Oh hey look I got Tuxborn working on my Mac!
Earlier this year I wrote about how I was experimenting with running modded Skyrim on my MacBook Pro, directly in macOS as opposed to using a Windows VM.
I’m now very pleased to report that I’ve pulled this off. I copied my working install of Tuxborn 1.2 up to my Mac, and courtesy of using a program called Crossover, I was able to get Tuxborn actually working on my Mac.
I have put two relevant wiki pages onto the site wiki:
Recommended means of playing and modding Skyrim on macOS
This one is my overview of the tools you’ll need to consider for playing, and possibly also modding, Skyrim on macOS. What tools you’ll specifically need will depend on exactly what you want to do.
The most critical tool you’ll need is Crossover. You may also need Parallels and a Windows VM, depending on how exactly you’d like to mod Skyrim, and also whether you’re considering playing any games not confirmed to work on Crossover.
And in this one, I describe two possible ways to get the Skyrim modpack Tuxborn working on macOS:
- Doing a fresh Tuxborn install, which requires Crossover, Parallels and a Windows VM, and Wabbajack to be used in the VM. MO2 will be installed as part of the Tuxborn install.
- Copying a working Tuxborn install off of another device, and setting it up to launch via Crossover.
So if you’re a Mac user, and you’re interested in running Skyrim directly on macOS (with or without mods), have a look at what I’ve written up and let me know my information is helpful to you!
Angela Korra'ti
As Angela Highland, Angela is the writer of the Rebels of Adalonia epic fantasy series with Carina Press. As Angela Korra'ti, she writes the Free Court of Seattle urban fantasy series. She's also an amateur musician and devoted fan of Newfoundland and Quebecois traditional music.
7 Comments
Fynman
Amazing you were able to figute this out! Any chance you could do a step by step guide to transfer the install from the deck to Mac? Like, which folders, first set up, how to run MO2?
Angela Korra'ti
I’m working on fleshing out the details on the second of the two links I have in the post here. There are some additional problems I’m trying to solve and document!
But I can get more specific with the parts involving getting the working install off of the Deck, and how to launch MO2 once you have all the stuff copied onto the Mac.
Fynman
So, many hours later I can confirm that I got this running somehow.
However, I have the decolorized face issue on the player character, some very odd face texture mixing on NPCs and… unfortunately no sky textures or grass at all.
D3DMetal doesn’t work at all for me (got the interface but everything else is black). With Auto I at least got it running. I might test each individual one to see if something solves the above mentioned issues.
Side Note: my Mod Organizer from the Tuxborn folder had a Runtime error on start-up. Installed the latest .NET-framework into the bottle in Crossover, then it worked, however, MO2 now has the original design-style and everything is a bit messy. Even if I re-copied the old files from the Tuxborn Steam-Deck install.
This might be a reason for the issues above but who the hell knows.
Angela Korra'ti
It sounds like you’re running into some of the same issues I did. Depending on which settings I’m choosing in Crossover, I will see either sky textures missing, or grass textures.
And I DID briefly see the black face issue in RaceMenu, but something I did made that go away and I’m genuinely not sure what.
Right now I’m trying to see if I re-run Wabbajack on the files I copied off my Deck, does that settle stuff down any. I’ll update here if I find that’s successful.
I’ve also been able to confirm that at least on my system, I’m able to launch the Tuxborn – Deck profile, either with saves copied off my Deck, OR with starting a new test character. Trying to make a new test character via Tuxborn – Desktop did NOT work, I was able to do chargen, but as soon as I came out of chargen and landed on the Solitude docks, my FPS dropped hard into the single digit range.
I’m on an M1 MacBook Pro. What flavor of Mac do you have? If you have something later than an M1, you may be better positioned to try Tuxborn – Desktop than I am.
Fynman
Update.
So the Decolorized Face comes from “Skin Feature Overlays SE – Freckles Scars Birthmarks Stretch Marks Moles and More for Face and Body RaceMenu Overlays”. Deactiveate and everything seems fine.
The Skybox and other graphical issues come from “Community Shaders”. Deactivated and the game runs almost perfect.
Of course this is quite unfortunate. Wonder if there’s a different installation that would work, but no idea with which one they ran in Tuxborn.
The only remaining issue is that the sun’s light is flickering if you look directly into it.
And yes, I run on a M4Pro so Desktop-Mode without Community Shaders ran super smooth
Angela Korra'ti
Tuxborn just dropped a minor release this very day, but we’re still not on the most recent Community Shaders. That was my main suspect for why things might look weird, but so far I hadn’t been able to confirm that, so thank you for that info.
Since I have no End key on my MacBook Pro keyboard, I haven’t been able to get into the CS UI! I was going to try to recompile my shaders to see if that improved matters any. But it sounds like you beat me to that.
Ooh yeah, M4? Good to know you were able to get the Desktop profile running. 😀
Angela Korra'ti
Additional followup: I just confirmed your finding that disabling Community Shaders fixes my missing grass, awesome.
Tuxborn’s version of Community Shaders is 1.2.1, current version of Community Shaders is 1.3. We’re well into Rule 11 territory here, so it might be interesting to see whether 1.3 works any better.
Ouro’s said on the Discord that the 1.1.3 version of Tuxborn will be the last one for a while, and he’s not likely to do 1.2 until later this year. He wants to work on his Enderal list for a bit. So we have time for further research before the next Tuxborn version drops!