Run Morrowind in true fullscreen.

[leadgolem]

For basic wine setup please see my Wine Basice how-to. You will need direct rendering as well as wine. You will also need the ability to extract .rar archives.

1. Install Morrowind

1A.Insert the Morrowind disk.
1B. Install Morrowind

cd /media/MORROWIND/
wine Setup.exe

Then follow the installer.

I'm going to assume that you installed the game to the default directory.

2. Download the latest official patch.

3. Download the right unofficial patch.

The unofficial patch isn't actually required, however, it improves game stability greatly. It also fixes several hundred game bugs.

4. Install the official patch.

wine $DESKTOP/yourpatchfilenamehere.exe

That'll take a few minutes.

5. Navigate to your morrowind Data Files directory. Usually this is ~/home/leadgolem/.wine/drive_c/Program Files/Bethesda Softworks/Morrowind/Data Files. The period before the wine folder name indicates it is hidden. It should be in your home folder.

6. Move the unofficial patch to the data files directory. Usually it will download to your desktop.

7. Extract the archive in it's present directory. If you end up with a new folder, grab everything in it and drag it into your Data Files directory. Then say replace all. You won't actually remove and replace the folders, you'll just add any new files in them to the folders and replace any files with the same name. If you have trouble extracting a .rar look around in the forum, their are some very good guides.

8. Go up a folder, and open your morrowind.ini with a text editor. Make the following changes.

SkipProgramFlows=1
DontThreadLoad=1

This is not strictly necessary, but it does greatly improve game stability.

9. Set your screen resolution.

9A. Go to Applications/Wine/regedit.
9B. Expand HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINE/Software/Bethesda Softworks/Morrowind/ tree.
9C. Right click Screen Height, select modify.
9D. Click Decimal and enter the Value data with your vertical screen resolution. My screen is 1680x1050 so I set this as 1050.
9E. Click "OK".
9F. Right click Screen Width, select modify.
9G. Click Decimal, then enter your horizontal screen resolution. I set mine at 1680.
9H. Click "OK"
9I. Click Registry/Exit.

10. Setup your wine configuration.

10A. Click your Applications/Wine/Wine Configuration menu item.
10B. Click on the graphics tab, make sure emulate a virtual desktop is NOT checked off.
10C. Click on the applications tab.
10E. Click on add application.
10F. Navigate to your morrowind.exe and click open.
10G. Click on the Morrowind.exe entry . Everything we do in this panel will now apply only to morrowind.
10H. Click the drop down for windows version, and select windows 98.
10I. Then click on the graphics tab.
10J. Use the vertex shader support drop down, and set it to hardware.
10K. Check off, "allow pixel shader support."

10L. Click on the audio tab. These audio settings are what worked best for me.
10M. Check off alsa Driver, make sure EsounD Driver and oss Driver are unchecked.
10N. Set hardware acceleration to emulation, Default sample rate to 44100, Default bits per sample to 16, and make sure driver emulation is NOT checked off.
10O. Click Ok. See screenshot for more information.

11. Add wine registry keys for rendering.

11A. Click your Applications/Wine/regedit menu item.
11B. Open HKEY_CURRENT_USER/Software/Wine/Direct3D, and create the following keys. If you do not have a Direct3D folder click on the Wine folder, then click on edit/new/key. Name the new key Direct3D. See this screenshot if you are confused.

DirectDrawRenederer Value=opengl
OffscreenRenderingMode  Value=fbo
UseGLSL   Value=enabled
VertexShaderMode   Value=hardware
VideoMemorySize   Value=the amount of video ram you have on your card.  (IE "256" for my nvidia 6600)

You can also use fbo for OffscreenRenderingMode if pbuffer doesn't work correctly. RenderTargetLockMode you can play with to see what gives you the best results. Take a look at this for more information.

12. Set your plugins up.

12A. Open a terminal and,

cd "$HOME/.wine/drive_c/Program Files/Bethesda Softworks/Morrowind"
wine "Morrowind Launcher.exe"

12B. Click on Data Files, double click on the unofficial patch and any mods you choose. There should be a little x in front of them now.
12C. Click ok, then click exit.

13. Make a little script to launch morrowind. This step is not essential, but it does make it easier to start Morrowind.

13A. Right click in the folder you want your launch script to be in.
13B. Click Create Document/empty file.
13C. Name that document morrowind.
13D. Double click to open it in a text editor. Paste this into it.

