AlterWare Launcher

Official launcher for AlterWare Call of Duty mods

IW4-SP | IW5-Mod | IW6-Mod | S1-Mod

[!IMPORTANT] Only legitimate copies of the games are supported. If you don't own the game, please buy it.

🗺️ Table of Contents

• Installation
• Supported Games
• Command line arguments
• Config file
• Building from Source
• Support

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📦 Installation

Windows | Debian/Ubuntu | Other Linux OS | macOS

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🪟 Windows

1. Download the game from Steam.
2. Download the appropriate version of the AlterWare launcher:
3. Windows 64-bit: Download the latest alterware-launcher.exe.
4. Windows 32-bit: Download the latest alterware-launcher-x86.exe.
5. Place the alterware-launcher.exe in the game directory.
6. Run alterware-launcher.exe. After updating, the game will launch automatically.

[!NOTE] Windows 7 is no longer supported.

[!IMPORTANT]

Information for server owners:

On Windows, the launcher self-updates and restarts by spawning a new console. For automated processes, use --skip-launcher-update and manually download the latest launcher from here.

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🐧 Debian/Ubuntu (amd64/arm64)

1. Download the game from Steam using either SteamCMD or the official Steam desktop app.
2. Follow the instructions provided in this forum post to install the alterware-launcher using our self-hosted APT repository.
3. Once installed, run the launcher from your game directory to download the client files automatically.

[!TIP] Use the --update command-line argument if you want to launch the game through Proton or other Wine versions instead of the default wine found in your path.

[!NOTE] The steps above can be used for any Debian-based distribution that uses the APT package manager.

[!NOTE] For more information on how to run the launcher on Linux, see this guide.

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🐧 Other Linux OS

1. Download the game from Steam using either SteamCMD or the official Steam desktop app.
2. Download the latest release corresponding to your system architecture.
   • Most likely you want alterware-launcher-x86_64-unknown-linux-gnu.tar.gz
3. Unpack the archive and copy the alterware-launcher executable to your game directory.
   • Alternatively, you can place it in your PATH so you can run it from anywhere. For example, in /usr/local/bin/
4. Make the launcher executable: chmod +x alterware-launcher
5. Run the launcher from your game directory to download the client files: ./alterware-launcher

[!TIP] Use the --update command-line argument if you want to launch the game through Proton or other Wine versions instead of the default wine found in your path.

[!NOTE] For more information on how to run the launcher on Linux, see this guide.

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🍎 macOS

1. Download the game from Steam using either SteamCMD or the official Steam desktop app.
2. Download the latest alterware-launcher.
3. Once installed, run the launcher from your game directory to download the client files automatically. For updates, use the launcher from the terminal with the --update command-line argument as explained in this guide.

[!CAUTION] Running the AlterWare launcher on macOS has not been officially tested. However, since WINE has a macOS port, it should theoretically be possible to run our clients on this platform.

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🎮 Supported Games

[!IMPORTANT] Only legitimate copies of the games are supported. If you don't own the game, please buy it.

IW4-SP
Call of Duty: Modern Warfare 2 - Singeplayer

IW5-Mod
Call of Duty: Modern Warfare 3 - Singleplayer, SpecOps

IW6-Mod
Call of Duty: Ghosts

S1-Mod
Call of Duty: Advanced Warfare

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⚙️ Command line arguments

• iw4-sp, iw5-mod, iw6-mod, s1-mod
• Skip automatic detection and launch the specified game
  • Must be the first argument if used
• --help
• Print help
• --update, -u
• Update the game without launching it
• --skip-launcher-update
• Skip updating the launcher
• --bonus
• Download bonus content (default)
• --skip-bonus
• Don't download bonus content
• --force, -f
• Force file hash recheck
• --path, -p
• Set the game installation path
  • Do not include a trailing backslash in the path
• --pass
• Pass additional arguments to the game
  • See client-args.md for more details
• --version, -v
• Print the launcher version
• --ignore-required-files
• Install client even if required files are missing
• --skip-redist
• Skip installing redistributables
• --redist
• Install or reinstall redistributables
• --prerelease
• Update to prerelease version of the launcher
• --cdn-url
• --offline

Example:

alterware-launcher.exe iw6 --bonus -u --path "C:\Games\IW6x" --pass "-headless"

[!TIP] Some arguments can be set in alterware-launcher.json, args generally override the values of the config.

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🔧 Config file alterware-launcher.json

• update_only: Set to true to only update the game. Default: false.
• skip_self_update: Skip launcher updates. Default: false.
• download_bonus_content: Automatically download bonus content. Default: false.
• ask_download_bonus_content: Ask before downloading bonus content. Default: false.
• force_update: Force file recheck. Default: false.
• args: Pass additional arguments to the game. Default: "".
• use_https: Use HTTPS for downloads. Default: true.
• skip_redist: Skip redistributable installations. Default: false.
• prerelease: Update to prerelease version of clients and launcher. Default: false.
• cdn_url
• offline

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🔨 Building from Source

See CONTRIBUTING.md for details.

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❓ Support

Need help or have questions? We're here to help you!

• AlterWare Forum: Visit our official forum for in-depth discussions, troubleshooting, and community support.
• Discord Community: Join our Discord server for real-time chat, quick questions, and to connect with other users.

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