Death Stranding 2: On the Beach (v1.0.48.0, Steam) crashes during rendering initialization when running through CrossOver 26 with D3DMetal 3.0 on an Apple M2 Max Mac Studio running macOS Sequoia. The game successfully initializes Streamline, NVAPI, DLSS (Result::eOk), DLSSG (Result::eOk), Reflex, and XeSS — all subsystems report success. The crash occurs immediately after, during rendering pipeline creation, before the game reaches NXStorage initialization or window creation. Minidump analysis confirms the crash is an access violation (0xc0000005) at DS2.exe+0x67233d, writing to address 0x0. RAX=0x0 (null pointer being dereferenced), R12=0xFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFF (error/invalid handle return). The game appears to call a D3D12 API — likely CheckFeatureSupport or a pipeline state creation function — that D3DMetal acknowledges as supported but returns null or invalid data for. The game trusts the response and dereferences the null pointer. Two other Nixxes titles using the same engine and D3DMetal setup run without issue: Spider-Man 2 (~50 FPS) and Horizon Zero Dawn Remastered (~34 FPS). DS2 uses newer technology versions (DLSS 4, FSR 4, XeSS 2) and a newer DirectX 12 Agility SDK, which likely queries D3D12 features that D3DMetal does not yet fully implement. The crash also reproduces when D3DMetal reports as AMD vendor (1002) instead of NVIDIA (10de), crashing at the same executable offset, confirming it is a D3D12 feature reporting gap in D3DMetal rather than a vendor-specific issue. How To Reproduce Install Crossover 26+ on MacOS 26.4 Install Steam and download Death Stranding 2 Run Death Stranding 2 and check logs after crash in Documents\DEATH STRANDING 2 ON THE BEACH Feedback Requests FB22285513 — Game Porting Toolkit 3 issue with Modern Pipeline Creation

I am new to RealityKit and Metal and I am building a RealityKit app that renders a procedural LowLevelMesh road. But the left and right side of the road is a complete green terrain mesh object and it doesn't look great. What I want is to add some rocks, tall trees and dence bushes (or weed) to make it look like the player is in the woods. But when I add many of those objects then the performance drains. What is the best approach to fill background empty spaces in the scene?

The CGSetDisplayTransferByTable() is not working on the latest round of Mac hardware, namely the MacBook Neo (external display), MacBook M5 Pro (both built-in and external display) and possibly the M5 Max. All tested apps (BetterDisplay, MonitorControl, f.lux, Lunar) exhibit the very issue both in macOS Tahoe 26.3 and macOS Tahoe 26.4 RC. Tested on multiple Macs and installations on the MacBook Neo and MacBook M5 Pro. This issue breaks several display related macOS apps. Way to reproduce the issue using an affected app: Install the app BetterDisplay (https://betterdisplay.pro) Launch the app, open the app menu, choose Image Adjustments and try to adjust colors. Adjustments take no effect Way to reproduce the issue programmatically: Attempt to use the affected macOS API feature: https://developer.apple.com/documentation/coregraphics/cgsetdisplaytransferbytable(::::_:) Here are the FB numbers: FB22273730 (Filed this one as a developer on an unaffected MBP M3 Max) FB22273782 (Filed from an affected MBP M5 Pro running 26.4 RC, with debug info attached)

I’m trying to use MTL4FXTemporalDenoisedScaler, and I’m seeing a crash during initialization even with a very simple sample app. I created a minimal sample here: https://github.com/tatsuya-ogawa/MetalFXInitExample The exception is: NSException: "-[AGXG16XFamilyHeap baseObject]: unrecognized selector sent to instance ..." What I found is: • This works: descriptor.makeTemporalDenoisedScaler(device: device) • This crashes: descriptor.makeTemporalDenoisedScaler(device: device, compiler: metal4Compiler) So the issue seems to happen only with the Metal4FX version. For testing, I’m using an iPhone 15 Pro. According to the Metal Feature Set Tables, MetalFX denoised upscaling should be supported on Apple9 and later, so I believe the device itself should meet the requirements. Reference: https://developer.apple.com/metal/Metal-Feature-Set-Tables.pdf Has anyone seen this before, or knows what might be causing it? I’d appreciate any advice. Thanks.

