Bloodlines: MacOS Installation Instructions (via Wineskin)

• For Updated Notes: Jump to post 49 (until i find time for another full writeup)
• Alternate Option: ciemnika posted a PlayOnMac step-by-step variant of these instructions later in this thread.

I've seen a couple of people ask if Bloodlines works on a Mac using Wine. Yes it does!

There's a catch, though. The mod-loader doesn't work, so the Unofficial Patch doesn't load correctly out of the box. But that's ok, the workaround is simple enough.

This works fine with the base GOG version (Unofficial Patch), but also for the Plus Patch if you want to download it separately. I haven't tested any other patches.

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Tools Required:

• Wineskin Winery
• An up-to-date Wineskin Wrapper
• A recent Wineskin Wine Engine
• Finder
• Terminal

The following was tested using:

• Late 2013 MacBook Pro
• MacOS Sierra 10.12.5
• Wineskin Winery 2.6.2
• Wine Engine WS9Wine 1.9.21
• Vampire: The Masquerade - Bloodlines 1.2 (UP 9.7 Basic)

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Installation Instructions

Note: I won't go into detail on the basics of setting up Wineskin Winery, so if you're unfamiliar, check out the documentation on the project's website or search for one of the many fine tutorials out there :)

Step 0: Download the game's Windows installer.

Step 1: Open Wineskin Winery and create a new blank wrapper named "Vampire the Masquerade - Bloodlines"

Step 2: Open Finder and browse to your new file's location (default location is /Users/<your username>/Applications/Wineskin)

Step 3: Right-click or Control-click on your new file, Vampire the Masquerade - Bloodlines.app, and select "Show Package Contents" from the popup menu.

Step 4: In the newly opened directory, double-click Wineskin.app to start the application. Select "Advanced" on the popup dialog and then click the "Install Software" button down in the bottom left corner.

Step 5: Click "Choose Setup Executable" and then find your downloaded game exe file. The installation should begin.

Step 6: Perform the installation normally. You may receive an error near the end of the installation, but this is a known issue and can be safely ignored. When it is complete, unckeck the box to run the game automatically (if it is checked) and click Finish to close the installer.

Step 7: After a few seconds a window will pop up asking you to select the correct application executable. Select "Vampire.exe" and hit OK. This will take you back to the "Wineskin Advanced" window you started on.

Step 8: (Optional) If you want to use the in-game console, find the input box labeled "EXE Flags" and enter "-console" (without quotes).

Step 9: Next, look to the top of the window at the small, 3-button selector bar. Select "Options" and then uncheck "Map User Mac OS X folders in wrapper."

Step 10: At the bottom of the window, click "Set Screen Options" and then, in the lower right column, check "Use Mac Driver instead of X11" and then click "Done". This fixes some of the common mouse pointer issues in-game.

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That's it for the basic installation, but we're not done yet. Next up is making sure the Unofficial Patch works.

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Updating to the Plus Patch

If you are fine with the basic patch then you have everything you need (it's shipped in the GOG version) and can skip to the next section.

If you prefer the Plus Patch, you'll need to download it separately. At the time of this writing the most recent version is Unofficial Patch 9.7 (Final), which you can download from Patches Scrolls here.

Installing the Plus Patch works exactly as installing the game did, but first you'll need to get the Basic Patch out of the way, as their directory names conflict.

Step 1: Go back to your Finder window, to the same directory that contains Wineskin.app, and then navigate to drive_c/GOG Games/VtMB/.

Step 2: Rename the "Unofficial_Patch" directory to something like "Unofficial_Patch.bak" to get it out of the way.

Step 3: Go back to the Wineskin Advanced window, click "Install Software", and repeat the same process you used to install the game but this time using the downloaded patch executable.

Step 4: Install the patch using your preferred patch options. You don't need any of the "Extras", but you can install the walkthrough documentation if you like. When the patch installation is complete, uncheck both options (to avoid viewing the readme or auto-running the game) and then finish the installation. If you receive a warning about not finding any new executables you can safely ignore it and continue back to the starting screen.

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Fixing the Patch

You're finally done with Wineskin, so you can go ahead and close that out now.

The remaining issue is that the mod-loader doesn't work right under Wine on a Mac. So if you tried to run the game right now, it would run, and SOME of the patch would get loaded. Unfortunately, not all of it loads and it can leave your game in an even more broken state than the original unpatched game was in when the developers ran out of money ;)

Since the mod-loader's broken, we'll just manually merge the patch files in ourselves.

The following steps will be performed using terminal commands, but at this point I recommend opening up Finder and "installing" your game by moving the Vampire the Masquerade - Bloodlines.app into your root Applications directory. The following commands will assume your game is installed to /Applications/Vampire the Masquerade - Bloodlines.app.

Step 0: Open Terminal (the built-in MacOS terminal emulator).

Step 1: Change to the game's installation directory:

cd "/Applications/Vampire the Masquerade - Bloodlines.app/drive_c/GOG Games/VtMB"

Step 2: Backup your base Vampire data directory:

ditto -V Vampire Vampire.bak

Step 3: Merge the patch data into the base data:

ditto -V Unofficial_Patch Vampire

Step 4: Rename your Vampire directory to denote the patched data:

mv Vampire Vampire_UP

Step 5: Create a symbolic link to replace the Vampire directory:

ln -s Vampire_UP Vampire

===

That's it! Patch should be fully merged now.

We backed up the game directory and created a symbolic link to the patched version for a couple of reasons. First, if something went wrong copying the patch over you don't want to have to reinstall the game from scratch because you killed your data directory. Second, if you ever want to update to a newer version of the patch (or use a different patch) you can do so by copying the backup (Vampire.bak), applying the new patch, and creating a new symbolic Vampire link pointing to the new directory.

