Release notes

Pixel Port 0.4.5

Pixel Port 0.4.4

Voice chat fix. - Games can now use your microphone for in-game voice chat: Pixel Port asks for mic permission the first time you launch a game (fixes silent mics in PEAK and other voice-chat games). If you previously denied it, enable Pixel Port under System Settings → Privacy & Security → Microphone.

Pixel Port 0.4.3

Reliability and self-repair. - Fixes 'Play does nothing': a stuck launch state could silently swallow every later Play click, with no error and no explanation. This was the cause behind most recent launch complaints. - Games set themselves up: Pixel Port can now write a game's config before first launch, at your display's actual resolution. Command & Conquer: Generals and Zero Hour now start correctly the first time instead of failing with a misleading 'DirectX' error. - Check and repair your game setup: Settings → Help & Recovery can now find Windows system files missing from a game setup and restore them from Pixel Port's own runtime. It only ever copies files back; it never deletes or replaces anything, and never touches your games or saves. - Honest crash reporting: quitting a game is no longer recorded as a crash, so compatibility ratings reflect reality. - Per-game fixes delivered over the air now apply reliably, and stale settings from an old fix are cleaned up properly.

Pixel Port 0.4.2

The fast-lane release. Classic DirectX 8/9 games can now run on the new high-speed graphics path (measured up to 9x faster on supported titles): the per-game graphics picker now offers DXVK for 32-bit games on Prism 0.6.5+. Also: game fixes delivered over-the-air apply more reliably, and launch shortcuts now queue through sign-in instead of being dropped.

Pixel Port 0.4.1

Consolidation release: fixes and polish from three contributors' workstreams. - Voice chat works: games with in-game voice (PEAK, R.E.P.O., WEBFISHING and others) can now use your microphone; macOS will ask permission once. - Meccha Chameleon false 'VC++ required' error fixed: a launch-configuration race, root-caused and closed; the fix also hardens launching for every game with a nested main executable. - Game fixes now reach every game: an internal delivery gap meant some per-game fixes silently never applied; all recipe-carried fixes now deliver. - Redesign polish: Back button, launch progress on Play, refined banners, cards, and theming.

Pixel Port 0.4.0: The Redesign

Pixel Port has a new face. The whole product experience has been rebuilt: - Home, Library, Discover: a clean three-part structure. Library unifies your installed games and Steam purchases in one place with tabs; Discover replaces Browse with playable-first filtering. - Redesigned game pages: every game leads with its readiness for *your* Mac, a clear confidence rating, and one obvious next action. Technical details tuck into an accordion. - Compatibility reports, per Mac: a new report matrix shows how each game runs across Apple Silicon generations and macOS versions, highlighting your machine. - Refreshed visual style: the Deep Amethyst design language across every surface, including a faster command palette (⌘K). Under the hood, 0.4.0 carries everything the 0.3 series built: reliable Steam launching (client-update resilience, teardown-race fixes), per-game graphics backends, honest DX9 routing, texture-flicker controls, and cleaner shutdowns. *New in the catalogue this week: Command & Conquer Remastered Collection, Red Alert 2 + Yuri's Revenge, and the Guns 'n Goblins demo.*

Pixel Port 0.3.41

Play via Steam fix for 'Reduce texture flickering' users. - Fixes Play via Steam doing nothing / 'Steam launch failed' when the Reduce texture flickering setting is on. The launch command was sent with a Wine sync mode that didn't match the running Steam session, so it silently never arrived: while 'Open Steam' + clicking Play inside Steam worked. All launch, install, and settings helpers now use the session's sync mode from one source, and a source-level test guards against regressions. - Generated game launchers now resolve the sync mode at run time, so flipping the setting applies without reinstalling.

Pixel Port 0.3.40

Launch reliability hotfix. - Fixes 'Play via Steam does nothing' after updating the app or right after launching it. Pixel Port's cleanup sweeps (which remove leftover Wine processes) could mistake a freshly starting Steam session for leftovers and stop it mid-boot. Sweeps now never touch processes that started after the sweep began, and game launches wait for any in-flight cleanup before starting Steam. - Follow-up to 0.3.39's Steam client-update resilience.

Pixel Port 0.3.39

Steam reliability wave. - Survives Steam client updates: when Valve ships a Steam client update (like the July 22 one), Play via Steam kept spinning on 'Launching' and could log you out. Pixel Port now detects the pending update and restarts the in-prefix Steam once so the update applies cleanly, and waits out the update cycle instead of giving up mid-install. - Faster, more reliable game detection: the 'is the game running' probe is now case-insensitive (some games, like Grim Dawn, register their executable with different casing than expected, causing false 'game never appeared' errors while the game was actually running). - Per-game graphics backend picker: choose Automatic / DXMT / DXVK (experimental) per game from its Details card. - Honest DX9 routing at install time: newly installed DirectX 9 games route to the renderer that actually runs them. - Housekeeping: launch helper processes are now cleaned up immediately after use.