I am exploring the development of a utility app that provides real-time feedback to users based on their active screen content (e.g., providing text suggestions for various communication apps). To achieve this, I am looking at using ReplayKit and Broadcast Upload Extensions to process screen frames in the background via OCR. I have a few questions regarding the "Screen Recording" permission and App Store Review: Permission Clarity: Is it possible to trigger the Screen Recording permission request in a way that clearly communicates the "utility" nature of the app without the system UI making it look like a standard video recording? Background Persistence: Can a Broadcast Extension reliably stay active in the background while the user switches between other third-party apps (like messaging or social apps) for the purpose of continuous OCR processing? App Store Guidelines: Are there specific "Privacy & Data Use" guidelines I should be aware of when an app requires persistent screen access to provide text-based suggestions? I want to ensure the user experience is transparent and that the permission flow feels like a "helper utility" rather than a security risk. Any insights on the best APIs to use for this specific background processing would be appreciated.

In ARKit there is ARGeoAnchor, which lets you anchor content using latitude and longitude so objects stay fixed to a real-world location. Is there an equivalent feature in RealityKit? I want to place points in the world and make sure they don't move or drift after placement. If RealityKit doesn't support this directly, what is the recommended approach?

I asked AI to build a realistic ocean shader for a VisionOS project using RealityKit. It gave a bunch instructions and asked me to connect large amount of nodes for the ShaderGraph in the Reality Composer Pro. I am just wondering if AI can help to generate the Metal shader code directly, or build the ShaderGraph nodes for me automatically.

I'm converting my game from SceneKit to RealityKit. It has a SpriteKit overlay that according to Explore advanced rendering with RealityKit 2 I can add with the code below. The code runs fine if the SKScene only contains a SKSpriteNode (see the commented out line), but when I add a SKShapeNode with a fillColor instead, the app crashes with this error: -[MTLDebugRenderCommandEncoder validateCommonDrawErrors:]:5970: failed assertion `Draw Errors Validation MTLDepthStencilDescriptor uses frontFaceStencil but MTLRenderPassDescriptor has a nil stencilAttachment texture MTLDepthStencilDescriptor uses backFaceStencil but MTLRenderPassDescriptor has a nil stencilAttachment texture ' I don't know enough about low-level graphics and stencils yet to figure out a quick solution, so I would appreciate if anyone could share an easy fix or explanation of what's wrong. Thanks! class ViewController: NSViewController { var device: MTLDevice! var renderer: SKRenderer! override func loadView() { let arView = ARView(frame: NSScreen.main!.frame) view = arView arView.renderCallbacks.prepareWithDevice = { [weak self] device in guard let self = self else { return } self.device = device renderer = SKRenderer(device: MTLCreateSystemDefaultDevice()!) let scene = SKScene() let shape = SKShapeNode(rectOf: CGSize(width: 10, height: 10)) shape.fillColor = .red scene.addChild(shape) // scene.addChild(SKSpriteNode(color: .red, size: CGSize(width: 10, height: 10))) renderer.scene = scene } arView.renderCallbacks.postProcess = { [weak self] context in guard let self = self else { return } let encoder = context.commandBuffer.makeBlitCommandEncoder() encoder?.copy(from: context.sourceColorTexture, to: context.targetColorTexture) encoder?.endEncoding() renderer.update(atTime: context.time) let descriptor = MTLRenderPassDescriptor() descriptor.colorAttachments[0].loadAction = .load descriptor.colorAttachments[0].storeAction = .store descriptor.colorAttachments[0].texture = context.targetColorTexture renderer.render(withViewport: CGRect(x: 0, y: 0, width: context.targetColorTexture.width, height: context.targetColorTexture.height), commandBuffer: context.commandBuffer, renderPassDescriptor: descriptor) } } }

I'm new to graphics and game design and I just wanted to know if a compute pipeline could be as efficient as a render pipeline for rasterization and an explanation on how and why. Also is it possible to manually perform rasterization with a render pipeline as in manipulate individual pixel data in a metal texture yourself but do it with a render pipeline?