#!/bin/sh
cd "$HOME/.wine/drive_c/Program Files/Bethesda Softworks/Morrowind"
WINEDEBUG=fixme-all wine 'Morrowind Launcher.exe'

13E. Save the file and close the text editor.

14. Set permissions for your script.

15A. Right click on your script and click properties.
14B. Go to the permission tab and check off the "allow executing file as program" box.
14C. Click close.

15. Turn off any desktop effects software you're running. Such as compiz or beryl

16. Double click on your file and click run. Not run in terminal, just run.

17. Have fun playing Morrowind.

FAQ

Q: Why can't I just click play when setting up my plugins?

A: It'll tell you, you don't have the disk in.

Q: The music in Morrowind doesn't play.

A: By default, no it doesn't. Getting it to play requires a bit of a workaround.

1. Install a mp3 codec for windows in wine.
2. Rename the installed .acm mp3 codec file "winemp3.acm". If you install the Fraunhofer mp3 codec it will typically go in ~.wine/drive_c/Program Files/Fraunhofer MP3 Codec Pro.
3. Move the newly named winemp3.acm file to your ~.wine/drive_c/windows/system32

The music in morrowind should now play correctly.

Note 1: When running morrowind with the nvidia driver on a 64bit system you also need to install the appropriate 32bit libraries. This is usually provided by xorg-x11-drv-nvidia-libs.i386 or xorg-x11-drv-nvidia-96xx-libs.i386 etc... This is now required to run Morrowind at all.

Note 2: When adding mods to morrowind under wine, I suggest you add them one at a time. Even a mod that works fine in windows, and doesn't require any extended script functions mwe, mwse, mge, may not work properly in linux under wine. The most common problem is with files being misnamed. IE: File name in .esp file.NIF; Actual file name file.nif

Note 3: As of wine 1.1.14 the minimap and the world map are working correctly. However, if you have loaded a game that has explored map areas prior to the update you will not see the terrain on your world map until you have revisited that area.

Note 4: For those of you experiencing no audio of any kind and are using pulse audio try adding pdasp in front of a generic wine execution command. IE: pdasp wine Morrowind.exe. You do need to set your audio for morrowind to alsa for this to work.

[leadgolem]

A few things I forgot to mention.
A. I am not a wine expert, just a determined amateur. You can TRY posting your problems, I MIGHT be able to help.
B. While your doing step 8, you might also want to change the light setting to

UseLinear=0

UseQuadratic=1
QuadraticMethod=2
QuadraticValue=16.0
QuadraticRadiusMult=3.0

This SOMETIMES increases game performance. I think it looks better too.
C. If you have a lower performance video card, while doing step 17 you might want to click on options and change pixel shading to off.
D. If you are using a laptop the VideoMemorySize value should reflect your dedicated video ram, not what the sticker said the laptop had for video ram. The actual amount of dedicated video ram the manufacturer states for that model. If you have less then 64mb you probably shouldn't be trying to run morrowind on it at all.

[leadgolem]

E. It takes considerably longer to launch morrowind under wine then it does in winblows. Give it several minutes before you even consider killing it.

[Dreadstriker]

Thanks for this guide, it's been immensley helpful in getting morrowind working for me, but I do have one problem. What would you suggest as an outdated mod to use to get the error message? I've been trying some of the oldest mods I can find, but none of them seem to conflict. Any suggestions on a mod to use?

[leadgolem]

Try the real signposts mod. I think that is the one I'm using that causes the error. Here is a full list of the mods I'm running, in case that isn't the one.

adamantiumarmor, Lights_300_V4, Area Effect Arrows, Lilypads11, Ash_Grasses_10,
Barnacles10, moons_soulgems, Better Bodies, Better Heads, Bones11, Morrowind Patch v1.2.2, Cobwebs3.4, PeasantGownsReplacer, EBQ_Artifact, RealSignposts, entertainers, Siege at Firemoth, EW_Glass_Shortsword, ferns_10_unscripted, Swamp_Scums_20_unscripted, Grasses_unscripted_10, Twilight_Flight_1.0,and LeFemmArmor.

The area effect arrows mod I'm using isn't the official one, it's the one included in the particle arrows replacer mod.

Incidentally, the particle arrows replacer mod requires bloodmoon and tribunal, but the area effect arrows esp with that mod does not.

