For reference, I use Debian as my host operating system with QEMU/KVM, but you can apply the same steps using other operating systems and VM software. The steps are similar using QEMU under Windows 10, for example.
Why play OSRS in a Virtual Machine?
Besides curiosity, there are a few benefits to consider:
- You can hop more worlds without being kicked out of the game.
- One-click to log in, as opposed to typing in your password. Great if you are AFK training.
- The look & feel is entirely different, and some people prefer it.
If you have a rather slow computer, this wouldn’t be a good option over the regular Runescape client. Since we’re in 2020, I assume most of you reading this have half-way decent computers.
Why Android x86 over Bluestacks?
Android x86 is open source software, and simply a part of the mobile operating system to regular PC hardware. As you can see in this Youtube video, Android x86 can also be installed as the primary operating system, and run Runescape Mobile:
For something easy to use and better graphics performance, Bluestacks is better for Windows machines. I personally don’t like it since it is full of advertisements and uses many closed-source components.
Where to download Android x86
You can download the latest image from the official project website: https://www.android-x86.org/download
In Linux/BSD/MAC, you can download it from the command line: ```bash wget https://osdn.net/dl/android-x86/android-x86-9.0-r2.iso
Installing with KVM
Once you have your CD image downloaded, you will also need to create a hard disk image. 8GB is sufficient, but if you plan on experimenting with other applications, you can make it as large as you wish. This is the command I used to create a 16 Gigabyte image:
qemu-img create -f qcow2 android.img 16G
Once the image has been created, here is a basic launch command using default values and 2 Gigabytes of RAM:
kvm -net nic -net user -m 2G -cdrom android-x86-9.0-r2.iso OSRS.img
For Windows, BSD or MAC users, you may also replace “kvm” with qemu.
Once you get to the boot launcher, select the third option: “Installation – Install Android-x86 to harddisk”.
This should promptly bring you to the first step of the installer: Partition Creation.
Create a Partition using the first option, and select No when asked to use GPT. In the partition creator, select New – Primary – and press enter to confirm the partition size. Scroll over and click Write – type yes – Bootable – Quit. You will then be brought back to the partitioner with a blue background.
Click OK – Ext4 – Yes – Yes (to install bootloader Grub) – Yes (to install /system as read-write).
This will start installing Android to your virtual disk. If everything goes OK, the installation will finish and reboot automatically.
Go through the configuration as if it were a brand new phone, but with the Wifi portion, select the dummy access point named “VirtWifi” to connect to the Internet.
Once everything is to your liking, open the Play Store, sign in with your Google account, and install the OSRS Mobile app.
