WINE & Slackware

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Preamble

Installing and Configuring WINE
I personally prefer to run programs that are native to Linux, but sometimes it just isn't available, or what is written for Windows just works better. Below are some of those instances.
The latest version of Wine (1.2) builds and installs quite easily in Slackware 13.1, using the XFCE 4.1 window manager. Just unarchive the source code, and run /tools/wineinstall
cd ./wine-1.2/tools
./wineinstall

If you want access to your optical drive, you will have to allow all users access to it, and you'll need a mount point for it. My optical drive shows up as device
/dev/sr0
and I mount it at
/DVDROM

so, as root
chmod 666 /dev/sr0
mkdir /DVDROM
chmod 777 /DVDROM

Now, as a normal user, run
winecfg
and it wil have already set itself to emulate WinXP as the default.
At this point, it should create a C: drive on   ~/.wine/drive_c   in your user home partition.
From within the popup window, select the "Drives" tab, and "Add..." another drive. It should present the next letter, in my case,  D: , click OK, and define the path to the drive as
/DVDROM

Purity
After having experimented fairly extensively with many games, using previous versions of Wine, and making the usual MS mess in system32, it sometimes is helpful to be able to uninstall and reinstall. Generally, you can simply delete your user's .wine partition, rerun winecfg , and start all over. If you think you might want to uninstall Wine completely, some day, and you've compiled it from source with the wineinstall script, just keep the unarchived-and-compiled source code tucked away some where. When you want to remove Wine, cd into the directory and run
make uninstall
and that will remove Wine from the system entirely.

Another thought on purity - while rooting through old software, using earlier versions of Wine, I had found a CD distribution of MSN and IE5.0. I had encountered difficulty finishing an install of CMR3 & CMR2005 because I lacked Windows Media Player 5.2 or better, so I thought I'd really scored when I dug up this disc!
I ran the setup.exe, virtually nothing happened... I removed the CD, started with my "proven" game installations, and had ALL kinds of trouble. Deleted the .wine directory, and started over. This time it all went smooth.
For the sake of consistency, I suggest keeping your Wine installation as pure as possible (no MS stuff). If you're having trouble with some particular piece of software, check out winetricks.


Game CDROMs
On a side note, you are probably finding that these older games are becoming a little more precious, as time goes on. They seem to be getting harder and harder to come by. So rather than mount and use the CDROM directly, I now simply rip an ISO image on my hard drive and mount that (if the game needs it). Use   dd   to rip the CD image from an unmounted optical drive, then mount through the loopback device.
<place disc in drive>
su
<enter password>
dd   if=/dev/sr0   of=./DISC_IMAGE.iso
mount   -o loop /place/where/image/is/DISC_IMAGE.iso   /VirtualCDROM
exit

Now when you start your game, it'll use the image off the hard drive and never know the difference. Unmount it just like a normal CD/DVD
umount   /VirtualCDOM

I've found that for some games, if I want to use ISO images on a Virtual mountpoint, that I have to install the game from ISO as well - installing from CD, then trying to play from ISO doesn't always work. It may be nothing more than a quirk of my setup that I don't understand, though.

Alternately, I see there is a company called "Great Old Games" which has been recompiling old Win games to make them compatible with newer versions of Windows, selling them as way cheap downloads. In the Winehq app database, it looks like a lot of them  run fairly well under Wine with WinXP emulation.

Uninstalling
A handy little piece of code: If an application installation works, but the software doesn't run, uninstall it with Wine's built-in uninstaller
wine  uninstaller

Problems During Installation?
Sometimes, an install won't go quite as planned, and you have to back out and try something else. If the attempt doesn't run smoothly, before restarting, give the system a few seconds to work things out on its own, then make sure that all the Wine-related processes are dead. Do a
ps -A
just to see if any instances of   wine-preloader   or   wine-server  are still in motion.
Generally, if you   killall -15 wine-preloader   , then wine-server will go down in a moment as well.
Obviously, if you are running more than one app under Wine, that command will kill it also.





