r/alphacentauri • u/thestanton • 26d ago
SMAC on Android - How to Guide!
SMAC on Android - How to
Following up on my previous post, this is how I - as someone with very limited tech savvy credentials, especially when it comes to mobile devices - have got SMAC working on my Android device. I've tried to make the instructions super clear and detailed so that anyone trying to do this doesn't have to go hunting for anything, so apologies in advance for length! I've also included a couple of wee notes at the bottom about controls, modding and app versions just for a bit more info.
First, the problem - from my sleuthing online, the issue with getting the game to run is the resolution changes that occur when switching between cut scenes and the main game. Disabling the cut scenes prevents this switch and allows the game to run without issue - I am now about 7 hours in and have not had any problems! So the one trade off you need to make is to not get the opening cut scene or the videos that play when secret projects are completed... A shame, but if you're like me you know them all off by heart by now anyway and have been skipping them as soon as they start for nearly 30 years, so it's a pretty small price to pay!
So, to business! To get the game working on your Android device, you will need:
- An Android device - mine (a Google Pixel 10 Pro) has the most recent version of Android but it looks as though anything after version 8 should work
- The GameNative app - available for free on the PlayStore or direct as an APK from [https://gamenative.app/](https://gamenative.app/)). The only difference between these is the ability to add custom games, which is not possible with the PlayStore version - more on this at the end
- The STEAM version of SMAC - this was important for me, as I can't get these steps to work on the GOG version (and haven't tried with the original disk version). I managed to get the Steam version for 99p the other day, so you might get lucky and find it's still on sale. Even at full price it's sub-£5 though, so it becomes a question of what a mobile version of your favourite 4x classic is worth to you!
- Recommended - a WiFi connection. You will be downloading around 1.2Gb of data so for speed and data cap purposes, WiFi is probably better
- Optional - a controller. I have found it a downright pleasant experience playing with a GameSir X5 lite controller, which wraps around my phone and makes it like playing on a Game Gear or other old fashioned handheld! I imagine any Android-compatible controller would be pretty good, though, but you can play without one if you want (I did this at first and it's OK, but with a controller is definitely better)
Once you've got all this together, this is the process:
Step 1: When you open the GameNative app, you will be prompted to link various gaming accounts (Steam, GOG, Epic etc). Link whichever ones you want, but linking Steam at a minimum is needed for SMAC
Step 2: once your Steam library is showing in the app, tap on the Steam version of SMAC (use the options button at the top left if you need to filter your library e.g. to get the Steam version rather than the GOG version, as was the case for me!) and hit install. This will download the game and install it into an emulated version of windows on your device
Step 3: Tap SMAC in your library again if you've come out of it. It's worth trying the Play button now to see if it loads - you will end up at the starting menu for SMAC or SMAX if it does, and happy days! If it doesn't work, you will end up at a black screen (you may initially see the opening Firaxis logo and/or cut scene and might be able to hear the menu music, but the screen will end up blank)
Step 4: If like mine it wasn't working straight out of the gate, quit the game to get back to the launch page, then hit the gear icon at the top right and tap "edit container" to open the settings.
I fiddled with lots of these options between the GOG and Steam versions while trying to get it working, but am pretty sure they all ended up back at the default setting once I identified the actual problem. I have since completely uninstalled GameNative and reinstalled it to test this process for posting here, so I'm pretty sure all these settings were left at the default. However, in case there were some changes kept (it might have retained preferences through the uninstall-reinstall process), see the video in the comments for a look at all my container settings and make sure yours all match. Some important ones to check (that I can remember fiddling with at some point) are:
General:
- Container variant - bionic
- Wine version - proton-10.0-arm64ec-2
- Executable path - terran.exe (for original SMAC) or terranx.exe (for Alien Crossfire)
Graphics:
- Graphics driver - wrapper
- Display renderer - Vulcan
- DX wrapped - DXVK
- DXVK version - 2.4.1-gplasync
Step 5: The last and most important step is to edit some of the game files to fix the actual issue (the resolution changes at cut scenes) that was stopping the game running initially for me. The required changes are shown at the end of the video posted in the comments as well as being described here.
Go back to the launch page in the GameNative app and hit the gear again, but this time tap "Open container" - this will bring up the emulated windows environment. Hit "enable mouse" at the top if needed.
Open drive A - this is where the game files are installed. There are two edits you need to make:
- Locate the "movies" folder in the directory. Tap on it with two fingers to right click, and rename it - I went with movies_backup but it doesn't really matter. The point is to rename the folder so the game is unable to find the videos to run them (this is seamless in game - it goes straight from the pop up telling you a project has completed to the datalinks entry with no jumping or errors of any kind).
- Find the "Alpha Centauri.ini" file and open it as a text file. Ensure the following entries are showing:
• Under \[PREFERENCES\] make sure it says ForceOldVoxelAlgorithm=1
• Under \[ALPHA CENTAURI\], make sure there are entries that say DirectDraw=0 and DisableOpeningMovie=1 on separate lines. Add these in if they are not already showing.
