Install MidsReborn for City of Heroes on Linux

Published: at 01:00 AM

Ever since City of Heroes returned officially, I’ve been working to try and get MidsReborn running on Linux. It’s not supported officially, and in fact not recommended by the devs of MidsReborn, I still wanted to have the opportunity to create builds. After all, one of the most wonderful parts of CoH/CoV is character creation.

To get this working for me, using Pop!_OS, I used Lutris. As this process was new to me, and it may be for others who follow this post, I am including images for each step.

  1. Download .NET6 using the link from the MidsReborn Github. I just saved the “.exe” to my Downloads directory.
  2. Download the Zip from the latest releases on the MidsReborn Github. For me it was Release 3.6.6.3.

Downloads directory with both files listed

  1. In Lutrus, click the + and select Install a Windows game from an executable.

Lutris install selection

  1. In the next screen, give the Game name as “MidsReborn”. Leave the Installer preset and Locale alone. Click Install in the upper right.

Game name displayed in correct location

  1. It’s time to setup wine. Click Install in the wine setup line.

Wine install screen

  1. Select the directory you want to install the enviornment. For me I selected /home/lovesudo/Games/MidsReborn. Click Continue when happy.

Directory path selection

  1. Select the installer for .NET6. Click Install in the upper right when ready.

NET selection

  1. A little box will pop up, and not too long after that, we’ll see the familiar installer.

NET6 install

  1. Once finished click Close on the .NET6 installer and then click Close on the Lutris Install Window. You should see the text Installation completed!

Installation complete

The intent with this step is to ensure that we have the correct runtime files for MidsReborn to work. Now we need to actually install MidsReborn.

  1. Extract the contents of the MidsReborn zip file into the location you picked in step 5. I just selected the “Desktop” of the wine install location.

Extraction path of zip contents

  1. In Lutris, find MidsReborn, or whatever you named it in step 4, Right Click and select Configure

View of options when right clicking a game in Lutris

  1. In the Configure window, select Game options and select the MidsReborn.exe as the executable. This can be found where you extracted the zip during step 10. Also set the Prefix architecture to 64-bit. Then click Runner options.

Options modified as stated in step 12

  1. In Runner options, I set the Wine version to Proton - Experimental. I have this due to having Steam installed already. It may work with GE-Proton, or other Wine Versions, but this is my default check to start. Select Save.

Visual display of runner options with changes from step 13

  1. Double click MidsReborn in Lutris and enjoy!