Steam

Steam, Valve Software's digital distribution service for PC games, is not directly provided in the Alpine or postmarketOS repositories, but it can be used on postmarketOS with some workarounds.
As Steam is only available for x86/x86_64 processors, an emulation layer must be used to get it working on arm64 platforms. While Steam may be installed directly (via Flatpak or otherwise) on x86_64 installations of postmarketOS, the majority of postmarketOS devices use the ARM architecture.
Install Guides
There are two candidates for the emulation layer used to run Steam on arm64 - FEX-Emu and box86/box64. I have created guides for setting up both of them inside Distrobox containers. FEX-Emu offers higher compatibility in my testing, but box86/box64 gives better performance on games that worked in both.
Games Tested
For a more generic list of games that were tested on FEX-emu please see this list. If you happen to have a game functional on your pmOS device that has not been added to their list, please be nice and add a wiki page with your tested game and/or device over there aswell.
Game | Device | Works in FEX | Works in box86/box64 | Notes |
---|---|---|---|---|
Baba is You | nothing-spacewar | Untested | Yes | |
Bioshock | xiaomi-elish | No | Untested | Shows intro logos and then crashes to desktop |
Celeste | oneplus-fajita, xiaomi-elish | Yes | Yes | |
Cuphead | nothing-spacewar | Untested | Yes | |
Drawful 2 | nothing-spacewar | Untested | Yes | Able to start games with just touch! |
Firewatch | nothing-spacewar | Untested | Yes | |
FTL: Faster than light | clockworkpi-uconsole-cm4 | Untested | Yes | |
Goat Simulator | xiaomi-elish | Yes | Untested | Required SDL_VIDEODRIVER=x11 |
Half Life | xiaomi-elish | Yes | Untested | Required SDL_VIDEODRIVER=x11 |
Half Life 2 | oneplus-fajita, xiaomi-elish | Yes | Untested | Required SDL_VIDEODRIVER=x11 |
Half Life 2: Deathmatch | oneplus-fajita, xiaomi-elish | Yes | Yes | Required SDL_VIDEODRIVER=x11 |
Half Life 2: Lost Coast | oneplus-fajita, xiaomi-elish | Yes | Yes | Required SDL_VIDEODRIVER=x11 |
Portal | xiaomi-elish | Yes | Untested | Required SDL_VIDEODRIVER=x11 |
Retrowave | nothing-spacewar | Untested | Yes | |
Retrowave 2 | nothing-spacewar | Untested | Yes | Crashes when loading certain maps |
Road 96 | nothing-spacewar | Untested | Yes | Works pretty well in lower resolutions |
Stardew Valley | nothing-spacewar | Untested | Yes | |
Subnautica | xiaomi-elish | Yes | Untested | Required swapfile to start |
Tetris® Effect: Connected | nothing-spacewar | Untested | Yes | |
The Elder Scrolls IV: Oblivion | xiaomi-elish | Yes | No | 4GB swapfile active |
The Elder Scrolls V: Skyrim | oneplus-fajita, xiaomi-elish | Yes | No | Required swapfile to start |
The Jackbox Naughty Pack | nothing-spacewar | Untested | Yes | Able to start games with just touch! |
The Jackbox Party Pack 9 | nothing-spacewar | Untested | Yes | Able to start games with just touch! |
The Jackbox Party Starter | nothing-spacewar | Untested | Yes | Able to start games with just touch! |
The Jackbox Survey Scramble | nothing-spacewar | Untested | Yes | Able to start games with just touch! |
Tomb Raider (2013) | oneplus-fajita, xiaomi-elish | Yes | No | Required using Windows version in Proton |
Ultimate Chicken Horse | xiaomi-elish | Yes | Yes | Required SDL_VIDEODRIVER=x11 |