Installing Mods (NAM) on Big Sur for SC4

[tonyfv 23]

Things keep changing as Apple updates macOS - this process is the latest as of this post's date for Big Sur 11.4 and NAM 41.

I will update this post with any changes affecting the installation if/as issues come up.

Other bugs or quirks discovered in gameplay will be posted as a reply to this topic farther down. As of now this has been found:

• Immortal Lots. Unable to bulldoze lots/buildings that overlap a modded plop. Solution found.

Installing Mods (NAM) on Big Sur for SC4

MODS WILL NOT WORK WITH THE NEW 64-BIT SC4 GAME FROM THE APPLE APP STORE. If you have it, forget about adding mods - Apple's configuration does not allow it. Delete it (and all its associated files) and get the Steam version.

Steam's downloadable version is 1/4 the price (~ $5 USD) and the NAM installation actually works.

Steps (in order)

1. Purchase SC4 and download/install Steam (free, but Steam account creation is required with a couple of back and forth confirmation emails).
2. Steam will not run on Big Sur without this adjustment: Copy this command:  rm -r ~/Library/Application\ Support/Steam/Steam.AppBundle , open the Mac's Terminal app and paste it, click Enter and close the Terminal app.
3. Download the latest NAM package and unzip it. Open the folder to see the files to run below.
4. Right-click (not double-click) to run and install the OpenJDK11U-jre_x64_windows_hotspot_11.0.8_10.msi file included in the package. MacOS may give you a hard time but there's a way in.
5. Right-click (not double-click) on the NetworkAddonMod_Setup_Version41.jar file in the package and select Open, continue past MacOS warning dialog.
6. A window opens for the NAM installer. Click to agree to the usage terms at the bottom of the Welcome tab (do not change the defaults in the Files tab - they will not work), click on the Install tab, and click to Start Installation.  A list of files will begin to fill the window for a while – keep scrolling to the bottom of the list until you see the notice that all files were loaded, then quit the application.
7. Open two finder windows. On one search for the Network Addon Mod folder, right-click to Duplicate it, then drag the copy to your Desktop.
8. Go to https://www.sc4devotion.com/csxlex/index.htm to download the JDATPacker tool. Register and then click https://www.sc4devotion.com/csxlex/lex_filedesc.php?lotGET=3140 to go straight to the item to download. 
9. Unzip the downloaded JDATPacker archive, then right-click on the JDatPacker-0.1.3.jar file, continue past the warning to open.
10. On the JDATPacker tool, Source Directory: click Browse and scroll to find and select the Network Addon Mod copy folder that you dragged to the Desktop. Target Directory: Browse to find and select Desktop. Execute and close the tool.
11. From Desktop select all the new .dat files just unpacked (including the NetworkAddonMod_Controller.dat file, which may still be inside the z_NAM Controller_RHD_4GB_Full folder), and drag to drop them inside the SimCity 4 folder's Plugins folder you previously removed them from. At the end of the process the folder contents should match the screen shot attached. You can move all the download archives and unneeded files to Trash. The files in the image below are all you need.
12. Launch the Steam app to finish its setup and connect to your Steam account, then run SC4. Open a city and check the menus for new mods, and put some down and bulldoze them to be sure they work.

Looks like the vast majority of people here [players and modders] are WIndows users. We few Mac users are usually just players so there's not a lot of tech wizards who know Macs well, although they are very helpful. Any time you can help with problem solving please pitch in.

 

[Wiimeiser 445]

So what exactly is the new Mac version doing to prohibit mods? I'm a Windows user, so I have no idea what goes on with Mac OS...

[rsc204 21,836]

It's not necessarily specific to the new 64-bit release, but the Mac version has always had a strict limit in terms of how many files/folders can exist in Plugins. As of NAM 41, simply installing the NAM, not even the Full RHW version either, is enough to create much instability (CTDs). The solution is simply to DAT-Pack the NAM and then this problem doesn't appear. Moreover it's pretty much mandatory to DAT-Pack your entire Plugins suite if you plan to use more than a small handful of mods

The next problem concerns the AppStore version, which is technically identical to the Steam one, but due to security restrictions in the OS all AppStore apps must be sandboxed, whereas you can manually configure Steam to access folders the AppStore version cannot. Up until Catalina the AppStore version did allow for the use of mods, I can't say for certain Big Sur doesn't, but certainly it appears the dedicated Plugins folder is not easy to locate for regular folk. :Edit:, it's been found, see my post below- Unlike the Windows game, it's not possible to parse command line switches on a Mac, so there is no way to alter the default location either.

