Can't find any of my game files

[Nebuchad]

Running OS X 10.7.4 with Steam installed. The only game I have used Steam for on the Mac is Civ IV and Civ V. I've been looking at the forums trying to find out where all the game files are but cannot find anything. I see references too ~Library/Application Support/Steam but I don't have that folder there are also references to ~Library/Containers but I don't have that folder either.

There is an Aspyr folder in my ~Documents but it is only about 166mb which seems odd for a ~4GB installation.

Am I just being very dense and missing something obvious here or is there something wrong with my installation?

The main reason I am trying to find out about this is because since installing G&K performance has become very laggy/choppy, from reading the forums, this seems to be happening to a lot of people and the GameCoreThreading in the config.ini might resolve it, problem is, I can't find that anywhere to try. Does that line not exist on the Mac OS X version? If not, is there anything I can do to improve the lag? It doesn't seem to be related to graphics settings at all, as I've tried reducing them to low and there are still delays and chop that weren't present before G&K.

Thanks.

 

[AlanH]

Hi, welcome

There are two different folders involved any Civ5 installation. The same applies in principle to Civ4, but as this is the Civ5 forum, I'll only talk about Civ5 locations.

The first folder is the one where the software is installed. Ideally, you should never have to touch that one, as it only contains the actual game code and scripts and multimedia files.

In a Steam installation, this folder is at /Users/[your_user_name]/Library/Application Support/Steam/SteamApps/common/sid meier's civilisation v


Please note that this Library folder is NOT /Library/.... or /System/Library/.... It lives inside your Home folder, and is hidden in Lion in the Finder. You have to use the Finder's Go->Got To Folder menu option to get into it. The only time a Civ5 user should need to get into this folder is to edit the script files if you want to hack the program to enable the Mods menu.

The second folder is where your saves, mods, configuration files and other user-specific files are stored. This is where you need to go to find your saves, and it is where the config.ini file is kept. In a Steam installation, this is at:

/Users/[your_user_name]/Library/Application Support/Sid Meier's Civilization 5

Again, this is in the same hidden Library folder that contains the software folder.

I suspect that the EnableGameCoreThreading line is not used in the Mac version of the game.

The references in this thread to containers/ are only relevant to the App Store Civ5 Campaign Edition.

 

[Nebuchad]

Thanks for the response. Didn't that Home/Library folder used to be visible by default? wonder why it was made hidden.

You were right about the GameCoreThreading which is a little bit disappointing because the game is close to unplayable as is. Guess I'll just have to hope for a patch or update that resolves it.

 

[gadha]

The User Library folder was made hidden in Lion (10.7), so users do not accidentally modify (or delete) files within it.

 

[AlanH]

For information, the standard shorthand for the current user's Library folder is ~/Library.

~/Library was presumably hidden in Lion to stop standard users fiddling with it unless they know what they are doing. The user can do dangerous things in there because it includes a lot of critical data, and its contents must be owned, and modifiable, by the user. It's unfortunate that the Civ series uses this location for its saves and other user data that really don't need this level of protection.

I imagine the reason why this is not extended to other more dangerous places is that folders such as /System, /Library, /System/Library, etc. are protected by permissions. You have to authenticate as an admin user to change anything in these.