SoD working on a Virtual Machine, here's how.

[fooraide]

Hi,

I've gotten Shards of Dalaya working inside a Virtual Machine (virtualbox) and I figured I would share this with the community. I strongly believe this will be useful in having players with otherwise incompatible OS configurations to play SoD.
While I have not tested this under a Linux distribution (I use OSx), I am convinced that this will provide better support than to rely on Wine.

Before I start, let me do a disclaimer:
- I won't be able to support you in doing this and I do not have much time to answer questions but I will do my best.
- This walkthrough is the steps I needed to go through to troubleshoot some issues, the goal of this walkthrough is to save you the trouble of finding how to fix these issues.
- You will need some general knowledge about computer software and hardware that I cannot go over in this walkthrough as you will need to create a virtual machine and install an operating system.
- This walkthrough is provided as is and without any guarantee. This IS a lenghty procedure and I cannot be held responsible for anything, yada, yada.
- Minimum requirements:
-- (For Windows XP, otherwise for Vista or 7, you'll need a bit more RAM and Disk Space) A single core processor @ 3Ghz+, 2GB of RAM and 25GB of free disk space
-- Either a Windows Installation CD/DVD or an image of one (.iso). It does not matter much if it's XP, Vista or 7.

General/Introduction
Throughout this procedure, we'll be creating a virtual machine. A virtual machine is a virtual instance of an operating system inside your operating system. You will be able to run a Windows operating system inside a Linux or inside a Mac computer at the end of this walkthrough.

Following these steps, I was able to get Shards of Dalaya working properly on a virtual Windows XP on my Macbook. However, I strongly believe the same could be achieved under a Linux distribution since Virtualbox is very similar across Linux, Mac and Windows.

Virtualbox, unlike VMWare is completely free and is maintained by an opensource community while ultimately being the property of Sun until it was acquired by Oracle.
I will not be talking about VMWare here.

[size=+2]Step 1: Installation of Virtualbox[/size]

Before we start, some vocabulary I'll be using:
- The host is your physical computer. The one you're probably reading this from right now.
- The guest is your virtual machine. I may also refer to the guest as VM throughout this walkthrough.
.. This said, you may have a Linux host but a Windows guest. See where I'm going..? Great.

Step 1.1: Downloading and installing Virtualbox
Head over to http://www.virtualbox.org/wiki/Downloads and download the Virtualbox for your HOST operating system. If you have a Mac, install the Mac hosts version. Once you're done downloading, install it - should be fairly simple.

Step 1.2: Creating your Virtual Machine
Fire up Virtualbox and at the top left, you'll see a "New" button. Go for it.

First step will ask you the name of your VM and the operating system you'll be using (Windows!)

Second step will ask you how much memory you want. SoD will run OK if you allow 1GB of RAM, better if you allow 2GB of RAM. The slider will indicate wether or not it's a good idea to allow these amounts of RAM. (If you're in the red, that's a nono).

Now, when you hit next, you'll be at the step of creating a hard drive for your guest OS. You'll want to make sure you are creating a boot volume and that it will be a new disk. When you hit continue, the new disk wizard will start.
You will want to create a fixed-size storage which is exactly like a real hard drive (you cannot outgrow the capacity of the drive). A dynamic storage will grow if the virtual machine needs it, which may full your host hard drive if you are not careful.
I've given 25GB to the virtual machine and once EQ Titanium was installed, I had 10GB of free space and I felt really comfortable with that.

Once you are done with creating the disk, you will need to edit some settings on the VM before we can actually get started with the installation of Windows.


Step 1.3: Configuring the guest settings
Select the VM and hit "settings"
There is nothing to do in these tabs: General, System, Audio, Ports and Shared folders.

Display Tab: Video Memory works just like graphics card memory. The more the better but I haven't needed to give more than 64MB of memory to run SoD without fancy graphics.
You'll want to make sure 2D and 3D acceleration options are enabled. Otherwise, nothing else to do here.

Storage Tab: There are two ways to install Windows. From your host CD Drive or from an .iso file. In either ways, you will need to select the IDE controller and at the bottom, you'll have an icon which (when mouse over) shows Add Attachment. Add a CD/DVD device from that button. It'll ask you if you want to leave it empty or if you want to attach an image.
If you have an .iso file for your Windows CD: That's where you are going to select it. You're done, move on to the next tab !
If you don't have an .iso file: Leave it empty for now, and once you are done, click on your empty drive. Under Attributes, you should see Secondary IDE and that's fine. But, to the right of that select menu, there's a CD icon - click on it and select "Host drive" and once it's selected, make sure passthrough is enabled.

Network Tab: This is where you'll be creating the network adapter for your guest. Make sure you are using a BRIDGED adapter and not a NAT. This will make sure your VM is a distinct machine on the local network, just like any physical computer.
If you are wired to your router or modem for your internet connection, you'll want to select "Ethernet" in the "Name" select menu. Otherwise, select your wireless internet card.

Hey, we're done configuring our virtual machine !

[size=+2]Step 2: Installation of Windows[/size]

So, what we've done so far:
- Downloaded and installed Virtualbox
- Created and configured a Virtual Machine
- Made sure we had access to a Windows installation through an .iso file or from the host drive (and the CD is in the drive!)

Now, you're ready to fire up the VM. From the VirtualBox main menu, simply double click on your VM.
From that point, you should be on familiar ground since it's nothing different than a regular Windows installation.
I won't be covering how to install windows in this Walkthrough.

[size=+2]Step 3: Little steps to configure your Virtual Windows properly[/size]

The Windows I've gotten installed was XP SP3 with DirectX 9.0c. Additionally, I've needed to do some things before I could get SoD working.

Step 3.1: Installing Guest Additions and Direct3d support
Ok, you've got your Windows working - that's great. You'll need to reboot it in safe mode for the next step. This is done by rebooting your virtual machine (just hit "restart" like you would in any Windows) and then mashing F8 until you see the safe boot option.

Once you're booted in safe mode, you will need to go in "Devices" and then select "Install guest additions". The "Devices" menu shows at the very top of my screen on Mac taskbar. I don't really know where this would be under Linux.

Well, once you've hit Install Guest Additions, you should get a Wizard to install the guest additions. Go through the Wizard and make sure Direct3d is selected to be installed.

Step 3.2: Disable mouse integration
If you don't do this, your mouse will be funky inside the game client. By funky I mean it will not behave correct and move very erratically. To disable mouse integration, go in the "Machine" menu (just next to the "Devices" menu you used in step 3.1) and click on "Disable Mouse Integration".

You're done, reboot in normal mode and be ready for step 4!

[size=+2]Step 4: Install the game client and play ![/size]

You're pretty much done and all that is left is the easy part, installing the game client.
Install the game like you would in any physical machine, there is no difference at this point.
You are probably going to want to use your host drive to install from CDs.

If you installed Windows from an ISO file, you'll want to configure your host drive to be accessible from your guest.
If that is the case, you'll need to power off your virtual machine and go back into the settings. Then, follow the instructions I've written at step 1.3 in the storage tab if you did not have a iso file.