Then just to make things even more fun, is the issue of content that causes problems on a Mac, but works fine for PC users. This was well documented in the 6 months or so after the 64-bit release, but essentially having such a file present in Plugins will either cause the game to crash before it loads a city or when trying to use such an item.

Add to that that mods and modding tools are generally designed around Windows, which too can add a further degree of complexity and it at the very least modding the Mac game just takes so much more work/knowledge.

[tonyfv 23]

BUG REPORT: Immortal lots

So far, everything is working fine except for one buggy annoyance with the Avenue Intersections tool. It's one of the only mods I've used so far and I hope similar bugs aren't common. 

I had placed a Bus Stop on a road which I later widened to an Avenue, and I placed an Avenue Circle adjacent to it. The bus stop did not get automatically deleted by the circle placement (I assumed the Avenue Circle placement it would destroy buildings in its footprint), and was overlapping one of the traffic circle's footprint squares. It kept traffic from circulating in the circle at the point of blockage, and therefore along one side of the avenue buildings had no road access. I bulldozed the circle, and that didn't destroy it, although it allowed traffic to access. I bulldozed the bus stop and it acts as if it is being blown up (incurs a cost too), but stays there. I ended up making a regular T intersection there to solve the traffic issue.

[Whte_rbt 1,431]

@tonyfv: Looks like you're gonna need the Immortality Killer by @RippleJet, available here:

https://www.sc4devotion.com/csxlex/lex_filedesc.php?lotGET=2356

Instructions/background on it can be found here:

https://www.sc4devotion.com/forums/index.php?topic=10434.0

[tonyfv 23]

1 hour ago, Whte_rbt said:

@tonyfv: Looks like you're gonna need the Immortality Killer by @RippleJet, available here:

https://www.sc4devotion.com/csxlex/lex_filedesc.php?lotGET=2356

Instructions/background on it can be found here:

https://www.sc4devotion.com/forums/index.php?topic=10434.0

Unfortunately, it's an .exe file which MacOS can't open. Is there a tool to convert it?

[Whte_rbt 1,431]

Not that I know of. I've extracted it for you, check your PM's.

[Whte_rbt 1,431]

Did some further research, not sure if any of these are applicable for Big Sur but you might have some luck.

https://macosx-faq.com/how-to-extract-exe-files-on-mac/

https://forums.techguy.org/threads/how-to-extract-exe-on-a-mac.1097611/

https://itstillworks.com/open-windows-exe-files-mac-6081554.html

[rsc204 21,836]

1 hour ago, tonyfv said:

(I assumed the Avenue Circle placement it would destroy buildings in its footprint)

Normally in such cases, the tool should go red and inform you there is no suitable place to plop the item in question. However, I just checked a bunch of puzzle-pieces real quick and noticed that this doesn't seem to happen on the Mac version, so I'd chalk that down to a Bug specific to Mac users. You need to be careful to ensure you don't overlap Puzzle Pieces and Lots (other network pieces should be fine, to prevent creating immortal lots.

32 minutes ago, tonyfv said:

Unfortunately, it's an .exe file which MacOS can't open. Is there a tool to convert it?

This is a problem you are going to have to deal with at some point if you continue using mods. My solution for this is to run VirtualBox with a Windows XP Virtual Machine (you can Run an OS as an Application this way). That way I can both deal with .exe's and also make use of a bunch of Windows modding tools.

I believe the more common tool used used to be File Juicer, note that's a paid application, Keka is another such tool. Solutions involving WINE no longer apply since Catalina's 64-bit requirement killed off WINE support on the Mac. It doesn't look like there is any shift to update the code there either.

[tonyfv 23]

4 hours ago, Whte_rbt said:

Not that I know of. I've extracted it for you, check your PM's.

Thanks! It worked, except that I have to plop the Killer on TOP of the item to be bulldozed, then use the ingame bulldozer. Plopping it on the side, as the popup instructions say, did not work, with or without the crane hanging over the lot to be blasted.

@rsc204 thanks for the advice on using Windows tools. I remember I had to use Wine when I was modding in Skylines. But I'm not ready to tackle another tech puzzle yet. This one took me so many hours, and they tend to do that due to my lack of skills in that complicated area.

