About
Tsukihime is a Japanese visual novel released by the doujin circle TYPE-MOON in December 2000, written by Kinoko Nasu with art by Takashi Takeuchi. Built on the NScripter engine, it is a click-to-advance story about a young man whose 'Mystic Eyes of Death Perception' draw him into encounters with vampires and other supernatural threats.
It became a landmark cult hit that launched TYPE-MOON's career and spawned the wider Nasuverse, including Fate/stay night. The original game was never officially localized in English; this configuration targets the long-running Mirror Moon fan translation of the 2000 release (distinct from the 2021 remake 'A Piece of Blue Glass Moon').
Identity
Launch
- Binary
- onscripter-en
- Needs files
-
- default.ttf
- nscript.dat
- arc.sar
- arc.nsa
Runtime
- Runs as
- Native Linux
- Proton
- not needed
⚙ Setup notes
Game: Type-MOON's 2000 Windows visual novel with the Mirror Moon fan English translation — it was never officially localized. The original Japanese game ran on NScripter; the English release runs on ONScripter-EN, an open re-implementation that is English-aware. It is a light text-and-image VN.
Best route (native, no Proton): ONScripter-EN runs natively on Linux/Steam Deck without WINE or Proton. Grab a current ONScripter-EN build (e.g. Galladite27's fork; prebuilt binaries are 64-bit), then copy the four data files from your patched Tsukihime install — default.ttf, nscript.dat, arc.sar, arc.nsa — into the engine directory and run the onscripter-en binary. Add it to Steam as a non-Steam game.
Required font: ONScripter-EN will not start without a default.ttf in the game folder — the Mirror Moon release already includes a custom one, so keep it; do not replace it.
Proton fallback: If you instead use the Windows onscripter-en.exe, run it through GE-Proton. The Japanese-locale launch options (LANG=ja_JP.UTF-8 LC_ALL=ja_JP.UTF-8 %command%) are only relevant to the raw Japanese NScripter exe — the English ONScripter-EN build does not need them.
Display: Renders at a fixed 4:3 / 640x480 window; pillarboxing on the Deck's 16:10 screen is normal. Pass -s ./ --fullscreen (or set scaling per-game) to fill the screen.
Controller: Controls are mouse / click-to-advance (left-click advance, right-click menu). There is no native gamepad support — add a Steam Input layout mapping A=left-click, B=right-click, and the trackpad to the mouse.
The one thing to know
Supply your own copy: English text comes from the Mirror Moon fan translation; the original is Japanese-only and was never officially localized (do not confuse with the 2021 Steam remake 'A Piece of Blue Glass Moon').
Engine: The English release runs on ONScripter-EN, which runs natively on Linux/Steam Deck without Proton. Copy default.ttf, nscript.dat, arc.sar and arc.nsa from your patched install into the engine folder and launch the onscripter-en binary (add as a non-Steam game). A Windows onscripter-en.exe exists as a GE-Proton fallback.
Required font: ONScripter-EN will not start without a default.ttf in the game folder — the Mirror Moon release ships one; keep it.
Locale: The Japanese-locale launch options apply only to the raw Japanese NScripter exe; the English ONScripter-EN build does not need them.
Display: Fixed 4:3 window means pillarboxing on the Deck screen; use -s ./ --fullscreen or per-game scaling.
Controller: No native controller support — add a Steam Input layout (A=left-click advance, B=right-click menu, trackpad=mouse).
Content: Mature visual novel.
Note: deckport describes configuration only. Test on hardware before marking working.
Community guides
Write-ups and threads from people who got this (or a similar) game running. deckport links to them — it doesn't reproduce them.
Get the artwork
deckport never hosts game images. Open this game on SteamGridDB, pick
the cover / hero / logo / icon you like, and drop them into the
game folder under .deckport-art/ before you push it to the
Deck. The importer files them under the right names automatically.
Run it on your Deck
Two files: the one-time importer (deckport.py) in your
Deck's home folder, and this game's install helper. Copy the game
into ~/Games and run the helper with Steam closed — it
writes the recipe (binary, launch options)
and registers the shortcut with artwork.