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Last active May 8, 2023 20:29
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Play Istaria On Linux
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Istaria on Linux.md

Play Istaria On Linux

I’m not an Istaria player, but I did recently have the pleasure of assisting someone to set it up based on an old guide on the Istaria site.

As a long time Unix, and Linux admin… I found the guide a little overly complex for newer users, and in some places inaccurate enough to need clarification….

So, the following is my summary of how best to do the installation, with a current version of Ubuntu (Based on 23.04, so should be valid for 24.04+).

The approach here is to use Wine to run the Istaria installer, but then run the game using the native Java (JVM) on the Linux side. I’m also assuming you are running Ubuntu on an x86_64 PC, not an ARM based SBC or similar (although since Istaria is run with Java, it may be possible to copy the install onto such a machine and run it there… YMMV).

The old guide on the Istaria site suggests that Wine after 6.x does not work, and since the major changes here are for executing 64 bit code, I simply suggest creating a 32 bit prefix, and I had no issues running the installer with Wine 8.x. I also felt that a mixed solution with some updates in the terminal and some in the GUI created more confusion than just sticking to one of the other, so the following guide is entirely console based.

Before starting you will want to have downloaded the "setup.exe" from the Istaria site, the instructions below will assume that it's located in your ~/Downloads folder

  1. First, ensure you have the necessary components installed.
sudo dpkg --add-architecture i386
sudo apt-get update
sudo apt-get install wine wine32:i386 winetricks openjdk-8-jre
  1. Second, create a dedicated prefix for Istaria (WINEPREFIX lets wine install it's data into an alternate folder than ".wine"), so that you can separate different applications and avoid unwanted interactions between them.
WINEPREFIX="$HOME/.wine-istaria" WINEARCH=win32 wine wineboot
  1. Next add some extra components to the wine prefix using "winetricks"
WINEPREFIX="$HOME/.wine-istaria" winetricks vcrun2005
WINEPREFIX="$HOME/.wine-istaria" winetricks d3dx9_36
WINEPREFIX="$HOME/.wine-istaria" winetricks corefonts

  1. Next run the Istaria installer within the same prefix and allow it to run.

    • The installer will incorrectly detect memory and display a warning - click Yes to continue.
    • Don't download Java
    • Don't install the Windows C++ libraries
WINEPREFIX="$HOME/.wine-istaria" wine $HOME/Downloads/setup.exe

  1. Once the install is complete, Wine will have created an icon for Istaria, but it will try to run inside the "wine" environment, and there is no Java installed for it to use, so you will have an error.... therefore, we need to alter the file.

    Either:-

    Use your favourite editor to edit the file named "~/.local/share/applications/wine/Programs/Istaria/Play Istaria.desktop", and Replace the "Exec=....." line with the following, remembering to replace <USERNAME> with your username.

    Exec=env WINEPREFIX=/home/<USERNAME>/.wine-istaria /usr/lib/jvm/java-8-openjdk-amd64/jre/bin/java -jar launcher2.jar

    Or, you can paste the following block to re-write the whole file from the terminal

cat << EOF > ~/.local/share/applications/wine/Programs/Istaria/Play\ Istaria.desktop
[Desktop Entry]
Name=Play Istaria
Exec=env WINEPREFIX=/home/$(whoami)/.wine-istaria /usr/lib/jvm/java-8-openjdk-amd64/jre/bin/java -jar launcher2.jar
Type=Application
StartupNotify=true
Path=/home/$(whoami)/.wine-istaria/dosdevices/c:/Program Files/Istaria
Icon=F5BC_GameIcon.0
StartupWMClass=jlauncher.exe
EOF
  1. You may need to log out, and log back in for the change to the desktop file to be recognised if the following command does not do the trick, but now run the following.
update-desktop-database ~/.local/share/applications/wine/Programs/Istaria

You should now be able to search for a desktop icon labeled "Play Istaria", pin it to the dock etc. in the normal way. If you just get a small window warning that you need to install Java 1.7.0, then you will need to log out and back in, as the updated .desktop file has not been picked up.

  1. I also suggest creating a symbolic link in your home folder so that the Istaria folder is more readily accessible.
cd
ln -s .wine-istaria/drive_c/Program\ Files/Istaria .

Feedback and updates appreciated.

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