I'm in the process of converting my SceneKit game to RealityKit. In SceneKit I used to be able to mark nodes as selected by setting SCNMaterial.emission with a custom color. I can do the same with PhysicallyBasedMaterial.emissiveColor, but I'd like to keep my entitities unaffected by the scene lights by using UnlitMaterial. In SceneKit I can set a category mask to indicate what light should affect what node, but there doesn't seem to be such a thing in RealityKit. So at the moment it seems like I have to choose between being able to mark an entity as selected, or having entities unaffected by lighting, but not both. Is there some effect or component I can use to mark entities as selected by applying some coloring regardless of the material used?

I think if your buffer is less than 4k its recommended to use setVertexBytes, the question I have is can I keep hammering on setVertexBytes as the primary method to issue multiple draw calls within a render buffer and rely on Metal to figure out how to orphan and replace the target buffer? A lot of the primitives I am drawing are less than 4k and the process of wiring down larger segments of memory for individual buffers for each draw primitive call seems to be a negative. And it's just simpler to copy, submit and forget about buffer synchronization.

I'm trying to convert my game from SceneKit to RealityKit. I noticed that even when the scene is static (nothing moves), RealityKit keeps using CPU. In SceneKit, CPU goes down to 0% with a static scene. With this simplest of games, RealityKit keeps using about 65% CPU: class ViewController: NSViewController { override func loadView() { view = ARView(frame: NSScreen.main!.frame) } } Is this expected or a bug? I created FB22125047.

Hello everyone! I am trying to wrap a ViewModifier inside a Swift Package that bundles a metal shader file to be used in the modifier. Everything works as expected in the Preview, in the Simulator and on a real device for iOS. It also works in Preview and in the Simulator for tvOS but not on a real AppleTV. I have tried this on a 4th generation Apple TV running tvOS 26.3 using Xcode 26.2.0. Xcode logs the following: The metallib is processed and exists in the bundle. Compiler failed to build request precondition failure: pipeline error: custom_effect-fg2a5cia7fmha4: error: unresolved visible function reference: custom_fn Reason: visible function not loaded Compiler failed to build request precondition failure: pipeline error: custom_effect-fg2a5cia7fmha4: error: unresolved visible function reference: custom_fn Reason: visible function not loaded Compiler failed to build request precondition failure: pipeline error: custom_effect-fg2a5cia7fmha4: error: unresolved visible function reference: custom_fn Reason: visible function not loaded Compiler failed to build request precondition failure: pipeline error: custom_effect-fg2a5cia7fmha4: error: unresolved visible function reference: custom_fn Reason: visible function not loaded Compiler failed to build request precondition failure: pipeline error: custom_effect-fg2a5cia7fmha4: error: unresolved visible function reference: custom_fn Reason: visible function not loaded Compiler failed to build request precondition failure: pipeline error: custom_effect-fg2a5cia7fmha4: error: unresolved visible function reference: custom_fn Reason: visible function not loaded Contents of Package.swift: import PackageDescription let package = Package( name: "Test", platforms: [ .iOS(.v17), .tvOS(.v17) ], products: [ .library( name: "Test", targets: [ "Test" ] ) ], targets: [ .target( name: "Test", resources: [ .process("Shaders") ] ), .testTarget( name: "TestTests", dependencies: [ "Test" ] ) ] ) Content of my metal file: #include <metal_stdlib> using namespace metal; [[ stitchable ]] float2 complexWave(float2 position, float time, float2 size, float speed, float strength, float frequency) { float2 normalizedPosition = position / size; float moveAmount = time * speed; position.x += sin((normalizedPosition.x + moveAmount) * frequency) * strength; position.y += cos((normalizedPosition.y + moveAmount) * frequency) * strength; return position; } And my ViewModifier: import MetalKit import SwiftUI extension ShaderFunction { static let complexWave: ShaderFunction = { ShaderFunction( library: .bundle(.module), name: "complexWave" ) }() } extension Shader { static func complexWave(arguments: [Shader.Argument]) -> Shader { Shader(function: .complexWave, arguments: arguments) } } struct WaveModifier: ViewModifier { let start: Date = .now func body(content: Content) -> some View { TimelineView(.animation) { context in let delta = context.date.timeIntervalSince(start) content .visualEffect { view, proxy in view.distortionEffect( .complexWave( arguments: [ .float(delta), .float2(proxy.size), .float(0.5), .float(8), .float(10) ] ), maxSampleOffset: .zero ) } } .onAppear { let paths = Bundle.module.paths(forResourcesOfType: "metallib", inDirectory: nil) print(paths) } } } extension View { public func wave() -> some View { modifier(WaveModifier()) } } #Preview { Image(systemName: "cart") .wave() } Any help is appreciated.