[leadgolem]

I just figured out how to get TESDTK to actually work in linux. First, download the zip file, you can get it from this site. Extract the zip file, then in a terminal cd to the TESDTK folder. Run

unzip TESDTK.exe

That will get the files out of the "self extracting exe."
Note: This is actually a java app, it's just in the .exe
Then select deptools, META-INF, package cache, and manifest.txt. Right click and add them to an archive that is a .jar type. Run with

java -jar TESDTK.jar

Or, whatever you named the .jar file. You do get a few errors, but the program does work.
Note: I'm using suns java 1.6 for all my local stuff, as well as for my web plugin.
Now you can update .esp version numbers, or remove dependencies.

[Dreadstriker]

Ended up going with some outdated npc vendor that gave me a nice error, but no gameplay effects. A couple more questions though. First off, how can I disable the minimap in the lower right since it won't display anything? I can't find the console command to get rid of it. Also, any more optomization tips? When I'm inside it runs fine, but the second I go outside my performance dies. Changed the exteriorcell buffer down, and the draw distance is already at its minimum.

[leadgolem]

If you haven't already, open the launcher and change pixel shading to off. Also, make sure Show FPS=0 and try changing Max FPS=30 in the morrowind.ini. When you launch morrowind try using this command.

WINEDEBUG=fixme-all,err-all,warn-all,trace-all wine AutoRunMorrowind.exe

That will suppress any actual wine errors, they can decrease your performance a lot. Not generally a great idea when you are trying to get it running, but useful afterwards.

[leadgolem]

If you are talking about the small map in the bottom right corner, I don't know of any way to disable that. If your talking about the larger map that opens with your inventory, just click the top right corner. If your in balmora, expect an fps hit. It is almost the worst area in the game, fps wise.

If you want to know why I'm using better bodies, better heads, and particle arrows, take a look at this.

[leadgolem]

Just in case you skipped over it, make sure any desktop effects are disabled before playing. Wine converts directx calls into opengl calls. Desktop effects software use opengl to create the effects. So, if they are active while your trying to play, it is like trying to play 2 3d games at once.

[Dreadstriker]

Ah! That did it, I skipped over the step about turning off pixel shading by accident. After turning that off it cleared up wonderfully. I also increased the exteriorcell buffer to get rid of the frequent area loadings I got. Thanks for all your help in getting this running!

[leadgolem]

Yeah, the area loading is somewhat irritating. If you change the option in your morrowind.ini to load the cells as you approach though, after about 9 exterior cells morrowind will crash.

[M. del Carpio]

Oh, leadgolem, I'm following your fantastic instructions, and have hit a snag with Step 16: I have no Direct3D directory under Wine in my regedit. I only have:

• + AppDefaults
• Debug
• DirectSound
• Drivers
• + Fonts
• MSHTML
• Temporary System Parameters

Now, I've just installed DirectX from my Morrowind CD, after having set Wine's default windows version to win98, and logged out and back in, but the entry still isn't there. I hope I haven't taken a wrong turning here. Of course, under .../Wine/AppDefaults/Morrowind.exe there is a Direct3D entry, but you couldn't mean that, could you? Would you mind pointing me in the right direction, please?

Oh, and just to reiterate: at the end of Step 15, do you mean the Driver Emulation box to be checked? I presume you do, but the instruction is a little puzzling.

Thank you very kindly.

[leadgolem]

You actually need to create the direct3d folder. Sorry, I'll add that to the instructions. In step 15, the driver emulation box should not be checked. If it is, morrowind usually crashes immediately on launch.

Unfortunately, you have taken a bit of a wrong turn. You should never install directx in wine. So, go ahead and remove that. You will need one directx .dll file, I just cant remember which one. If you launch morrowind from the command line it should tell you in the terminal output. If you do a web search you should be able to grab the .dll file, by itself, from the internet. That file then goes in your, ".wine/drive_c/windows/system32" folder.

[M. del Carpio]

Oh, fart. Okay, cheers. I can't find how to uninstall directx, but there is an empty directory under "c:\Program Files\" called "directx" (empty, besides another empty directory within it called "setup"), which I'll delete, and hope for the best. I found that to remove it properly I should delete the "HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINE\Software\Microsoft\DirectX " and upon restart (which won't happen), the default directx will be reinstalled, but the key seems to be the same as it was before I installed this version, and it seems (to me) that nothing was actually installed. I have actually got one .dll file, called "MSVCP60.DLL". I found that instruction on Wine's AppDB, and the page I downloaded it from told me to put it in "C:\Windows\System", so I've done that.

I'll just carry on, though, following your wonderful instructions, and hopefully it'll all work out okay. If not, I'll remove Wine completely, and start again properly.

Thank you very kindly!