Alternative : Virtualized Operating Systems (qemu)

I've been messing around a bit with qemu, it's pretty neat stuff.
I haven't been able to get Win95A to install, yet, so a lot of the games I am interested in are still dependent on Wine, but WinXP Pro installed effortlessly, and it seems quite stable. The only game I've installed, so far, is "Sid Meier's Alpha Centauri", which I've had a few lockups on. Ironically enough, when I set the game, in Windows, to run in "Win NT 4.0 compatability mode", it played a little nicer,. But, it still locks hard enough that I have to SSH in from another system to kill it off. Linux emulating WindowsXP emulating Window NT4.0 , running a simluation game -grin-. Pretty cool.
I invoke qemu to emulate the cirrus video card , the es1370 audio card, and the ne2k_pci NIC; the OS was able to use it's built-in drivers.


If I am able to get Win95/98A down, I'll update here, but my understanding is that there is a CPU speed limitation of 300MHz on "natural" Win95A, and an update which raises the bar to 2.1GHz. That is one problem. I think there may be an issue with the choice of emulated video cards as well, or perhaps the emaulted monitor. Whatever the case, I can only get as far as rebooting into "Starting Windows 95 for the first time..." and then a blank, locked screen. So, for now at least, Win95 is off the menu.







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Audio Video Software



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General DVD / blu ray / HD DVD conversion under Wine
(For Slackware 13.1 and Wine v1.2)

I'm not going into too much detail here, there are plenty of sites available to you to learn the ins and outs of converting your optical media into something a little more convenient for your home networked media system.
These are my latest notes to myself on converting my movies.
Perhaps they can help you get past some quirk or difficulty you're having.
The basic gist of this is that I cut my teeth on audio-video encoding in Windows, and the software seems to work so well under Wine 1.2 in Slackware 13.1, that I just haven't bothered learning how to do it with native Linux replacements.
The goal with all my rips is to end up with x264 and AC3 streams, muxed in either a matroska or m2ts container.
The  applications that work for me are :
DVD-Decrypter (3.5.4.0) (possibly, DVDFab is a better choice these days?)
eac3to (322 AOTW)
AviSynth (2.5.8 AOTW)
VirtualDub (1.9.9 AOTW)
x264vfw (24_1666bm_24064 AOTW)
DGIndex package (in AutoMKV archive)
DGAVCIndex package (in AutoMKV archive)
SubRip
SRTtoSSA.zip (converter is called "Conversor")
mkvtoolnix
tsMuxerGUI
IMGburn
also
AnyDVD-HD
I have not tried AnyDVD-HD under Wine yet, as the BD-ROM drive is in a WinXP box, and I've read conflicting reports - that it both works and doesn't. You'll need AnyDVD-HD if you plan on converting anything HiDef, and a handful of DVDs - it's worth every penny.

I have tried both under WinXPPro in qemu, but I can't get them to properly access the optical drives,yet, getting a disc I/O error.



AutoMKV 0.98.4

Automkv is a seriously nice piece of software for those of us who back up our optical hardcopy with digital encoding. Getting it to run under Wine 1.2 in Slackware 13.1 is fairly trivial, but I only really use it to encode DVDs, prefer to do my hi-def stuff manually. I tend to think of it as a VOB-to-MKV converter.
Download the latest release, and all the dependent program/files.
As of this writing, the latest package is 0.98.3 with an executable of  0.98.4. I don't believe it is maintained any longer, the developer has moved on to HDConvertToX, which doesn't run in Wine.

