Gothic on Linux: Notes & Tips

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Game Information
Title Gothic
Year 2001
Developer Piranha Bytes Software GmbH
Graphics API DirectX 7
Audio API DirectSound3D, DirectMusic



Runtime Environment

Wine version: Proton: 8.0-5 (Proton 9 throws Access Violation errors)

Prefix architecture: 64-bit

Notes

Added dgVoodoo2 library:

  • Ddraw.dll
  • D3dimm.dll


Selected the workshop release from beta participation

Gothic-steam-beta-workshop1.png


DXVK included in Proton 8.0-5 is really old v2.3.

I placed the new DXVK into the game system folder.

  • d3d11: d3d11.dll and dxgi.dll


Workshop subscribed to fix few issues with the game


In the launch options I put the following arguments:

WINEDLLOVERRIDES="ddraw,dinput,dxgi,d3d11,dsound=n,b" DXVK_HUD=fps,version,scale=0.6 DXVK_FRAME_RATE=30 %command%


The dinput.dll is a special library, converts DirectInput 1-7 (dinput.dll) to DirectInput 8 (dinput8.dll) for older games.

The version included with the game is v1.0.16.0 buty is possible to find a new version on the GitHub page.

Music

> directmusic winetricks is required


Gothic 1 uses Microsoft’s DirectMusic system for its soundtrack playback. The game’s original audio engine relied on DirectMusic to handle its dynamic, layered music themes. This is why running Gothic 1 on modern systems (or Linux/Steam Deck) often requires installing DirectMusic DLLs or using mods that replace it.


On Steam Deck/Linux: Gothic 1 won’t play music unless DirectMusic components (dmusic, dmloader, dmstyle, etc.) are installed via Protontricks


3D spatial sound (EAX2) can be restored using DSOAL

IMPORTANT: dsound.dll and dsoal-aldrv.dll need to be placed in the system\autorun folder.

Troubleshooting

Game reverts back to Miles Fast even after EAX restoration software is installed and enabled • Link


Gothic doesn't see dsound.dll wrapper from EAX restoration software.

Create pre.load file, which orders game to load dsound.dll wrapper.

  1. Open a text editor.
  2. Write exactly dsound.dll to document.
  3. Save the document exactly as pre.load to <path-to-game>\System\.
  4. Launch the game, change sound provider to Creative EAX 2 and quit. Relaunch the game and check if sound provider is still the same.


Notes

Users with Union (SystemPack 2.0) patch need to put dsound.dll (and dsound.ini) to <path-to-game>\System\autorun).

Users with old SystemPack installed have to change FixMss=1 to FixMss=0 in SystemPack.ini configuration file. SystemPack uses own implementation of restoring surround sound, which is purely software and because of that EAX restoration software will not make effect if FixMss is set to 1.


The d3dimm.dll library is related to Microsoft’s Direct3D Immediate Mode, part of the DirectX 1–7 era graphics APIs. It was used by older Windows games to access 3D rendering functions before the modern retained-mode Direct3D pipeline was introduced