[rsc204 21,836]

Just to update here, another user on SC4D has found the problem with accessing the Plugins folder on the AppStore version, it appears it was simply changed.

When I look in the Containers folder on Catalina, (mostly) everything there uses a .com.apple prefix:

But as you can see in the previous screenshot, under Big Sur it appears that's changed and the actual App Names are used instead. So good news is that playing with Mods on the AppStore edition is still completely possible. But it seems that the location of the UserDir is different depending on your version of MacOS.

[gweed123 33]

So I recently updated to NAM 42, and finally made the jump to using the 64-bit SC4 through the App Store. I had avoided the update because of the CTD issues and such. I've flipped back and forth a few times, but always kept the v1.1.1 copy in a separate location so I could downgrade.

There are a few things with NAM 42 that worked fine under the 32-bit version that no longer work with the 64-bit version.

1) The RHW starters menu no longer toggles through all of the options. It goes RHW 4 L0, RHW 3 L0, RHW 6C L0, RHW 8C L0, RHW 10S L0, RHW 4 L1, RHW 3 L1, RHW 6C L1, RHW 8C L1, RHW 10S L1, RHW 4 L2, RHW 3 L2, RHW 6C L2, RHW 8C L2, RHW 10S L2, MIS L3, RHW L4, RHW 6S L4.

So basically, I'm no longer able to place MIS, 6S, or 8S starter pieces. I checked, and this was working just fine with the 32-bit version, so something got messed up when I switched to 64-bit. Plug-in folder didn't change at all when I upgraded.

2) NetworkAddonMod_Bridges_Plugin_Controller.dat causes a CTD in the 64-bit version, but doesn't in the 32-bit version. Again, no idea why, but I went through the NAM files one by one to see what was causing it, and that's the one I found by process of elimination.

I can also confirm that that file in NAM 41 did not cause the same CTD, so there was something in it, or how it interfaces with another file, that was changed for NAM 42.

Any assistance that could be provided would be greatly appreciated! It’s just strange to me that upgrading the game itself would cause NAM files that haven’t been modified at all to behave so differently like that. And again, I have both versions 1.1.1 and 1.2.1 on my computer, so I’m able to test both.

[rsc204 21,836]

1 hour ago, gweed123 said:

The RHW starters menu no longer toggles through all of the options.

Actually the problem is bigger than RHW, every Tab-Ring jumps two items at a time under the 64-bit edition. You need to use Control + Tab or Shift + Control + Tab to only move forwards or backwards in single-increments.

1 hour ago, gweed123 said:

NetworkAddonMod_Bridges_Plugin_Controller.dat causes a CTD in the 64-bit version, but doesn't in the 32-bit version.

That would likely be an out of date file, pre-dating NAM 37 I suspect.

The current version of this NetworkAddonMod_Bridges_Plugin_Controller.dat, residing in the 7 Bridges folder, doesn't cause any CTDs for me. You should make sure you remove any previous NAM installation before installing a new version. Note that this problem is something endemic to the 64-bit update, so you likely wouldn't have previously noted it. If you are absolutely certain it's the correct file and only that version of the file installed, I can take a peek inside it. But if it were containing one of the faulty data types, it would cause the same crash for me, so I fairly certain you've a legacy file floating around.

1 hour ago, gweed123 said:

...and finally made the jump to using the 64-bit SC4 through the App Store. I had avoided the update because of the CTD issues and such. I've flipped back and forth a few times, but always kept the v1.1.1 copy in a separate location so I could downgrade.

Honestly, aside from allowing it to work with Catalina or later, which I assume since you didn't update you don't have, it's not like they've updated the code or made things better in any sense. They've simply made it work as 64-bit code and some of the modifications can cause headaches, explanation and current fixes here. That said, it doesn't necessarily mean you are better off going back to the previous version, it all depends on a number of factors. I should warn you too, once a city (save file) has been saved in the 64-bit version, you can no longer use it with any other version of SC4.

[gweed123 33]

21 hours ago, rsc204 said:

Actually the problem is bigger than RHW, every Tab-Ring jumps two items at a time under the 64-bit edition. You need to use Control + Tab or Shift + Control + Tab to only move forwards or backwards in single-increments.

