The Linux Chronicles #1: Let’s get Trion’s RIFT Running!

Weapon of Choice: 1962 Triumph Perfekt, Raro #85 Cubic Pica typeface.

Yes, I like to wring every last bit of use out of my technology, and I use a lot of technology that most people would consider to be very obsolete. Both of my main use computers were built in 2010, and are rounding out to a decade of use. Both were straight-up given to me for free. Neither would really run Windows 10 very well, even if I didn’t have severe privacy and ownership of access concerns about Windows 10. So, with Windows 7 reaching EOL in January, I’ve had to make the jump to 100% Linux. I’m used to CLI Linux, having run Linux servers for some 25 years (yes, even before there was such a thing as web browsers – the internet was once mostly CLI, ASCII text and uuencoded 256-color GIFs), but I had to get comfortable with an X11 interface of some sort.

Having settled on the MX Linux distro with its lightweight XFCE window manager implementation, I found that there were three Windows programs that I really wanted to be able to keep using, even though I was saying goodbye to Windows itself. The first is the 2012 MMORPG game “Rift. It only has a Windows game client, so if I still wanted to keep my adventure with Lef the Elf going, I had to find a way to run that client in Linux. This is how it got done.

The Rift installation page on Lutris.net Once you have everything installed from the package manager, go to the Rift page on Lutris.net and click the “Install” button.

Here’s the Lutris menu option where you set “Restrict to Single-Core”:

Here’s the Lutris menu option to set “Strict Draw Ordering”:

Once you’ve set these options, then copy the entire “RIFT\Live\” directory contents from where you have downloaded the game (usually in “\Program Files (X86)\Glyph\Games\”) to your new game directory (mine was in “/home/Munk/Games/rift/drive_c/Program Files (x86)/Glyph/Games/”). Then you launch the Glyph Client and “Repair” the installation to fix any files that need updates. This should only take a couple of minutes.

In the Glyph client, you can get to the “Repair Rift” option by right-clicking on the “Rift” launch button:

Coming up: How to get Sid Meyer’s Alpha Centauri/Alien Crossfire and Photoshop 7 running in Linux.

Wow, Lulu’s been shipping the TRB’s *fast*. Those who took advantage of the Black Friday and Cyber Monday sales have already gotten their book orders. I’m still keeping the 15% off discount going until January, and you can still stack any Lulu-issues coupon code on top of that 15% off, so be sure to check the front page at lulu.com for the current discount code. (oh hey, it’s another 15% off with code “ONEFIVE” until Dec. 19!)

2 Comments

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  1. Wow, all that work to run a game. I don’t recall working that much on most of my Windoze to Linux programs, but I know it is more fun than work. I may have you beat on old PCs in use though. I think mine goes back to about 2k5. Some of the last our company got rid of that ran NT. My Notebook’s newer.

  2. If you enjoy cribbage you don’t have to do all that! Nice Triumph! Dig the 2 tone paint job. Those babies are smoooth….

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