Starsiege Tribes launch problem

Questions about Wine on Linux
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Particle
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Joined: Sun Sep 04, 2022 2:32 pm

Starsiege Tribes launch problem

Post by Particle »

I have a working installation of Starseige Tribes, but I've found that there is one catch. While I can launch the game successfully if I create a virtual desktop and use the terminal within to start the game, I cannot directly start the game by invoking wine directly. If I try, the game process spawns but hangs indefinitely without drawing anything on screen.

Works:
WINEPREFIX=$PWD/wine wine start
*virtual desktop opens, terminal is automatically shown*
C:\Dynamix\TRIBES\Tribes.exe
*game launches successfully*

Does not work:
WINEPREFIX=$PWD/wine wine start "C:\\Dynamix\\TRIBES\\Tribes.exe"
*Tribes.exe spawns but hangs indefinitely*

Also does not work:
WINEPREFIX=$PWD/wine wine $PWD/wine/drive_c/Dynamix/TRIBES/Tribes.exe
*Tribes.exe spawns but hangs indefinitely*

I could use some advice. I've not run into this particular problem before where the difference between success and failure seems to be taking the extra step to manually launch something within the prefix from within a virtual desktop in the prefix.
jkfloris
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Joined: Thu Aug 14, 2014 10:10 am

Re: Starsiege Tribes launch problem

Post by jkfloris »

Several versions of Tribes are available for download at https://www.tribesuniverse.com.
I have tried Starsiege:Tribes, but this version has different file names and does not have the problem you describe.
Which version do you have?
Particle
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Joined: Sun Sep 04, 2022 2:32 pm

Re: Starsiege Tribes launch problem

Post by Particle »

I'm using the version of 1.11 that was released for free in 2004 when Vivendi owned the IP. The installer ran normally and the game runs normally too. It's just some sort of startup issue with how WINE is launched that I appear to be running into. If Tribes.exe is called directly it doesn't work, but if it's started indirectly it seems to work. Maybe it's some sort of working directory problem?
jkfloris
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Posts: 3136
Joined: Thu Aug 14, 2014 10:10 am

Re: Starsiege Tribes launch problem

Post by jkfloris »

You're right that it's strange that you can't start the game right away. Do any of the following work?
(I assume $PWD is your home directory? If not, use the full path instead of ${HOME}.)

Code: Select all

cd "${HOME}/wine/drive_c/Dynamix/TRIBES/"
WINEPREFIX=${HOME}/wine wine Tribes.exe

# or
WINEPREFIX=${HOME}/wine wine start /unix ${HOME}/wine/drive_c/Dynamix/TRIBES/Tribes.exe
Particle
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Posts: 3
Joined: Sun Sep 04, 2022 2:32 pm

Re: Starsiege Tribes launch problem

Post by Particle »

Interesting! The /unix flag seems to make it work as expected. I'll be verbose below for the benefit of future Googlers.

This works:
WINEPREFIX=$PWD/wine wine start /unix $PWD/wine/drive_c/Dynamix/TRIBES/Tribes.exe

This also works (at /opt/tribes):
WINEPREFIX=$PWD/wine wine start /unix ./wine/drive_c/Dynamix/TRIBES/Tribes.exe

And also, using the absolute path manually instead of $PWD also works. $PWD is an environment variable that is always set to the present working directory. My game was stored at /opt/tribes, so setting WINEPREFIX=$PWD/wine would make $WINEPREFIX equal to "/opt/tribes/wine".

Thank you for your help.
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