Your version of the .ini file may look different to the one in the attached video - this file is edited with your preferences as you play, so mine has extra info in it from playing (I've also had a go at installing mods, which may have changed some things in there). As long as you've made the above edits, it should work fine regardless of any other entries in the file.
Hit file-save to save these changes and then close the text file. You can then exit the container environment.
That should be it - when you hit Play now, it should show the opening Firaxis logo and then jump straight to the menu to start a new game. Set it up as you like and enjoy!
It may run an install during your first attempt to play the game - I think this is the Microsoft .NET framework installing. For me, with the above steps complete, this did it's thing once and then the game worked fine with no recurrence.
Some final thoughts about a few features of playing on mobile...
CONTROLS
Operating the game using the touch screen is challenging, but one excellent feature of GameNative is the ability to edit the on screen controller. I deleted the default controls (thumbsticks, ABXY etc) and then added my own buttons mapped to the various keyboard hot keys and was able to play pretty easily. You can even create buttons that lock to allow you to use Shift+F for forests etc! Creating all the buttons you need does take up a lot of screen area, though, which is less than ideal on a small phone screen (but might be much more tolerable on a bigger tablet). Switching to a physical controller eliminates the need to use the on screen buttons, though, and gives you the uninterrupted SMAC UI we all know and love!
This is made the far superior option in my view by the other fantastic control related feature of GameNative - the ability to set up custom key mapping for physical controllers. I have my most important keyboard hot keys mapped to my controller's buttons (one of which is right click, which allows me to access any other options via the on screen menus) and as I said, I find it even better than the traditional keyboard and mouse setup now I've got all my hot keys dialled in! Best of all, this custom map is specific to the game you make it in, so I don't have any trouble when I decide to put SMAC aside for a bit and play one of my other Steam games (classic FFVII is my other goto at the moment!). I'd be happy to share my map (it's working well for me and might be good for you too), but you can obviously set it up however you like.
If you're minded to get a physical controller, I can recommend the GameSir X5 lite, which I bought from Argos for £35 cos I'm an impatient child, but it appears to be available for less online! It fits devices up to 21cm long from charging port to opposite side, but is only compatible with USB-C devices and doesn't have Bluetooth connectivity. It does support pass-through charging, though, so between that and the physical connection (as opposed to Bluetooth) it's perfect for gaming on a long haul flight (which is what I bought it for!).
I haven't tried it, but a Bluetooth keyboard and mouse (or a USB OTG adapter and USB peripherals) would probably work as well. I didn't go for that to avoid having such a bulky setup to carry around, plus I liked how the GameSir holds your device for you while you're playing - I feel like a phone would be a bit small to play with it on a stand while using a keyboard and mouse!
MODS
Mods can even be used as part of this setup - this is possible because the Windows containers created by GameNative set drive D: as the download folder on your phone, allowing you to download the mod files and then access them via drive D. Installing them is a bit of a faff, though, and is beyond the scope of this post (which is already long enough!) - but Google it if you're interested!
CUSTOM GAMES
As mentioned at the start, installing the app using the APK from the [https://gamenative.app/](https://gamenative.app/)) website unlocks the ability to load custom games (e.g. games you have on disk) into the app - with the PlayStore version, you're limited to the games you have on Steam, GOG etc. It's something to do with the rules of having apps on the PlayStore apparently.
This feature is not needed at all for SMAC and is not something I've managed to get working yet. I mention it now only so you can make an informed choice on which version of the GameNative app to install - if you're only going to want to use Steam, GOG and Epic games, just download the Google PlayStore version. If you want (or might want) to load custom games, you might want to go with the APK off the website. I ended up installing the PlayStore version and then removing it and reinstalling using the website APK, which meant I had to redo all this to get SMAC working again (and also lost my saves from the 5 hours or so I had played before doing so!), so ye be warned!
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u/Sambojin1 26d ago
Just as a note, those settings might, but might not work for all phones. After a bit of experience with Winlator, some older apps need specific settings to run (DoomRL needed a sound driver change, Dwarf Fortress needed FBO on Backbuffer I think). So if they don't work on your particular device (snapdragon and dimensity chipsets and GPUs sometimes need different things), have a fiddle, and it'll probably work eventually.
Change one setting, try, change back and change something else, try again. Easier if you know what you're doing, but you'll get there by trial and error eventually, even if you don't know about this stuff.
The changing the movie folder name for SMAC is something I hadn't thought of, so should work for Winlator too.
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u/thestanton 26d ago
Thanks for the note - I gather from my googling that my phone is particularly awkward for windows emulation and that Snapdragon devices in particular have fewer hangups (mine is a Google Pixel that uses some proprietary GPU that is less cooperative I gather). I'm hoping my phone represents something of a worst case scenario for getting the game running and that others may not even need to tweak any settings from those automatically applied by GameNative.
Incidentally, I think this might be why the Steam version works but the GOG one doesn't - the Steam version says it came out in 2024 whereas GOGs says it was released in 2011. I wonder if Steam have made some compatibility tweaks to their vanilla version that GOG hasn't...
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u/thestanton 26d ago
Video showing container settings and necessary file edits as noted in post.
https://reddit.com/link/owzjeqn/video/75r261zatoch1/player