40 replies to this topic

[mattw]

As there are strong rumours that Lion (Mac OS X 10.7) will not support Rosetta I thought it might be an idea to share what PowerPC games we all still have installed and take a look at any methods of running them going forward (without dual booting).

I'll kick off with some of mine:

4x4 Evo2
Age of Empires 2
AvP 1
Battlefield 1942+SW
Commandos 2 & 3      - possible patch from Feral?
Cromag Rally
Delta Force Black Hawk Down - source a cheap PC version for Wine/Crossover
Diablo 2    -  install PC version from same disc in Crossover?
Star Trek Elite Force 2  - PC version expensive and problems in Wine
F1 2000 - hope VGP3 gets more tracks or look for alternative to run in Wine
FA-18 OIF - ??
Heretic 2 - PC version in Wine
Homeworld 2
Journeyman Project 3 - only got this recently and I think an Intel version was a problem.
Max Payne - PC version in Crossover
Medal of Honor + Expansions - PC versions in Crossover/Wine
MTX Motrax - try PC version included in Wine
Nascar 2003 - ?
NOLF - PC version in wine?
Oni - Intel Patch coming?
Real Myst
Red Faction
Sin
Spiderman
Splinter Cell ?? Problems in Wine
SW Battlefront
Starcraft - try PC version on same disc in Crossover or get SC2
Stubbs ??
SW GB
Return of the King?
TR AOD ?
TR Chronicles ? Problems in Wine
Total Immersion - probably too old to get a UB patch
True Crime - PC version in Wine
Undying - PC version in Crossover?
Unreal Tournament (99)
XIII   - patch one day from Feral?

[Janichsan]

I only have Starcraft, Neverwinter Nights and Battlefield 1942 as PPC only games installed at the moment, though I also have Diablo II lying around. NWN, Starcraft and Diablo II should work well in CrossOver. Battlefield also works in principle under CXG, but I have some odd problems with it there.

[Smoke_Tetsu]

Most if not all those games run well in wrappers and faster than in rosetta. In my experience rosetta has never had blazing speed even on games even with fast hardware. It worked best with simple applications. Performance wise believe it or not wrappers including cider beat the pants off of rosetta especially newer games.

If a game is Unreal engine based or Quake engine based (especially older versions of those engines) they are quite suited for wrapping. From a compatibility standpoint.

Newer games run well too but compatibility isn't guaranteed especially if they use proprietary engines.... also compatibility for eastern engines like capcom's isn't as good as western ones. I only have a couple of eastern games installed at the moment.

I have about 46 native games and 40 wrapped games right now and 0 rosetta'ed games.  

Personally I recommend using a wrapper system like WINEskin\Cider over crossover because you can make custom tailored wrappers for each game and you don't run the risk of bringing your whole house of cards down by installing software into a bottle..... or breaking a bottle causing the application to crash until you remove the bottle. Someone used to make a crossover based wrapper but it has been abandoned in favor of WINEskin 2.0. Being able to do custom environments in wrappers is a benefit Mac has over Linux that doesn't have app bundles. They have DOSBox based wrappers for old DOS games and those especially benefit since DOS games can tend to  be even more finnicky about environment settings.

As for comments on games listed

Clive Barker's Undying works very well in crossover\WINEskin\Cider btw. there's a patch out there for the PC version that adds in detail textures.

Elite Force 2 (you don't specify the problems you have) works fine for me but it still has a bug with the lens flares in WINE which have to be disabled. You can turn up everything except that. Serious Sam second encounter also suffers from that bug now that I'm on that subject.

Unreal Gold and Unreal Tournament 2009 are better in WINE also because the detail textures work better and you can install the unofficial patches and S3TC textures... and also music works.

It's a good idea to check winehq's app compatibility database.... that more or less gives you the idea if a certain game will work well... they also have tips for getting things to work.

You might find that until recently the old AvP games had some show stopping bugs that caused performance problems. They need a more recent version of WINE so I would suggest WINEskin 2.0 for those as gives access to the latest.

One other thing is you should get comfortable with editing cfg files in text edit to get the most out of those old games. I typically do that especially to get the highest settings possible out of them. in a wrapper you could make aliases to the most accessed files in the wrapper in the wrapper's main folder and or aliases to most used folders inside the wrapper.

