So you want to play the classic Fallouts and have a good time? Maybe you got them from GOG.com earlier and attempted to fire them up only to be greeted with a nasty and disparaging error:

The application X11 could not be opened. An error occurred while starting the X11 server: “Failed to activate core devices.
gog-osx-fallout-fix-1Do not fret! I have the fix for you and it’s easier than you think. Just follow these simple steps and Fallout 1 and 2 should work fine.

1. Download Wineskin Winery

First you need to download and install Wineskin Winery. It’s easy and free. Just go here and click download and install it.

2. Use Winery to install WS9Wine1.8

Once installed open it, and click the + sign and install WS9Wine1.8. Also, while you are here, click the update button to make sure winery is the latest version. Currently 2.6.2.

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Go to your Fallout or/and Fallout 2 app, right click on it and select Show Package Contents.

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4. Update Wineskin from inside the package

Just double click to open Wineskin. Select advanced.

gog-osx-fallout-fix-4Click on tools.
gog-osx-fallout-fix-5Click update wrapper once that is done. Click on change engine used.
gog-osx-fallout-fix-6You should only have one engine available, and that should be WS9Wine1.8.
gog-osx-fallout-fix-9Once you click okay a bunch of weird stuff might happen. You will probably see terminal open, a little dialog box will tell you Wineskin is doing something to Fallout. Fallout might even show you the same error again. Don’t worry about any of that until it’s all over

5. Set Screen Options

Don’t ask me to explain, but there is some resolution glitch that is randomly fixed by changing the game from fullscreen to window mode. Except it still runs in fullscreen… So whatever. Open Wineskin from within the package again.

gog-osx-fallout-fix-7 Then choose rootless window and done.

gog-osx-fallout-fix-8That’s it. Cross your fingers and open Fallout! Should work. If it doesn’t work, you probably didn’t follow the instructions correctly so try again!

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15 replies
  1. Jake Beveridge
    Jake Beveridge says:

    So excited to play one of the greatest games ever, I have run though your tutorial but each time I get to the step of Change Engine Used, when I apply the change it gives me this error message..

    “ERROR, tried to run command WSS-wineboot when the wrapper was already running. Please make sure the wrapper is not running in order to do this. ”

    Nothing is running when I do this step, yet It keeps stoping there and dosen’t work. Am I doing something wrong?

    Reply
    • Rich Legault
      Rich Legault says:

      I have Fallout Tactics (but not the Brotherhood online version), and I was able to get it to run by updating the Wrapper, but leaving the Engine Used alone.

      Reply
  2. Rami
    Rami says:

    So I downloaded Fallout, Fallout 2 and Fallout Tactics: Brotherhood online for my mac. All of which didn’t work. I tried out your method and it worked handsomely for the first two games, but Fallout TB doesn’t seem to work, can anyone help?

    Reply
    • AlexKrasny
      AlexKrasny says:

      Hey I’m sorry I don’t have tactics and I don’t know how/why it is different. I am glad this method works for the first two games at least!

      Reply

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