All of the files from the above linked page are fine, as of this writing. At one point or another, with previous versions of Wine, I ended up acquiring and installing a very recent (2009) release of ffdshow, and it broke the setup.
These days, I use ffdshow_beta3_rev1324_20070701_clsid.exe which has worked well in the past, and seems to work now. Otherwise, the latest versions of all the other dependent software seem to function properly.
So, download each of the dependent programs / files, and install them all. You will have to unrar (unarchive, make -f makefile.unix, cp the binary into /usr/bin) the main Automkv.rar into a directory of your own making, and move the latest Automkv executable into it.
Install the other software :
wine  Avisynth_258.exe
etc
etc

Once you've installed each of the programs, fire up winecfg
winecfg
and configure DVD Decrypter to run under WinNT4.0 emulation.
Mount a DVD in your DVD drive, then in a console , move into the DVD Decrypter directory and fire it up
wine  DVD\ Decrypter.exe

No, don't have it check for newer versions (development stopped a long time ago), set DVD Decrypter up for IFO mode, set semi-automatic file generation, and then set VOB splitting to "None".
Rip your DVD to hard disc.
Now move into the Automkv directory and fire it up
wine   autoMKV0984.exe
There will be a couple of prompts happening, the first time you run.
Yes, run VirtualDubmod (then shut it down immediately), yes download the Nero codecs, yes copy the lib-file it inquires about.

From now on, when you start it, it will go straight to the main menu.
So, the main menu will pop up, you set the software up as you like, and browse to the directory holding the VOB file that DVD Decrypter created, select the VOB.
 My habit is to run Automkv from one console, and have a second console running "top", just to make sure that everything is actually turning. Using x264 encoding, I regularly see over 700% CPU usage on my Corei7, all the SSE4x instructions acknowledged - it's pretty sweet.
On very rare occassions, an encode will fail. The dreaded "No CRF found" error comes up. Generally, once you see this error, you have to encode manually, unless there is some trick I am unaware of yet. Additionally, if you set your final file size too small, the resize routine will just loop infintely, and you'll have to kill it off and do the encode manually, or run AutoMKV again, with a larger final file size.



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Games


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Colin McRae Rally Series by Codemaster
(For Slackware 13.1 and Wine v1.2)

I got all my instructions from this fella's website.

Colin McRae Rally 2.0 appears to run pretty well, there are a couple of things to do. I installed in WinXP emulation, then ran winecfg and set the exectuable to emulate Win98. I also set the graphics to emulate a 1024x768 desktop, as the game likes to start in fullscreen mode at 640x480, and you cannot shut the intro movies down because the game doesn't respond to the keyboard, during their playback at the beginning. Setting a Virtual Desktop will keep everything in a window.
The first time around, I just let the intro video run its course, then set the game up as I prefer, and ran the "arcade" mode for a few laps. I tried setting the graphics to 32-bit mode, but it locked up - I think 16 bits is the only real choice. Audio seems fine, I didn't try networking at all.
If you don't want to endure the full intro movies every time you start, descend into the game's directory
/Frontend/Videos/
and change things. The previously linked page suggests deleting them & replacing them with a NULL file, but that doesn't work for me. He does archive  a 1-second .bik file, though, which you can just copy into the  directory as cm.bik and intro.bik

mv  intro.bik  intro.bik.original
mv  cm.bik  cm.bik.original
cp  black.bik  intro.bik
cp  black.bik  cm.bik


That's it. I only ran a few time trial laps in arcade mode, so I can't comment on long-term stability, but it appears to work well.







(older archive of previous tries)

Colin McRae Rally Series by Codemaster
(For Slackware 11.0 and Wine v0.927)

CMR1 : Full=?, demo=?
CMR2 : Full=No, demo=No
CMR3 : Full=?, demo=No
CMR4 Full= ?, demo=YES
CMR 2005 Full=No, demo=No

