Whisky is gone. What now?
Whisky was the free way to run Windows games on Apple Silicon. Development stopped, and its content server (data.getwhisky.app) went offline. Fresh installs can't even complete first-time setup anymore. Here's an honest map of what's left in 2026.
The options
| Option | Price | Notes |
|---|---|---|
| CrossOver | $74/yr | The most polished option, funds Wine development. If you can pay, it's excellent. |
| Soju (this project) | Free (GPL) | CLI toolchain focused on what it has actually verified: Battle.net, Diablo II: Resurrected, and the Windows Steam client with D3D11 games. Engine built from CodeWeavers' published GPL sources + Apple GPTK. |
| Kegworks (ex-Wineskin) | Free | Wrapper-app builder. Good for older/simpler titles; struggles with launchers that need modern Wine. |
| Whisky forks | Free | Community forks keep the app installable, but the underlying engine gaps (Battle.net Agent, Steam CEF) remain. |
| PlayOnMac | Free | Long-standing Wine frontend; not focused on Apple Silicon gaming specifics. |
Why "just use a Whisky fork" often fails
Whisky's problem was never just maintenance. It's that modern launchers need engine-level work:
- Battle.net dies with
BLZBNTBNA00000005on most free engines, because its Agent verifies the connecting process's signature via a PID→path lookup that needs macOS-specific Wine code. - D2R hangs at launch unless
ROSETTA_ADVERTISE_AVX=1is set, an undocumented Rosetta 2 variable. - Steam's modern CEF UI doesn't render on many builds (black screen) without a webhelper workaround.
Soju exists because we hit each of these walls, found the root cause, and documented them so any project can reuse the fixes.
If your game is on Battle.net or Steam
brew install BCD1210/soju/soju
soju install # Battle.net + D2R path
soju steam-install # Windows Steam client pathSee the full guides: Diablo II: Resurrected on Apple Silicon and the Windows Steam client on M-series Macs.
An honest caveat
Soju is young and CLI-based. It verifies specific targets end-to-end rather than promising everything will work. If you want a GUI and broad catalog support with commercial backing, CrossOver remains the safe choice. Soju is for people who want the free, transparent path and don't mind a terminal.