Watch Dogs Guide

Watch Dogs is an open world 3rd person action hacking game where you can explore a living city full of technology and crime. Roam the streets of Chicago as Alden Pearce while hacking phones, city devices, ATMs and Vehicles to stop crime. Stealth is your closest friend

Follow my step-by-step guide on installing, configuring and optimizing Watch Dogs in Linux with PlayOnLinux.

Note: This guide applies to the Legacy Uplay version of Watch Dogs. Other versions may require additional steps.

Tips & Specs:

To learn more about PlayOnLinux and Wine configuration, see the online manual: PlayOnLinux Explained

Mint 18.3 64-bit
PlayOnLinux: 4.2.12
Wine: 3.14 Staging 64-bit

Wine Installation

Click Tools
Select "Manage Wine Versions"

Look for the Wine Version: 3.13
Select it
Click the arrow pointing to the right

Click Next

Downloading Wine

Extracting

Downloading Gecko

Installed

Also click the "Wine versions (amd64) Tab" and download 3.13 as well

Wine 3.13 & 3.13 64-bit is installed and you can close this window

Download the Legacy Uplay

Go to: ubi.li/78pn4
Save UplayInstaller.exe to your Desktop
Note: This is the unsupported version that still works with Windows XP

PlayOnLinux Setup

Launch PlayOnLinux
Click Install

Click "Install a non-listed program"

Select "Install a program in a new virtual drive"
Click Next

Name the virtual drive: watchdogs
Click Next

Check all three options:

• Use another version of Wine
• Configure Wine
• Install some libraries

Click Next

Select Wine 3.13
Click Next

Select "64 bits windows installation"
Click Next

Wine Configuration

Windows version: Windows XP
Click Apply

Libraries Tab
Add the following overrides:

• d3d10
• d3d10_1
• d3d10core
• d3d11
• dxgi
• xaudio2_7

Click Edit on each override and select "(Native) Windows"
Click Apply

Note: Manually typing in each override is quicker than finding them on the dropdown menu

Graphics Tab
Check "automatically capture the mouse in full-screen windows"
Click OK

PlayOnLinux Packages (DLLs, Components, Libraries)

Check the following:

• POL_Install_corefonts
• POL_Install_d3dx10
• POL_Install_d3dx11
• POL_Install_d3dx9
• POL_Install_tahoma
• POL_Install_vcrun2008
• POL_Install_vcrun2010
• POL_Install_xaudio

Click Next

Note: All packages should automatically download and install

Click Browse

Select "UplayInstaller.exe" from your Desktop
Click Open

Click Next

Click OK

Click "I Accept"

Click Install

Click Next

Click Finish to run Uplay

Login to Uplay
Important: Check "Remember me"

Click Games
Click Watch Dogs

Click Download

Select Language
Click Continue

Uncheck "Create start menu shortcut"
Uncheck "Create desktop shortcut"
Click Continue

Note: PlayOnLinux will create the shortcuts in a later step

Click "Accept and continue"

Wait for Watch Dogs to download
Important: Do not run Watch Dogs!
When its finished downloading, Close Uplay

PlayOnLinux Shortcut

Select "Uplay.exe"
Click Next

Name the shortcut: Watch Dogs
Click Next

Select "I don't want to make another shortcut"
Click Next

Download Lutris Staging Wine

PlayOnLinux no longer provides "staging" versions of Wine
We'll grab one from Lutris Runners
Go to: https://lutris.net/files/runners/
Download "wine-staging-3.14-x86_64.tar.gz"
Save it to your Desktop
Extract "wine-staging-3.14-x86_64.tar.gz" to the PlayOnLinux Wine/linux-amd64 directory
Full path:

/home/username/.PlayOnLinux/wine/linux-amd64/

PlayOnLinux Configure

Back to PlayOnLinux
Select "Watch Dogs"
Click Configure

General Tab
Click the Wine down-arrow
Select "staging-3.14-x86_64"

Display Tab
Video memory size: enter the amount of memory your video card/chip uses

Close Configure

DXVK Setup

Go to: https://github.com/doitsujin/dxvk/releases
Download Version 0.70
Extract it to your Desktop

Open x64 directory
Copy all dlls

Paste in the Uplay/games/Watch_Dogs/bin directory
Full path:

/home/username/.PlayOnLinux/wineprefix/watchdogs/drive_c/Program Files (x86)/Ubisoft/games/Watch_Dogs/bin

DXVK Full Guide
http://www.gamersonlinux.com/forum/threads/dxvk-guide.2540/
Follow this guide for all the detailed steps to run DXVK in PlayOnLinux

