Lord of the Rings Online Forum

With Catalina's release, Standing Stone (current operators/devs for lotro) have stated in a forum post that the game is not compatible with Catalina, and that players must remain on Mojave (10.14).

Short of bootcamp or virtualisation options, it seems like Crossover 19 is the best hope for running Lotro on Catalina. For my limited part, I've been able to get the launcher running, but clicking 'Play Now' closes the installer and no game. The crash report that appears in the lotro log is "000000000.000: Program fault: ACCESS_VIOLATION (0xc0000005) trying to write to 0x000000EC"

Not sure if anyone else has had better experience (or is still playing lotro 😊 )

Same problem for me. The lotro logs seem to suggest it was DirectX initialisation issue for me, but I couldn’t get it working - tried reinstalling DirectX etc. I’m using Parallels for now but would be excellent if it could work in Crossover again.

I got this working yesterday. The problem was with the graphics, I believe.

I am running Catalina 10.15.2 on a very recent iMac with retina 4k screen. Installation went fine in a new bottle, screen resolution on my Mac was standard retina 2048 x 1152. With this resolution I could start the Lotro launcher, but not the actual game (failed to start the game up after selecting "No" to DirectX 10 option dialogue). I tried various tweaks in the settings of the game, but it always started to open the app, then crash. I did some reading and found some advice about the resolution.

The problem appeared to be the graphics, after it detected the various resolution modes it crashed, because the high resolution mode of the Mac and the application trying to start up in full screen mode always caused a crash.

I loaded a free application from the App Store to easily change the screen resolution on the Mac: EasyRes.

Changed the resolution to 1280 x 720 "720p" and re-installed the game in a new bottle from scratch.

This time running the Lotro launcher I chose again the DirectX 9 option (say "No" to DirectX 10 if dialogue appears).

Application then appears to start - but I still had an issue with the full screen mode. The Screen was just black - closed it again and looked at the UserPreferences.ini file in the My Documents folder of the bottle (there is a menu to access the log folder from the Lotro Launcher) and checked the DISPLAY section of the ini file.
Changed the screen mode to Windowed from FullScreen: ScreenMode=Windowed.

Re-started the bottle and this time the main application was able to start up properly and I could again access and play LOTRO.

You can use EasyRes to change your screen resolution back to normal on your Mac, and also change the screen resolution/size of the Lotro app in it's own settings. Tested closing and re-opening the game, and everything working as good as expected.

Hope this helps...

Thanks for your tips but it didn't work for me. I didn't even have screen mode in my .ini file. I've tried a fresh install but I am still getting the issue where the game crashes as soon as I've chosen my server. It also seems to go back to the password page before asking me if I want to use DX10 (to which I choose no of course). Very frustrating

Seems to be running fine for me. Though I haven't run it through it's paces, I got to my Crickhollow server just fine, and starting up in Moria. I haven't tested high def installation, just standard.

I'm running Catalina 10.15.5. MacBook Pro 2019, i5 1.4 Ghz, 8GB RAM

Steps, as per https://www.lotro.com/forums/showthread.php?658230-INSTALL-New-LotRO-Installs-One-Guide-to-Rule-Them-All

I didn't use steam.

Create a new installation.
Make lotrolive.exe the installer.
Windows 7 32-bit bottle.

Install options, add the Following:
DirectX for Modern games
.net Framework 3.5 SP1 (must be SP1, the other one crashed)
Microsoft Visual C++ 2005 Redistributable (not 64-bit)
Microsoft Visual C++ 2010 Redistributable (not 64-bit)

Run the bottle, go grab your favourite beverage, it should be OK.

Thanks for the detailed steps, but I still struck out on the same "ACCESS_VIOLATION (0xc0000005) trying to write to 0x000000EC". The only difference that I can see is that I'm still using 10.14.6 - I won't upgrade until I either get Lotro working or give up!

I am on a 2020 MacBook Pro running Catalina 10.15.5, and have also been getting the ACCESS_VIOLATION. I've tried variations on Dave's formula, 32 and 64 bit Windows 7 and 10, various extra packages...nothing has worked for me so far.

I have succesfully run lotro on my MBPro 16 thanks to Steve.
You just don't have to reinstall the game after running easyres app.
Lotro runs in windowed mode only, so you have to modify ini files first.
Max resolution is - if I recall correctly - 1280*800. When you have succesfully game running you can switch your mac resolution back to retina, the game stays running in its window.
The only issue I had were loud fans. But after installing
https://crystalidea.com/macs-fan-control
they were a little bit less noisy, but I hadn't time to play with it.

Edit: I was using crossover 20.0 rc1.

Marcel Mravec wrote:

I have succesfully run lotro on my MBPro 16 thanks to Steve.

You just don't have to reinstall the game after running easyres app.

Lotro runs in windowed mode only, so you have to modify ini files
first.
Max resolution is - if I recall correctly - 1280*800. When you have
succesfully game running you can switch your mac resolution back to
retina, the game stays running in its window.
The only issue I had were loud fans. But after installing
https://crystalidea.com/macs-fan-control
they were a little bit less noisy, but I hadn't time to play with
it.

Edit: I was using crossover 20.0 rc1.