Damn I like the Colin McRae Rally games!
CMR2.0 is the reason I bought a used PSOne. CMR3 is the reason I bought a PS2. I've even got it for my GBA. And if it was available for my GP2X, I'd own it there as well.
Linux ,and the Open Source movement in general, is making great headway in the gaming department, but we still lack a really good racing game, in my opinion; something slick-looking with excellent physics.
For my Windows box, I've got CMR2.0, and CMR2005. Unfortunately, I can play neither under WINE. CMR2 installs, but won't start. CMR2005 seems to install, but finishes with something like "..this game requires Windows Media Player 5.2 or better, please install 6.4 and rerun this setup...". And all attempts at installing WMP (even the successful ones) have yielded the same popup when trying reinstall CMR2005. When you try to run what HAS installed, it fails with some cryptic hex code.
So I thought I'd try the demos.
CMR2 installs but won't start, CMR3, CMR4, and CMR2005 demos all claim to need WMP5.2 or greater,
 but the single player demo for CMR4 still plays
 even after complaining about WMP.
I installed using WinXP emulation. When I ran the game, it started in 640x480 resolution, and a big chunk of the bottom left of the screen is covered by what I think is supposed to be a map. The sound has breaks / stutters (kinda funny to hear the codriver say "...and left fifty fifty fifty... and").
You can enter the menu for changing the configuration, I set my video to 1024x768 - this caused the "desktop" to go to 1024x768, but the screen resolution stayed the same. I hit <esc> a few times, which brought me back to the main menu (judging by the corner of the screen that was visible to me). I exited the demo by alt-tabbing to the console and ctrl-c the process, then     killall -15 wine-preloader   to make sure WINE was dead.
Restarted, and all was good with the video. I changed emulation to Win98, which seemed to play a little cleaner (?) but didn't shut down smoothly. Changing emulation to WinNT3.5 seems to retain the faster 3D rendering, and it exits cleanly. I still haven't figured out how to clean up the sound, although using the switches -NO3DSOUND -NOHARDWARESOUND seem to help a bit (see the readme.txt in the installation directory). Am considering snagging a full retail copy of CMR4 (IIRC it wasn't released in North America), when I get it in my hot little hands hopefully it will play as nice as its demo. So, to run the demo
cd   ~/.wine/drive_c/Program\ Files/Codemasters/Colin\ McRae\ Rally\ 04\ Demo/
wine   ./cmr4.exe  -NO3DSOUND -NOHARDWARESOUND



Open Source alternative : ??? Let me know
Or better yet, how about a real Linux release Codemasters?
Maybe TopWare will come around with a Linux version of XpanRally and the ChromEd editor. That'd rock!


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Daytona USA by SEGA Sports
(For Slackware 11.0 and Wine v0.927)

This game installed and plays fairly easily for me. The trick is to installing is to run the setup executable from within the cdrom drive's directory. So, if you've got the CD mounted on   /cdrom  , descend into that directory and run
cd /cdrom
wine  ./ssp.exe

Make sure you've run   winecfg   and are emulating Win95, it doesn't like any of the NT variants. Start the game by moving into the installation directory and running it
cd   ~/.wine/drive_c/SEGA/DAYTONA/
wine  DAYTONA.EXE

use left&right arrows to steer, "x" to accelerate, alt-F4 to exit. This game is pretty old, I think it was originally an arcade game, its hook was being able to link four players together.



Open Source alternative : ??? Let me know


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Deadlock Planetary Conquest by Accolade
(For Slackware 11.0 and Wine v0.927)

There is no easy way to do this, but it seems to work. You'll need a windows box with a CD burner. Sorry <shrug>, I just can't get around that.
You probably can't get this game to install. It craps out with something like
"...Unable to find D:\SETUP.INS..."
For some reason, when the game disc is mounted under Linux, you can only see certain files. If you stick the same CD into a Windows CDROM drive though, then open Windows Explorer, you'll see a bunch of additional files.
This is not something I fully understand, yet, but here's the workaround.
On a Windows box, make a temporary directory, stick the CDROM into the drive, use Windows Explorer to browse to the CDROM drive. Make sure you are able to see all hidden files.
Use   ctrl-A  (or    menu->select->all  ) to select everything, then copy it into the temporary directory (it's about 552M).
When it's done, burn a new data CD of the temp directory, making sure that the structure looks like the original CD's structure (that is, don't just drag'n'drop the temp directory, descend into it and ctrl-A the contents you copied; use them on the root of the to-be-burned disc).
When prompted, name the disc  DEADLOCK.