Run Watch Dogs

Select Watch Dogs
Click Run

Note: Click Debug to see bugs and errors

Uplay should automatically login and run
Click Games
Click Watch Dogs
Click Play

The first launch will try to install dependencies like Direct X, Visual C & DOT Net Framework 3.5
Since we previously installed all of them but Dot Net it will hang on Dot Net
DOT Net Framework 3.5 doesn't even install in a 64-bit prefix

Go to your System Monitor
Find Setup.exe
End Process

The game launch should continue
If not, end close it and run it again.
Eventually the Dot Net installation will skip and run the game

Optmization

Click options

Click Display

Adjust:

• Resolution
• Refresh Rate
• Aspect Ratio
• Window Mode
• VSync
• GPU Max Buffered Frames
• Textures
• Anti-Aliasing
• Widescreen Letterbox

Click Apply

Note: The first time Watch Dogs launched the resolution was 800x600 and I could change it in-game, but you need to move the mouse to the right-edge of the screen to see the "Apply" button

Click Graphics Quality
Adjust:

• Overall Quality
• Level of Detail
• Shadows
• Reflections
• Ambient Occlusion
• Motion Blur
• Depth of Field
• Water
• Shader

Click Apply

You can manually adjust the game settings in the GamerProfile.xml

1. Go to Documents
2. My Games
3. Watch Dogs
4. hexadecimal directory
5. Open GamerProfile.xml

Manually adjust game resolution and other settings here

Conclusion:
Watch Dogs needs a lot of workarounds and extra hacks not provided by PlayOnLinux, but it runs GREAT!
The main issues I had was trying to make the first launch skip the Dot Net installation. I don't even know why it requires Dot Net??? The other problem was at first launch the resolution was 800x600 and I was trying to adjust it in-game, but the apply button was not in the screen. Then it would eventually crash and I had to kill it from TTY shell. But later I found that all I have to do is slide the mouse to the right side of the screen and there is the "Apply" button.
DXVK has made all the difference in playing these Direct X 10/11 games in Wine.

Gameplay Video:

Screenshots:

 

Also it looks like you can still install Uplay from here:
https://static3.cdn.ubi.com/orbit/launcher_installer/UplayInstaller.exe

 

@booman

I'm using lutris? how do i get xaudio2_7 i do not see it in there winetricks

Uplay isn't being used tho I'm not sure if it will be anymore. because ubisoft connect gets installed over it. there's no point in having it because it updates to that. even when you launch Uplay. Why have 3 launchers. I first Downloaded and installed the game with epic then it went to Uplay then updated to ubisoft connect WOW i just want the game LOL

 

That figures, so the Uplay updates and installs "connect"
Oh well, it was worth a try.
I don't use Lutris, but look for Wine Configuration
Once you launch that go to the Libraries tab and type in xaudio2_7

 

@booman

How do i install the DirectX End-User Runtimes (June 2010) in playonlinux i get a ERROR in lutris trying to run the.exe

 

@booman

How do i install the DirectX End-User Runtimes (June 2010) in playonlinux i get a ERROR in lutris trying to run the.exe

The error might result because of the Windows version. Try going back to Wine Configuration then setting Windows version to Windows XP

Install the DirectX Runtime June 2010, then set it back to Windows 7 or Windows 10

Don't forget that the download is a compressed file. It will act like its installing, but its not, it will extract to the directory of your choice in the wineprefix.
I used C:\
Then you have to go to the folder that extracted and run the DXSETUP.exe

If you are using PlayOnLinux, then you can go to Configure, then Miscellaneous Tab and "run an .exe in this virtual drive" and run DXSETUP.exe

I suggest sticking with Lutris since you already have it running. You might want to ask someone in the Lutris forums or on https://www.reddit.com/r/linux_gaming about it. There are a lot of helpful gamers there.

 

@booman

DirectX Runtime June 2010, its an .exe file its not compressed. not sure what you mean.

I got it working with custom proton i forgot to install something needed if on Arch so proton works. I may do guide here becuase uplay+ is going away to ubisoft+ connect now.

 

Oh cool, I didn't realize you were missing something for Proton to work. I read that Proton installs the necessary libraries for it to run properly... then again there is all kinds of different hardware, audio, video, etc.

 

DirectX Runtime June 2010, its an .exe file its not compressed. not sure what you mean.

yeah for Arch users for proton to work in lutris need selinux-python and dxvk-bin or it wont launch at all