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Lord Of The Rings: Return Of The King Guide

Discussion in 'Guides' started by booman, Oct 17, 2014.

  • by booman, Oct 17, 2014 at 1:35 PM
  • booman

    booman Grand High Exalted Mystic Emperor of Linux Gaming Staff Member

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    Lord of the Rings: Return of the King is a hack-n-slash game where you re-live the movie and can play as each of the main characters. The game plays in third person as you pick off minions and bosses from the movies. Execute combos, special moves and level up to purchase new abilities.

    lotr81.png

    lotr94.png

    Follow my step-by-step guide on installing, configuring and optimizing Lord of the Rings: Return of the King in Linux with PlayOnLinux.

    Note: This guide applies to the Retail version of Lord of the Rings: Return of the King. Other versions may require additional steps.

    Tips & Specs:

    To learn more about PlayOnLinux and Wine configuration, see the online manual: PlayOnLinux Explained

    Mint 17 64-bit
    PlayOnLinux: 4.2.5
    Wine: 1.6.2

    Wine Installation

    Click Tools
    Select "Manage Wine Versions"
    wine01.png

    Look for the Wine Version: 1.6.2
    Note: Try using stable Wine 1.8 and 1.8-staging

    Select it
    Click the arrow pointing to the right
    wine02.png

    Click Next

    Downloading Wine
    wine04.png

    Extracting

    Downloading Gecko
    wine05.png

    Installed
    wine06.png

    Wine 1.6.2 is installed and you can close this window

    Copy CD ROM Data

    Create a folder on your desktop
    Enter Install Disk
    Copy all of the files to your folder
    lotr04.png

    Click "Skip" on any Replace file warnings
    lotr02.png

    Enter the next CD ROM and do the same thing
    The play Disk is the last one

    PlayOnLinux Setup

    Launch PlayOnLinux
    Click Install
    lotr05.png

    Click "Install a non-listed program"
    lotr06.png

    Click Next

    Select "Install a program in a new virtual drive"
    Click Next
    lotr08.png

    Name your virtual drive: returntotheking
    Click Next
    lotr09.png

    Check all three options:
    • Use another version of Wine
    • Configure Wine
    • Install some libraries

    Click Next
    lotr10.png

    Select Wine 1.6.2
    lotr11.png

    Select "32 bits windows installation"
    Click Next
    lotr12.png

    Wine Configuration

    Application Tab
    Windows version: windows 7
    Click Apply
    lotr13.png

    Graphics Tab
    Check "Automatically capture the mouse in full-screen windows"
    Check "Emulate a virtual desktop"
    Desktop size: 1024x768
    lotr14.png

    Installing Packages (Libraries, Components, DLL's)

    Check the following:
    • POL_Install_corefonts
    • POL_Install_d3dx9
    • POL_Install_tahoma

    Note: All libraries will automatically download and install

    Click Next
    lotr15.png

    At this point PlayOnLinux refuses to install the Game
    Click Cancel
    lotr16.png

    PlayOnLinux Configure

    Click Configure
    Select virtual drive: returntotheking
    lotr28.png

    General Tab
    Wine Version: 1.6.2
    Note: Click the + to download another version of Wine. Click the down-arrow to select another version of Wine.
    lotr29.png

    Display Tab
    Video memory size: Enter the amount of memory your video card/chip uses
    lotr30.png

    Installing Lord Of the Rings Return To The King

    Miscellanous Tab
    Click "Run a exe file in this virtual drive"
    lotr31.png

    Navigate to the folder on your desktop
    Select AutoRun.exe or Setup.exe
    Click Open
    lotr17.png

    Click Install
    lotr18.png

    Click Yes
    lotr19.png

    Enter the key off the Game insert
    lotr20.png

    Click Next
    lotr21.png

    Click "Register Later"
    lotr22.png

    Installing...
    lotr23.png

    Insert the Play Disc
    Click OK
    lotr24.png


    PlayOnLinux Shortcut

    Back to General Tab
    Click "Make a new shortcut from this virtual drive"
    lotr29.png

    Select ROTK.exe
    Click Next
    lotr25.png

    Name your shortcut: LOTR Return of the King
    Click Next
    lotr26.png

    Click Next

    Close Configure

    Launch Lord Of The Rings Return To The King

    Select LOTR Return of the King
    Click Run
    Note: Click Debug to see errors and bugs
    lotr32.png

    Optimization

    When the game begins you will see some movie clips, then it automatically begins playing.
    You can press ESC to see options or wait until you get to the Home screen