Great to know, thank you! I tried it out, and they are in fact all there. Weird how that they made that change between versions.

21 hours ago, rsc204 said:

That would likely be an out of date file, pre-dating NAM 37 I suspect.

The current version of this NetworkAddonMod_Bridges_Plugin_Controller.dat, residing in the 7 Bridges folder, doesn't cause any CTDs for me. You should make sure you remove any previous NAM installation before installing a new version. Note that this problem is something endemic to the 64-bit update, so you likely wouldn't have previously noted it. If you are absolutely certain it's the correct file and only that version of the file installed, I can take a peek inside it. But if it were containing one of the faulty data types, it would cause the same crash for me, so I fairly certain you've a legacy file floating around.

I didn't have any old NAM files that I knew of in my Plugins folder, but I did some cleaning and removed a few that I wasn't sure what they were (they were really old files from when I needed to dat pack in order to run the game, back when the App Store version was first released). Seems to be working now!

21 hours ago, rsc204 said:

Honestly, aside from allowing it to work with Catalina or later, which I assume since you didn't update you don't have, it's not like they've updated the code or made things better in any sense. They've simply made it work as 64-bit code and some of the modifications can cause headaches, explanation and current fixes here. That said, it doesn't necessarily mean you are better off going back to the previous version, it all depends on a number of factors. I should warn you too, once a city (save file) has been saved in the 64-bit version, you can no longer use it with any other version of SC4.

I'm planning on getting a new MacBook relatively soon, since my 2011 Air is getting a bit sluggish. It would be an M1, so I wanted to upgrade SC4 to the 64-bit version and get all the kinks worked out before I got my new laptop.

One thing I have noticed though is since NAM 39, cities take significantly longer to load. The difference in load time between NAM 38 and NAM 39+ (including the new NAM 42) is 3-4x as long. Any idea what could be causing that?

Thanks for your help!

[rsc204 21,836]

17 minutes ago, gweed123 said:

One thing I have noticed though is since NAM 39, cities take significantly longer to load. The difference in load time between NAM 38 and NAM 39+ (including the new NAM 42) is 3-4x as long. Any idea what could be causing that?

The NAM controller holds all the RUL code, which is needed to tell the game what networks can interact with each other and how. The complete list of "rules" must be in memory, so when you try to make networks in-game, it can use a "look up" system to analyse the relevant code and work out what to do. The delay comes from this process, because the RUL2 side of things has swelled since NAM 36 quite largely. The additional code is mostly used to make RHW more stable, but for NAM 42 a similar addition for NWM was included. Long and short, the now millions of lines of code required to use all the NAM, simply takes a while to process. The good news is, it's only for the first city tile loaded upon startup. Subsequent cities load much quicker, since it's a one-time process.

There are a few things you can do to speed things up:

• Switch to the non-RHW controller
  The installer gives you two controller options, Full4GB and No RHW, if you don't actually use RHW, it's a no-brainer which of those to choose. Make sure you also untick the RHW feature too, since you don't need those files. Of course, if you do use the RHW, this won't really be a solution for you.
• Uncoupling network RUL
  This essentially means, switching between the two controller files above. When you want to build RHW, you load the game with the full controller, so you have access to everything. But when you aren't, you can switch to the quicker-loading leaner No RHW controller. The drawbacks here is that you need to switch things about, but whilst the No RHW controller is present, clicking too close to any RHW piece, may break it too. Since the code won't exist if the game needs to do a lookup to see if anything needs changing, any pieces within the "radius" of a click, may be destabilised. Fixed by switching controller and just clicking around again. It's a bit fiddly, but a solution that may work for some.
• Make a custom controller
  Using the Controller Compiler, included in the NAM installer download, you can make a RUL controller with only those bits of code you need. However, if you use RHW this is a bit futile, you'll barely make a dent in the problem. But if you wanted to switch off some parts of RHW you don't use, that might reduce things a little. You can have full control and manually alter the .txt files that make up the actual code the compiler turns into a game-usable form. So you could remove any files you didn't need the code for and mix and match things. However, this is complex stuff and understanding exactly what is what might not be obvious, it'll probably take some tinkering to make that work satisfactory.

Personally I go for method #2 right now, especially as I'm often testing things and loading times hurt when you need to constantly re-open the game to take account of any modifications you're making. But it may not be so big a deal for you to just wait, after-all your reward is even more content than ever to make use of.

