Hi all,

I just tried to re-install two older games - Falcon Gold and The Witcher - and both wouldn't start on macOS Big Sur.

I assume that this is a "64bit issue". I understand that both games are running under some DOS emulation. DOSBox should have 64bit support by now, but e.g. Boxer (a "UI wrapper" around DOSBox for macOS) is essentially "abandoned" and left as 32bit application (means: "won't work on macOS > Mojave").

So are GOG games in general "bundled with Boxer" (I did see some references to Boxer here in the forum)? Or was I just unlucky with those two games?

Or asked more general: any luck with DOS-based games from GOG on macOS Big Sur?

This is what I am getting on the command line, e.g. for Falcon Gold:

% pwd
/Applications/Falcon Gold.app/Contents/MacOS

% ls
GOGLauncher

% ./GOGLauncher
The application cannot be opened for an unexpected reason, error=Error Domain=NSOSStatusErrorDomain Code=-10386 "(null)" UserInfo={_LSLine=3844, _LSFunction=_LSOpenStuffCallLocal}

The same error also for The Witcher (which also has a "GOGLauncher" as executable).

The macOS system report claims that both binaries (Falcon Gold and The Witcher) are "Intel" binaries (so they should work - no mention of "32bit (unsupported)".

Oh, and most importantly: I am on an Intel Mac ;) (iMac 27" 2020, for that matter). Running Big Sur with latest macOS patches applied.


UPDATE: I actually got another game to work on macOS Big Sur: Wing Commander 3 - Heart Of The Tiger.

I assume that this game is also using some kind of DOXBox emulation - but apparently a different one (?) than the other two games (Falcon Gold and The Witcher).

Have you considered:


[spoiler]



not gaming on a Mac?



[/spoiler]

It's clear that gaming on a Mac has always been an uphill battle, and Apple isn't going to make that any easier.

Bootcamp and install Windows?

Otherwise, not sure what to suggest. Gaming on a Mac used to be a (just about) viable option. However, Apple's most recent business decisions make it less so (let's be honest, Apple products are more fashion statements than anything else at this point)

In my experience, GOG was/has been slowly changing their DOS games from 32-bit Boxer games to 64-bit DOSBox games, which is why some DOS games work (DOSBox) and some don't (Boxer).

I believe The Witcher is a windows game though, so it would be running through WINE (32-bit version).

For DOS games, there is a forked Boxer which runs on 64-bit:
https://boxer.thec0de.com/
It works great in my experience by downloading the offline installers and adding them to Boxer (I don't know anything about Galaxy though so I can't comment on that).

Your best bet for a free way to run Windows games on Big Sur is Porting Kit:
https://portingkit.com/

You could try https://dosbox-staging.github.io/downloads/macos/ instead of the Dosbox that is used by GOG for DOS games.

Windows trolls need to stay out of Mac threads, since you have no clue what you're talking about and don't provide any help whatsoever.

As mentioned above, 64-bit Boxer exists and is the way to go for DOS games. Much nicer than plain DOSBox. If you have more than a couple DOS games it's probably better to not use any GOG versions directly anyway and use Boxer instead, so you don't end up with multiple redundant DOSBox installs.

Witcher is old but not THAT old. ;) It's not a DOS game. You can expect that for old 32-bit Mac games, you can download the Windows version instead and use Wine to run them. PortingKit is essentially Wine but click-and-go, no need for buying Windows and messing with Bootcamp (which doesn't work on new Macs anyway). You might also consider CrossOver, which is similar, but as with Boxer it provides a common Wine install for multiple games, so you don't end up with redundant files.

What if I want to suggest they install a real Unix system instead? ;)

What if I suggest you stop the idiotic trolling?