Guild Wars 2

Hi folks!

I’m Posting this here at the request of one of the people who posted on the Original Thread in the Tech Support Forum.

I’ve just completed a video tutorial on how to install/configure Guild Wars 2 on Linux, using Wine or Play on Linux.

Downloaded on Windows – Install on Linux : http://youtu.be/dA7FWgEy-oY

Download and install – Linux Only : http://youtu.be/MFmojaEHx08

GW2 doesn’t play perfectly on Linux, but its getting better.

I hope it helps all my fellow Linux buffs out there!

Cheers!

Star

EDIT*** Replaced the music within the second video to better comply with the Creative Commons License.

EDIT*** Replaced the music within the first video to better comply with the Creative Commons License.

EDIT*** Added second video, showing how to install, using ONLY Linux, without the need to download the content on MS Windows.

EDIT*** Due to requests, Audio levels have been adjusted. Music is now more quiet, and Voice has been boosted.

Also, thanks to KerrMD for pointing out the web address for the Guild Wars 2 wiki entry for Linux : http://wiki.guildwars2.com/wiki/Guild_Wars_2_on_Wine

Nice work! Hope to see more stuff like this going on.

Cheers man Its good to hear that you like it. You know its always difficult when you put yourself out there.

This is my first really public vid, so I’m glad it’s gone down well

Nice! Using OpenGL or DX?

I just watched and bookmarked the video for when I get my desktop back up. Now I can get an Archbang install going and play my GW2. Best of both worlds.

EDIT: I would like to suggest throwing a post and link up in the subforum Linksville.

Kudos and thanks!

Also, for those interested, I found a bit of info in the Guild Wars 2 wiki.

http://wiki.guildwars2.com/wiki/Guild_Wars_2_on_Wine

Thanks! Great tutorial, probably gonna use it sooner or later.

Ive been running GW2 on Ubuntu 12.04. No issues yet! Everything works great

A small thing to note for your future videos if you plan to continue on releasing them – make sure to up your microphone volume up a bit or to reduce the music volume down so people can hear you a little bit better. Other than that, a cool video and kudos for making it. :-)

Thanks for the feedback guys. I will re work it tonight. Ill adjust the Music and Voice volumes.

Its strange, because when I play it on Linux, the volumes through Flash are near perfect. Then when I switch over to Windows, its all out of whack. Silly Windows

Oh, and KerrMD : I cant find a command line switch for OpenGL, so unfortunately, its in DirectX9. Also that link you posted is basically where I got the information from. I just thought a vid might be easier to follow for some people, especially if I can cut out most of the cli, and introduce Play On Linux’s GUI instead.

Anyway, Ill update tonight!

Cheers!

Star

TY, I’m a long time Debian user (since 1998) but my laptop runs Linux Mint, gonna give this a try.

Thanks to all those who have posted so far. Its really encouraging. Ok, so based on feedback, I’ve adjusted the Audio levels. Maybe this will make it easier to hear?

Let me know!

Star

starblessed.4786:

Thanks for the feedback guys. I will re work it tonight. Ill adjust the Music and Voice volumes.

Its strange, because when I play it on Linux, the volumes through Flash are near perfect. Then when I switch over to Windows, its all out of whack. Silly Windows

Oh, and KerrMD : I cant find a command line switch for OpenGL, so unfortunately, its in DirectX9. Also that link you posted is basically where I got the information from. I just thought a vid might be easier to follow for some people, especially if I can cut out most of the cli, and introduce Play On Linux’s GUI instead.

Anyway, Ill update tonight!

Cheers!

Star

It’s a failing of mine. I like CLI for some things.

KerrMD.2617:

It’s a failing of mine. I like CLI for some things.

LOL! I know what you mean. But in the interests of being as straight forward as possible for the n00b and expert alike… grin

That was really cool for you to put that together for people ^5

fps could be a little better tho
but works pretty well.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=2aXu8Cvg26g

Swordbreaker.2581:

That was really cool for you to put that together for people ^5

Cheers man. I appreciate the feedback.

Xpander.5729:

fps could be a little better tho
but works pretty well.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=2aXu8Cvg26g

You’re right of course Xpander. But the mission was to get it installed and running. Everything else from that point on is a tweak.

Also, keep in mind that wine are not officially supporting GW2 yet anyway. There has been some preliminary work done though. I imagine that dev on the GW2 portion will now start to ramp up, as there is a lot more call for it.

