help setting up windows version of steam on a mac with wine

[nskaran]

hi, i'm pretty new (to steam, gaming and computer programming-type stuff) and i have a mac, which i know isn't that great for games usually, but i'd still like to play what i can. i've been looking into playing some windows-only games recently (like the sims or guild wars) and i did some googling around and found this guide, but i spent almost six hours yesterday trying to figure this out, and i'm having some problems.

i'm not very experienced with programming or command line, so i just followed the instructions i found blindly, which might have overcomplicated things. i'm gonna explain what i did in possibly too much detail in case something's important:

1. launch xcode (which i had already) and install the command line tools.
2. go into terminal and accept the end-user license agreement for xcode (sudo xcodebuild -license).
3. update macports, which i already had (sudo port -v selfupdate).
4. go to terminal, enter "echo export PATH=/opt/local/bin:/opt/local/sbin:\$PATH$'\n'export MANPATH=/opt/local/man:\$MANPATH | sudo tee -a /etc/profile" (no response) and then "if [ `sysctl -n hw.cpu64bit_capable` -eq 1 ] ; then echo "+universal" | sudo tee -a /opt/local/etc/macports/variants.conf; else echo "not 64bit capable"; fi" (got +universal).
5. close terminal, reopen, enter "sudo port install wine." wait ages for it to finish.
6. try to install windows version of steam. at first i tried the instructions here, but i didn't know what to do about the wineprefix; then i think i just typed in "wine msiexec /i SteamInstall.msi" and it created ~/.wine (and gave me an error because i hadn't downloaded SteamInstall.msi, like a dumbass).
7. download windows steam.
8. find this guide, try to follow it. enter "cd ~/.wine" in terminal. then enter "curl http://www.kegel.com/wine/winetricks > winetricks." it seems to download winetricks. then enter "chmod +x winetricks." it sends me back to the command prompt.
9. try "winetricks tahoma," it tells me winetricks is not a valid command.
10. mess around trying to install winetricks, finally succeed with "sudo port install winetricks."
11. try "winetricks tahoma" again, get this error: "wine cmd.exe /c echo '%ProgramFiles%' returned unexpanded string '%SystemDrive%\Program Files' ... can be caused a corrupt wineprefix, an old wine, or by not owning /Users/[username]/.wine"
12. give up on winetricks because i think tahoma's a font anyway and i have it so maybe this is unnecessary.
13. enter "cd ~/Downloads/" and then "wine start SteamInstall.msi." it appears to install steam! the PC version of steam even opens for the initial installation and closes automatically.
14. enter "cd ~/.wine/drive_c/Program\ Files/Steam" and then "open ~/.wine/drive_c/Program\ Files/Steam." it opens the folder with steam.exe in finder.
15. enter "wine steam.exe." this is where everything explodes. i get the following error: "fixme:actctx:parse_depend_manifests Could not find dependent assembly L"Microsoft.Windows.Common-Controls" (6.0.0.0)
Jul 21 09:28:43 Gigo.local steam.exe[66594] <Error>: ImageIO: PNG Extra compressed data
fixme:heap:HeapSetInformation 0x0 1 0x0 0
wine: Unhandled exception 0x40000015 in thread 9 at address 0x478490 (thread 0009), starting debugger...
err:seh:start_debugger Couldn't start debugger ("winedbg --auto 8 84") (2)
Read the Wine Developers Guide on how to set up winedbg or another debugger"

i'm not sure what's happening, and if it's related to the fact that macs can't open .exe files? i guess this is what happens when you try to mess around with command line without knowing anything. what am i supposed to do?

(i also then tried using playonmac, but it wouldn't actually open steam. then i realized that i didn't actually have X11 even though it shows up in my applications folder, so i installed it and then tried again, but i still get the error message.)

(i asked this on the steam forums too, but it seemed like a good idea to ask here.)

[gman104]

I find that it is better to use winefile for installations. Type "winefile" into terminal. Then go File -> Open and open the SteamInstall.msi from there (from the files on your Mac, or the Z:\ drive). It should work flawlessly.

This way of doing it should work for most every application (it has for me )

[nskaran]

ah thank you so much, i didn't even know winefile existed! this looks really useful.

[Maexel]

Hi nskaran,

which version of wine have you installed over MacPorts? To figure out, you can enter in Terminal: wine --version.
It might be version 1.4 which isn't the newest developper version. So to install the newest one over MacPorts, type in Terminal:
sudo port install wine-devel (it maybe will install some further dependencies)

With this version, I'm able to start Steam (Windows version) and play Window Games over Mac without problems so far. Although, to install this version of wine, you need Mac OS X 10.6 or higher. Leopard won't install this version due to cmake.

After compiling wine-devel and installing Steam, you might get just a plane Login-Screen without text being displayed. This hasn't got anything to do with a 'missing' Tahoma font but is a dwrite issue. You come around this issue by simply adding: -no-dwrite into Terminal. So the whole start command would look like this:
wine Steam.exe -no-dwrite Voilà!

Furthermore, you can create a nice Startup-Icon (have a look at the attachment 'Start-up Icon') to launch from your desktop if you'd like so, where you haven't to start Steam over Terminal and always typing in the command line.
To do so:
1) Type into Spotlight: AppleScript and start the Editor
2) Enter the Code like is displayed in the attachment 'Start-up Icon Code'. Make sure you check the path to your located Steam.exe file. You maybe need to adjust it. You get this sign '~' with 'alt n'.
3) Save (or export) it on your desktop while choose as File-Format: Program. You've just created your desktop launch app for Windows Steam.
4) If you'd like an appropriate Icon, go for example to google and search for one in the image section. Have you found one you'd like, save it on your desktop, open the pic and copy it with Command-c
5) Finally, select your new created icon and go into the information menu (command i). There, click in the upper left corner on the icon and replace it with yours (command v). That's it!

Hope could have helped you with this advice.

Cheers mate,
Maexel

[nskaran]

hi Maexel! wow, thanks for all your help. i have Wine version 1.6, which did end up giving me the dwrite issue. now i've fixed that i can make a startup icon!

[Maexel]

Hey,

ok you've already got the latest and stable version of wine: 1.6. So you might don't need to install wine-devel. I have still installed the wine-devel version and so I'm not sure if the dwrite issue is still a problem with the newest version 1.6. Well, anyway, the process to create the icon remains the same . Please let me know if things have worked out for you or not.

Cheers mate,
Maexel