Running Neocron in Linux

Neocron 2.2 in Linux with Wine

This has been tested on the following systems. If you get your system working, please added you setup to this section.

System 1 (MrTrip)

• AMD Athlon64 X2 5200+ Dual Core
• 2GB DDR2 800Mhz
• GeForce 7900GS
• Ubuntu Linux X86 8.04.1 LTS

Setup 2 (Unknown user)

• Intel Core 2 Quad Q9300
• 4GB PC2-8500C5 1066MHz SLI-Ready DDR2
• GeForce 9800 GX2 1024MB GDDR3
• Ubuntu GNU/Linux 32bit 8.04.1 LTS

Instructions for getting Neocron working with Wine

Some general notes:-

• Currently there is no known issues with installing Neocron from scratch, however patching may become an issue. It is better to just copy it from an NTFS drive.
• The use of automatrix is outdated, and WineDoors is an unsupported hack. WineHQ recommend the use of Winetricks.

Installing Wine

First, we need to install Wine. I suggest adding wines repo to your list. This is a quote from their website.

Adding the WineHQ APT Repository

First, open a terminal window (Applications->Accessories->Terminal). On Debian, you will need to open a root terminal. Then add the repository's key to your system's list of trusted APT keys by copy and pasting the following:

wget -q http://wine.budgetdedicated.com/apt/387EE263.gpg -O- | sudo apt-key add -

Next, add the repository to your system's list of APT sources:

For Ubuntu Hardy (8.04):

sudo wget http://wine.budgetdedicated.com/apt/sources.list.d/hardy.list -O /etc/apt/sources.list.d/winehq.list

For Debian Etch (4.0):

sudo wget http://wine.budgetdedicated.com/apt/sources.list.d/etch.list -O /etc/apt/sources.list.d/winehq.list

Then update APT's package information by running sudo apt-get update.

Getting Neocron to work with Wine

• Install Wine and ubuntu-restricted-extras from your terminal with the following: sudo apt-get install wine ubuntu-restricted-extras
• Run the command winecfg in terminal, this will setup your user account for Wine.
• Download Winetricks - wget http://www.kegel.com/wine/winetricks
• Install the following packages via Winetricks with the following command:- sh winetricks corefonts vcrun6 mfc42
  • Visual C++ Runtime Libraries 6
  • MS Core Fonts
  • Microsoft Foundation Classes 4
• Navigate to your Neocron directory in your terminal and run wine Client.exe -precache first. Then close the Client.
• Now just run the launcher! Either by double clicking the exe, or in terminal cd to the Neocron directory and type wine NeocronLauncher.exe
• Done! Neocron should now run smoothly.

If all else fails

If the above didn't work, you may need to follow these additional instructions

• Copy your Neocron2.2 directory over to ~/.wine/drive_c/Program\ Files/
• run winecfg and Add Application Client.exe with the following options
  • Windows Version: Windows 98
  • [Libraries]
  • Override msvcrt, set to Native (Windows) [Thanks to vitamin in #winehq for this]
  • Override quartz, set to Native (Windows) [Again thanks to vitamin in #winehq for this]
• Copy msvcrt.dll and quartz.dll from your C:\Windows\System32 folder on your WIndows machine to ~/.wine/drive_c/windows/system32
• From the terminal, go to your Neocron 2 folder cd ~/.wine/drive_c/Program\ Files/Neocron2/ and type wine Client.exe -sysconfig
• Setup your options and click OK.
• From the terminal again type wine Client.exe -precache PlayTutorial
• After making sure that it works, you need to make sure that in your /etc/hosts file your hostname is set to resolve to your external IP, NOT LOCALHOST!
• Now just fire up Client.exe and connect!

Notes

A few notes on getting things working, sometimes you have to fiddle with the msvcrt.dll or quartz.dll file versions to get the one that works properly. I offer the versions I use on my website at http://areamc5.info/linux to get things rolling

Instructions for getting Neocron working with Cedega

Neocron 2.2 can be run directly from an NTFS drive. No need to copy it over. It assume it will install nicely in Cedega, please edit this page if it does.

These instructions should work for people on all GNU/Linux distros.

• Download and install Cedega.
• Open Cedega, go to Tools > Game Folders > Add. Call it NC2, or whatever you want.
• Right click the game folder you just created, click Add Shortcut and point it directly to your NC2 Client.exe This can be on an NTFS drive if you have not copied it accross e.g. /media/hda1/Games/Neocron2.2/Client.exe
• Give the shortcut a name (Neocron), and Extract the icon.
• In the 'Command Line Options' enter -sysconfig. Press Ok.
• Run Neocron (double click, or hit 'Start').
• Now right click the Neocron shortcut, go to 'Properties' and replace the 'Command Line Option' with -precache PlayTutorial If the game loads the tutorial, which it should, you now have a working NC2
• You can remove the Command Line Options now.
• You will need to edit your /etc/hosts file in order to play online. Replace your hostname (LOCALHOST) with your external IP.
• Now just launch the game and play!

And there you have it! Neocron in Linux with Cedega

Contacts and credits

• NC Forum discussion on Linux support
• Credit and questions go to MrTrip for this wiki entry (Josh@DigitallyEvolved.net - MrTrip on NC forums.
• Feel free to message BaDDaSS on NC forums with any questions about this updated wiki guide.
• Huge thanks to vitamin and all the guys at #winehq on irc.freenode.net for all the help they gave me (MrTrip) in this. Could not have done it without you guys!