I want to fade objects in and out, and while setting an entity's OpacityComponent works, animating it doesn't seem to do anything. In the following code the second sphere should fade out, but it keeps its initial opacity. On the other hand, the animation that changes its transform works. What am I doing wrong? class ViewController: NSViewController { override func loadView() { let arView = ARView(frame: NSScreen.main!.frame) let anchor = AnchorEntity(.world(transform: matrix_identity_float4x4)) arView.scene.addAnchor(anchor) let sphere = ModelEntity(mesh: .generateSphere(radius: 0.5)) anchor.addChild(sphere) sphere.components.set(OpacityComponent(opacity: 0.1)) let sphere2 = ModelEntity(mesh: .generateSphere(radius: 0.5)) sphere2.position = .init(x: 0.2, y: 0, z: 0) anchor.addChild(sphere2) sphere2.components.set(OpacityComponent(opacity: 0.1)) sphere.playAnimation(try! AnimationResource.makeActionAnimation(for: FromToByAction(to: 0, timing: .linear), duration: 1, bindTarget: .opacity)) sphere.playAnimation(try! AnimationResource.makeActionAnimation(for: FromToByAction(to: Transform(translation: SIMD3(x: 0.1, y: 0, z: 0)), timing: .linear), duration: 1, bindTarget: .transform)) view = arView } }

I'm currently converting my game from SceneKit to RealityKit. What's the easiest way to run an animation in which every frame I want to run custom code, similar to SCNAction.customAction which accepts a callback that is called repeatedly until the action completes?

We are developing a video processing app that applies CIFilter chains to video frames. To not force the user to keep the app foregrounded, we were happy to see the introduction of BGContinuedProcessingTask to continue processing when backgrounded. With iOS 26, I was excited to see the com.apple.developer.background-tasks.continued-processing.gpu entitlement, which should allow GPU access in the background. Even the article in the documentation provides "exporting video in a film-editing app" or "applying visual filters (HDR, etc) or compressing images for social media posts" as use cases. However, when I check BGTaskScheduler.shared.supportedResources.contains(.gpu) at runtime, it returns false on every iPhone I've tested (including iPhone 15 Pro and iPhone 16 Pro). From forum responses I've seen, it sounds like background GPU access is currently limited to iPad only. If that's the case, I have a few questions: Is this an intentional, permanent limitation — or is iPhone support planned for a future iOS release? What is the recommended approach for GPU-dependent background work on iPhone? My custom CIKernels are written in Metal (as Apple recommends since CIKL is deprecated), but Metal CIKernels cannot fall back to CPU rendering. This creates a situation where Apple's own deprecation guidance (migrate to Metal) conflicts with background processing realities (no GPU on iPhone). Should developers maintain deprecated CIKL kernel versions alongside Metal kernels purely as a CPU fallback for background execution? That feels like it defeats the purpose of the migration. It seems like a gap in the platform: the API exists, the entitlement exists, but the hardware support isn't there for the most common device category. Any clarity on Apple's direction here would be very helpful.

I've been using Metal compute shaders for lattice quantum chromodynamics simulations and wanted to share the experience in case others are doing scientific computing on Metal. The workload involves SU(2) matrix operations on 4D lattice grids — lots of 2x2 and 3x3 complex matrix multiplies, reductions over lattice sites, and nearest-neighbor stencil operations. The implementation bridges a C++ scientific framework (Grid) to Metal via Objective-C++ .mm files, with MSL kernels compiled into .metallib archives during the build. Things that work well: Shared memory on M-series eliminates the CPU↔GPU copy overhead that dominates in CUDA workflows The .metallib compilation integrates cleanly with autotools builds using xcrun Float4 packing for SU(2) matrices maps naturally to MSL vector types Things I'm still figuring out: Optimal threadgroup sizes for stencil operations on 4D grids Whether to use MTLHeap for gauge field storage or stick with individual buffers Best practices for double precision — some measurements need float64 but Metal's double support varies by hardware The application is measuring chromofield flux distributions between static quarks, ultimately targeting multi-quark systems. Production runs are on MacBook Pro M-series and Mac Studio. Code: https://github.com/ThinkOffApp/multiquark-lattice-qcd