    Click Options
    lotr33.png

    Click Video
    Set Resolution
    Note: LOTR only accepts 3:4 aspect ratios, so you will need to change your Linux desktop to a resolution on this list

    Adjust:
    • 32 bit color
    • Character Detail
    • Shadows
    • SFX
    • Alternate Cameras
    lotr34.png

    Rule of thumb:
    Higher settings = More detail, lower frame rates
    Lower settings = Less detail, higher frame rates

    Conclusion:
    Once I set my Linux Desktop to 1400x1050 the game would appear fullscreen. There is no widescreen support. The Shadows setting would default to Low unless I set it in the ROTK.ini
    You can find it in your home folder.
    Otherwise, the game ran perfectly and is suitable for laptops and older computers. The controls are kinda strange due to the way the in-game camera floats around. I also tested with a joystick and was able to play cooperative perfectly.

    Gameplay Video:


    Screenshots:
    lotr95.png

    lotr93.png

    lotr92.png

    lotr91.png

    lotr89.png

    lotr88.png

    lotr86.png

    lotr84.png

    lotr80.png
    Last edited: Jan 13, 2016
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Comments

Discussion in 'Guides' started by booman, Oct 17, 2014.

  1. mrdeathjr28
    Very good old title, good guide works for most users want used, normally guides for older titles is uncommon

    :)
  2. booman
    Exactly! I have a bunch of old games, but I know most gamers want to play new games. So I try to mix it up and do a bit of both.
    I was surprised how cool this game was. There are no patches or mods that I can find, so you will be stuck with 4:3 ratios with the resolution.
    But the controller support in Linux is great and I was able to play cooperative.
  3. slipq
    hi, im aware this may be old, but i really need an answer. i did everything stated in this article, however, whenever i get to the "please insert play disc" part, i cannot get wine to read the disk. mint itself reads the disc, but wine will not. when i go into the wine config, under drives, my "D:" is the disc drive. it shows the disc within that drive, but no dice.

    in the terminal, i have tried:

    1) wine eject
    2) wine eject -a
    3) wine "path/to/your/drive/and/setup.exe" (of course not word for word that)
    4) exiting wine, reseating the CD, and trying again

    nothing has worked so far. so if you could get back to me asap, i would be very appreciative. thank you in advance!

    also, does this absolutely have to be done with wine? i'm not all too familiar with distros, but in the event that mint has bugs reading things pertaining to wine correctly, could i try to use something like fedora, or ubunutu?
  4. booman
    HI slipq, welcome to the forum!

    This problem is very common, in fact I normally copy all of the disk data to a folder on the Desktop and install from there. This could probably help with Wine not recognizing the drive.

    You can also go to PlayOnLinux Configure, Wine Tab, Wine Configuration. In there you will find a Drives tab. You can map the optical drive to any folder you want. Maybe it just needs to be mapped to drive D:?
    mrdeathjr28 likes this.
  5. nemethmiki
    I did everything as you have writed. I have the game in 3 image file and when i have to insert the 2. one i opened playonlinux configuration / miscellaneous / Run a *.exe file in this virtual drive and i choosed RunGame.exe of the second disc. Then i went back to the window "insert the second disc" and pressed ok, but nothing happend. What should i do?
  6. booman
    I had problems installing the game as well. Try using "AutoRun.exe" instead of "RunGame.exe"
    Also make sure to copy all of data from both disks in to a folder on your desktop. This way it shouldn't ask for a second disc. It should just continue installing the game.
    Let me know if this doesn't work, and I'll search for my discs and try installing it again.
  7. nemethmiki
    When i mounted the first disc i used autorun.exe.

    When you write "copy all ... to a folder" you mean all of the data should be copied into the same folder, or the content of disc 1 should be in folder 1, disc 2 in folder 2, disc 3 in folder 3 on my desktop? I mean the point is that the content of the disks have to be not on disk or in image file but simply on the computer or they have in the same folder?

    THX!
  8. booman
    Normally if I have a game with multiple discs, I will copy all of the contents from each disc into a single folder. You might get some over-write warnings, so normally I will click "skip" for duplicate files.
    This works most of the time. Most multi-disc games have a data file or cab file with all the data, then they split them up into:
    • data1.cab
    • data2.cab
    • data3.cab
    so all of the game data can fit on mutiple discs. Its hard to know which file to copy, so I just copy all of disc1 into the folder, then disc2 into the folder and so on.

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