Pixel Port 0.3.38

Stability + library wave. - Reliable shutdown: Pixel Port now cleanly stops every Wine/Steam process it owns when you quit, with a native progress panel during cleanup. Fixes orphaned `wine` processes lingering after quit. Your native Steam / CrossOver / Whisky installs are never touched (exact runtime-tree ownership via kernel executable path). - Full Steam library: a dedicated Steam Library view now shows every owned catalogue title, manually-confirmed purchases survive inexact local syncs, and stylized-punctuation titles (e.g. R.E.P.O., PEAK) are searchable. - Open Steam from the account menu: quick access to the in-prefix Steam client. - Honest DX9 labelling: DirectX 9 games are labelled with the renderer that actually runs them (wined3d), not the impossible dxmt. - Reduce texture flickering toggle (Settings → Troubleshooting) for games like Grim Dawn. - Fullscreen scale-to-fit (experimental, opt-in) + engine patch-version visibility.

Pixel Port 0.3.37

Pixel Port 0.3.37: stability wave 1 The biggest reliability release of the beta. Nine fixes from the fleet-report triage (PR #41, community-reviewed and adversarially verified) plus the install-robustness batch. Steam & installs - Real Steam first-launch detection: readiness now gates on Steam's own bootstrap log instead of a 4-minute process poll. Slow one-time self-updates no longer get declared broken ("first launch did not finish"), genuine crashes fail fast with an honest message, and a hard ceiling guarantees the wait can never spin forever. - Data-loss-safe "Reset & rebuild Steam": preserves installed games, login, and saves; kills orphans; reports honest errors. - Per-verb winetricks verification: no more "installed fine" with broken audio; each verb is adjudicated with artifact probes. - Install disk-space preflight and reasoned install-failure diagnostics; UE shader-compile no longer false-times-out on first launch. Runtime & launches - Prism runtime fallback pinned to 0.6.3 (fixes DXMT games aborting at device creation on macOS 14/15) with a CI gate so the pin can never silently drift again. - Runtime download hardening: retry with backoff, real byte-level progress, disk preflight (kills the "stuck at 8%" class). - DXVK provisioned into the actual launch prefix (fixes silent no-launch on DXVK titles), with automatic DXMT fallback. - Quit-time Wine/Steam teardown: no more orphaned wine processes after quitting the app. App - Recipe catalogue now survives a single bad recipe file. - Retry-loop detection: three failed launches of the same game in 10 minutes surfaces targeted advice instead of letting you spin. Huge thanks to everyone filing reports on Discord: most of this release traces directly to your bundles.

Pixel Port 0.3.36

Your Pixel Porter number. Sign in and the Account pane now shows your join rank: "Pixel Porter #N, one of the first Mac gamers here." A small thank-you to everyone who showed up early. Under the hood: fixed account sync so your sign-in providers and roles hydrate correctly from the server (a decode mismatch had been silently dropping them). Server-side fix applies to existing installs too.

Pixel Port 0.3.35

Smarter help when a game won't start: if the same failure keeps happening, Pixel Port now tells you why and what actually fixes it: instead of letting you retry forever. Plus internal reliability improvements.

Pixel Port 0.3.34

Safety + reliability: Pixel Port now prevents launching games known to crash entire Macs on macOS 14 (update to macOS 15+ to play those), fixes an installer regression affecting games needing extra components, stops a crash loop when removing games, and adds ~20 new game recipes.

Pixel Port 0.3.33

Smoother gameplay (Pixel Port now steps out of the way of the GPU while you play), a fix for games that looked stuck at 0% when Steam had only queued the download, and cleaner desktop-shortcut handling. Thanks to community contributor vitaliy-blprnt.

Pixel Port 0.3.32

Reliability + security hardening: installs cancel cleanly, quit is snappier, the runtime updater is safer, plus behind-the-scenes robustness across the board.

Pixel Port 0.3.31

Important: this update fixes automatic updates themselves: some earlier versions had them silently switched off, so you may have been stuck on an old build. After this one, Pixel Port keeps itself current in the background. Also includes clearer install error messages and reliability fixes.

Pixel Port 0.3.30

What's new in 0.3.30 More games render correctly. Extends the engine fix from 0.3.27 to 64-bit games built on a mobile-style graphics path: more titles now display properly instead of a blank screen. Delivered automatically via the engine update. Fewer stuck Steam processes. New Force-quit all Windows processes button (Settings → Troubleshooting): one click cleans up when Steam won't come up or Steam icons pile up in the menu bar. Plus quieter cold-starts (no more accidental multiple Steam instances) and an automatic "Reset & rebuild Steam" when its setup gets wedged. Optional: GPU-accelerated Steam UI. An experimental toggle (Settings → Troubleshooting) that renders the Steam client on the GPU: lighter on your Mac, less fan noise. Off by default; if the Steam window ever looks wrong, just turn it back off. Runs on the free Prism engine: no CrossOver required.

Pixel Port 0.3.29

Steam stability: Pixel Port now starts exactly one Steam client at a time (no more multiplying Steam icons or wedged sessions from rapid retries), waits out Steam's connection throttle instead of tripping it, and if the Prism engine is missing or mid-update it says so plainly and reopens setup instead of failing cryptically.

