Steam deck and everquest.

Discussion in 'Time Locked Progression Servers' started by mark, Apr 29, 2022.

  1. mark Augur

    I know you can install windows on the steam deck and probably run everquest on it.
    I was wondeing if eanyone was able to run everquest on the linux os ? and if the screen was big enough or just a mess ?.
  2. JustAnotherOpinion Augur

    My quick google search said that Everquest does work on the Steam Deck because the hardware runs a modified Bootcamp Linux OS.
  3. Zanarnar Augur

    it runs a modified/customized Arch Linux distro.

    It won't run out of the box, but you can get EQ to run on linux and run well. (I mostly run EQ under linux, just not on a steam deck, but rather my desktop)

    It would be cool if the Dev's would take some time to make EQ work properly with proton out of the box, but I think that's unlikely. More likely, valve might fix whatever is causing the issue from their end as they continually improve proton. (fingers crossed here, would be nicer to ditch my playonlinux/lultris setup for steam proton)
  4. Chromate New Member

    I want to let you know that I just got my steamdeck and was able to get it to run. Installed it through steam adjusted the proton version and had to install protontricks and adjust the startup script.

    %command% --disable-gpu protontricks 205710 d3dx9

    Also need to go into the eqclient.ini and change the VertexShaders=FALSE

    It runs well just need to adjust some of the hotkeys to get it optimized how you like it.
    Yoda, Lucentio and Chikkin like this.
  5. Ecko Elder

    can confirm, got my steam deck, did the exact same thing and now have a 4th box for Vaniki. Got the steam deck hooked up to my usb-c dock so works on my monitor with keyboard and mouse and performs like a normal pc, bonus!

    Did get the steam deck to play other games whilst camping mobs though, so kinda not doing that now, hehe.

    Although when I'm camping trivial mobs I can at least.
    klanderso likes this.
  6. Chikkin Augur

    oh! Bookmarking this!

    I haven't installed it on my steam deck yet, and in fact, I really need to because after putting God of War on my steam deck, I haven't touched it, and my wife is looking at me like "wtf?!"

    So now I can tell her it's going to play EQ and Diablo Immortal! haha!
  7. Vumad Cape Wearer

    Slightly off topic, not a steamdeck but I bootcamp my Mac.

    Just be careful on any system where the work around is a virtual machine. I believe that Bootcamp on a Mac boots Windows as the OS, so it's okay. However, Parallels, a Mac program, runs Windows while MacOS is active. I believe this is done by making a virtual machine and running windows inside of it. Since Virtual machines can result in a suspension/ban, using parallels to run windows inside of Mac is a risky choice.

    It sounds like based on the previous posts that you have your answer. Just adding to make sure any solutions you choose do not put EQ inside of a Virtual Machine.
  8. Zanarnar Augur

    Just to clear this up. Parallels *IS* a VM. If you have an intel mac, crossover would likely work for you and NOT be a virtual machine, as its based on WINE. Parallels however, is a VM and could get you in trouble.

    Steam's Proton is a custom fork of WINE, and as such isn't running in a VM, rather its simply implementing all the API calls that the game needs to work. It does create a little fake windows environment to run in (with a C: drive; COM and PARALLEL ports, and a few other things but this isn't a VM). (This is what the steam deck uses, you can also use it on most linux distributions.)

    I've run EQ on linux (via WINE and now Proton) for years without issue. Its not officially supported, but they don't seem to mind that your doing it either. Also YES they are checking for it. If you look at all the system/registry stuff the client does as it loads, looking for devices and other clues that its running under a VM, it also notes the ones WINE uses. (If your curious how to see what it does, look into Process Explorer which is part of the power tools)

    https://wiki.winehq.org/FAQ#Is_Wine_an_emulator.3F_There_seems_to_be_disagreement
  9. Captain Video Augur


    Crossover now supports the 64-bit EQ client running on Apple silicon. I don't personally use it, but others have reported it works fine and does not trigger any EQ alarms. On a Truebox server it's still one client per machine.
  10. Overcast451 Augur


    I have run on Fedora, CentOS8 and Currently Ubuntu. My main EQ machine is Windows, but I run the box toons on Linux.

    Fedora and CentOS can be a bit harder to get the nVidia drivers working properly. You have to blacklist nouveau drivers in the boot parameters and then disable wayland. After that, you can install the driver via SSH. Make sure SSH is enabled before blacklisting the default video drivers - that's the KEY to getting the nVidia drivers working under those OSes. The drivers won't install with nouveau active and need to be installed via the CLI anyway, which is why SSH being usable is important. Once I figured that out - nVidia driver installs on the RedHat kernel OSes went from a nightmare, to a breeze.

    Ubuntu is the easier route though, pretty sure the nVidia drivers just installed on it with no issues. I did have to add a parameter to the station launcher to disable the GPU for the launcher to show properly.

