Steam to End Support for macOS Mojave and 32-Bit Games

[headlessmike]

The more I think about it, the more surprising it is to me that this is an issue. Apple sold 32 bit x86 Macs for less than a year in 2006. The last system to support 32 bit hardware was Snow Leopard that was replaced by Lion in 2011. How can there be so much software for macOS that is not compiled for x86-64 (or ARM64)? It's not like people are writing very much code in x86 assembly.

 

[Spaceboi Scaphandre]

Ok, this one is pure ********.

“Major updates” for TF2 have not been made by Valve since 2017, and have just included content made by community contributors. This includes VSH, which existed as a mod more than a decade ago.

The bug fixes post “saveTF2” were made by a single contract developer and not Valve proper.

FFS the most work on TF2 comes from trolls who host bots that spam racial slurs and kill everyone instantly.

Counterargument: They added a seal

Look at him go. He's doing his best

 

[Nicole1980]

Think of it more as a companion device that compliments your single computer, as you can take whatever you are currently playing on the go with you, and you will have your library on you wherever. No limits to where and when you can play

I took my Steam Deck to the Apple Store since I needed maintenance done on my Macbook Pro, and everyone in the store just crowded around me as they all wanted a turn playing on it, even the Apple Store employees. They each were taking turns playing GTA5 on it when I just wanted to play Persona 4 Golden. 😅

good for you. I"d rather play Steam on my Mac. Bottom line.

 

[Nicole1980]

To the people complaining. Mojave is a 5 years old OS!

I don’t think many typical users are still on that version of MacOS.

Agreed, But I am still on Mojave on 4 of my computers (2 iMacs and 2 intel MBP's). I am running Monterey on my 14 inch m1pro MacBook Pro. Love them all.

But ... I will NEVER upgrade my Intel Macs beyond Mojave.

 

[Shirasaki]

To the people complaining. Mojave is a 5 years old OS!

I don’t think many typical users are still on that version of MacOS.

I held out on high Sierra for as long as I could until my Time Machine backup was unusable for purpose.

I understand why Steam can not longer support it but Steam should allow me to run the 32 bit games offline including DLC (some games and many DLC will not run offline).

It will likely involve tons of licensing agreement changes Valve can’t possibly do themselves. Also, opening up this means windows side must also be the same, which, last time I check, doesn’t suffer the same dilemma users Of older Mac do.

But ... I will NEVER upgrade my Intel Macs beyond Mojave.

Nah, you should’ve kept using high Sierra. Truly uncompromised last version 32-bit application support.

 

[felt.]

Nobody gets a mac to game. The most popular game on steam (cs2) can't even be played on a mac, without first jumping through a bunch of hoops to emulate a windows environment.

 

[Homy]

Nobody gets a mac to game. The most popular game on steam (cs2) can't even be played on a mac, without first jumping through a bunch of hoops to emulate a windows environment.

No, but Mac users want to game and they have found a new favorite. Combat Master, a free alternative to CS 2 with very positive reviews and even native port for Apple Silicon. It's more popular than CoD: Modern Warfare and Black Ops Cold War that was released back in March and those have only Win version.

New version highlights:

• Multiplatform: play and share your progress on iOS, Android, PC and Mac!
• Full gamepad support: battle and all the game menus!
• New Map Warehouse!
• Combat Master is now available on Steam!
• Shadow Rider Bundle.
• Gun sway amplitude is now customizable in settings.
• UI is now scalable with new settings.
• Cross-platform switch to play with PC and Mac users, or mobile-only matchmaking.
• Daily Rewards Checkpoints: your daily streak now always starts with the last claimed reward!

Combat Master: Season 4 on Steam

Join fast-paced action-packed combat. Play Combat Master -- AAA experience on any hardware. Best-in-class multiplayer gunfight. Next-level extreme performance. Lightning-speed loading time and a whole lot more.

store.steampowered.com

 

[MagnusVonMagnum]

My Mini Server is still running Mojave specifically so I can run not only the 32-bit games, but also high-end software (e.g. iZoTope RX) I don't really want to re-buy or RENT (e.g. Photoshop), but it's not even clear whether existing games will function when they drop support. I don't imagine the cloud feature will work, at the very least. They are blaming it on Google Chrome dumping Mojave support as they are apparently 100% dependent on Google for their software to work (freaking bizarre, IMO. What kind of LOSER gaming company depends on Google code for their GUI? Oh yeah, the same LOSER company that can't even port their own Half-Life games to 64-bit). Screw Steam.

