How to run Fallout 4 on macOS along with mods (2024)

It seems like there’s been a returning interest with Fallout 4 with the upcoming series on Amazon Prime. For Mac users, it has always been a bummer as the game was never made for macOS. But since late 2023 when CrossOver 23.7 was released, I finally could run Fallout 4 on macOS flawlessly out of the box. I’ve previously been able to run it quite well but there was one area where the default installation will just fail.

And for the record, I was able to run Fallout 4 on macOS very well and finished the game after a total of 175 hours (according to Steam) on it.

Note: I primarily play the game with an Xbox One controller, not with a mouse + keyboard. So this post might not cover any tweaks required for good experience on the mouse and keyboard.

How to install Fallout 4 on macOS

While you can probably do it using plain old Wine and Whisky, my recommendation has always been to use CodeWeaver’s Crossover to run games on your Mac. While usually cost about $59.95, there are promos like Black Friday, you may be able to snag it cheaper. Crossover makes it less complicated as it prepackages both Wine, Apple’s D3DMetal and a bunch of other tweaks so that you can easily run these apps and games on your Mac. Moreover, the team at CodeWeaver are also the main contributors to the Wine project, so in a way, this helps supports the project too.

Assuming you got Crossover and installed it, the fun begins.

For Fallout 4, my copy was purchased on Steam. This makes it a lot easier as well for you as Crossover will automate the whole installation process for Fallout 4. It would install Steam, and then automatically get Steam to download and install Fallout 4 if it’s already in your Steam library.

BTW, this guide is using the old Fallout 4: GOTY version, not the recently announced Next Gen edition.

Furthermore, the Fallout 4’s crosstie will also perform the necessary DLL overrides for x3daudio and xaudio to fix the audio issues when running Fallout 4 on macOS.

One more audio fix

You might have also heard that there are quite a number of comments about the game audio crackling or popping when Fallout 4 runs on macOS. I can’t confirm but it some seems to be related to the game or the OS doing real time re-encoding of the audio to whatever’s configured on your audio output. So on the Mac’s Audio MIDI Setup app, configure the format to the highest settings possible. I generally play the game though speakers connected to the Mac itself, or sometimes on my AirPods Pro. For both, I’ve set the output format to be 96KHz and 48KHz respectively. Any output that is 44KHz and below will have significant crackling sound.

At this point, you should already have Fallout 4 installed.

However, as discussed with a fellow Redditor, the default installation will actually start to freeze during combat when you reach Concord which is relatively early in the game. If I run the game on Low settings using the Fallout 4 launcher, the game does play on well without the freezing issue. I finally figured out that this is caused by the dismemberment bug. Whenever you dismember an enemy limb, the game will freeze. To prevent this, disable Gore in the INI settings, or use the No Dismemberment Only Blood mod to remove dismemberment from the game.

I also came across this guide and tested using Mod Organiser and BethINI. This little app did wonders to my Fallout 4 installation and I’m now able to play Fallout 4 at High settings without any issues! There are also a bunch of bug fixes mods I would recommend to use.

But before the BethINI and Mod Organizer installation, you would need to run the game once so that it generates the .ini files. You can use the any settings at this point, but I recommend setting it at Low first to just get it started. The .ini files would be located your Documents/My Games/Fallout4 folder.

Installing BethINI for Fallout 4 on Crossover

Getting the right BethINI Standalone application

First up, let’s get the BethINI application into the Fallout 4 bottle. The Midnight Ride guide now recommends using the latest version of BethINI PIE. Unfortunately, this version crashes on Crossover. Instead, the one I’m using is the older version here. Download the Standalone Version.

Once downloaded, go to Crossover to open the C drive for the Fallout 4 bottle.

Here, extract the Standalone BethINI you just downloaded. I recommend extracting it into a simple directory at C:\. I put mine at C:\modding\BethINI Standalone for example. Do take note that this is also where I would install Mod Organiser 2 as well.

Once done, you can now add BethINI launcher in the Fallout 4 bottle. The Midnight Ride guide does mention to add BethINI as an executable to run from MO2. I do find this step unnecessary and preferred to keep them separately running.