When it's done, you can mount it in your Linux CDROM drive and run    SETUP.EXE   with wine emulation from its root directory. Make sure WINE is currently emulating Win95, it should install without a hiccup now.

There is a patch
 I had to switch emulation to WinNT3.5 (run    winecfg   )  before it would unarchive properly. You can either unarchive directly in the Deadlock directory, or do it in a temporary directory and copy them into the Deadlock directory. It will also unarchive it in   DOSbox   , if you run into difficulty.


At this point, if you try and run the game in Win95 emulation, it plays the Accolade splash and intro movie, but when it comes time to enter the main play menu, it hangs at the pretty planet picture. It creates a files called   DEBUG.TXT   in the directory from which you've started the game; it appears mine is hanging on an attempt to   LoadWail   .
The workaround for this is run the game under WinNT3.5 emulation. If you aren't still doing so after patching, run   winecfg   , and set emulation up for WinNT 3.5.
Make sure, like all WINE apps (it seems), you start the game from within the directory it is installed. For me, it is in the default directory
cd   ~/.wine/drive_c/Program\ Files/Accolade/Deadlock/
wine   ./DEADLOCK.EXE

Run the game again, and this time when you click through the introduction screens, it will present you with the Main Menu splash!
This workaround seems to kill the background music, but sound effects and A/V animations all seem to work. It can't hurt to disable background music, from the preferences menu, just to reduce the probability of a crash. I've only run the game long enough to try a few menu items, and basic movement, but it seems to be off and running.


Note that you can configure WINE to run specific applications using different emulations. I have WINE configured globally for Win95, but specified WinNT3.5 emulation for DEADLOCK.EXE . It's pretty easy to do. When you first run   winecfg   , it should start you in the "applications" tab. Click the "Add an application" button, browse into your installation of DEADLOCK.EXE,  select the excutable, then select WinNT3.5 from the drop-down menu near the bottom. Click apply, and all is hunky-dory. Now click the "defaults" selection in the window, put it back to whatever you usually use.


Open Source alternative : ??? Let me know

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Expendable (full version)
(For Slackware 13.1 and Wine v1.2)

It appears this game is running pretty well, nowadays. Basically, all you have to do is mount the installation CD and run the SETUP.EXE. I only had one hiccup, and that was when the game started automatically after installing. The intro video didn't play properly, and the game was not rendering properly (the screen appeared to be cut in half). I simply hit -escape- a couple of times to back out, then restarted the game, and immediately went into the configuration screen, set the resolution to 1024x768x32bits, everything went fine after that. The game seemed completely playable, and the only other issue I had was quitting. I had started the game from a console (as is my habit), and it looks like the game won't terminate cleanly. The graphics and sound all shut down, but some element stays alive. ctrl-c in the console kills it off, though, and you're ready for the next game.
I installed and played this game under WinXP emulation


Open Source alternative : ??? Let me know

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Lords of the Realm II by SIERRA
(For Slackware 13.1 and Wine v1.2)

Exit the game, my Lord?

I bought the (way cheap) recompiled-for-XP version from GOG, it just installed and worked under Wine 1.2 with WinXP emulation. No problems whatsoever. It was, like $3 or something. Save yoruself the hassle of working with the old CD, you buy it and download it in minutes. Note that, LOTR 1 did not play nicely, just 2.


