Note: I have only tested this with the default FGLRX drivers that are installed by default in the Linux Mint 17 Variants and the AMDGPU and RADEON default drivers that are installed by default when installing Linux Mint 18 Variants. I will be testing this at some point in the future with NVIDIA and INTEL drivers as well but for the time being I have only been able to confirm this works with AMD/ATI graphics. If anyone has tried this with NVIDIA Or INTEL graphics feel free to reply to this post and you are more than welcome to share a link to your guide as well.
Note: I am particularly using currently an AMD Radeon R7 370 Desktop Graphics card with a Gigabyte 1170A motherboard. I have tested various older AMD/ATI Video cards as well varying from HD4000 series, HD5000 series, HD6000 series, etc. This appears to work on many combinations and I was also able to get this same method to work on an older Lenovo Thinkpad Laptop model X130e which has an AMD Radeon HD 6320 on board graphics and a AMD Core i3-2367M processor being the oldest system I tried this on. It does get pretty laggy but it will launch and load the game this way as well on the Lenovo Thinkpad X130e.
Note: I have not tried this on any release before Linux Mint 17 but I have no doubt that this will work. Also do not install DirectX separately in wine as FFXIV Stormblood will do it during the install. This same method appears to work on some other games that are Pre DirectX 11 that I am still currently testing.
The topics discussed here are not sponsored by or endorsed by the respective companies that own the rights to the following games mentioned. All this information is from my own point of view and experience and is also for educational purposes to get the game to work on your Linux Mint 17/18 Variant 32/64 Bit operating system. The steps below will get you up and running quickly.
Step 1: Start off with a freshly installed Operating System or a fresh reset.
I highly recommend this to ensure there is nothing that can interfere with the wine staging that is about to be installed. Ensure that you have installed all available safe updates available and you will quickly be able to determine this by seeing a shield symbol with a green checkmark in it at the bottom right hand side of you desktop in the taskbar.
Step 2: Installing Wine Staging For Linux Mint
Open up terminal by pressing CTRL+ALT+T and put in the following code below and hit enter. This will install the wine staging release key needed for Linux Mint.
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wget -nc https://dl.winehq.org/wine-builds/Release.key
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sudo apt-key add Release.key
If you are using Linux Mint 17 Variant use this code
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sudo apt-add-repository 'deb https://dl.winehq.org/wine-builds/ubuntu/ trusty main'
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sudo apt-add-repository 'deb https://dl.winehq.org/wine-builds/ubuntu/ xenial main'
Next put in the following code and hit enter. This will update the changes you have made so far.
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sudo apt-get update
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sudo apt-get install --install-recommends winehq-staging
Step 3: Configuring Wine To Work For You In Linux Mint 17/18 Before Installing FFXIV Stormblood
Put in the following code in terminal and hit enter. This will install Winetricks to take care of any DLL issues that can appear during install and running of the game.
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sudo apt-get install winetricks
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winecfg
Once you are in the Wine Configuration menu you will go to the Staging tab and make sure the Enable CSMT is checked. This will take care of registry issues that can arise during install and running of the game. After that you to the Applications tab and make sure that the environment is set to Windows 7. Once that is done click apply and then click close.
Step 4: Installing Final Fantasy XIV Stormblood
Next you will go to the Final Fantasy XIV website to download the game client that will be used to play the game. The link to download this is below...
https://www.finalfantasyxiv.com/playersdownload/na/
Once the download completes proceed to install.
Note: During the install you may see a couple installs pop up once again. One will be for Wine Gecko and the Other will be for Wine Mono. Make sure to proceed with those installs as they are needed for wine and the game to function properly.
Once that is done make sure to select the create desktop icon at the end to place an icon for the game on your desktop. After this that will complete the installation.
Step 5: Configuring Final Fantasy XIV Stormblood To Launch Properly And Avoid The Black Screen Launcher
Double click on your Home folder or search under Applications search for Home and select it. This will take you to your home directory. Once you are there navigate to Documents --> My Games --> FINAL FANTASY XIV - A Realm Reborn and then find the file FFXIV_BOOT.cfg and open it. A dialogue box will pop up just select display. This will open the file in plain text.
You will see a line near the bottom that says "BrowserType 0". Change that line to "BrowserType 2" and then save and close the text file. This will change your game launcher to a style that your operating system will be able to load so that you will be able to play the game.
Step 6: Launch Final Fantasy XIV Stormblood And Configure Graphics Settings Before Playing
Next we are going to go ahead and launch FFXIV Stormblood by double clicking the icon you made on your desktop. On first start up it is going to take you through the registration portion. You will have the option to Sign Into Current Square Enix Account or Create A New Account. Select the appropriate option for you and complete it. Once that completes it will start logging you in as its doing that click the Config option near the bottom of the launcher. This will interrupt the download for a minute and make sure DirectX 11 support is turned off as the game currently does not display correctly with this on. After that save it and it will take you back to the login. Go ahead and login and it will proceed downloading. Let this complete as it can take some time. Once that completes you will see a green box to click on that says directx 9 be sure to click on that to start the game.
It will pull up the main game window at this point and begin to start up. You will have the main menu starting off. Select System Configuration from the main menu. In the Configuration Menu first go to the Game Pad tab. If you have a game pad keep enabled if not then disable as it will not be needed. After that go to the Mouse Tab and ensure its enabled. Once that is done select the Graphics Tab and make sure to uncheck Disable Rendering Of Objects When Not Visible (Occlusion Culling). This is due to a glitch that makes objects disappear in game. Also make sure that Enable HDR Rendering is checked as that will improve your graphics quality. Once that is done click apply and then click close.
Step 7: You are ready to go everything has been setup
From the main menu just finish logging in. If you have any feedback or find any other games that this method helped make work as well feel free to reply and let me know. Happy Gaming