Using BethINI to tweak the Fallout 4 settings

Honestly you milage will vary depending on the Mac you have. On my M3 Max (12 core CPU, 38 core GPU, 64GB RAM), I can generally get 50-60 FPS @ 1440p at mostly High settings as defined in BethINI but dropped the decal settings to Medium and disabled god rays. The following are screenshots of my BethINI settings. Do remember to also check Recommended Tweaks.

You can also change any other settings like subtitles, FOV values, UI colours etc if you like too. When done, just go back to the Basic tab and click and Save and Exit.

I recommend testing a few different settings to see what works best for your Mac. Honestly, even at Low settings, the game still plays quite well.

Before you end, there is still one recommendation from the Midnight Rider’s guide to add some custom settings. The custom INI is hosted here on Nexus. Download it and head to your Documents/My Games/Fallout4 directory and copy to Fallout4Custom.ini file there.

If you’re wondering what it adds on, the following is the content of the file.

[Display]
; Increases Pip-Boy screen resolution to improve clarity
uPipboyTargetHeight=1400
uPipboyTargetWidth=1752
; Centers the game window
iLocation X=0
iLocation Y=0
; Pushes away the point where high quality shadows transition to low quality
fBlendSplitDirShadow=256
; Toggles godrays for more performance especially at high native resolutions, reducing their quality below ultra is not recommended as it will make them look very blocky
bVolumetricLightingEnable=1
; Forces the highest quality of godrays in case you have the setting above enabled, this reduces the blocky artifacting that you can notice at any lower setting.
iVolumetricLightingQuality=3

At this point, if you’re not interested to Mod the game, you can just run it from the default launcher. Just don’t edit the settings anymore. But I would recommend installing Mod Organizer 2 to get some bug fixes mods installed.

Installing Mod Organizer for Fallout 4 on Crossover

The latest version crashes on Crossover. Instead I found version 2.2.2.1 runs well enough. There are some crashes that happen sometimes with this version. But it does what it needs to do to get mods running on Fallout 4 on Crossover.

Download the .exe and install it into the same Fallout 4 bottle. I used the “Install Application into Bottle” option to do so.

I recommend following the Mod Organizer 2 (MO2) configuration guide as described in the Midnight Ride guide.

• When prompted to create a new instance, choose the “Create a portable instance” option. Install it to C:/modding/MO2.
• Select Fallout 4 when asked
• Keep both profile-specific options
• Keep the Location file path default
• When MO2 launches with the Category Setup prompt, select Do Nothing.
• You can try to connect MO2 with your Nexus account but I personally didn’t do that.

The main mods I recommend installing is of course the Unofficial Fallout 4 Patch. Suffice to say, it fixes a lot of things to make Fallout 4 better to play. Another mod I find useful for performance is the Insignificant Object Remover mod.

Installing mods using MO2 is quite simple. Simply click on the install the Install Mod icon and choose the downloaded mod archive.

Check on the mod at the left pane to have it activated on the game at launch. But before moving on, you can use Mod Organizer to sort the mod loading order. I recommend installing all the different mods you like and then sort it when done. This is because this version of MO2 will crash as soon as it sorts the load order. 🤣 But it does sort it, so just ignore the error message that pops-up and reload MO2 to launch Fallout 4.

What about Fallout 4 Script Extender (F4SE)?

Personally, I didn’t go as far on mods to need F4SE installed. It should work well.

I decided to use some mods that need F4SE anyways. The installation is based on the guide I mentioned above. The installation is pretty straightforward. Just download the F4SE files, and extract the main files to the fallout game folder. It should be at /Users/<username>/Library/Application Support/CrossOver/Bottles/Fallout 4/drive_c/Program Files (x86)/Steam/steamapps/common/Fallout 4.

List of mods I’m currently running (always updated to the latest used)

In case you’re wondering, here’s the list of Fallout 4 mods that I’m currently running.

