3DS emulator on MacOS High Sierra?

Hi this is just asking for help with this idea that will be awesome if I can get this working.

Nintendo 3DS is that little handheld that creates 3D effects to the naked eye. Impressive tech but I don’t really want the thing.

However I do want to play ONE game with 3D effects and I know people do emulate it on a normal screen (using magic eye style graphics for the 3D effects).

Anyway I’d love to get it working on my Mac desktop but Citra, the emulator, doesn’t like MacOS High Sierra, apparently.

Citra wants a newer version of OpenGL apparently... which is not quite supported, apparently.

So I know it’s possible but this is getting really convoluted lol bc I need to figure out how to make it install the newer OpenGL version, before Citra will work...

Anyone familiar with this mess lol?

github.com...

What version of opengl do you have?

Which build of citra are you using?

Have you tried building from source or using an older build that supports the versionof opengl you have?

I have Citra... Nightly, released 12-29-18 (so released like 3 weeks ago).

Citra seems to start up OK but won't open up the game that I want. "Your GPU may not support OpenGL 3.3, or you do not have the latest graphics driver."

My iMac is from late 2017 (so like a year-and-a-half old). Running MacOS High Sierra. (I could upgrade to Mojave but I haven't...)

I'm not rlly familiar with OpenGL, but it doesn't seem to be part of MacOS in the first place...

So I downloaded OpenGL Extensions Viewer... Which seems to be OpenGL version 4.1...

But now I'm wondering if this is the wrong OpenGL product or something lol. "Extensions Viewer" doesn't sound right...?

There's also a few settings to mess around with in OpenGL... So I'll be messing around with its settings... (Maybe I have to have OpenGL open and running, before I try Citra, or something like that...?)

Mostly I was hoping that someone might have already made this work on their own Mac...?

a reply to: peacefulpete

According to the link dug88 posted, if you download build 1144 it should work. Good luck.

a reply to: peacefulpete

As an aside, but not an unimportant one, MacOS is basically Linux under the hood. (I have zero MacOS experience but plenty of Linux experience.) If you upgrade important system components such as OpenGL you run the risk of breaking MacOS or certain components/programs.

Applications (think system tools, programs, window manager, etc) are compiled to use and look for a certain version of a component or library. If they cannot find it, they break. Bigly.

I advise leaving it to the Devs of your desired program to fix it.



ETA But according to users, build 1144 should work.

originally posted by: LightSpeedDriver
a reply to: peacefulpete

As an aside, but not an unimportant one, MacOS is basically Linux under the hood. (I have zero MacOS experience but plenty of Linux experience.) If you upgrade important system components such as OpenGL you run the risk of breaking MacOS or certain components/programs.

Applications (think system tools, programs, window manager, etc) are compiled to use and look for a certain version of a component or library. If they cannot find it, they break. Bigly.

I advise leaving it to the Devs of your desired program to fix it.

ETA But according to users, build 1144 should work.

Can mac not have multiple versions of the same library installed? The only time I run into trouble is when I install software with depreciated versions of libraries. Having multiple versions of the same library hasn't really been much trouble for me. I've got opengl 2,3, and 4 installed simultaneously with no issues.

There's also sometimes a place in the buildfiles to specify directories for libraries i'm not sure if citra has this but it may be looking for opengl in the wrong place.

Hmm also leaving it to devs to fix isn't always necessary. Grabbing the source and trying to build it will usually tell you what's wrong. A lot of build failures are pretty trivial to fix. As a bonus, with an open source project, you can submit a pull request for your fix and help development.

Also, just one more note, citra doesn't work very well and it's not really compatible with a lot of games yet. 3ds emulation isn't up to par with ds, GameCube or Wii emulation yet.

a reply to: dug88

I have no idea, hence my advice against going too far until someone who knows Mac came along.

originally posted by: LightSpeedDriver
a reply to: dug88

I have no idea, hence my advice against going too far until someone who knows Mac came along.

It may also have something to do with this.

It seems like Apple is depreciating opengl in macos.

archicad-talk.graphisoft.com...

Thanks guys,

I really have no idea why Citra won't work on my Mac. I haven't used Citra at all before but my Windows PC's just died so I only have my Mac.

I tried this guide:



but the latest Citra still wouldn't work. So I deleted it and then:

I downloaded Citra build 1144... But now it won't open up the game that I want to play.

I have the game as a... .dmg file.

But I also have it as a... .cia file.

Neither will work and I could try messing around with GodMode9 (some kind of file converter) but IDK what to do with it, and besides, I think those are the file types that it's supposed to open anyway.

Honestly I'm getting exhausted and upset about it (I first tried to make it work, a few weeks ago). It seems that I'm chasing after some weird glitches or quirks, which is unclear what I'm even trying to find and fix.

This is exhausting bc I'm all excited for this full-screen 3D game, and then I keep getting nothing but a bunch of weird glitches and errors.

I could also just buy a 3DS but the idea of the game running on my flatscreen is way better than the handheld.

Ah well, I guess I'll try another guide or two. Also Apple has an 800 number for tech support (which I did use once before, they did help when my Mac had temporarily refused to start up). So I wonder if they might help me get Citra working lol.

Otherwise this seems almost impossible bc who knows what the problem even is, lol.

Anyway thanks guys. I was hoping someone might have done the same exact thing but oh well.

re: OpenGL: I'm guessing this is not the real issue anyway, even though that's what the error message was saying before.

OpenGL doesn't seem to be part of MacOS in the first place, and messing around with OpenGL didn't seem to do much, if anything.

originally posted by: peacefulpete
re: OpenGL: I'm guessing this is not the real issue anyway, even though that's what the error message was saying before.

OpenGL doesn't seem to be part of MacOS in the first place, and messing around with OpenGL didn't seem to do much, if anything.

If you don't have opengl citra won't work. It might run but you won't be able to play any games. Opengl is how citra renders it's graphics. It's basically the equivalent of direct3d on windows. If you have a newer mac, it looks like Apple has.depreciated opengl in favour of it's own graphics pipeline. Unless you install the opengl version citra wants. It won't work. Honestly even if you get it working there's a good chance the game won't run well. 3ds emulation is pretty new. Most things won't run at an acceptable frame rate, even if you can get past the title screen. In its current state, citra is more suitable for homebrew developers or people hacking the 3ds than playing actual games.

In case you're wondering, i've built and tested citra with a few ROMs. Nothing really worked.

Thanks guys,

This is such a mess. OpenGL would seem all-set.

At the moment it would seem my security preferences won't let me install FUSE which is needed (for fuse-3ds). And there seems no reason that it won't let me install it. Changing security preferences seems straightforward, I've "unlocked" my security preferences but they won't accept it that I want to Allow this one thing to install. (And yes, I've "unlocked" my security preferences, yet it still won't Allow it.)

I'll try calling Apple tomorrow lol. Actually I should also just restart my Mac and see if the security preferences will let me change them, after a restart.

What an aggravation for nothing lol.

This is the game I want to play, with 3D magic eye effects, on my 21.5-inch screen... It would be amazing lol.