Steam

This page is intended to explain how to run Steam, Steam games as well as proprietary DRM-free games under NixOS. A dedicated Games page lists games and reports on their successful execution on NixOS.

Prerequisites

If you are using 64-bit system and plan to also run 32-bit code (some games are 32-bit only) - add hardware.opengl.driSupport32Bit = true and hardware.pulseaudio.support32Bit = true (in case you are using pulseaudio) to your configuration.

Example snippet of configuration.nix:

  ...
  hardware.opengl.driSupport32Bit = true;
  hardware.opengl.extraPackages32 = with pkgs.pkgsi686Linux; [ libva ];
  hardware.pulseaudio.support32Bit = true;
  ...

See the relevamt section of the manual: https://nixos.org/manual/nixpkgs/stable/#sec-steam-play

Installation

Several installation options exist.

Pure steam client

If you need Steam client, install it withsteam package. Example snippet of configuration.nix:

  environment.systemPackages = with pkgs; [
  ...
  steam
  ];
  ...

Native steam client

If you want Steam client to use NixOS libraries instead of Steam-provided, you need to set an override. Note, that this may be broken. Example snippet of configuration.nix:

  environment.systemPackages = with pkgs; [
  ...
  (steam.override { nativeOnly = true; })
];
  ...

FHS environment only (aka GOG/Humble)

This will only make partial installation - provide the script, which creates the typical environment expected by proprietary games and software on regular Linux, allowing to run such software without patching. Useful if you plan to run GOG or HumbleBundle games.

First option is to install eithersteam-run or steam-run-native. The native version may work better for DRM-free standalone games.

Example snippet of configuration.nix:

  ...
  environment.systemPackages = with pkgs; [
  ...
  steam-run-native
  ];
  ...

Other option, in case you need more flexibility, is to directly reference to the part of steam metapackage instead. In fact, steam-run-native above is just a wrapper linking to steam.run.

Example snippet of configuration.nix:

  ...
  environment.systemPackages = with pkgs; [
  ...
  (steam.override { nativeOnly = true; }).run
  ];
  ...

This builds same result as steam-run-native above.

Install the game by setting the executable attribute on the installer and then running it via steam-run ./your_gog_installer.sh. After installation, edit the "~/.local/share/applications/your_game_here.desktop" and replace the exec line from Exec="/home/user/game/start.sh" "" with Exec="steam-run" "/home/user/game/start.sh".

Adding missing dependencies

This can be done this way:

  ...
  environment.systemPackages = with pkgs; [
  ...
  (steam.override { extraPkgs = pkgs: [ mono gtk3 gtk3-x11 libgdiplus zlib ]; nativeOnly = true; }).run
  ];
...

Bumblebee and Primus

This can be done this way:

  ...
  environment.systemPackages = with pkgs; [
  ...
  (steam.override { withPrimus = true; extraPkgs = pkgs: [ bumblebee glxinfo ]; nativeOnly = true; }).run
  ];
...

Java

Example snippet of configuration.nix:

  ...
programs.java.enable = true; 
environment.systemPackages = with pkgs; [
  ...
(steam.override { withJava = true; })
];
  ...

You can test java availability by invoking chrooted bash instance: steam-run bash and then typing: java -version. Can be combined with extra packages above.

Limit user access

Example snippet of configuration.nix:

  ...
  users.users.<your-username>.packages = [
    pkgs.steam
  ];
...

Troubleshooting

Steam fails to start. What do I do?

strace then open bug report.

Game fails to start

Games may fail to start because they lack dependencies (this should be added to the script, for now), or because they cannot be patched. The steps to launch a game directly are:

• Patch the script/binary if you can
• Add a file named steam_appid.txt in the binary folder, with the appid as contents (it can be found in the stdout from steam)
• Using the LD_LIBRARY_PATH from the nix/store steam script, with some additions, launch the game binary

 LD_LIBRARY_PATH=~/.steam/bin32:$LD_LIBRARY_PATH:/nix/store/pfsa... blabla ...curl-7.29.0/lib:. ./Osmos.bin32 (if you could not patchelf the game, call ld.so directly with the binary as param)

With this technique, I can play many games directly from steam. Others, like Team Fortress, cannot be patched so I only managed to run them from the cmd line.

new Libcpp for steam

This article or section is out of date.

Reason: Since the merge of #29180 this subsection is obsolete (Discuss in Talk:Steam)
Once the page has been updated this notice can be removed.

The open source radeon drivers need a newer libc++ than is provided by the default runtime, which leads to acrash on launch. Use

(steamPackages.override { newLibcpp = true; }).steam-chrootenv

in your config if you get an error like

libGL error: unable to load driver: radeonsi_dri.so
libGL error: driver pointer missing
libGL error: failed to load driver: radeonsi
libGL error: unable to load driver: swrast_dri.so
libGL error: failed to load driver: swrast

Known issues

"Project Zomboid" may report "couldn't determine 32/64 bit of java". This is not related to java at all, it carries own outdated java binary that refuses to start if path contains non-latein characters. Check for errors by directly starting local java binary within steam-run bash.

HiDPI

If Steam's UI fonts are unbearably tiny, consider adding a custom skin from https://github.com/MoriTanosuke/HiDPI-Steam-Skin for your user to alleviate this. The skins directory is ~/.local/share/Steam/skins/.

steam-run

steam-run is a helper that can be used to run external programs in the steam FHS environment. This means that some third-party software, mostly games, can be run easily on NixOS using steam-run. Before trying other solutions, try starting your game this way, where start-game.sh is the script used to start the game on Linux.

 $ steam-run ./start-game.sh

Steam hardware

If you are using a Steam Controller or a Valve Index, you will want to add hardware.steam-hardware.enable = true; to your configurations.