One would maybe have thought at a first glance that Steam Deck might be a console that can only run Steam games, but this is (luckily) not the case, and you can install the EA Desktop App (Origin) in order to run games that you have bought on the EA platform, and/or titles that you want to play in the future but are exclusive to Origin.
Prima Games is here to set you up with a step-by-step guide for the installation of Origin on your Steam Deck.
Steps to Install Origin on Steam Deck (Tutorial)
This is a very, very long procedure, so we hope you have the patience. First, we’ll install Origin.
- Make your Steam Deck go into Desktop mode from the Power menu of your device.
- Visit the official EA website where you can download Origin (click here for the file link). When you download it, move it to your Steam Deck if you have downloaded it from your PC.
- On your Steam Deck, open Steam, and in the drop-down menu located in the top-left corner, add a non-Steam game to your Library (similar to what you can do on Steam on PC).
- With the Browse function, locate the Origin file OriginThinSetup.exe (remember to make sure you know where you downloaded or sideloaded it and to have “All Files” selected during this search), and add it.
- Now, within the Properties of the file (available when you right-click it), enable the “Force Compatibility” feature. When choosing a compatibility option, go with Proton Experimental.
- After confirming these compatibility features, go ahead and run the Origin installation file and install it as normal. When all is done with the setup, find the OriginThinSetup.exe again and right-click it to reach the Properties again.
- You need to re-assign the file that Steam will try to run when you run the Origin shortcut, replace the installation file because you do not need it anymore, and find the Origin.exe file instead. Now, you need to find a thing called “wine prefix” within this folder: /home/deck/.local/share/Steam/steamapps/compatdata
Basically, you are looking for a folder that is named with a bunch of numbers. You ought to remember that number because, with this number, you will be able to add the Origin games to Steam one by one.
Also, within the wine prefix, find the following folder:pfx/drive_c/Program Files (x86)/Origin - Within this folder, you need to locate Origin.exe and open it. Now you have Origin launcher “mapped” within Steam.
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How to Add Origin Games to Steam on Steam Deck
In case you want a bit more convenience when launching Origin games on your Steam Deck (and just skip the Origin launcher as much as possible), there is a way to do that as well. Assuming that you have installed Origin successfully, you will need to fully exit Origin. Now, within Steam, you need to go back to that drop-down menu in the top-left where you add non-Steam games to your library.
- Remember that Wine prefix folder where you installed Origin? Time to go back there.
pfx/drive_c/Program Files (x86)/Origin Games. Within this folder, locate the game that you have installed through Origin already.
Then within the folder of the game, you need to locate the executable (.exe) file that is used to run the game and select it. - If you add the game successfully you will see it on your Steam. Now, you need to right-click it and go into Properties.
- (OPTIONAL) Within this dialogue, enter the exact name of the game, as it appears on SteamDB, in case that the game you are adding exists on both Steam and Origin. This is done so that you can grab the controller layouts!
- Within the Shortcut page, you will need to find the “Launch Options” and enter the following string:
STEAM_COMPAT_DATA_PATH="/home/deck/.local/share/Steam/steamapps/compatdata/YOURORIGINNUMBER" %command%
(YOURORIGINNUMBER is the number we’ve mentioned in the previous section) - Same as in the previous section, we’ll choose “Proton Experimental” in the Compatibility section. And that’s it! You can close the dialogue.
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We hope this guide was helpful and we thank you for visiting Prima Games!