That was the issue -- screen resolution! Using EasyRes I switched to 1152x720 which allowed the game to open, even in fullscreen mode. After I changed to "Windowed Mode" within the LotRO settings, I was able to play just fine with normal retina resolution. Wow, what a relief to finally have the game working! Many thanks.

Edit: Just to clarify, I was NOT able to get LotRO to open using the built-in OS X Display Settings to change screen resolution, even though you can effectively give the computer x480 resolution through this method. Also, 1280x800 wasn't enough within EasyRes--only when I tried 1152x720 did it work.

Mark Lanari wrote:

Marcel Mravec wrote:

I have succesfully run lotro on my MBPro 16 [b]thanks
to Steve[/b].
You just don't have to reinstall the game after running easyres
app.

Lotro runs in windowed mode only, so you have to modify ini files
first.
Max resolution is - if I recall correctly - 1280*800. When you
have
succesfully game running you can switch your mac resolution back
to
retina, the game stays running in its window.
The only issue I had were loud fans. But after installing
https://crystalidea.com/macs-fan-control
they were a little bit less noisy, but I hadn't time to play with
it.

Edit: I was using crossover 20.0 rc1.

That was the issue -- screen resolution! Using EasyRes I switched to
1152x720 which allowed the game to open, even in fullscreen mode.
After I changed to "Windowed Mode" within the LotRO settings, I was
able to play just fine with normal retina resolution. Wow, what a
relief to finally have the game working! Many thanks.

Edit: Just to clarify, I was NOT able to get LotRO to open using the
built-in OS X Display Settings to change screen resolution, even
though you can effectively give the computer x480 resolution through
this method. Also, 1280x800 wasn't enough within EasyRes--only when
I tried 1152x720 did it work.

Thanks - this sorted my problem and works great in Big Sur. One question, what resolution do you use on your 16" MBP in windowed mode. I am used 2048x1280 and then go to MacOS full screen but get black bars. Trying to increase the height of the resolution causes the black screen issues again.

So could someone make a step-by-step guide, Tip-fashion, for getting LOTRO installed on Catalina? There are several different bits of advice in this forum, and I don’t know which are necessary. Thanks!

Hello!

This is my first time trying to use Crossover with LOTRO. I have a 2019 Macbook Pro running 10.15.7. I have a completed bottle for Lotro but when I run the app I get this dialogue box:

Whether I select yes or no, nothing happens after that. Crossover remains open but nothing occurs. I'm going to try rebooting my machine but I would appreciate some help here. During the build of the bottle, I wasn't prompted to modify it or add on any software like DirectX. So I'm assuming I made a mistake with that part. I noticed a user in this thread mentioned that but again I wasn't clear when/where in the bottle installation/creation process that had to happen.

Thanks!

Hi, Craig!

First off, when presented with that DirectX 10 (or DirectX 11) dialogue, answer NO. DirectX 10 for LOTRO on a Mac in WINE or Crossover is a hot mess. DirectX 9 is fine and that is what you should try first. DirectX 11 is best but DirectX 11 won't work well or at all on certain discrete video cards and many integrated video systems. You can try DirectX 11 later once you get the game running in DirectX 9; then if it works and works well under DirectX 11 you can keep using it, otherwise you can go back to DirectX 9.

The issue you are experiencing is very common and is related to LOTRO's finickiness about resolutions. It does not handle typical Mac "retina" resolutions (more generally called "UHD" resolutions) well, especially in Full Screen Mode. And since your Mac has a retina display probably set to a pretty high retina resolution, and the game defaults to Full Screen Mode, you get what looks like either a failure to launch or a black screen.

Another thing that could be going wrong is that the Crossover "Crosstie" for LOTRO really isn't very good. You should set up a Windows 10 64-bit bottle, install "DirectX for Modern Games" into that bottle, and THEN install the Windows version of LOTRO using the installer from SSG's website. It is also important to have your bottle settings just right: PERFORMANCE ENHANCED GRAPHICS and DXVK BACKEND FOR D3D11 must both be checked, HIGH RESOLUTION MODE and PERFORMANCE ENHANCED SYNCHRONIZATION (ESYNC) must both be un-checked.

I'm going to refer you to a couple of other threads. They cover installing Crossover and LOTRO, mostly under Big Sur but everything applies to running Crossover and LOTRO under Catalina, too. Try following the procedures in those threads and if that doesn't work for you, report back here and I'll do my best to offer some help directed just for your issues. Good luck!

This one is a huge thread, Message #17 is the one with the fairly brief instructions:
https://www.lotro.com/forums/showthread.php?684532-Success-with-Crossover-20-and-MacOS-Big-Sur-11-0-1

Not a very long thread so worth reading in its entirety but Message #3 includes the important information for you:
https://www.lotro.com/forums/showthread.php?687419-Mac-Crossover-Issues-(Abby-Nicole-Continued-)

John,

Thank you so very much! Following your instructions I was able to get the game to run properly. The only snag I ran into was trying to run the game on the retina display scale but honestly I don't mind at all.

I haven't played since early 2019 so I'm thrilled to be back in Middle Earth. :)

I'm happy to hear that, Craig!

If you provide some details about your inability to play in "retina display scale" I might be able to help you fix that up.

Same Problem. The lotro logs seem to suggest it was DirectX initialisation has some issue for me, but I could not get it working. I’m using Parallels for now but would be excellent. It may be work again.
Team: 4lolipop