If you want the best out of wine/GW2, then you really need to slim down the distro you’re using, and compile wine yourself.

This was just a straight forward guide to get people started.

The intention at the end of the day, is to make it as simple as possible for people to make the move to Linux. If I can ease the transition, then mission accomplished!

Ultimately, you’re right though. So thanks for mentioning it. Perhaps Ill make another one at a later date, on how to improve your frame rates.

Cheers!

Star

starblessed.4786:

You’re right of course Xpander. But the mission was to get it installed and running. Everything else from that point on is a tweak.

Also, keep in mind that wine are not officially supporting GW2 yet anyway. There has been some preliminary work done though. I imagine that dev on the GW2 portion will now start to ramp up, as there is a lot more call for it.

If you want the best out of wine/GW2, then you really need to slim down the distro you’re using, and compile wine yourself.

This was just a straight forward guide to get people started.

The intention at the end of the day, is to make it as simple as possible for people to make the move to Linux. If I can ease the transition, then mission accomplished!

Ultimately, you’re right though. So thanks for mentioning it. Perhaps Ill make another one at a later date, on how to improve your frame rates.

Cheers!

Star

I agree. A slim distro can make a difference indeed. Linux From Scratch and building nes own kernel would be ideal. However, I think that when I get my machine back together I will be going the Archlinux or Archbang route. There’s also Crunchbang for those that prefer a Debian base.

the problem seems to be that the game or wine doesnt use all the cpu cores under linux.
maybe thats the -dx9single command that does that..but u can run without it also and it doesnt change a thing but just keeps freezing then when chating.

so if u want a good performance under linux currently…then u need to overclock ur cpu a lot.
for example i got +10 fps from going 3,2ghz to 3,8ghz …and that 10 made a huge difference in massive action.

hope wine will get this sorted and the game can use multiple cores soon enough. so we can enjoy some better performace.
looking at the wine git, there seems to be some fixes about the cpu information…will have to wait and see if that helps in that regard.

ps sry for my poor english

I do not think that overclocking is the answer. Wine does in fact allow for multi-core usage. It does so in WoW. Provided, of course, you alter your config.wtf file properly. It seems to be as much game config as it is wine config.

Awesome info there guys. Ill keep an eye out for more info and patches. Ill add more as I find them

Updated with Linux Only, installation Video.

Star

wonder why GW2 is only supporting mac since the mac client is basically using wine too, via transgaming cider. didn’t transgaming used to have a linux version too called cedega?

Right now GW2 runs like kitten on my Linux, I read that it’s because the game (or wine) isn’t using more than one core on a multi-core CPU, there’s a way to enable it but I forget how and haven’t found a definite answer after googling (I know there’s a way to set it in World of Warcraft config). I sort of encountered the same issue in City of Heroes, going into special/task forces it lagged like a buffalo in deep mud.

I’m curious about the Mac native client, that could lead onto something for Linux users.

Had to move the video’s. Updated and uploaded to alternative server.

Yeah can anyone get this to work where they can play it? I am on Ubuntu 12.04, using the latest ATI graphics catalyst, and I get 5-10 fps. Unplayable.

Updated to the beta 12.9 catalyst drivers, and now the fps are 8-14 . Still not playable, but an improvement. Anyone else actually playing beyond “Yeah your’e technically playing but not really”?

I use Linux Mint Debian for my office work. But I’m going to have to give this a try!

OK, sorry I’ve been absent for so much time. Family commitments and all.

Turns out (after much research) that GW2 is CPU bound. So the framerate is directly proportionate to the amount of available CPU speed. Now herein lay the problem…

WINE is not capable of using multiple cores (above setting the affinity of the process to a chosen core) other than in a rudimentary capacity.

This is a known problem, so after a certain point, your Video card is more than capable, but your “Single” available core, is too slow to cope. Therefore = Slow Framerate (even though your graphics card is able to do it).

Here is the bug report : http://bugs.winehq.org/show_bug.cgi?id=11674

There’s no known fix just yet, but it should be coming soon, as this affects multiple games.

Ill try and keep you all updated as I find out more!

Star

My personal guide would be:
- format to ntfs
- install windows
- install gw2

Good to see it runs OK under wine though. I really hope this project can achieve windows-like performance one day.

I hope to one day night need wine at all, and Arenanet gets on board with Steam, or just ports to linux.