For older version of Wine and Slackware , here's the old blurb on what I had to do (with the original CD):

I've also been able to get this game running in DOSbox, but WINE seems to be a much smoother experience.
Run    winecfg    first, and set it it emulate Windows 95, then run the    setup.exe    file from the CDROM.
When the installation went to test my system, it failed quite badly. Couldn't test the CDROM speed properly. It also complained about the lack of a 256-colour desktop (I'm 24/32 bits). You have the option to bypass the test altogether, though, so you can just just blow past it and let it install itself as is. A small problem arises when doing that, because it has to create a file   SIERRA.INI  which it places in the   windows  directory of your virtual C drive.
My experience with this install step is that I can test everything except the CDROM speed and the OS/CPU type. You can create an INI with a text editor, and save it as   ~/.wine/drive_c/windows/SIERRA.INI. Using, say, kedit, if you edit thus:



it should be enough to allow you to test the other things (it will still show your CPU as untested. Don't sweat it).
That should do it. For some reason, to run the game with wine emulation I have to be right inside the Lords2 directory.
<open a console>
<insert the CD and mount>
su
<enter password>
mount   /dev/cdrom  /cdrom
exit
<create and save SIERRA.INI if necessary>
cd   ~/.wine/drive_c/
wine  /cdrom/setup.exe
<The SIERRA Install Popup will present itself. Install without testing>
<there will be a number of error popups, just click OK>
<when prompted, you do not want to register>
<when prompted, you do not want to install DirectX3>
<exit from installation when complete>
cd   ~/.wine/drive_c/SIERRA/Lords2/
wine  ./LORDS2.EXE

I haven't had a chance to really induldge in the game yet, and ATM background music does not play under 2.6x. There is some issue with MIDI and Linux that I am not addressing.
If you want to write a start script and associate an icon with it, there is a bitmap on the root of the CDROM called l2.BMP. Open it with a graphics program (The GIMP, KIconEdit, etc) and save it as a   .png   file. You can use it as an icon now.
There is a patch , but it is only for dealing with a conflict that arose with Internet Explorer v3.01+, way back when.
I was unable to run the patch in WINE, but it (si_lotr2_update_103.exe) is simply a self-extracting zipfile, with another self-extracting zipfile (l2winfix.exe) within. I don't know how to apply them, I don't use IE3.01.

LOTR2 Siege Pack

Lords of the the Realm II also had an expansion pack, called the Siege Pack. It installs in much the same manner as the game, use WINE in Win95 emulation to run   setup.exe  , and again "install without testing" the computer. I encountered a small issue with the file transfer after setup began; it (unbeknownst to me) presented a popup behind the progress bar. If the progress bar hangs  at 0%, and you're wondering "...WTF...?", just grab the window behind it and drag it into view. It asks about overwriting files, click yes, and let it run its course. If you want to run the Siege Pack expansions, rather than play a standard game, make sure the Siege Pack, not the game, CD is mounted in the CDROM drive.
There are two patches for the Siege Pack.
They work with WINE, just run them. They forewarn you about using the right directory, but when the window pops up it presents the correct path, no matter where you've started from.


Open Source alternative : ??? Let me know



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Master Rallye by Steel Monkeys
(For Slackware 13.1 and Wine v1.2)

Master Rallye does a pretty good job of giving the race experience. In Wine, it is not without its flaws though. I cannot get the music to play, which is too bad really, there is some good jazzish tunage the soundtrack (descend into the install directory and take a listen - they are in MP3 format). Also, traversing the menus (in cup and challenge mode) can be very slow - slow enough, that you wonder if the game has hung - it hasn't. This was a problem with the game, even under windows. The trick in Wine is to start the game from a terminal, then when you go to navigate the menu and it hangs, alt-tab, pause, alt-tab back. That will push you through the menu.The 3D video side of the action is fine though, it renders in 3D well and the physics are just as the if you were playing on your Win98 machine.
Installation is easy enough, I did it under XP emulation, the game itself seems to run better in Win98 emulation (config both StartMR.exe and MRallye.exe for Win98). Open a console, mount the CD, and run the installer with WINE.
<open a console>
<insert CD>
su
<enter password>
mount   /dev/sr0   /DVDROM
exit
wine  /DVDROM/Setup.exe