• DLCs
  • DLC: Wasteland Workshop
  • DLC: Vault-Tec Workshop
  • DLC: Nuka-World
  • DLC: Far Harbor
  • DLC: Contraptions Workshop
  • DLC: Automatron
• Utilities mods
  • PrivateProfileRedirector F4 0.5.3 (Runime 1.10.163)
  • Address Library
  • Fallout 4 Language Filter
  • Mod Configuration Menu 1.39
  • Buffout 4
  • MCM Booster
  • Robco Patcher
  • Baka MaxPapyrusOps
• Bug Fixes mods
  • Unofficial Fallout 4 Patch
  • Ownership Fixes
  • Community Fixes Merged
  • Weapon Mod Fixes
  • Sprint Stuttering Fix
  • Armor Penetration Bug Fix
  • Outfit ReDress Fix
  • Weapon Debris Crash Fix
  • 3rd Person Behavior Fixes
  • Reload Fix
  • Fixed Gobo Effects
  • Marine Combat Armor Material Fix
  • Marine Wet suit Material Fix
  • NPC Drinking Fix
  • Wetness Shader Fix
  • Simple Puddle Reflection Flicker Fix (Water and Blood)
  • Misc anim tweaks and fixes
  • High FPS Physics Fix
  • Brawl Bug Fix
  • Long Loading Fix
  • Long Save Bug Fix
  • Midnight Ride – Glitchfinder All-In-One
  • No Dismemberment Only Blood
• Performance mods
  • Insignificant Object Remover
  • Previsibines Repair Pack Stable Branch – PRP
    • PRP Main – Branch 69
    • PRP Plugins – Branch 69
• Quality of Life mods
  • Sim Settlements
  • See-Through-Scopes
  • All-In-One Better Mod Descriptions
  • Lowered Weapons 1.1
  • more aluminum shipment
  • Loot Detector (ESL)
  • Salvage Beacons 1.0.4
  • Power Armor Animation Changes-v1
  • Everyone’s Best Friend v3.0.0
  • Very Rich Merchants 1.1
  • Faster Terminal Displays (10x) Creation Kit Version
  • Achievements v1
  • Craftable Ammo – no perk restrictions
  • Full Dialogue Interface
  • Keep Radiants in the Commonwealth UFO4P Version
  • Weapon Scrapping Redone
  • Clothing Scrapping Redone
  • No Mess
  • To Your Face FO4
  • Remove Ammo from Dropped Guns
  • Bullet Counted Reload System (BCR)
• Visuals mods
  • HUDFramework 1.0f
  • FallUI – HUD
  • FallUI – Inventory
  • FallUI – Icon Library
  • FallUI – Confim Boxes
  • FallUI – Workbench
  • FallUI – Sleep and Wait
  • FallUI – Map
  • FIS – The NEW FallUI Item Sorter
  • Power Armor HUD – paHUD
  • VividFallout – All in One – Best Choice
  • VividFallout – Rocks – Best Choice
  • NAC X Legacy edition
  • Fallout 4 Particle Patch
  • Gloomy Glass
  • Targeted Textures
  • Textures – High 2K Version (BA2 Format)
  • Commonwealth LOD – Best Choice
  • Nuka World LOD – Best Choice
  • Far Harbor LOD – Best Choice
  • MCM Weather Control
  • NAC X Addon for MCM Weather Control
• Easy mode mods
  • 1 Year Fusion Core
  • Easy Lockpicking
  • Easy Hacking
  • Companion Infinite Ammo and Unbreakable Power Armour – SINGLE

And here is the mods sorted on MO2

One last thing, Let’s lock up the game installation from getting updated by Steam. To do so, look for the appmanifest_377160.acf file, and using the file info menu, lock the file and also set it to read-only for your user. Thanks Redditors!

Finally. Running Fallout 4 on macOS

Yes. you can finally run and play Fallout 4 at this point. Since we’re using Mod Organizer 2 (MO2) to load the mods, you will need to use MO2 to launch the game, not from Steam. But it still needs Steam to be running in the background. So, the load order is simple.

1. Open Steam
2. Open Mod Organizer 2 and click on Run with F4SE selected.

Fallout 4 on M2 Max. 100+ hours with no crashes!

Watch this video on YouTube.

With that, I hope Fallout 4 runs just as well on your Mac. Enjoy the game!

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