XCOM EU Mods/Installer for OS X

[Koofas2]

I know that OS X isn't the most popular operating system, which is why there are no mods for it. I would really like a mod or mod installer, however.

 

I don't know that much about programming so I'm not even sure if what I want is possible, but I'm hoping that it is because I really want to be able to enjoy things like Long War and WarSpace.

[Amineri]

The good news is that since XCOM is built on the Unreal Engine, pretty much all mod changes should be cross-platform compatible. The only part of the game code that isn't cross-platform is what is in (on the PC) xcomgame.exe. This functionality is accessed via the dreaded 'native' functions which for the most part aren't currently moddable.

 

99.9% of Long War, for example, consists of edits to the upk files, config files, and localization files, all of which should be identical on Windows vs OS X.

 

However, there are a few things that are different:

1) On PC the executable does a hash check on several of the upk files, exiting if they don't match. The two workarounds are (a) fix the hashes (XSHAPE), or (b) disable hashes (via string change in executable)

2) On PC three of the config files are embedded in the Resource Cache to prevent editing. The most critical of these is the DefaultGameCore.ini. The two workarounds are (a) Use ModPatcher or ResourceHacker to edit the Resource Cache, or (b) disable using the Resource Cache version (which defaults to loading the file).

3) Decompressing the upks is currently done using Gildor's Unreal Engine tool : http://www.gildor.org/downloads Currently this appears to only be available for Windows.

 

Both of the (b) options above require using a hex editor to find & change some text strings in the native executable. Some people have reported getting this working on OS X.

 

Possible issues are that the UE cooking process optimizes the Unreal byte-code for a particular architecture. However since OS X and Windows run on the same underlying hardware architecture, they may be cooked identically.

 

If the 3 issues above could be resolved, then in theory the same hex changes should be applicable.