Let the installer do its thing, eventually it will prompt you about instally DirectX 8. You don't want that, Wine has its own DirectX code built in. Finish the installation, use winecfg  to set StartMR.exe and MRallye.exe to Win98 emulation (it will work in XP, but not quite as well), descend into the MR directory, and start the game with
cd ~/.wine/drive_c/Program\ Files/Microids/Master\ Rallye/
wine ./StartMR.exe


The game is also really picky about the screen resolution. I could only play in 640x480. If you are emulating Win95/98, in the past, it had really really really wanted 16 bits before it would let me play, and video configuration only allows a choice of only 8 or 16 bits depth. If you try and start in 24/32 bits, it said something about needing "...16 bits or more to play...". Run emulating   WintNT4.0/XP   the first time, if you are starting from 24/32 bits, then switch to Win98 emulation (make sure xorg.conf supports 16 bits colour depth).


Open Source alternative : ??? Let me know

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Richard Burns Rally Demo by SCi Games
(For Slackware 11.0 and Wine v0.927)

I don't own a full version this game, RBR is OK, but it doesn't feel as "real" as Colin McRae Rally 3 <shrug>. Unfortunately, I can't get any of my  full retail CMR versions to play in WINE, so I gave Richard Burns Rally demo a run.
I emulate WinNT3.5 for the installation and playing. I tried running under Win98 emulation, but the audio stutters.
It installs easily, if you try to play immediately, it starts in 640x480 mode, and the menu fonts aren't rendered properly. You can negotiate with the arrow keys, but you can't see what you're selecting. I had to start the game in 1024x768 mode to see the fonts. To do this, before starting the game in WINE, edit the     RichardBurnsRally.ini   file with kedit, or vi (or any other plain-text editor), change the values for   XRes   &   YRes   to 1024 and 768 respectively. You can also edit   RunStartup = true   if you ever want to go through the startup sequence again. Start the game like most apps under WINE, first descending into the installed directory, then running as usual
cd   ~/.wine/drive_c/Program\ Files/Sci\ Games/Richard\ burns\ Rally\ Demo/
wine   ./RichardBurnsRally.exe

The audio works good, I can change the keyboard controls, and the 3D rendering is the best I've seen . The only quibble is that it leaves my desktop in 1024x768 resolution when it's done, and I natively run 1280x1024. There is an option to run the game at the higher res, but it hangs upon exit.



Open Source alternative : ??? Let me know


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Slave Zero
(For Slackware 13.1 and Wine v1.2)

I have the retail box of this, think I picked it up at a garage sale years ago, but have never actually managed to get the game working in Wine. I am able to install the game, using Win98 emulation, but can't get the game to run. From searching the web, it appears there is some kind of ancient DRM to cope with ("protected disc"?), but a bit of the less cryptic feedback, when it crashes, states that it is looking for some .vxd files. I believe this game was put out in the early days of 3D accelerated graphics, and my gut tells me that there are underlying video / DirectX 7 issues that need to be hacked (beyond my skill level) to get things functional.
As of now, I'd have to say that this game is

NOT WORKING

Open Source alternative : ??? Let me know


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Snowball Fight
(For Slackware 13.1 and Wine v1.2)

I remember getting this game by email  in '98 or '99, I think. Simple and fun, and works easily in WINE, an easy way to fritter away a few minutes.
Get   "Snowball Fight.exe"




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Other Slackware Gaming Pages I've Made

I've got a bunch of Lokigames releases, here's a webpage on how to install and run them.

Here's how I got my FPS games happening.

I've got a webpage linking a few very good Open Source games.

Go here to see my DOSbox work.





HTH, "Have Fun".
I am Dan