I have a new MacBook with Catalina and wanted to run an old 32-bit game. I created a virtual machine with High Sierra in Parallels 15, but when I start the game I get the error message "Unable to detect a RAVE compatible 3D accelerator", see attached screen shot. Any idea what I can do? On my old laptop with High Sierra the game runs without problems.
I found the explanation in another thread. Apparently, when you use macOS X as a virtual machine it runs like macOS X in safe mode and 3D Acceleration does not work. Indeed, I checked this by booting my old laptop (with High Sierra) in safe mode and I got exactly the same error message when I started the app. Is there any way around this or does this mean that I cannot use Parallels to run this old app.
I'd suspect the only way that might work, is to run Windows instead of a Mac OS. This has direct X support, so the game should run. The Steam subscription supports operation on Windows as well as the Mac. The Windows VM is a lot more 'capable' than the Mac VM. I run a couple of 32 bit cad applications that use Direct 3D, and they merrily run in a Windows VM. Also Windows still supports 32bit applications.
Worth also adding that you can install a Windows VM, without a license key and though some of the 'customisations' won't be allowed, the OS itself still runs fine.