So you want to run Diablo III on Linux? Hopefully this general installation guide helps some of you into doing that.
Well, in the past there have been several threads that popped up about running the game on linux. Some of them were just that they couldn't get the program to run and others were heavily distorted graphics, like in the launcher, which made things unplayable. Since Blizzard doesn't support linux then it is left up to the users to find help for their problems. While linux use is at all new highs in the consumer market making it on par with MacOS in terms of numbers the lack of a centralized forum for linux or any official support makes finding help hit or miss usually.
Hopefully this installation guide will help some of the people who want to play the game on linux but are having issues.
This will assume a from scratch install. No Battle.net and no Diablo III on the PC.
First we need to add WINE to the repositories (and for 64bit the i386 wine). Do this by going to the links and selecting your distribution. Then do what it says to do.
- https://www.winehq.org/download/
- https://github.com/wine-compholio/wine-staging/wiki/Installation#-ubuntulinux-mint
example: in Ubuntu you would do type this in terminal
sudo dpkg --add-architecture i386
sudo apt-get update
sudo add-apt-repository ppa:ubuntu-wine/ppa
sudo add-apt-repository ppa:pipelight/stable
sudo apt-get update
Now.. depending on what you want you would install the wine or wine-staging. WINE is the official repo but falls behind on MANY updates that are available and have been for some time (for example you cant run Hearthstone with the official repo). Wine-staging is a community of WINE devs that have implemented several bug fixes and features into this special WINE so that there is better performance and compatability.
That said you would type one of the below:
sudo apt-get install wine1.7
or
sudo apt-get install --install-recommends wine-staging
I highly recommend you install this! Its not mandatory and you can play things without it. However, it is a WINE-manager and makes managing your WINE versions and the applications MUCH easier.
go to the link and select your distribution for instructions. https://www.playonlinux.com/en/download.html
example: for Ubuntu you would do this.. Ubuntu 14.04LTS
wget -q "http://deb.playonlinux.com/public.gpg" -O- | sudo apt-key add -
sudo wget http://deb.playonlinux.com/playonlinux_trusty.list -O /etc/apt/sources.list.d/playonlinux.list
sudo apt-get update
sudo apt-get install playonlinux
or download the .deb file and manually install. For a default Ubuntu installation this shouldnt require anything extra and you should be able to open the .deb with software center.
if you cant install the .deb file with a package manager like the software center then install gdebi and use it to install the .deb file. helpful to have for later too incase you need to install deb files.
sudo apt-get install gdebi
================================================================
Now we have the utilities installed and can move on to the game itself.
Click Tools > Manage Wine Versions > Install the Wine versions you want to use for PlayonLinux Click install > install a non-listed program > install a program in a new virtual drive > name the drive Select all the boxes - Use another version of Wine, Configure Wine, and Install some libraries Select Wine version to use > Choose 32bit windows installation
Windows version - Windows 7 is preferred Windows XP may be needed for some WINE versions Graphics - turn off "allow the window manager to decorate the windows" Audio - test your sound to see if it works, adjust output device if necessary.
this is a "general" set of libraries I install not necearrily what is required.
POL_install_corefonts
POL_install_dotnet20sp1
POL_install_dotnet40
POL_install_dxfullsetup
POL_install_gdiplus
POL_install_gecko
POL_install_msxml3 , 4 , and 6
POL_install RegisterFonts
POL_install riched20
POL_install riched30
POL_install tahoma
POL_install tahoma2
POL_install vcrun2010
Browse to the game file you want to install. In this case it will either be the Battle.net installer or the Diablo III installer.
First we need to tell the application that it needs to run in 32bit only because Diablo III STILL DOESNT SUPPORT 64bit. I know.. its crazy with everyone running 64bit now days that they dont implement it. Here is how to tell it what to do though AND get auto login to work from Battle.net
go to your Battle.net shortcut and right-click it for properties. you are going to add "setarch i386 -L -B -R -3" to it. example:
Command: setarch i386 -L -B -R -3 /usr/share/playonlinux/playonlinux --run "Battle.net" %F
After this you should be able to open Battle.net, install, and play them.
================================================================
Troubleshooting
Why is my Battle.net launcher all distorted? Likely because you are using an Intel with integrated graphics. Unlike Nvidia (dunno about AMD) support for out of the box "gaming" for Intel is pretty well non-existant. Dont worry though, you can fix this issue!
Just go here and get the Intel Graphics Installer: https://01.org/linuxgraphics/downloads
Why is my permormance slow and/or much less then on Windows? This one is a bit broader and harder to answer. So here goes...
-
Are you using default drivers that came with your system install? If you said yes then stop. Go download the Intel, Nvidia, or AMD Linux driver package and install it.
-
Linux DOES NOT support DirectX , and guess what? Diablo III is optimized for DirectX. Even on Mac the OpenGL is lacking and there are complaints about performance.
================================================================