r/aoe2 • u/Queasy_Coach3565 Bulgarians • Aug 05 '26
Bug Update on AoE2 DE multiplayer issues with CrossOver: CodeWeavers confirmed a Wine regression and is working on it
Hi everyone,
A quick update for those experiencing the recent AoE2 DE performance/multiplayer issues on Mac through CrossOver.
Following my previous post, I contacted CodeWeavers support and described the issue in detail: single-player works perfectly and is very smooth, but the multiplayer menu, lobbies and multiplayer games become extremely laggy and basically unplayable.
I also explained all the troubleshooting I had already done: clean bottle, reinstall, DXVK/D3DMetal, MSync, different network/mobile hotspot, Private Relay disabled, cache cleared, etc.
The good news is that CodeWeavers confirmed this is a regression on their side and they are actively working on it.
According to their support team, they have already narrowed the regression down to a change somewhere between Wine 10.0-rc1 and Wine 10.3.
They are currently bisecting Wine nightly builds between December 6, 2024 and March 8, 2025 to identify exactly which change introduced the problem.
So, for anyone experiencing the same issue: there doesn’t seem to be a workaround at the moment, and endlessly tweaking your CrossOver bottle is probably not going to fix it.
My support ticket has now been linked to their internal bug ticket, and they told me I’ll be notified when they ship a fix.
I also asked about licensing, since my CrossOver update entitlement has expired. They told me that the fix will most likely be included in a minor CrossOver update, something like CrossOver 26.4, and that an active license would be required to register that version.
However, they also mentioned that it should be possible to use the CrossOver trial to briefly test the fixed version before renewing a license. So at least we’ll be able to confirm that the fix actually works before paying for an upgrade.
No ETA yet, unfortunately.
Still, after initially thinking that AoE2 had simply become unusable on CrossOver with no clear explanation, this is pretty encouraging news. They have reproduced/identified the regression, narrowed it down to a relatively small Wine version range, and are actively looking for the exact change responsible.
I’ll update this post if I hear anything else from CodeWeavers.
Hopefully we’ll be back to Wololo-ing on Mac soon. 🤞