[Eric5h5]

Smoke_Tetsu, on 27 February 2011 - 09:53 AM, said:

Performance wise believe it or not wrappers including cider beat the pants off of rosetta especially newer games.

I don't know why that would be hard to believe, considering that no emulation is happening with wrappers, whereas Rosetta has to emulate PPC code.  That said, I played Warcraft III recently with someone on a 2010 Mac Pro and a 2007 Mac mini, and as I didn't have it previously installed, we used the version straight from the CDs, and it wasn't until later that I realized that it had been running with Rosetta, since it wasn't patched.  I have to say it wasn't noticeable even on the mini, although it's true that Warcraft III is pretty old.  (Note to certain other companies who aren't Blizzard: here's a game from 2003, which even unpatched runs flawlessly in the latest OS.  Why can't you do that?)

--Eric

[mattw]

Eric5h5, on 27 February 2011 - 01:05 PM, said:

I don't know why that would be hard to believe, considering that no emulation is happening with wrappers, whereas Rosetta has to emulate PPC code.  That said, I played Warcraft III recently with someone on a 2010 Mac Pro and a 2007 Mac mini, and as I didn't have it previously installed, we used the version straight from the CDs, and it wasn't until later that I realized that it had been running with Rosetta, since it wasn't patched.  I have to say it wasn't noticeable even on the mini, although it's true that Warcraft III is pretty old.  (Note to certain other companies who aren't Blizzard: here's a game from 2003, which even unpatched runs flawlessly in the latest OS.  Why can't you do that?)

--Eric

That's another point I hadn't really considered - even when there is an Intel or UB patch often the installer on the CD/DVD will be PowerPC and need Rosetta.

Thanks Smoke_Tetsu for the info. I haven't tried the PC version of Elite Force 2 (just the Mac one back on my G5 and now in Rosetta) but based on the fact it is working for you I've bought a copy along with Black Hawk Down to try in Wineskin 2.  I'm optimistic as you have an ATI card as well. Sometimes I read that things work at Winehq only to find that is only the case with Nvidia cards.

[Smoke_Tetsu]

If a game doesn't work in WINEskin or work well then chances are Cider will do the trick. They have different compatibility characteristics being different branches of WINE (the latter is a proprietary version of WINE branched from transgaming's WINEX). On ATI hardware for example UE3 games work better in Cider specifically using versions past 4xxx. But for Elite Force II either should do the trick I think. WINEskin like crossover just has way too many glitches and missing graphics while running UE3 games but I digress since this thread is about older games. But it just goes to show they've done workarounds for ATI cards in there that may benefit some games.

Anyway, keep in mind for EF2 in particular you have to turn off lens flares still.... and being a Q3A engine game has a high level of compatibility with either type of wrapper.

Here's some screenshots from my wrapped games relevant to this thread... taken from my ATI card of course:

http://dl.dropbox.co...944/IMG/EF2.jpg

http://dl.dropbox.co...944/IMG/EF1.jpg

http://dl.dropbox.co...4/IMG/FAKK2.jpg

I also may add some old Mac games particularly of the UE1\2 variety don't like having their config files manually edited for things like custom resolutions but the PC versions wrapped work just fine doing that. EF1 is too friggin' buggy playing the old PowerPC version even if Rosetta is around with messed up cut scenes and crashes trying to load certain levels.

[mattw]

Smoke_Tetsu, on 27 February 2011 - 04:40 PM, said:

EF1 is too friggin' buggy playing the old PowerPC version even if Rosetta is around with messed up cut scenes and crashes trying to load certain levels.

Yeah I ended up buying the PC version of EF 1 and it worked fine in CG 9 - played through it all no problem once I'd allocated more RAM in the config file. There was already an Intel Mac build of the multiplayer so I kept the Mac version installed separately for that. The only thing I don't have is the single player expansion pack features that I had with the Mac version.

[mattw]

mattw, on 27 February 2011 - 06:08 PM, said:

Yeah I ended up buying the PC version of EF 1 and it worked fine in CG 9 - played through it all no problem once I'd allocated more RAM in the config file. There was already an Intel Mac build of the multiplayer so I kept the Mac version installed separately for that. The only thing I don't have is the single player expansion pack features that I had with the Mac version.

