Workaround
Deleting the options.txt file from the minecraft directory before relaunching the game should allow older versions to start.
I suspect that the versions of Java that the launcher uses to run the older versions are the culprit.
The issues in the official launcher range from opening a completely black window, opening with the wrong window size (which crashes on attempt to resize), opening but with partially inverted colors, or just not opening at all.
With such a huge community that continues to play on older versions of the game, this is a problematic issue to come across in the official launcher.
Comments 7
Hi!
Have you tried deleting options.txt from your minecraft folder, and then starting the game again?
This ticket will automatically reopen when you reply.
@Zgajak - Thank you. This allows older versions to start now, but they are still visually buggy. Specifically, the inverted colors issue has not been resolved by this.
Again, probably a result of the java version used to run the pre-1.6 versions of the game.
I am able to launch 1.5 and even beta versions on my M1. I don’t know about anyone else though.
However, everything before 1.6 has the R and B color channels swapped, so colors look inverted. But I think there is a different bug about the color swap issue, which still needs addressed.
I've been dealing with this as well! (macM1-user)