Neverwinter Nights on Ubuntu (mouse lag or crashes)
 

Hello Everyone,

I've been using Ubuntu for the last year and haven't felt the need to reinstall windows or dual-boot. But about a week ago I decided that I missed playing the RPGs I used to play on Windows (Neverwinter Nights and Oblivion). I couldn't be bothered trying to get Oblivion working on Linux, but had read that NWN ran perfectly, so I decided to install it. I used the loki installer and did the updates (all seemed to work perfectly). However when I come to actually play the game I have one of two problems: either the game (and everything else) freezes after about two minutes and I have to reboot, or the mouse lags so badly that I can't get past the opening menu.

If I run the game at 1280x1024 everything seems to run fine, I get good frame rates etc. But then after two minutes the game computer freezes completely (this used to happen with windows as well). And if I run the game at a lower res the mouse lags horribly and I can't play at all (this never happened on Windows). Does anyone have any ideas on how to fix this, beside reverting to windows that is?

My computer is as follows:

Ubuntu 8.04
Kernel: 2.6.24-19-generic
RAM: 512
Processor: AMD Athlon64 3200+
Graphics: nVidia Geforce 6600GT

I read that the current stable SDL library might be causing problems so I compiled and installed 1.2.5 (as found on the NWN webpage) but this doesn't seem to have helped. I really have no idea what I am doing (partly because Ubuntu has been so easy to use and I haven't had to learn anything), so if anyone has any ideas on what I can do to get NWN working properly can you please use baby-linux language. Thanks. :)

I have discovered that adding "export SDL_MOUSE_RELATIVE=0" to the nwn script stops the mouse lag. However if I don't also disable the sound the game closes whenever I talk to an NPC. Problem part way solved, any thoughts on getting the sound running (without the game crashing), or stopping the game from freezing in 1280x1024?

I had the same problem as you (the crashing when talking to NPCs). In my case it was caused by a missing file.

After googling for a while I found this forum post. A member of Bioware posted the solution about 6 posts down. Obviously you'll want to download the zip file. It's fairly large (155mb) so get yourself a cup of tea.

If that doesn't work, I don't know how to help you, unfortunately.

Good luck!