Somebody contacted me via my module download page with what they believe to be the potential reason why some modules fail to run on a MAC. Below, I will post their entire message to me, and hope it may help others on this forum to help find a fix that will allow MAC users to play our modules in the same way.
Please let me know if you have any ideas of possible solutions and if this is easier to overcome than it first looks …
i.e. I was hoping to avoid having to add “jump” placeables for a MAC version.
Thanks, Lance.
The message …
"Hi. So I think I figured out what is making this (and Black Scourge of Candlecove and White Plume Mountain) Crash on Macs. It’s the walkmeshhelper placeables in the .GIT files for the trouble areas. I haven’t tested it for Althea I went in and deleted all these placeable from the .gits for candlecove WPM and now both load just fine. No idea if not having those in their will prevent my PC from reaching something but it loads. There were around 6 areas that used them ( can send list if you like). Same for WPM. Althea does use them too in fact they are the only three modules I have that do and all three crashed in the same way
I tried loading the game with the walkmeshhelper override folder (https://neverwintervault.org/project/nwn2/hakpak/original-hakpak/walkmesh-helper-expansion-pack) in my override and it still crashed so maybe Macs just don’t like them. Or maybe there’s some file missing that is standard on the windows version. Anyway, it would be cool if we could figure out how to make the walkmeshhelpers work on macs. In the meantime we can just delete those placeables."
EDIT: The placeable walkmesh mdb names can be quite long … eg: plc_br_walkmeshhelperramp_wood.MDB
Interesting. However, I use helpers almost on every module and a MAC player could play such areas. She only crashed on a world map transition, but where she was transitioning to there are no helpers placed.
I use a Mac with EE and nothing so far has caused it to crash on a regular basis. Filenames can be up to 255 characters I believe but certain types of characters can be problematic. Is there an easy way of testing this?
One Mac user had a lot of problems with my module A Strange World. Don’t know why that is and I couldn’t fix it. For instance, in one area there was a creature spawned I believe that were suppose to run and talk to the PC using create ip speaker. None other than him reported issues with this particular area… I don’t think I used walkmesh helper in my module (but I’m not sure since I used many prefabs).
Hi. I’m the user Lance refered to. Just to be clear, this is for NWN2, original fully patched DVD Mac-port (ie not bootcamp) version. I haven’t played EE so can’t comment on how stable it is on Mac.
Update 1: I hadn’t tested it on Althea, just Legacy of White Plume Mountain and Black Scourge of Candlecove. I may have spoken too soon regarding Althea and so stuck my foot in it. I reinstalled Althea today and it does not crash in the same as WPM and Candlecove. Those two crash while trying load an area with a walkmeshhelper placeable in it. Althea loads all areas fine, allows selecting a character and then crashes some random time after the area is fully loaded, usually within a couple seconds (the longest was about a minute). I wasn’t able to do much in that time, however screen scrolling and hovering the mouse (like over the custom PC menu) work. I never got far enough to turn off that opening message. So while deleting the walkmeshhelper placeables from the .GITs did indeed fix WPM and Candlecove that does not appear to be the problem in Althea. Sorry to get your (and everyone else’s) hopes up. I’ll keep messing around though I see what I can discover.
Update 2. I changed the file names for the plc_br_walkmeshhelperramp_wood.MDB and _stone.mdb to something shorter and updated the placeables.2da to match. That did not make a difference. WPM still crashed on loading the area with the helper. So I do not believe it has to do with the file name, It appears to be something within the intance in the .GIT that causes the problem.
Don’t worry about possible misdirection, we have all done it unintentionally. Any and all info is helpful, so do keep testing and let us know if you do discover why certain modules do not work on a MAC .
My guess is it relates to some sort of memory leak only on a MAC, but it’s just a guess. Especially as the area does load and fails a little later.
As I say though, if you do get to the bottom of the issue, it will be a welcome discovery for both builders and players alike.
Thanks Lance. Tchos is going to post the updated .GITs on the Candloecove page. It would be great if other Mac users could experient and see if they can duplicate what I experienced.
If anyone here has other mods that use WMH, let me know and I’ll see if they have the same issue.
If possible (and you have the time), would you be able to help determine what aspect of my own module is causing your game to crash when using a MAC?
The problem you describe reminded me of a problem similar to one I experienced on a PC, which turned out to be something to do with database handling. That was eventually resolved for a PC.
Here is something you could try to see if it helps:
When entering my module for the first time, the game automatically makes a save game for the player. It advises the player to make a manual one too, which I would recommend.
Rather than continue playing at this point, come out of the game completely and restart from the saved game position just made.
Report if that stops the game from crashing unexpectedly.
The database is made at the start of the game, and is why reloading from the saved position will now bypass this step on the reload, which may help with computer resources (?).
