Installing openBVE on Linux or Mac OS X

In order to install openBVE on Linux or Mac OS X, please follow the instructions below. It is assumed that you know how to download files from the internet and how to extract ZIP files. If not, please look up how to do these things somewhere else.

The first thing you should do is to create the install directory. This directory can be anywhere on your hard drive and can have any name you want, for example "openBVE". It is where you will deploy the files that you are about to download.

Download the latest stable version of the openBVE main program and extract the ZIP file to your install directory.

Download this ZIP file and extract it to your install directory.

Linux users should visit the SDL homepage and download the runtime libraries matching their operating system.

Mac OS X users should download this package and then copy the SDL.framework directory to /Library/Frameworks.

Linux users should download OpenAL via their operating system's package manager. If OpenAL is not available this way, you can likely only get OpenAL by compiling it yourself from here or here.

Mac OS X users should use this installer.

Visit the Mono homepage and download the latest stable version of Mono matching your operating system (but at least 2.8.1). If you are given any choice, make sure that System.Windows.Forms and libgdiplus are installed.

By default, all of the options you can set up in openBVE and all the add-ons you download through openBVE are not stored in the install directory, but in a directory specific to your operating system. If you want this "userdata" inside your install directory, download this ZIP file and extract it to your install directory.

You can now start OpenBve.exe from your install directory and start playing. In order to do this, you have to use the terminal. Depending on your operating system and version of mono, the exact steps may vary. The following are examples of what you may need to enter in the terminal. For more information, please look up the manual of your terminal and the Mono documentation.

If you have run into problems during the installation process, please see the Troubleshooting section for some commonly encounterd problems.

It is also highly recommended that you browse through the Install and Play pages. You can find valuable information there such as the keyboard assignment and a general overview on how to operate trains.

If you ever want to update openBVE to the latest available version, you only need to download the main program again and extract it to your install directory. You do not have to download the other stuff again.

You can download routes and trains directly from inside the game. Please see managed add-ons for users for the details.

There are also plenty of legacy add-ons, particularly for BVE Trainsim, that can also be used but must be found and installed manually. Some authors of such add-ons make it easy for you by providing a single archive that just needs to be extracted somewhere, while others make it very complicated. You have to read the folder structure for legacy routes and trains before even considering to install such add-ons.