Yes folks, some clever sods at The Porting Team have released a Cider Wrapper for Skyrim so now is a good time for Mac users to polish their Skyrim skills! There are several ways of getting a working copy of Skyrim on a Mac. Since it requires an *installed* copy of the game, you can't just pop a Retail disk into your Mac and expect it to work - you have to get that disk installed somehow. This is why Steam was invented. You don't need cracked Torrent files (with all the legal and security hazards that entails). You don't need to buy a legal licence of Windows to run Bootcamp. You don't need to cadge a loan of a friend's Windows PC. You just need Steam. The simplest (and FULLY LEGAL) method is to run the Windows Steam Client inside a Wineskin or Crossover wrapper/bottle, purchase the Skyrim for Windows Digital Download off Steam then copy the downloaded files to the location that the Cider Wrapper needs.The benefit of this method over stealing it from a Torrent site is that as Bethseda release patches (and they have already announced the second one for after Thanksgiving), you just go back to Windows Steam and autoupdate your Windows Skyrim version then copy it back into your Cider Wrapper - voila! For those that don't want to wade through 20-odd pages of folks arguing about how to crack the game and which torrent site is best or safest, here are the LEGAL instructions. The Cider wrapper is available to you from The Porting Team once you have registered on their forums... Now since you are running the game inside a wrapper, I would advise being a little more conservative with your performance expectations. For example, I have a Mac Pro 2010 6x3.33GHz, 12Gb ECC, ATI HD 5870 1Gb machine which if it was running the game natively would play it at Ultra Graphics without difficulty but I have set it to High and then manually added a few options back in such as self-shadowed trees and rocks. You will find the mouse sensitivity to be low but there are some ini tweaks to deal with that. Make sure your version of OSX is either fully updated Snow Leopard or Lion and give it a go. Even Macbook Airs have been running it passably! Next prisoner to the block! You! The Nord in the rags!
Thanks, I am sure it will be helpful for others. I got it recentyl via thepiratebay.org and went to youtube to get the cider wrapper, but your way is better.
I tried using wineskin/crossover/parallel desktop/vmware and the one that actually worked & is free was vmware, but skyrim kept crashing on that. So the best way for me was buying windows 7, and using bootcamp, and it worked like magic! Plus the graphics were excellent, i advise anyone who wants to play windows games to get it, it's worth the money ^^
Bajj - apart from trying to run it on a laptop, does the torrent file (THIEF! *points finger of shame*) give you a way to choose the graphics details? You may need to select low or medium settings. TomsHardware have a technical review of the effects of running Skyrim on Low/Med/High/Ultra settings and the recommended minimum card for each. They also talk about improving the AA options for native Windows users. Pocnet - how much did you have to pay for your Windows licence in the end? I remember that the OEM licence only tended to be available to folks buying hardware to run it on at the time. We OS X users get spoiled regarding the cost and flexibility of an OS licence compared to the poor Windows sods.
I know finger of shame should be pointed, but its free, and I have no money . It does have that option, im on medium, I will change it next time i get on it.
Daniel, the windows 7 home basic costed me about $130, and it's pretty much all you need to get windows 7 on mac, that and somewhere to store the windows bootcamp support (you have to download it onto a hardisk or something, then download windows 7, then just drag n' drop the windows support software into windows 7 and start the setup.exe this is all done by bootcamp assistant) now i can play skyrim on high graphics with no bugs at all, you can also get any windows game too ^_^ I give it my pocnet seal of approval.
Thanks for the tip, Pocnet - unfortunately Windows 7 Home Basic is not for sale in my region (UK) and as such could not be activated if I bought it and shipped it here. I'll have a look at Win7 Home Premium (Retail) which is a little more expensive but legal. Out of interest, since I have a 2010 Mac Pro and will be giving Win7 its own HDD (yay for 4 HDD sleds), I assume I will be wanting to instal the 64-bit version? I also assume I have to source appropriate Win7 drivers for my ATI 5870 card plus appropriate security software or does Win7 Home Premium come with enough to keep me safe for playing Skyrim, accessing Steam to update it and installing approved drivers from approved sites? I will NOT be using it as a main browsing or surfing OS - Lion will be used for that.
Guys, I'm desperate. Please help me out here. I have downloaded the Cinder AND the wineskin wrapper. After trying for HOURS to install I have tried to install with Crossover Games, and it didn't recognize the Launcher. After a few hours I just decided to download a "pre-made" one, and after it finished, IT WORKED. I was sure it was too good to be true, and I was right. Game keeps crashing immediately after the loading screen. The version I have doesn't use the cinder wrapper. Can anyone PLEASE tell me what files I need to transfer where? because I DONT want to bootcamp and if its possible to make this game run even on the lowest settings I'll be a happy camper. Just tell me what files to move where, EXACTLY. because at the moment I have a cinder wrapper (settings + sky rim) and its empty inside, except for a 170mb contents folder. Where do I put what files where??? (( I'll be forever greatfull to the person who will help me make this work :| I'm using a MBP 15', 4ram, Nvidia 330 card, 128ssd drive Ah and I tried forcing windows 7 and 500vram, but I can't force core audio since I want to use my good external sound card. Thanks! P.S - I 'know' where to put the files, I already tried moving them into /contents/Resources/transgaming/c_drive/Program Files/The Elder Scrolls V Skyrim - BUT THIS DOESNT WORK. the icon pops on the dashboard but nothing happens, so I'm assuming I copied something somewhere wrong
Not necessarily - you only need the Cider wrapper from the Porting Team (not the Wineskin one at all) and of course an installed copy of Skyrim... but as I said, a few days ago the Steam folks updated the TESV.exe so that it has to check in with Steam every time you play... which is probably why you are having trouble. You need a copy of the TESV.exe from before that date to get it to work. At the moment there is no way to get Skyrim inside Cider to talk to Steam for Windows unless you steal a pirated copy that does't need to. Since I didn't want to download a pirated copy and already had the Steam for Windows version, that is what drove me to buy Windows 7.
I did everything in the instructions, but when I try to launch the cider wrapper I receive an error: "Steam Error: Application Load Error: 8:0000065559" Please help!
Yes, as I said above, the current TESV.exe now tries to check in with Steam every time you play and the Cider wrapper can't see Steam for Windows so fails with the error you listed. You will have to go check with The Porting Team to see if they have found a work-around for this yet. I am not trying to be smug, but I saw this coming so bought a licenced copy of Windows 7 to avoid these problems.
Nooooo. Well, thanks for clearing that up with me though! So, at the moment, is the only way to play skyrim on mac to: download a pirated copy of Skyrim and put its files into the wrapper's package contents? are they forcing me to pirate skyrim even though I already bought it on steam?!
