macos: fix Vulkan/Metal renderer on macOS 26+ and bump MoltenVK (#2149)

* macos: fix Vulkan/Metal renderer on macOS 26+ and bump MoltenVK

Four related changes that together let the Vulkan backend boot a game
on Apple Silicon Macs running macOS 26.x. Each is needed independently;
the combination was tested on a Mac16,6 (M4 Max) / macOS 26.4.1.

CMakeModules/DownloadExternals.cmake:
  Bump bundled MoltenVK from v1.2.9 to v1.4.1. v1.2.9 does not
  recognize macOS 26 surface objects and traps with an Objective-C
  "unrecognized selector" inside vkGetPhysicalDeviceSurfaceCapabilitiesKHR.

src/video_core/renderer_vulkan/vk_instance.cpp:
  Disable VK_EXT_tooling_info on MoltenVK. MoltenVK advertises the
  extension but does not expose vkGetPhysicalDeviceToolPropertiesEXT
  through its dispatcher, so the call inside CollectToolingInfo()
  trips a vulkan-hpp assertion in Debug and dereferences NULL in
  Release.

src/citra_qt/bootmanager.cpp:
  Force-install a fresh CAMetalLayer on the NSView before handing it
  to createMetalSurfaceEXT. Qt 6.11's QWindow::MetalSurface does not
  always back the view with a CAMetalLayer on macOS 26, and MoltenVK
  1.3+ aborts in MVKSurface::getNaturalExtent() if the layer is not
  the right class. Implemented via objc_msgSend so no .mm conversion
  is needed.

src/citra_meta/CMakeLists.txt:
  Gate LaunchScreen.storyboard behind 'if (IOS)'. The storyboard is
  iOS-only and previously broke the Xcode generator on macOS with
  "iOS storyboards do not support target device type 'mac'."

* Move Metal layer creation logic into MetalUtil::CreateMetalLayer ObjC++ function

This change makes the code much more readable, as the logic is now in its native language

---------

Co-authored-by: SergeyMild <>
Co-authored-by: OpenSauce04 <opensauce04@gmail.com>

CMakeModules/DownloadExternals.cmake

@@ -174,7 +174,7 @@ function(download_moltenvk)
     set(MOLTENVK_TAR "${CMAKE_BINARY_DIR}/externals/MoltenVK.tar")
     if (NOT EXISTS "${CMAKE_BINARY_DIR}/externals/MoltenVK")
         if (NOT EXISTS ${MOLTENVK_TAR})
-            file(DOWNLOAD https://github.com/KhronosGroup/MoltenVK/releases/download/v1.2.9/MoltenVK-all.tar
+            file(DOWNLOAD https://github.com/KhronosGroup/MoltenVK/releases/download/v1.4.1/MoltenVK-all.tar
                 ${MOLTENVK_TAR} SHOW_PROGRESS)
         endif()
 

src/citra_meta/CMakeLists.txt

@@ -15,9 +15,11 @@ if (APPLE)
     set(DIST_DIR "../../dist/apple")
     set(APPLE_RESOURCES
         "${DIST_DIR}/azahar.icns"
-        "${DIST_DIR}/LaunchScreen.storyboard"
         "${DIST_DIR}/launch_logo.png"
     )
+    if (IOS)
+        list(APPEND APPLE_RESOURCES "${DIST_DIR}/LaunchScreen.storyboard")
+    endif()
     target_sources(citra_meta PRIVATE ${APPLE_RESOURCES})
 
     # Define app bundle metadata.

src/citra_qt/CMakeLists.txt

@@ -202,6 +202,8 @@ if (APPLE)
   target_sources(citra_qt PUBLIC
     qt_swizzle.h
     qt_swizzle.mm
+    util/metal_util.h
+    util/metal_util.mm
   )
 endif()
 

src/citra_qt/bootmanager.cpp

@@ -37,8 +37,7 @@
 #endif
 
 #if defined(__APPLE__)
-#include <objc/message.h>
+#include "util/metal_util.h"
-#include <objc/objc.h>
 #elif !defined(WIN32)
 #include <qpa/qplatformnativeinterface.h>
 #endif
@@ -420,8 +419,7 @@ static Frontend::EmuWindow::WindowSystemInfo GetWindowSystemInfo(QWindow* window
         // Our Win32 Qt external doesn't have the private API.
         wsi.render_surface = reinterpret_cast<void*>(window->winId());
 #elif defined(__APPLE__)
-        wsi.render_surface = reinterpret_cast<void* (*)(id, SEL)>(objc_msgSend)(
+        wsi.render_surface = MetalUtil::CreateMetalLayer(window->winId());
-            reinterpret_cast<id>(window->winId()), sel_registerName("layer"));
 #else
         QPlatformNativeInterface* pni = QGuiApplication::platformNativeInterface();
         wsi.display_connection = pni->nativeResourceForWindow("display", window);

src/citra_qt/util/metal_util.h

@@ -0,0 +1,11 @@
+// Copyright Citra Emulator Project / Azahar Emulator Project
+// Licensed under GPLv2 or any later version
+// Refer to the license.txt file included.
+
+#import "qwindowdefs.h"
+
+namespace MetalUtil {
+
+void* CreateMetalLayer(WId window);
+
+}

src/citra_qt/util/metal_util.mm

@@ -0,0 +1,23 @@
+// Copyright Citra Emulator Project / Azahar Emulator Project
+// Licensed under GPLv2 or any later version
+// Refer to the license.txt file included.
+
+#import <AppKit/AppKit.h>
+#import <QuartzCore/CAMetalLayer.h>
+#import <qwindowdefs.h>
+
+namespace MetalUtil {
+
+void* CreateMetalLayer(WId winId) {
+    // Qt's MetalSurface QWindow on macOS does not always back the NSView
+    // with a CAMetalLayer immediately; MoltenVK 1.3+ aborts in
+    // MVKSurface::getNaturalExtent() if the layer is not CAMetalLayer.
+    // Force-install a fresh CAMetalLayer on the view.
+    CAMetalLayer* metalLayer = [CAMetalLayer layer];
+    NSView* view = (__bridge NSView*)winId;
+    view.wantsLayer = YES;
+    view.layer = metalLayer;
+    return (__bridge void*)metalLayer;
+}
+
+} // namespace MetalUtil

src/video_core/renderer_vulkan/vk_instance.cpp

@@ -451,7 +451,8 @@ bool Instance::CreateDevice() {
     image_format_list = add_extension(VK_KHR_IMAGE_FORMAT_LIST_EXTENSION_NAME);
     shader_stencil_export = add_extension(VK_EXT_SHADER_STENCIL_EXPORT_EXTENSION_NAME);
     external_memory_host = add_extension(VK_EXT_EXTERNAL_MEMORY_HOST_EXTENSION_NAME);
-    tooling_info = add_extension(VK_EXT_TOOLING_INFO_EXTENSION_NAME);
+    tooling_info = add_extension(VK_EXT_TOOLING_INFO_EXTENSION_NAME, is_moltenvk,
+                                 "function pointer is not exposed by MoltenVK");
     const bool has_timeline_semaphores =
         add_extension(VK_KHR_TIMELINE_SEMAPHORE_EXTENSION_NAME, is_qualcomm || is_turnip,
                       "it is broken on Qualcomm drivers");