[gweed123 33]

21 hours ago, rsc204 said:

The NAM controller holds all the RUL code, which is needed to tell the game what networks can interact with each other and how. The complete list of "rules" must be in memory, so when you try to make networks in-game, it can use a "look up" system to analyse the relevant code and work out what to do. The delay comes from this process, because the RUL2 side of things has swelled since NAM 36 quite largely. The additional code is mostly used to make RHW more stable, but for NAM 42 a similar addition for NWM was included. Long and short, the now millions of lines of code required to use all the NAM, simply takes a while to process. The good news is, it's only for the first city tile loaded upon startup. Subsequent cities load much quicker, since it's a one-time process.

Thanks for the explanation! I just wanted to make sure there was a legit reason behind it and not some random file in my Plugins reacting in a funny way and slowing down the process.

And good to know it’s only for the first city launched. I’ve been doing a lot of CTD testing lately, so that’s probably why I noticed it more, since every launch was a first launch.

[ironjaw 54]

I wanted to thank you for making this tutorial and helping out MacOS users playing SC4. I've been a member  for quite a long time and find myself always coming back to SC4 and this website to see what else has happened since. I must say I am always disappointed with playing SC4 on a Mac and should make the final decision and get a Windows to not worry about all those patches and fixes and the nightmode lights. Does it work on Mac?

Anyway I'm stuck on No 9. I've got the SC4 Steam 64 bit version that I've just downloaded and downloaded the JDATPacker tool, but when I load the tool and go to Source Directory: click Browse and scroll to find and select the Network Addon Mod copy folder, it's all blank.I can't select the folder. What do I do?

[96blik 1]

On 10/2/2021 at 3:59 PM, ironjaw said:

I wanted to thank you for making this tutorial and helping out MacOS users playing SC4. I've been a member  for quite a long time and find myself always coming back to SC4 and this website to see what else has happened since. I must say I am always disappointed with playing SC4 on a Mac and should make the final decision and get a Windows to not worry about all those patches and fixes and the nightmode lights. Does it work on Mac?

Anyway I'm stuck on No 9. I've got the SC4 Steam 64 bit version that I've just downloaded and downloaded the JDATPacker tool, but when I load the tool and go to Source Directory: click Browse and scroll to find and select the Network Addon Mod copy folder, it's all blank.I can't select the folder. What do I do?

I also got stuck on this step. When I load the tool and got to my Desktop in Source Directory, it's blank. I know this post is a couple of years old (and running and older OS), but curious if anyone has found a workaround. Thanks!

[simster007 387]

35 minutes ago, 96blik said:

I also got stuck on this step. When I load the tool and got to my Desktop in Source Directory, it's blank. I know this post is a couple of years old (and running and older OS), but curious if anyone has found a workaround. Thanks!

My workaraound is like this and works:

1 Create a new folder which u want to use for items to be packed by the datpacker (source folder), name and place it however you like

2 Create a new folder which u want to use as target folder for the datpacker to save the dats (target folder), name and place it however you like

3 use the "browse" buttons to define these two folders as source/ target in the datpacker

4 move your items (the network addon mod folder or what ever) to be packed in the source folder

5 press start button

6 the dats should occur in the target folder

7 the orginal unpacked files are still in the source folder, you should remove and maybe store them as backups somewhere else before next packing

[96blik 1]

On 7/9/2023 at 3:28 PM, simster007 said:

My workaraound is like this and works:

1 Create a new folder which u want to use for items to be packed by the datpacker (source folder), name and place it however you like

2 Create a new folder which u want to use as target folder for the datpacker to save the dats (target folder), name and place it however you like

3 use the "browse" buttons to define these two folders as source/ target in the datpacker

4 move your items (the network addon mod folder or what ever) to be packed in the source folder

5 press start button

6 the dats should occur in the target folder

7 the orginal unpacked files are still in the source folder, you should remove and maybe store them as backups somewhere else before next packing

I did something similar to this yesterday and it worked. Thank you! For some reason, only certain folders were allowing me to view subfolders, so I just pointed the respective directories toward those folders and was able to process everything

[rsc204 21,836]

The basic problem lies with OS security blocking access to certain folders like Documents or the Desktop. But as mentioned the easier solution is just to set two new folders for the task and move files around as necessary.