I had a hankering to replay Quake 4 and discovered OpenQ4, a recent open-source engine that can apparently run the original game. However, I can't get it to work, and I don't want to file a formal issue until I've made sure that it's not a "me issue".
The first problem I ran into is that the official releases are only built for Arm, and I'm on Intel. I downloaded the source and built it using the instructions on the official page:
This appeared to work successfully, generating a "openQ4-client_x64" binary at approximately 12.7 MB. However, when I run it, I just get this:
This leads to a question. The official docs say to get the game from Steam or GOG. I'm not sure whether this is just because they're a convenient source, or whether it actually needs one of those specific versions. I have neither: I copied the q4base folder across from the original Mac retail DVD [Edit: I have subsequently updated q4base to version 1.4.2 to no avail, but credit to Aspyr for still hosting the updater after all these years!].
In short, I'm not sure what the problem is. It could be that something went wrong with my build. It could be that the code simply can't run on an Intel machine even when built for one. It could be that the Mac data files are in a different format. Or it could be something else entirely.
Has anyone tried to run OpenQ4 and did you have any luck?
The first problem I ran into is that the official releases are only built for Arm, and I'm on Intel. I downloaded the source and built it using the instructions on the official page:
Code:
bash tools/build/meson_setup.sh setup --wipe builddir . --backend ninja --buildtype=debug --wrap-mode=forcefallback
bash tools/build/meson_setup.sh compile -C builddirThis appeared to work successfully, generating a "openQ4-client_x64" binary at approximately 12.7 MB. However, when I run it, I just get this:
Code:
openQ4 0.1.010-dev (macos-x64, Jul 7 2026 17:27:08)
loopback
IP: 10.0.1.210
NetMask: 255.255.255.0
doom using SSE2 for SIMD processing
enabled Flush-To-Zero mode
enabled Denormals-Are-Zero mode
Steam install discovery roots (1):
/Users/nermal/Library/Application Support/Steam
Steam explicit library roots (0):
Steam library roots to probe (1):
/Users/nermal/Library/Application Support/Steam
Steam Quake 4 install candidates (1):
/Users/nermal/Library/Application Support/Steam/steamapps/common/Quake 4
------ Initializing File System ------
idRenderSystem::Shutdown()This leads to a question. The official docs say to get the game from Steam or GOG. I'm not sure whether this is just because they're a convenient source, or whether it actually needs one of those specific versions. I have neither: I copied the q4base folder across from the original Mac retail DVD [Edit: I have subsequently updated q4base to version 1.4.2 to no avail, but credit to Aspyr for still hosting the updater after all these years!].
In short, I'm not sure what the problem is. It could be that something went wrong with my build. It could be that the code simply can't run on an Intel machine even when built for one. It could be that the Mac data files are in a different format. Or it could be something else entirely.
Has anyone tried to run OpenQ4 and did you have any luck?
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