There's too many 32-bit games being wiped out. It seems like someone ought to be able to create a sandboxed 32-bit emulator environment or something that they could run in. I mean if you can run Windows 10 entirely in Parallels...the whole operating system...you mean to tell me there's no way to just to make Mac games think they're still in a 32-bit environment? All these people emulating arcade game systems, etc. and even my VMWare Fusion could run Snow Leopard Server on top of Mojave! Of course, that wouldn't address the fact that Steam itself simply won't be updated anymore, blabbing on about security risks, etc. when a huge percentage of these games are offline single player or only save in the cloud or whatever. They can't make a final release that simply lets you play those kind of games and just save the cloud like older versions of Steam? It's ridiculous to just say SCREW YOU to your customers. I don't need a newer Steam GUI, just the damn thing to keep working as it is for now so I don't have to constantly boot into Windows just to play a game.

I guess it's a good thing I still have Windows 10 on the same Mac I can boot into and use Steam there, but Microsoft is dumping support for Windows 10 security updates in 2025 (you know the so-called "last version of Windows" .... such LIARS). Why can't Windows 11 run? Some security chip BS (not a shock for the most hacked/insecure OS of all time).

You'd think with all the push to be "GREEN" that this crap wouldn't happen, but the FACT is that Apple isn't even slightly green. They force (by refusing to continue security updates) old hardware into the landfills. All Tim is really about is GREED.

 

[Spaceboi Scaphandre]

good for you. I"d rather play Steam on my Mac. Bottom line.

You know you could still do that with the Steam Deck using Steam Link, having the Deck do all the processing and your game is controlled and displayed on your Mac

 

[jlnr]

Uhh...Windows has had driver support for the Steam Deck for a while now. Microsoft has support articles for using Windows on the Deck and also how to access Xbox Game Pass for Cloud on the Deck.

Yes, for the original Steam Deck (and not at launch). The Wi-Fi, Bluetooth and audio drivers for the Steam Deck OLED are still missing as of right now. So is the dual-booting installer that they announced a long time ago. https://help.steampowered.com/en/faqs/view/6121-ECCD-D643-BAA8

Again, I enjoy my Steam Deck, but I wouldn't buy one for anything else than SteamOS at this point.

I hope one of them is Persona 5 Royal. I will not rest until everyone in this forum plays that masterpiece.

Rest assured that it's on my wishlist, but Christmas season is couch coop season. Sackboy is my winner of the last sale, even if it seems to be pushing the Deck to its limits at full HD (=on TV).

 

[Spaceboi Scaphandre]

Yes, for the original Steam Deck (and not at launch). The Wi-Fi, Bluetooth and audio drivers for the Steam Deck OLED are still missing as of right now. So is the dual-booting installer that they announced a long time ago. https://help.steampowered.com/en/faqs/view/6121-ECCD-D643-BAA8

Again, I enjoy my Steam Deck, but I wouldn't buy one for anything else than SteamOS at this point.

The Age of Linux begins now!!!!!!

Rest assured that it's on my wishlist, but Christmas season is couch coop season. Sackboy is my winner of the last sale, even if it seems to be pushing the Deck to its limits at full HD (=on TV).

What about Ultimate Chicken Horse? That's an excellent local multiplayer game. There's also It Takes Two which won GOTY 2021

 

[nachodorito]

oh how i love to live in a country where i dont have to choose between supporting the developers and having a launcher/os-agnostic version of the game

 

[Nicole1980]

Nah, you should’ve kept using high Sierra. Truly uncompromised last version 32-bit application support.

Interesting. Can you explain what is 'compromised' about the 32-bit support in Mojave? By my understanding, it's exactly the same 32-bit support that was in High Sierra.

 

[Nicole1980]

You know you could still do that with the Steam Deck using Steam Link, having the Deck do all the processing and your game is controlled and displayed on your Mac

Ok so there's still a large clunky tool on my desk, when I have always just been able to launch bootcamp in my iMac and never adjust a thing to play Steam games. It's that clean elegance that I prefer.

 

[Shirasaki]

Interesting. Can you explain what is 'compromised' about the 32-bit support in Mojave? By my understanding, it's exactly the same 32-bit support that was in High Sierra.

Nagging window and feature deprecation in Mojave is a downgraded experience compared to High Sierra, which has none of those issues.

Who knows what Apple disabled quietly in Mojave to nudge more people to abandon their old machine or upgrade to Catalina.

 

[Zest28]

Because either those developers are long gone, or in their eyes it's not worth it due to how little people play on macOS versus Linux and Windows, or they literally can't due to a technical issue. Valve's old Source games for example are all 32 bit due to how old the Source Engine is. They tried to update Half Life 2 to 64 bit, but it did not work right at all. It crashed constantly and had horrible framerate that the 64 bit update was scrapped entirely. It's why CSGO ran so poor on macOS nowadays since Catalina forced them to haphazardly update the game to 64 bit, on an engine never meant to run 64 bit binaries to begin with



Fortunately there's a solution for Mac users who want their library of games: The Valve Steam Deck, which just got refreshed to have 1TB configurations and a new OLED model with longer battery life. Combined with a price drop for higher configs it's never been a better time to hop on the handheld Linux PC that could.

