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Does steam work on Freebsd?



Largely. Here's the web page tracking current status: https://github.com/shkhln/linuxulator-steam-utils/wiki/Compa...


Yes. Well enough to play Counter Strike: Global Offensive.

Beware, as soon as I switched to FreeBSD on the desktop my trust factor tanked.

https://www.freshports.org/games/linux-steam-utils/



Just FYI, that info is now 10 years old. I recently researched switching to FreeBSD and found that the NVidia drivers don't support Vulkan, which is a requirement for DXVK to work, not to mention a lot of Linux ports. Can't comment on the other manufacturers' drivers though.


Nexuiz, OpenArena, World of Padman.

I've got nothing against those games but they're ancient.

They'd run on a 15 year old ThinkPad with integrated graphics.

Steam Proton allows you the run new games on Linux like Final Fantasy XV, Witcher 3, Death Stranding, Hitman 2, Doom Eternal.

Actual blockbuster games from the last few years.


It's a 10 year old article. Of course the games are old. It might be that things are different now, or the same. But it still answers the question: Does steam work on FreeBSD (Yes), and is still accurate (Sometimes better)


Considering the age of the article, and the fact that I'm unable to find any information on Vulkan support for any manufacturer's drivers, I'm going to go out on a limb and say that Steam (more specifically Proton) doesn't work as well as it does on Linux.


The documentation is certainly lacking, but sources such as https://github.com/FreeBSDDesktop/kms-drm/issues/130 suggest that Vulkan support is there, at least for Radeon.


Steam was released on Linux 2 years after that article.

Googling "freebsd steam" doesn't really indicate that it's easy to get it running.

The frames per seconds in those results are 150fps+ 10 years ago. You may as well have said that Tux Racer runs faster on FreeBSD.

I doubt people are running variable refresh rate on 360hz monitors on FreeBSD to fully enjoy the advantage of playing these ancient games.

What's the point in being disingenuous?


It can be made to run, but I can't really recommend it unless you enjoy tinkering/troubleshooting. It's still pretty far from being a "plug-and-play" experience.




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