverted. If you really want to use gamescope, you need to use a super old build. Something from like October 2025 or so.
#9064 (comment)

[doomperfect]

Actually, HDR still does work on latest gamescope and latest Hyprland, but you have to be strangely specific with the launch command on Steam... I found a working setting from this thread on Reddit. Not sure which parts of this matter, but I think the "env" part in here is what finally made it work for me.

ENABLE_HDR_WSI=1 gamescope --fullscreen -w 3440 -h 1440 -r 144 --hdr-enabled --hdr-debug-force-output --force-grab-cursor --mangoapp -- env ENABLE_GAMESCOPE_WSI=1 DXVK_HDR=1 DISABLE_HDR_WSI=1 %command%

Obviously feel free to change resolution/refresh rate and add game-performance or similar script before the gamescope part.

Tested with Cyberpunk 2077 and Star Wars Outlaws. Using NVIDIA RTX 5090 (575.64.03 open kernel modules), on hyprland-git 0.49.0.r160.g6375e47-1 with gamescope 3.16.9-2 and proton-cachyos 1:10.0.20250702-1. I also have vk-hdr-layer-kwin6-git r46.1384036-1 installed, I think that package is necessary for gamescope HDR on nvidia.

You may also need these HL conf settings (more details in #10993). Haven't really bisected to see which of them actually matter for gamescope HDR though:

monitorv2:cm = wide
debug:full_cm_proto = false
experimental:xx_color_management_v4 = true
render:direct_scanout = 1
render:cm_fs_passthrough = 0
render:cm_auto_hdr = 2
cursor:no_hardware_cursors = 2

[LionHeartP]

xx_color_management is no longer used by Gamescope ever since they switched to upstream CM. Also, the HDR WSI layer is not needed if you're on AMD with mesa 25.1 and newer.

I'll test again with some of the stuff you posted, but you have most of the hyprland config variables set to their defaults.

Edit: Additionally, gamescope 3.16.9 is far from the newest one. That's a tag from May. We're now on 3.16.14 plus a few commits since then.

[LukasLichten]

I did run into this (SDL_Vulkan_CreateSurface failed: VK_KHR_wayland_surface extension is not enabled in the Vulkan instance.) after updating aquamarine, and compared to the example here I do not use HDR at all.

I tested:

• Hyprland 0.50.1 in both
• Gamescope versions 3.16.1, .16 and .17 resulting ion the same outcomes
• aquamarine 0.9.2 and 0.9.4 (.2 worked, .4 produced the error, but I did not do a rollback check to verify)
• hyprutils 0.8.3 and 0.8.4
• Other hypr related packages were not changed

Hyprland build info (Arch package):

Hyprland 0.50.1 built from branch  at commit 4e242d086e20b32951fdc0ebcbfb4d41b5be8dcc  ([gha] Nix: update inputs).
Date: Sat Jul 19 21:37:06 2025
Tag: v0.50.1, commits: 6291
built against:
 aquamarine 0.9.2
 hyprlang 0.6.3
 hyprutils 0.8.1
 hyprcursor 0.1.12
 hyprgraphics 0.1.5

I did fine this (ValveSoftware/gamescope#1956) issue, that lays out this precise issue, timed around that aquamarine release.
It is suggested hyprland-git fixes this (and I can confirm it does), but I have been unable to track down a commit (I did not look hard, but could not find a pull request, or even a commit on aquamarine at all...).

This comment mainly serves for documentation for anyone who runs into this issue too, considering this seems fixed in -git again.