SteamPlay May Soon Allow Games to be Installed on Unsupported Operating Systems, Particularly Linux

An observant Reddit user recently noticed that one of the latest commits for the Steam Database on GitHub contains a few lines of code that reference Steam Play and Wine compatibility, which may mean this is something Valve is working on for a future update.

Steam Play is a feature that allows users to buy a game one time, and then install it in whatever OS it is supported in – which sounds like a great feature, unless you own a game that isn’t supported in Linux. At this point, Steam won’t allow games that do not have Linux support to be installed on a Linux machine.

If this code actually makes it to a future Steam update, it could mean that Steam users on Linux machines will be able to install Windows games on the Linux version of the Steam client, through Wine – or maybe directly through the Steam client.

Considering the amount of support and updates DirectX 11 has received on Linux this past year, especially Vulkan drivers for Nvidia GPUs, this could be a pleasantly awesome update for Linux gamers.

If you’re programming-minded, you can check out the include code below, but we’ve bolded the part that has Reddit users speculating.

"Steam_Settings_Compat"             "Steam Play"
"Steam_Settings_Compat_Title"           "Steam Play Settings"
"Steam_Settings_Compat_Info"            "Steam Play will automatically install compatibility tools that allow you to play games from your library that were built for other operating systems."
"Steam_Settings_Compat_Enable"          "Enable Steam Play for supported titles"
"Steam_Settings_Compat_Advanced_Title"      "Advanced"
"Steam_Settings_Compat_Forced_Info"     "You can use Steam Play to test games in your library that have not been verified with a supported compatibility tool."
"Steam_Settings_Compat_Forced_Enable"       "Enable Steam Play for all titles"
"Steam_Settings_Compat_Advanced_Info"       "You may select a compatibility tool to use with games that have not been tested or verified to work on this platform.nnThis may not work as expected, and can cause issues with your games, including crashes and breaking save games."
"Steam_Settings_Compat_Default_Tool"        "Compatibility tool:"
"Steam_Settings_Compat_Info_Link"       "SteamPlay FAQ"
"Steam_Settings_Compat_No_Default"      "None selected"

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