Symptoms:
When trying to start a virtual machine in VMware Workstation 9.x and above or VMware Fusion 5.x and above, you see one of these errors:

• This virtual machine's policies are too old to be run by this version of VMware. Contact your system administrator
• Error while loading the virtual machine's policies: A required file was not found.

VMware Workstation Pro 14.x (for Windows)
VMware Fusion Pro 8.x
VMware Workstation 11.x (for Linux)
VMware Workstation 10.x (Linux)
VMware Workstation Player 15.x (Windows)
VMware Workstation 9.x (Windows)
VMware Workstation 10.x (Windows)
VMware Workstation Pro 15.x (Linux)
VMware Fusion 6.x
VMware Player 7.x (Linux)
VMware Workstation Player 14.x (Windows)
VMware Fusion 8.x
VMware Player 5.x (Windows)
VMware Player Pro 7.x (Windows)
VMware Workstation 9.x (Linux)
VMware Workstation Player 15.x (Linux)
VMware Player 6.x (Linux)
VMware Workstation Player 14.x (Linux)
VMware Fusion 5.x
VMware Fusion 10.x
VMware Player 7.x (Windows)
VMware Player Pro 7.x (Linux)
VMware Workstation Player 12.x (Linux)
VMware Fusion Pro 10.x
VMware Player 5.x (Linux)
VMware Workstation Pro 15.x (Windows)
VMware Workstation Player 12.x (Windows)
VMware Player 6.x (Windows)
VMware Workstation Pro 14.x (for Linux)
VMware Workstation 11.x (for Windows)
VMware Fusion 7.x

This issue can occur in these scenarios:

• When you attempt to start a virtual machine having an older Hardware version, which has certain policies set for it.
• When you attempt to start a virtual machine which was shared in Workstation 8.x.
• In Workstation 9.x and above or Fusion 5.x and above, when you attempt to start an ACE virtual machine which was created with Workstation 7.x.

To resolve this issue, manually edit the virtual machine's configuration file (the .vmx file):

1. Locate the virtual machine's files. For more information, see:
    
   • For Workstation: Locating a hosted virtual machine's files (1003880)
   • For VMware Fusion: Locating the virtual machine bundle in VMware Fusion (1007599)
      
2. Open the virtual machine's configuration file (.vmx) using a text editor. For more information, see:
    
   • For Workstation: Tips for editing a .vmx file (1714)
   • For VMware Fusion: Editing the .vmx file for your VMware Fusion virtual machine (1014782)
     
     Note: Take a backup of the .vmx file before modifying it.
      
3. Remove the lines which are similar to:
   
   policy.vm.mvmtid = "52 d6 6f f9 f3 36 0f 9f-31 da 9f f5 90 7b ce 76"
policy.vm.managedVMTemplate = "TRUE"
policy.vm.managedVM = "FALSE"
    
4. Save the file and close the text editor.
    
5. Start the virtual machine and verify.

 

Note: If you still encounter the error, then browse to the location where the virtual machine files exist. Search for a file with the extension .vmpl, and rename it to .vmpl.old.

Warning: Renaming/deleting this file from a restricted virtual machine will break it permanently. Contact VMware Technical support for further help in such a scenario.

 

Locating a hosted virtual machine's files
Locating the virtual machine bundle in VMware Fusion
Editing the .vmx file for your VMware Fusion virtual machine
Tips for editing a .vmx file
Workstation または Fusion での仮想マシンの起動が次のエラーによって失敗する: この仮想マシンのポリシーが古すぎてこのバージョンの VMware で実行できません
启动 Workstation 或 Fusion 中的虚拟机失败并出现错误：此虚拟机的策略过旧，因而无法由此版本的 VMware 运行