===

Run the game like any other app by double-clicking it from the Applications directory or running it from Launchpad / Spotlight.

Note: The intro videos might very well not work for you—If you get an all black or all white screen during startup, but it sounds like a video is playing, just hit the Esc key a few times until you hit the main menu.

Have fun! Let me know if I've missed anything (or have any major typos) in the comments below.

There is a linux_loader script in the Unofficial Patch Patch_Extras/Player Mods folder, I thought this would fix the loader issues with Wine...

Hi, wesp. I was almost hoping you would chime in on this thread :)

Yeah, I started there, but there's a number of problems with that approach for Mac.

Using a shell script loader doesn't work for those using Wineskin -- the most common means of at-home Wine wrapping for Mac games at the moment.

Running a straight wine installation is an option though, so that aside, linux_loader.sh (a) uses zenity for user messaging (which isn't available on MacOS), and (b) sets the dbghelp native dll override... which unfortunately crashes Wine in all my tests on a Mac.

If I recall correctly, VtMB uses a custom dbghelp.dll that the mod-loader depends on. If so, that may leave the mod-loader as something of a non-starter on the Mac right now.

I'm happy to do some more testing if anyone's got any tips on getting dbghelp.dll to load. Specific Wine engine perhaps?

As a aside, the GOG release doesn't contain any of the UP Extras does it?

Wesp, do you happen to have a public resource available to get the Extras files without performing a patch installation? linux_loader.sh in particular might be useful for the Linux users that are ok with the prepackaged UP Basic.

No, just install the patch into an empty folder...

Of course ;)

What I intended was that if linux_loader.sh were available separately, it would let the Linux-based GOGers fire up GOG's base VtMB release (with UP Basic) without the extra ~480 MB download.

You should ask GOG do put it up somewhere then...

That's a good idea. Any blues want to run that up the flag pole? Adding linux_loader.sh would only add a couple KB to the package.

Better to send in a support ticket if you want them to read it. Also, the title should be (via Wineskin).

Agreed. It would be more accurate. I was trying to ensure the title didn't get truncated in the thread list. It looks like it may fit, but I don't know of any way to change thread title. I'll update it at the top of the OP for clarification.

I haven't encountered that specific issue, but I've encountered numerous other issues with the title screen—going black, random flashing, etc. Sometime hiding and reshowing the window helps.

Have you tried Cmd+Tab to hide the window and then bring it back? (click the app icon, NOT the image of the window, as that can hang the app)

With other games you can often drop out of fullscreen and then back to reset the resolution, but VtMB doesn't have that option.

I haven't had any major issues running at 1440x900, but ay available resolution on the settings page ought to run alright (assuming your monitor can handle it).

If you're sure you're running a supported resolution and hide/show doesn't work, go ahead and post what Wine Engine your using (I'm still running it against WS9Wine 1.9.21). Maybe that'll give me (or someone else) additional ideas.

Edit: You might also consider trying to set the Wineskin Screen Options to run in a virtual desktop at your preferred resolution. That won't run fullscreen, but may allow you to correct your resolution issue and then switch back to your original settings.

Thanks for the quick reply.

So I tried the CMD+Tab and for a second the Hud pops to the side of the screen where it should be then the screen flashes black for a few seconds then it the hud goes back to where it was but the rest of the screen is now black.

I tried changing the screen options from the package content but it simply opened fullscreen again.

As for Wineskin I have to be honest I'm not that great at knowing these things but I think it is WS9Wine2.3, that's the option that was highlighted when I created the wrapper, there was another option WS9WineCX 13.2.0

I haven't tested any of the 2.x engines, but according to WineHQ, it's rated platinum on Wine 2.9 (WS9Wine2.9 for your purposes). That's on Linux (Fedora), however, and very often you will see dissimilar results on a Mac. Still, you're welcome to try 2.9 if you want to stick with the more modern 2.x line. Alternately, give 1.9.21. a try.

You can download additional Wine versions to Wineskin by opening Wineskin Winery and clicking the "+" icon next to where it says "New Engine(s) available!".

To update your existing installation, Ctrl+Click or Right-Click your .app file, "Show Package Contents", and run Wineskin.app. Click the "Advanced" button, and under the "Options" tab, use the last button under "Wrapper Tools" titled "Change Engine Used".

Sometime (but not in all cases) rolling backward to an older Wine engine can cause problems, so I'd recommend first trying to update to WS9Wine2.9. If that doesn't work, then you could try rolling back to WS9Wine1.9.21. If you run into any problems (like the game entirely crashing out on repeated startups), then you may have to try reinstalling the game to a new wrapper.

Normally I'd recommend doing such experiments on a RAM disk (as I usually do) to avoid unnecessary disk writes, speed up the installation, and avoid wasting disk space, but the updated/patched version of VtMB with Wineskin is around 13GB, so that may be too tall an order if you don't have at least 16GB of RAM to work with.

Anyway, let me know if ya need any further info. I'm happy to help when I have the time.

Hey Xixas,

So I removed everything and started again from from step 1 using the Engine you suggested and ended with the exact same issue. I tried updating to the 2.9 engine but still had the same issue.

For a moment I thought it might be that I was using the 9.8 patch not the older 9.7, so I opened the game before installing the patch and it was still having the same issue before and after the patch is installed.

I wonder if I might have made a mistake in the terminal section of the install because while the first 3 scripts I ran seem to work as I can see the terminal doing something, the scripts from steps 4 and 5 didn't seem to do anything and as I said I'm not the most savvy guy when it comes to things like that.

I even tried opening the package contents and running the vampire.exe with wine directly but it has the same problem.

Could it be an issue with the gog download? and if so is there a way to check?

Thanks again for all the help