Highball
Which renderer to use
Highball can run each game through three different Direct3D translation layers. This is what the database knows for this title — empty rows are open questions, not failures.
| Renderer | Verdict | Evidence |
|---|---|---|
| DXVKDirect3D 9-11 over Vulkan | Untested | no report yet — send one |
| DXMTDirect3D 11 over Metal | Reported | community reports |
| D3DMetalApple's Game Porting Toolkit | Untested | no report yet — send one |
No dated Highball run yet. When one lands it records the renderer, the engine build and the macOS version it was seen on — which is what stops a verdict quietly rotting. Send one.
Notes
An Electron game. The reporter runs the demo on r11 with DXMT. On an M1 Pro (macOS 27.0) the demo (Steam 5157480) exits three seconds after Steam starts it on the default engine and on r11 alike, with no window and nothing in the log, so the maintainer could not reproduce either half of the report yet. The game rejects Chromium command-line switches (--disable-gpu, --no-sandbox come back as bad options), so launch arguments are not a route.
Provenance
Reported by maddada (highball#204, 2026-09-26), Apple M5 Pro, macOS 27.0, Highball 0.9.35: the demo did not run on the default Wine 10 engine and runs on the Wine 11 engine x64-crossover26.3-r11 with DXMT. Not verified by the maintainer.
Before installing anything, it is worth checking whether the game already ships a native Mac build.
Common questions
Does Word Link work on Mac?
Word Link has no native Mac build, but it is reported to run on Apple Silicon through Highball, a free open-source compatibility layer. This comes from community reports rather than a Highball test run, so treat it as a reasonable expectation rather than a guarantee.
Which renderer should I use for Word Link?
DXMT. Highball can translate Direct3D through DXVK, DXMT or Apple's D3DMetal, and the right choice varies by game. The database records DXMT for Word Link. Highball uses it automatically when the game has a row; to set it by hand, open Settings, then Environments.
Contribute a result
This page is generated from an open database. If you have run Word Link on Apple Silicon, working or not, a report takes a minute and fills in the empty rows above. Send a report, or read how the data is put together.