Well a couple of my recently purchased PC versions arrived today. Elite Force 2 installed and runs fine so far in a WineSkin wrapper (It didn't recognise the 2nd CD despite having two optical drives but I copied the pak files manually). The only issue in game I have seen so far is that it doesn't recognise the wheel on my Logitech Performance MX mouse (I don't use the Logitech software but it is normally recognised elsewhere OK).

The other game that arrived was Delta Force Black Hawk Down (with the Team Sabre expansion). This all installs and patches to 1.5.05 in either WineSkin or Crossover Games 10 but despite all the reports of it working it doesn't load for me. It mentions something about DFBHD.CMD at the end of the install and when I run it it bounces a few times then quits. The log file is the same from either:

err:module:import_dll Loading library IBrowse.dll (which is needed by L"C:\\Program Files\\NovaLogic\\Delta Force Black Hawk Down\\DFBHD.EXE") failed (error c0000020).
err:module:LdrInitializeThunk Main exe initialization for L"C:\\Program Files\\NovaLogic\\Delta Force Black Hawk Down\\DFBHD.EXE" failed, status c0000135

I tried setting a virtual desktop but no change.

[Smoke_Tetsu]

When you insert a disc most of the time WINE mounts it as a different lettered drive "d: f: g: etc." and your other drive probably was just mounted as a different letter than what you thought.

For the second thing I'm just guessing here but it looks like it's failing because it can't find "IBrowse.dll" sometimes to fix something like that you have to find the dll it mentions and either put it somewhere in your path either in the same folder as the games .exe or in the WINE system32 folder. Either that or you can do an override and disable that dll like for example certain games look for a dll called gameux.dll which puts games into the games browser on Windows 7 but makes the game fail in WINE. One has to disable that DLL in the WINE preferences for it to work in WINE. Example:

This window is accesible by going into the wrapper and launching the wineskin app inside and then click on advanced then tools and then config utility (winecfg).
Note: yours wont look the same as mine as I turned on window decoration and loaded a windows uxtheme msstyle on it.

Alternatively you could also ask for help at the porting team forums.

[mattw]

Smoke_Tetsu, on 08 March 2011 - 04:32 PM, said:

For the second thing I'm just guessing here but it looks like it's failing because it can't find "IBrowse.dll" sometimes to fix something like that you have to find the dll it mentions and either put it somewhere in your path either in the same folder as the games .exe or in the WINE system32 folder. Either that or you can do an override and disable that dll like for example certain games look for a dll called gameux.dll which puts games into the games browser on Windows 7 but makes the game fail in WINE. One has to disable that DLL in the WINE preferences for it to work in WINE.

Thanks! Disabling iBrowse.dll didn't work but googling it there was a security patch from Novalogic which contained a different version of that dll and it now runs with that installed

Guess I can remove my PowerPC version now and tick another game off the list.

[Diablofett]

I still play a few PowerPC games when I have time. Oh, and Age of Empires II is UB now. They released 1.0.6 about a year ago.

My (non-Universal Binary PPC Games):

Return to Castle Wolfenstein - Excluding the "Unofficial UB"
Rainbow Six 3 - Raven Shield and Athena Sword
Neverwinter Nights - SoU HoTU
Baldur's Gate II - SoA and ToB
Icewind Dale
Sacrifice
SiN
Fallout 2
True Crime - Streets of L.A.
Starcraft - BW
Diablo II - LoD

I probably missed a few, but those are my OS X PPC games as far as I can currently remember offhand. I could see Blizzard bringing out some UB patches for Diablo II or Starcraft at some point. The rest of the games are out of luck once Rosetta is gone, sadly.

[mattw]

Diablofett, on 08 March 2011 - 06:51 PM, said:

I still play a few PowerPC games when I have time. Oh, and Age of Empires II is UB now. They released 1.0.6 about a year ago.

I checked my install and it is 1.0.6 but it shows as a PowerPC application - not sure I can see any reference to a UB on Macsoft's site?

I've ordered a PC copy of True Crime as that should work in WINE.

I installed PC version of Max Payne which worked fine in Wineskin and also NOLF 1 today. NOLF looked fine but the mouse stops working in game so it isn't really playable. I tried disabling the hardware cursor but no joy.

