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I know it's not the topic here so apologies for the digression, but the Mac compatibility on this list is somewhat misleading. Games like TF2 don't actually wor

I know it's not the topic here so apologies for the digression, but the Mac compatibility on this list is somewhat misleading. Games like TF2 don't actually work on the Mac any longer unless you stay on or downgrade to Mojave. And even then, the performance and bugginess leaves much to be desired. If you're using this article at all to make decisions around a Mac for gaming, dive a little deeper to make sure the game you want to play works on Catalina+ (generally requires a full 64 bit port). Back to the actual topic: I had no idea Proton got this good. That's quite an achievement for Linux gaming. What's the state of modern GPU support?

smoldesu 6y ago
As for Mac support, my understanding is that Apple's reluctance to support third-party graphics APIs has made development incredibly difficult, especially on modern versions of MacOS where they're moving away from technologies like OpenGL and dragging their feet in the sand with Vulkan. From what I've seen on Github, a lot of Proton developers aren't keen on picking up Mac support, and the last time it was (officially) supported by Proton was nearly 2 years ago (where you had to compile from source to get it working). Given Apple's recent hostility towards Valve, I doubt they have much interest in working with their platform. As for GPU support, it's fine. I use an older GeForce card that works perfectly fine on Manjaro, and I haven't seen any driver issues so far (though I don't use Wayland, so ymmv). I've even been surprised by their control panel, which lets you easily enable G-sync on supported monitors, force compositing, micromanage your displays, adjust color calibration and more. I've heard the situation is much better on AMD cards, but I have yet to run into any issues with Nvidia.
ekianjo 6y ago
> What's the state of modern GPU support? Pretty good on AMD, still somewhat behind for Nvidia (Raytracing is being worked on, and DLSS is to come at some point). AMD is the preferred way to go for VR as well as they support reprojection on Linux, but Nvidia does not yet.
- Rhedox 6y ago
  Ray tracing itself works since the launch of Nvidia GPUs that can do it in Vulkan. What's being worked on is DirectX Ray Tracing.
dleslie 6y ago
As a game developer: I whole-heartedly recommend against gaming on a Mac. Just don't, you will be disappointed.
- benhurmarcel 6y ago
  I think the best solution to game on Mac is cloud gaming
  - PartiallyTyped 6y ago
    I wholeheartedly agree. For anyone interested, there exists shadow[1], and nvidia geforce-now [2]. [1] Provides a virtual pc, game developers can't deduce whether you are on the cloud: https://shadow.tech/ https://shadow.tech/ [2] Gateway to a game instance: https://www.nvidia.com/en-us/geforce-now/ https://www.nvidia.com/en-us/geforce-now/
tjpnz 6y ago
Even if the game is compatible more often than not it won't be playable on all but the lowest settings. My 2017 MBP struggles with KSP and Cities Skylines. This is an older system but those games are even older.

smoldesu 6y ago

As for Mac support, my understanding is that Apple's reluctance to support third-party graphics APIs has made development incredibly difficult, especially on modern versions of MacOS where they're moving away from technologies like OpenGL and dragging their feet in the sand with Vulkan. From what I've seen on Github, a lot of Proton developers aren't keen on picking up Mac support, and the last time it was (officially) supported by Proton was nearly 2 years ago (where you had to compile from source to get it working). Given Apple's recent hostility towards Valve, I doubt they have much interest in working with their platform. As for GPU support, it's fine. I use an older GeForce card that works perfectly fine on Manjaro, and I haven't seen any driver issues so far (though I don't use Wayland, so ymmv). I've even been surprised by their control panel, which lets you easily enable G-sync on supported monitors, force compositing, micromanage your displays, adjust color calibration and more. I've heard the situation is much better on AMD cards, but I have yet to run into any issues with Nvidia.

ekianjo 6y ago

> What's the state of modern GPU support? Pretty good on AMD, still somewhat behind for Nvidia (Raytracing is being worked on, and DLSS is to come at some point). AMD is the preferred way to go for VR as well as they support reprojection on Linux, but Nvidia does not yet.

Rhedox 6y ago
Ray tracing itself works since the launch of Nvidia GPUs that can do it in Vulkan. What's being worked on is DirectX Ray Tracing.

dleslie 6y ago

As a game developer: I whole-heartedly recommend against gaming on a Mac. Just don't, you will be disappointed.

benhurmarcel 6y ago
I think the best solution to game on Mac is cloud gaming
- PartiallyTyped 6y ago
  I wholeheartedly agree. For anyone interested, there exists shadow[1], and nvidia geforce-now [2]. [1] Provides a virtual pc, game developers can't deduce whether you are on the cloud: https://shadow.tech/ https://shadow.tech/ [2] Gateway to a game instance: https://www.nvidia.com/en-us/geforce-now/ https://www.nvidia.com/en-us/geforce-now/

tjpnz 6y ago

Even if the game is compatible more often than not it won't be playable on all but the lowest settings. My 2017 MBP struggles with KSP and Cities Skylines. This is an older system but those games are even older.