I'm having the exact same issue with a fresh install of VMWare Workstation Player 14.0.0. I'm also running Linux Mint 18.3 (based on Ubuntu 16.04) as host. The Guest operating system installed successfully and was running. But after closing the vm window and try to re-open it it no longer responds. (Opening the .vmx file appears to do nothing from the GUI). VMWare installer tells me no files have changed; the installation is valid.
The only difference from the original post is that I installed Windows 10 x64 as the guest OS.
One possible issue might be related to the Tools installation, which I accepted and completed, but had not yet been in use (I don't believe). Perhaps using this has caused it to fail somehow?
parmarr I tried using the howto you suggested, to no effect. There are no lines beginning with "policy." in the .vmx file and there is no .vmdi file. (I might have the details wrong here since this is by memory, but the steps didn't apply to me)
Perhaps the following might help debug. When I run vmplayer from the command line and open the .vmx file in question, I get the following messages :
[AppLoader] Use shipped Linux kernel AIO access library.
An up-to-date "libaio" or "libaio1" package from your system is preferred.
[AppLoader] Use shipped Linux kernel AIO access library.
An up-to-date "libaio" or "libaio1" package from your system is preferred.
I/O warning : failed to load external entity "/etc/vmware/hostd/proxy.xml"
Fail to open executable: No such file or directory
All but the last line occur when the GUI opens (EDIT: the first 4 lines go away after installing the libaio1 package, but nothing else changes.). The last line happens when I try to open the VM. (There is no file /etc/vmware/hostd/proxy.xml)
On this run there is a log file in /tmp/vmware-me/vmware-player-7017.log which ends with the following:
2017-12-30T22:43:31.293-05:00| vmplayer| I125: VMMgr::OpenVM (cfgPath=/home/me/vmware/Windows_10_x64/Windows 10 x64.vmx)
2017-12-30T22:43:31.294-05:00| vthread-3| I125: VTHREAD initialize thread 3 "vthread-3" tid 7544
2017-12-30T22:43:31.294-05:00| vthread-3| I125: /home/me/vmware/Windows_10_x64/Windows 10 x64.vmx: Reloading config state.
2017-12-30T22:43:31.299-05:00| vthread-3| I125: VMHS: Transitioned vmx/execState/val to poweredOff
2017-12-30T22:43:31.311-05:00| vigorCnx| I125: VTHREAD start thread 3 "vigorCnx" tid 7548
2017-12-30T22:43:31.314-05:00| vmplayer| I125: SnapshotTree: Emitting refresh (/home/me/vmware/Windows_10_x64/Windows 10 x64.vmx)
2017-12-30T22:43:31.315-05:00| vigorCnx| I125: VigorOfflineGetToolsVersion: updated tools version to 0
2017-12-30T22:43:31.316-05:00| vmplayer| I125: ReadProxyFile: Failed to read file: /etc/vmware/hostd/proxy.xml
2017-12-30T22:43:31.320-05:00| vmplayer| I125: Setting power state poweredOff
2017-12-30T22:43:31.327-05:00| vmplayer| I125: OnVMStateChanged: alive = 0
2017-12-30T22:43:31.331-05:00| vmplayer| I125: IPC Manager: Error while connecting socket client: No such file or directory
2017-12-30T22:43:31.331-05:00| vmplayer| I125: OnGuestCanRunUnityChanged: The guest is a supported version of Windows, checking Tools status. Version status: 5, running status: 3
2017-12-30T22:43:31.331-05:00| vmplayer| I125: OnGuestCanRunUnityChanged: Tools status is not INSTALLED
2017-12-30T22:43:31.331-05:00| vmplayer| I125: VMMgr: Finished opening VM at /vm/#9801d81c1e48e136/ from /home/me/vmware/Windows_10_x64/Windows 10 x64.vmx
2017-12-30T22:43:31.532-05:00| vmplayer| I125: IPC Manager: Error while connecting socket client: No such file or directory
2017-12-30T22:43:31.832-05:00| vmplayer| I125: VMHSGetDataFileKey: Could not get the dataFileKey from VMDB
2017-12-30T22:43:31.933-05:00| vmplayer| I125: IPC Manager: Error while connecting socket client: No such file or directory
2017-12-30T22:43:32.734-05:00| vmplayer| I125: IPC Manager: Error while connecting socket client: No such file or directory
2017-12-30T22:43:34.337-05:00| vmplayer| I125: IPC Manager: Error while connecting socket client: No such file or directory
2017-12-30T22:43:37.538-05:00| vmplayer| I125: IPC Manager: Error while connecting socket client: No such file or directory
2017-12-30T22:43:43.941-05:00| vmplayer| I125: IPC Manager: Error while connecting socket client: No such file or directory
2017-12-30T22:43:56.754-05:00| vmplayer| I125: IPC Manager: Error while connecting socket client: No such file or directory
2017-12-30T22:44:22.357-05:00| vmplayer| I125: IPC Manager: Error while connecting socket client: No such file or directory
2017-12-30T22:44:46.778-05:00| vmplayer| I125: MKSWindowTrans: The current transaction 558BFA085FB0 has not been submitted.
2017-12-30T22:44:46.778-05:00| vmplayer| I125: VMMgr::CloseVM: closing VM at /vm/#9801d81c1e48e136/
2017-12-30T22:44:46.787-05:00| vmplayer| I125: VMMgr::OnVMDestroyed: cleaning up after destroyed VM at /vm/#9801d81c1e48e136/
2017-12-30T22:44:46.999-05:00| vmplayer| I125: WORKER: asyncOps=0 maxActiveOps=0 maxPending=0 maxCompleted=0
So it looks like the Tools install indeed failed. And there is some socket problem where some file is missing. Not clear what.
I looked for all these signs online and found nothing relevant. Anybody got a clue? Or anything else to look at?
Note: running "vmware-modconfig --console --install-all" before vmplayer makes no difference.