[Diablofett]

mattw, on 09 March 2011 - 04:24 PM, said:

I checked my install and it is 1.0.6 but it shows as a PowerPC application - not sure I can see any reference to a UB on Macsoft's site?

I've ordered a PC copy of True Crime as that should work in WINE.

I installed PC version of Max Payne which worked fine in Wineskin and also NOLF 1 today. NOLF looked fine but the mouse stops working in game so it isn't really playable. I tried disabling the hardware cursor but no joy.

My mistake, I could have sworn it said Universal Binary last time I did a "Get Info" on the application. Well, it looks like that game is out of luck as well.

[Tesseract]

Slightly off topic: Getting rid of Rosetta is a pretty lame move IMO. As unlikely as it is that Apple will pay any attention, this is probably worth making a stand on. Send feedback, file a radar if you have a developer account, email Tim Cook.

Apple seems to want to ignore the existence of legacy software. Yeah it's a pain, and yeah people should upgrade when possible, but it sometimes isn't. Legacy apps exist, and they are important to users. 5 years ago you had a reasonable chance of being able to run an app from 20 years before that. Now you'll be lucky to be able to run something 5 years old (not to mention games that were still being patched much more recently but never got a UB, like Neverwinter Nights).

Getting rid of Classic was understandable with the Intel switch, even if the timing looks pretty obnoxious in hindsight, with it being left out of the last PPC-bootable OS release. There's no such justification here.

[Diablofett]

Tesseract, on 11 March 2011 - 12:51 AM, said:

Slightly off topic: Getting rid of Rosetta is a pretty lame move IMO. As unlikely as it is that Apple will pay any attention, this is probably worth making a stand on. Send feedback, file a radar if you have a developer account, email Tim Cook.

Apple seems to want to ignore the existence of legacy software. Yeah it's a pain, and yeah people should upgrade when possible, but it sometimes isn't. Legacy apps exist, and they are important to users. 5 years ago you had a reasonable chance of being able to run an app from 20 years before that. Now you'll be lucky to be able to run something 5 years old (not to mention games that were still being patched much more recently but never got a UB, like Neverwinter Nights).

Getting rid of Classic was understandable with the Intel switch, even if the timing looks pretty obnoxious in hindsight, with it being left out of the last PPC-bootable OS release. There's no such justification here.

I agree with you on this topic Tesseract. Removing the ability to use non-Intel applications at this point would be ridiculous and very obnoxious. I hope Apple does not do this, it is far too early. I know technology moves very fast, but shouldn't we at least be able to use things that came before?

[mattw]

I see this from both angles. It is nice to have a clean system without too much legacy stuff. The problem is that games have too often been abandoned by the publisher months after release and the OS has moved on. Only the most popular titles have been given regular patches. Hopefully with things like steam and the app store making it easier to keep titles available without investing in doing another run of optical media we can keep our favourites around.

As a side note my copy of the PC version of True Crime arrived today and I eventually got it working in Crossover Games 10 using a Win98 Bottle. The installer gave an error after disc 3 with WineSkin and CG 10 using an XP bottle. It runs at 1024x768 but if I edit the .ini file to 1680x1050 it crashes on launch - the Aspyr PowerPC one worked in widescreen after editing the ini

[Mister Mumbles]

You know, older OS X games that have later been patched to Intel may be negatively affected as well because some may have come with installation apps that are only PPC-coded, for example some of Feral's titles.

[mattw]

Mister Mumbles, on 13 March 2011 - 02:24 AM, said:

You know, older OS X games that have later been patched to Intel may be negatively affected as well because some may have come with installation apps that are only PPC-coded, for example some of Feral's titles.

Yeah - it is a good idea to back up your installs so you don't risk having to run an installer in 10.7.

[Mister Mumbles]

I still can't fathom why Apple would completely drop Rosetta support. I mean, at the very least they could just let it be a manual download file on their site. It's not like there's a whole lot of effort on Apple's part. It's already working so why cut it out completely unless it's fundamentally broken? As it is, I remember it being very small size-wise.

If it is true that Rosetta won't be in 10.7 then I might not upgrade my OS for some time because, frankly, the few new features shown in Lion are pretty much worthless to me. I'd feel more like I was downgrading rather than upgrading.

[Thain Esh Kelch]

The question is, would it be possible to move a 10.6 Rosetta installation over onto Lion?