[cstar]

I got FS2 from Desura and had it working two years ago on my previous computer. I recently re-downloaded the game and attempted to run it again, but the FS2_Open app crashes on startup. I realized it was an older version of FS2 Open, so I downloaded the windows FS2 installer exe, opened it in wineskin and then copied those files over and ran the FS2 open installer. I now have the latest version of FS2, 3.7.2, but it still crashes on startup. It has opened to the pilot screen once when directly opening the FS2_Open app file, but has not done so since. I have tried to get a log file, but the debug version crashes without generating a log file. I've attached the OSX crash report for the debug version instead, which I hope could be useful. Thanks for any help you guys can give me!

My error seems similar to the error described here: http://www.hard-light.net/forums/index.php?topic=71493.msg1414036#msg1414036 but that solution has not worked for me.

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[Cyborg17]

You're using Wxlauncher, correct?

[cstar]

Yep. I've tried opening the app without the launcher and it makes no difference.

[niffiwan]

I can see that FSO is using this video card; Intel HD Graphics 4000. They aren't that well supported in FSO, can you try adding -no_glsl to the launcher options?

Advanced Settings -> Troubleshooting -> Disable GLSL (Shader) Support

[cstar]

Still crashes. My laptop has a graphics card, but I think OSX only uses it when there is high demand, which wouldn't happen when it crashes immediately.

[DahBlount]

Mac has relatively poor driver support on Intel graphics. Disable the following: Post-Processing, FXAA, Lightshafts, Deferred Lighting, Shadows, and GLSL support.

In addition: Please post your fs2_open.log file.  Instructions on how to do this can be found in this post.

[cstar]

I've disabled all of those that I can find. FS2_Open crashes without generating a log file, so I don't have anything other than the crash report to post. As far as I can tell, its the same issue as the one in the linked post in the OP.

[niffiwan]

FSO Debug should nearly always create a log, and from the OSX crash report FSO seems to have passed the point where the log will start being written. On OSX it can be found here:

~/Library/FS2_Open/data **

**NOTE FOR PEOPLE USING MAC OS X LION:
The library folder is hidden in the Finder for some excellent reason. Please see information here on how to access the folder.

I'm not very familiar with OSX, but is there a way that you can configure the more powerful GPU to always be used for FSO? On Windows this is usually found in the Nvidia or AMD control panel.

[AdmiralRalwood]

If you try a more recent Nightly Build, they export special values that should make the system default to the high-performance GPU; renderer changes may also affect your ability to launch the game.

[cstar]

I've tried the nightly build and had the same issue. I can attach the crash report for that if it would help. I have attached screenshots of my Freespace 2 folder and the folder that should contain the log file, which I still can't find 

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[DahBlount]

Have you tried running a debug build instead of the normal build? They will generally have "debug" or "DEBUG" at the end of the file name.

[cstar]

Yep, the crash report in the op is from a debug version.

[Cyborg17]

It's hard to figure out problems without the log, but let's try going back instead of forward.  We can try a really old but really stable build.  It's unlikely to work, but maybe an edge case broke somewhere along the way.

3.6.12 http://www.hard-light.net/forums/index.php?topic=70692.0

In addition try: Software Rendering mode.

Also do you have any mods activated?  Have you tried running vanilla (no mods)?

[niffiwan]

Could you also try creating the "data" directory in Library/FS2_Open? (FSO is *supposed* to create that if it doesn't exist, so I'm not sure what's going on there). Then run another debug build & see if fs2_open.log appears there?

[cstar]

I created the data directory, and a file showed up, I've attached it below!!!! My original download came with 3.6.12 and that had the same issue as 3.7.2, which is why I tried to upgrade.

[attachment deleted by nobody]

[niffiwan]

It looks like FSO has crashed while trying to initialise OpenGL. Try removing these command line options.

Code: [Select]

  -soft_particles
  -post_process
  -fb_explosions
  -nohtl

If that doesn't work, please run debug again and post another log.

Also, did you have any luck finding out if you can manually force OSX to use your more powerful GPU?

[cstar]

So I disabled those settings, but have no change, I've attached the new .log file below. I've set my computer to only use the discrete card, but it seems to not have made a difference.

Thanks for the help!

[attachment deleted by nobody]

[niffiwan]

Urgh, the log isn't very helpful. As a last resort, can you try running in 1024x768... but I'm really starting to feel that we've got a fatal bug with 3.7.2 on OSX, and we're going to need the OSX coders to have a look at it.

[Echelon9]

Cutting right through the testing here (thanks though), this is a known problem with OS X 10.x and one of the middleware layers the FS2Open engine uses, specifically SDL.

Apple made some changes behind the scenes to their OpenGL implementation, and the way our engine uses SDL to initialise the OpenGL renderer hits this bug every time. We directly package our SDL middleware with the FS2Open binary, so its not possible for users to simply rip and replace. Unfortunately, I'm not aware of any known workaround that you can use. i.e. FS2Open is completely broken on OS X 10.x at the moment.

Importantly, there is a fix - which is to use the latest 2.x version of the SDL middleware in a new release of the FS2Open engine. We have a testing branch called "antipodes" that has the SDL2.x middleware in use, but it is not yet in any of the nightlies builds. You can also follow along high-level development in this thread, but it doesn't include every change.

The project is aiming to get out a final SDL1.x based release of FS2Open shortly, before we pull over the antipodes testing branch to nightlies. A build based on that SDL2.x middleware code will resolve this issue for OS X.