    I have been getting some rare crashes lately, but turning off the Flora seemed to help. I did think CentOS was a bit more stable overall.

    Performance wise - my linux machine uses an older CPU (i7) and loads just as fast as my Windows machine with a much newer i10. The EQ install on my Windows PC is using SSD, but the Linux machine is using a standard SATA drive. So performance is great on linux ;)

    Once you get the OS up and running along with the video drivers - google "Everquest Lutris". Lutris, if you aren't familiar is a helper for gaming on Linux that works very well.. like Proton. I had more issues with Proton personally. Lutris made it easy. When you run the script - it will download it and everything. After that I copy my character INI files, maps - etc into that install.

    Anyway - once Lutris is installed you can run various scripts on their site to setup the WinePreFix properly for the game you want to run.

    The script published '3 months ago' (third one down) is the one that works with the 64-bit client.
  11. Vumad Cape Wearer

    Not wanting to derail OP but I feel the question has been answered and it's okay to do so...


    I have a 2015 Macbook pro. It is intel based. One thing I have going is on the Mac side, I was able to get my eGPU running on MacOS with PurgeWrangler, now Kryptonite, and it works very, very well, about 400% increase in frame rates on WoW. However, I can NOT get it to work on Windows. Well, I did once with a specific build but windows quickly forced an update and killed it.

    I did try wineskin MacOS with EQ but I couldn't get it to work. Didn't try wineskin with anything on GamePass but that sounds even more complicated, especially with EasyAntiCheat active.

    I thought about trying to run parallels but the VM and EQ would be a problem, plus the extra CPU load probably wouldn't makeup for the offloaded GPU load.I don't know what Crossover is (I'll look it up) but I'm curious if it would allow MacOS to keep my eGPU working while I am in a windows environment using Xbox Gamepass Games, EQ, or whatever.

    Anyway, hate to derail but you sound like you might be knowledgeable on some of these subjects and I think OP got his answer by a few posts in.
  12. Zanarnar Augur


    Well, I don't own a MAC so tank what I'm saying with that grain of salt.

    Crossover is basically a commercial WINE build with some support and such; its mostly used on MAC's to run windows apps. It works just like WINE does, so its not a VM but rather a compatibility layer.

    I don't know if it can run EQ, but I'd guess yes, likely with some of the same tweaks needed for linux (some folks have to set VERTEXSHADERS=0 to get models to show in-game) In theory it should work with the eGPU as its still running under MacOS proper, just through a translation (compatibility) layer to make the DirectX calls into something the MAC and do (metal? openGL? not sure)

    I'd guess if that stuff doesn't work for you, bootcamp might be the best option, dual-boot into windows and go from there... the upside is that way windows should see the eGPU too as long as there are windows drivers for it. (if its an apple product, might be out of luck, if its nvidia or ati, you can likely find drivers)

    good luck and sorry I'm not a lot of help when it comes to Apple products :)
  13. Vumad Cape Wearer


    Thanks for the tips.

    It's a DevilBox, so not Mac specific. It hasn't worked because windows doesn't know how to manage the resource. The one specific build of windows did work, but it forced an auto-update, and the current version of windows has the resource management problem. Deactivating other resources that use the same ports didn't resolve the issue.

    I wouldn't expect you to know how to resolve the port conflict on windows, but I do appreciate the information about crossover. I wish that DPG would just come out with a Mac version if modern computers would allow an integrated compatibility layer to work.

    I of course understand why that would be a waste of money for DPG.

    And, of course, that wouldn't fix the fact that I can't use GamePass PC games on the Mac either.
  14. Rotlust Augur

    sorry to necro this thread (but I am a necromancer) but I didn't want to start a flood of threads on steamdeck

    I tried to do what some of you said and it crashes as soon as it starts to load after server select. I think my issue is a failure to understand proton tricks. Is anyone willing to help me out on this?
  15. Godricc New Member

    Did you ever figure this out? I’m having the same issue
  16. Gheed Is not reading your response

    I haven't been able to get it to work on mine either
  17. Maph Lorekeeper

    one of my guildies plays with VR..he is crazy
  18. Jim_Dugan New Member

    Any chance you can provide some steps on how to do the changes that are need? I was able to get EQ to load but it crashes when I log into a sever
  19. Polekn Augur


    Got my Steam Deck today and was able to log in to test server and play there for a bit. I modified shortcut per post above and it was crashing after server select screen. Then I launched protontricks, selected EverQuest, "use default wine prefix", "add Windows component", selected "d3dx9, d3dx9_43, d3dx10, d3dx10_43". It starts fine after that. Mouse is off in windowed mode, but once you switch to fullscreen it works fine.
  20. Yoda Journeyman

    Which model of Steamdeck are you guys using? Specs?