Well one of us broke it [Mac, 32-bit beta]

[32BitStew]

After finding myself suddenly unable to launch the game overnight and an hour of troubleshooting, I finally caught wind of the update causing 32-bit incompatibility, as well as the beta to rollback to a previous version.

However, before finding *that* solution, I pulled an oopsie and tried a fix wherein I used "chmod +x" on "hollow_knight.app / Contents / MacOS / hollow_knight" (to make a long story short, the top answer on a StackExchange thread related to the error message Apple was throwing at me said "do this thing", though had I scrolled down I would have found someone else saying "hey maybe don't do this thing") (I feel just great about this).

So: presently HK [rolled back to the beta] will open, show a black screen and the cursor, and then hang on a spinning beachball. How screwed am I, whose fault is it, and how do I get my game back?

IT Inept from California

EDIT: I'm MacOS High Sierra, 10.13.6, if that makes any difference.

EDIT 2: Okay, it's not just me — https://steamcommunity.com/app/367520/discussions/0/3109152828492986232/

[JuiceKong]

The game wouldn't launch for me, updated to big sur and now it launches.

[tintingaroo]

Try the launch options

-screen-fullscreen 0

If nothing, try with 1 instead of 0.

(Right click HK in Steam > Properties. Launch options text box is at the bottom of that screen)

If still nothing add these as well:

-screen-width xxxx -screen-height yyyy

(Replace xxxx, yyyy with screen resolution.)

[32BitStew]

Originally posted by tintingaroo:

Try the launch options

-screen-fullscreen 0

If nothing, try with 1 instead of 0.

(Right click HK in Steam > Properties. Launch options text box is at the bottom of that screen)

If still nothing add these as well:

-screen-width xxxx -screen-height yyyy

(Replace xxxx, yyyy with screen resolution.)

No such luck, I'm afraid. No dice on:
-screen-fullscreen 0
-screen-fullscreen 1
-screen-fullscreen 0 -screen-width 2880 -screen-height 1800
-screen-fullscreen 1 -screen-width 2880 -screen-height 1800
-screen-fullscreen 0 -screen-width 800 -screen-height 600
-screen-fullscreen 1 -screen-width 800 -screen-height 600

Originally posted by JuiceKong:

The game wouldn't launch for me, updated to big sur and now it launches.

Glad that compatibility is on the record, but I can't upgrade to Big Sur. I'd lose most of my Steam collection without 32-bit support. Hopefully the game isn't broken on 10.13! I was quite enjoying it.

[tintingaroo]

Ok, clear out the launch commands for now.

Try the game after verifying game files:
Right-click HK in Steam > Properties > Local Files > Verify integrity of game files

If nothing then go for an uninstall > reinstall.

[32BitStew]

Good suggestions, but neither of those worked either.
I even tried deleting common/Hollow Knight and then verifying. :/
EDIT: Found another thread; just attached a link on the original post.

[32BitStew]

I got the main release running (not the 32bit version) by launching the game directly from Terminal. See the attached page (Method 2):

https://appuals.com/error-4294956486-in-steam-windows-and-macos/

[🉑 rezno[R].technology]

Originally posted by 32BitStew:

I got the main release running (not the 32bit version) by launching the game directly from Terminal. See the attached page (Method 2):

https://appuals.com/error-4294956486-in-steam-windows-and-macos/

Good research! Interesting that such problems exist. Is it more like Steam issue, MacOS issue or HK developers? (I don't really understand what is happening here that causes this issue)

BTW. are you able to run the game directly? (without Steam launched). HK is DRM-free on Steam. For this putting a simple steam_appid.txt file in the main game folder with the number

367520

is required. Team Cherry unfortunately didn't add this file still. With this file you can run the game without Steam.

[Hu.]

I've tried method 2 but it doesn't seem to be working either...
Are there any other fix options?

[tintingaroo]

Originally posted by 32BitStew:

I got the main release running (not the 32bit version) by launching the game directly from Terminal. See the attached page (Method 2):

https://appuals.com/error-4294956486-in-steam-windows-and-macos/

So a Steam (or interfacing with Steam) thing? I see posts from players in the Steam Mac forums of being unable to launch any games (that seems to be a Steam Beta client thing though).

[tintingaroo]

Originally posted by Hu.:

I've tried method 2 but it doesn't seem to be working either...
Are there any other fix options?

Are you seeing the same error message?

[Hu.]

Originally posted by tintingaroo:

Originally posted by Hu.:

I've tried method 2 but it doesn't seem to be working either...
Are there any other fix options?

Are you seeing the same error message?

Yep. With the 64 bit update i get error 4294956486 and when i switch to the 32 bit beta, the game launches but stay on black screem with the HK cursor showing... And the cursor just turns into loading circle

[Hu.]

I was able to launch the beta, but then steam updated and now i can't

[tintingaroo]

Are you on Steam's beta client branch or stable btw?
If beta, try opting out of it.

Ah, I see - they pushed the beta client onto stable. People had issues launching games with the Mac Steam beta, guess more will have it now it's been moved to stable...
32BitStew has identified the issue (part of the issue?) with Steam here: https://steamcommunity.com/app/367520/discussions/0/3109152828490656868/#c3109152828493454125



So one successful method seems to be running the game without Steam.

This method (as described by rezno[R]) worked on Windows to get the game to run w/o Steam but give it a shot on Mac:
I don't know the exact directory on Mac but open hollow_knight.app package and somewhere should be folder hollow_knight_Data. Create a new text file there and call it steam_appid.txt.
In the file enter 367520 then save.

On Windows we'd then run hollow_knight.exe, on Mac do you have to do that from Terminal?

[32BitStew]

Originally posted by 🉑 reznoR.technology:

Originally posted by 32BitStew:

I got the main release running (not the 32bit version) by launching the game directly from Terminal. See the attached page (Method 2):

https://appuals.com/error-4294956486-in-steam-windows-and-macos/

Good research! Interesting that such problems exist. Is it more like Steam issue, MacOS issue or HK developers? (I don't really understand what is happening here that causes this issue)

BTW. are you able to run the game directly? (without Steam launched). HK is DRM-free on Steam. For this putting a simple steam_appid.txt file in the main game folder with the number

367520

is required. Team Cherry unfortunately didn't add this file still. With this file you can run the game without Steam.

Actually — though I haven't tried the appid thing, I have just realized that after changing the MacOS filename (from Hollow Knight to hollow_knight) to match the .app filename (in my case hollow_knight), I could just launch the app standalone by double-clicking hollow_knight.app.

As an important addendum — I don't know how any of this interacts with Steam cloud, so I recommend making a copy of your saves folder. That should be:

Library / Application Support / unity.Team Cherry.Hollow Knight

And if anybody doesn't know, you can get to the Library through a Finder menu: hold option in the Go menu at the top of the screen.

EDIT: Also worth looking at Team Cherry's recent post here
https://steamcommunity.com/app/367520/discussions/0/3109153465655517517/