Steam Deck

Available now.

www.steamdeck.com

Or just check Apple Gaming Wiki and see if your game works through GPTK.

Those old Mac’s can still run Windows. No need to buy a SteamDeck.

 

[Spaceboi Scaphandre]

Those old Mac’s can still run Windows. No need to buy a SteamDeck.

But those old Macs most likely got pretty piss specs so the Deck would play your games a lot better, and then you could use Steam Link to play said games on your newer Mac, and then some without ever having to touch Windows. On top of that you'd then have a convenient portable means to take your library with you.

 

[Spaceboi Scaphandre]

No, but Mac users want to game and they have found a new favorite. Combat Master, a free alternative to CS 2 with very positive reviews and even native port for Apple Silicon. It's more popular than CoD: Modern Warfare and Black Ops Cold War that was released back in March and those have only Win version.

Firstly, CS2 is already free lmao

Secondly, what? MW2019 and Cold War are 4 years old they're not new games. It's the Steam version that released back in March. Most of the PC players are on Bnet since the games were exclusive to there for years. How the hell did you not know this when the Mac Bnet launcher shows the games there?

Do you even play games?

 

[Zest28]

But those old Macs most likely got pretty piss specs so the Deck would play your games a lot better, and then you could use Steam Link to play said games on your newer Mac, and then some without ever having to touch Windows. On top of that you'd then have a convenient portable means to take your library with you.

Those old Mac's like the 2018 15" MacBook Pro outperform the Steam Desk according to Geekbench.

 

[Spaceboi Scaphandre]

Those old Mac's like the 2018 15" MacBook Pro outperform the Steam Desk according to Geekbench.

Oh the 2018 15 inch? You mean the laptop that jumps to 100 degrees celesis from just running Intel Power Gadget, thermal throttling from any Final Cut export, and has the infamous butterfly keyboard? The same laptop that was so bad it made Apple begin the process of transitioning away from Intel processors to their own custom ARM chips?

The New MacBook Pro Throttles?!? (Live)

Let's see how long it takes from opening the box to thermal throttling!!

www.youtube.com

Yeah I don't think that's the flex you think it is lmao.

 

[MRMSFC]

Who knows what Apple disabled quietly in Mojave to nudge more people to abandon their old machine or upgrade to Catalina.

Based on my experience with Catalina, Apple encouraged people to stay on Mojave by making Catalina kp more.

 

[MRMSFC]

Firstly, CS2 is already free lmao

Secondly, what? MW2019 and Cold War are 4 years old they're not new games. It's the Steam version that released back in March. Most of the PC players are on Bnet since the games were exclusive to there for years. How the hell did you not know this when the Mac Bnet launcher shows the games there?

Do you even play games?

The same CS2 that Valve released missing features from CS:GO, while replacing it on the Steam Store to keep the “Overwhelmingly Positive” review score (which has dropped to “mostly positive”, at a percentage difference of 10 points)

The one where they had to bring back CS:GO as “classic” because the backlash was so bad?

And disliking my post about TF2 doesn’t make it untrue.

 

[Zest28]

Oh the 2018 15 inch? You mean the laptop that jumps to 100 degrees celesis from just running Intel Power Gadget, thermal throttling from any Final Cut export, and has the infamous butterfly keyboard? The same laptop that was so bad it made Apple begin the process of transitioning away from Intel processors to their own custom ARM chips?

The New MacBook Pro Throttles?!? (Live)

Let's see how long it takes from opening the box to thermal throttling!!

www.youtube.com

Yeah I don't think that's the flex you think it is lmao.

It still beats a Steam Deck, while being able to run all the games natively in Windows.

It makes no sense to downgrade to an expensive Steam Deck from an Intel Mac.

 

[Spaceboi Scaphandre]

It still beats a Steam Deck, while being able to run all the games natively in Windows.

It makes no sense to downgrade to an expensive Steam Deck from an Intel Mac.

How does it do in real world performance versus a Deck though? Because we got data on that 2018 15 inch Memebook Pro and they ain't pretty versus a Steam Deck.

 

[Spaceboi Scaphandre]

The same CS2 that Valve released missing features from CS:GO, while replacing it on the Steam Store to keep the “Overwhelmingly Positive” review score (which has dropped to “mostly positive”, at a percentage difference of 10 points)

The one where they had to bring back CS:GO as “classic” because the backlash was so bad?

And disliking my post about TF2 doesn’t make it untrue.

It dropped to Very Positive not Mostly Positive. The Recent Reviews are mostly positive. And this is out of 7.7 million reviews

And the game still gets a million plus concurrent players daily