I have noticed that the performance drop on SpriteKit-based projects running on iOS 26 is still ongoing With iOS 26 back in Sep 2025 a framerate problem was introduced. My app was always running smoothly with 60fps even on very old devices suddenly started to stutter with 40fps - and lower on a rather normal iPhone 13. This problem continued with BETA 26.1 The problem was fixed in 26.2. But 26.3 brought the problem back and its still ongoing with 26.4 of yesterday This is easily reproducible with a very simple example // // BareboneSpriteKitApp.swift // BareboneSpriteKit // // Created by Bernd Beyreuther on 24.02.26. // import SwiftUI import SpriteKit @main struct BareboneSpriteKitApp: App { var body: some Scene { WindowGroup { BareboneSceneView() } } } final class BareboneScene: SKScene { override func didMove(to view: SKView) { size = view.bounds.size scaleMode = .resizeFill anchorPoint = CGPoint(x: 0.5, y: 0.5) backgroundColor = .darkGray let s = SKSpriteNode(color: .cyan, size: CGSize(width: 64, height: 64)) addChild(s) let action = SKAction.rotate(byAngle: .pi, duration: 2) s.run(.repeatForever(action)) let t = SKLabelNode(text: deviceInfoString()) t.fontSize = 15 t.position.y = -100 addChild(t) } } struct BareboneSceneView: View { var body: some View { SpriteView( scene: BareboneScene(), debugOptions: [.showsFPS] ) .ignoresSafeArea() } } func deviceInfoString() -> String { let os = ProcessInfo.processInfo.operatingSystemVersion let osString = "iOS \(os.majorVersion).\(os.minorVersion).\(os.patchVersion)" let model = UIDevice.current.model // "iPhone", "iPad" let machine = { var sysinfo = utsname() uname(&sysinfo) return withUnsafePointer(to: &sysinfo.machine) { ptr -> String in ptr.withMemoryRebound(to: CChar.self, capacity: 1) { cptr in String(cString: cptr) } } }() // z.B. "iPhone15,2" return "Model Identifier: \(model) (\(machine)), \(osString)" } I file a bugreport via Feedback Assistant FB22038921 The problem is no around for such a long time ! This is deeply concerning, because it questions if it is really feasable to continue to develop using Spritekit ?

Dear colleagues, when will you add the ability to manually adjust the display's color temperature? Everyone is familiar with the color rendering issue on the 17 series. Many complain about the display's yellowish tint. I'm one of those people, with a G9N panel, but I can't get whites right; there's a persistent yellow tint. TrueTone only solves this problem under cool, white lighting conditions. So, the display might work as intended, but how can I make it work consistently? If there were a way to manually adjust TrueTone, many users wouldn't be so upset when buying a new device, fearing the display would be yellow. I'd like users to be able to choose their preferred color, warm or cool, and have a scale to adjust it! This would solve the yellowish tint issue on 17 series displays! Thank you.

Setup: MSAA rendering using a memoryless texture as the color attachment (render_image) and a "normal" texture as the resolve attachment (resolve_image). MTL_DEBUG_LAYER / API validation is enabled for this. When trying to add the memoryless texture to a residency set, I get the following error: -[MTLDebugResidencySet validateResource:], line 114: error 'residency sets do not support memoryless resources. Which is as expected and identical to Metal 3. However, if I don't add it to the residency set, I then get the following error when committing to the command queue: -[MTL4DebugCommandQueue commit:count:options:], line 67: error 'Commit With Options Validation Attachment texture (Label: render_image) used in command buffer (at index 0) is not added to any residency set on the command buffer or command queue. So which way around is actually correct in Metal 4? Either way, this makes the use of memoryless textures/attachments impossible right now when validation is enabled. FWIW: when disabling all validation, either way seems to work just fine. Tested on: M1 Max, macOS 26.3, Xcode 26.2 & 26.4b2