Pixel Port 0.3.28

Safety: games can now warn you up front when your macOS version is known to be risky for them (starting with Meccha Chameleon on macOS 14), and if a game ever crashes your Mac, Pixel Port now tells you what happened on next launch instead of leaving you to retry blind.

Pixel Port 0.3.27

What's new in 0.3.27 Automatic engine updates. Pixel Port now keeps its game engine up to date on its own: when we ship a compatibility fix, your app fetches it automatically (with a manual "Check for updates" in Settings too). No reinstalls. More games render correctly. Fixed a class of games that launched to a blank/white screen on Apple Silicon (games built on a mobile-style graphics path). The fix lives in the engine and reaches everyone via the update above. My Singing Monsters and similar titles now display properly. Under the hood. More reliable success/failure detection when a game launches, so the catalogue's compatibility labels stay honest. Runs on the free Prism engine: no CrossOver required.

Pixel Port 0.3.26

Crash reporting accuracy: crash reports are now attributed only to Pixel Port's own processes, crash excerpts always carry the actual cause, and game sessions keep a runtime log so mid-game crashes can be diagnosed.

Pixel Port 0.3.25

Installs are smoother when Steam is signed in elsewhere: Pixel Port now explains the conflict and gets you unstuck in one tap (no more dead-end loops), instead of needing a restart.

Pixel Port 0.3.24

Cleaner navigation: Installed (your games, one click to play), Playable (everything that runs on Mac), and Request a Game. Plus library and ownership accuracy fixes.

Pixel Port 0.3.23

Updates now happen automatically in the background: no more update prompts. From here, Pixel Port just quietly keeps itself current. Plus reliability improvements to crash reporting.

Pixel Port 0.3.22

Request a game and we'll tell you the moment it works: you'll get a heads-up right in the app when a game you asked for is ready to play. Plus a cleaner Home layout.

Pixel Port 0.3.21

Your library, personalized: connect Steam and Pixel Port now shows the games YOU own that run on Mac: front and center, sorted by what runs best. Recommendations lead with your own games too.

Pixel Port 0.3.20

A stability + safety improvement: if a game ever causes a hard crash, Pixel Port now helps us understand why so we can prevent it. Behind-the-scenes reliability work.

Pixel Port 0.3.19

More accurate under the hood: Pixel Port no longer mistakes a running game for a crashed one, so what you see reflects what's actually happening. Plus tidier in-app messages you can expand to read, with updates handled right inside the app.

Pixel Port 0.3.18

A reliability fix for game installs: smoother setup of the pieces some games need, with fewer spurious failures. If an install stumbled before, it should be steadier now.

Pixel Port 0.3.17

Connecting Steam and installing games is smoother now. Pixel Port tells you up front what it needs: like quitting the desktop Steam app if it's open, or connecting your Steam account: instead of letting an install fail. Update and it's easier.

Pixel Port 0.3.16

We found the install bug: and fixed it. If a game wouldn't install before, that was on us (a missing piece that only affected some Macs); it's fixed now, so give it another try. Also: help is one tap away in the app now, and you'll see a friendly heads-up when we ship fixes.

Pixel Port 0.3.15

Installing a game is clearer now: if you haven't connected Steam yet, Pixel Port tells you up front instead of failing silently: and when something does go wrong, it captures what happened so we can fix it fast.

Pixel Port 0.3.14

A warmer welcome for the Open Beta, plus all of 0.3.13's improvements: refreshed Settings, the Prism engine view, a clean uninstall (saves kept safe), and Discord in the app.

Pixel Port 0.3.13

Settings got a glow-up: smoother controls, a clearer view of the Prism engine and how games get verified, and a proper Uninstall that removes everything (your game saves are kept safe by default). Plus: join the Pixel Port Discord right from the app.

Pixel Port 0.3.12

Pixel Port now starts with a quick sign-in (Apple or Google): free during the beta. Fresh setup got friendlier: cleaner install progress, and MECCHA CHAMELEON: the #1 game on Steam: leads your first-game picks. Plus smarter crash detection and support for the newest Apple chips.

Pixel Port 0.3.11

Smoother first run: pick a first game to install-and-play right after setup, and browse the whole catalogue while the engine installs. Untested games now show a clear 'help test this' note. Under the hood: much better crash diagnostics (so we can fix games faster for everyone), a privacy hardening pass, a smoother Steam connection flow, and faster launch + artwork.

Pixel Port 0.3.10

Fixed: the app could refuse to quit (staying in the Dock until force-quit) when the system process list grew large. Also: sign-in credentials now live under the app's proper identity, dev builds can no longer interfere with them, and smoother under-the-hood process handling.

Pixel Port 0.3.9

First launch, fixed: the full catalogue now appears instantly on a fresh install, and you can browse everything while the engine sets itself up in the background (with a progress bar that actually moves). The app no longer freezes for a second right after launch. Cover art loads faster and your library's art works offline. Plus: a quick one-tap 'did it run well?' after your first session with a game.