Moving beyond OpenGL: The need for Native Metal (macOS) and Vulkan (Linux) support

[Milashka]

Hi everyone,
The technical state of ETS2 and ATS on macOS and Linux is honestly terrible.
Right now, the "native" versions for Mac and Linux still rely on OpenGL, which is ancient and performs poorly. What’s really crazy is that running the Windows version via Crossover (on Mac) or Proton (on Linux) often gives better performance and stability than the actual native ports. It’s pretty bad when 'emulation' works better than the native build.

Also, if you manually change uset r_device "gl" to uset r_device "vk" in the config.cfg file, the FPS on Mac literally doubles because of MoltenVK. It shows that the 'native' port of game is capable of running much faster, but for some reason, we are still stuck with the laggy OpenGL by default.
We really need a proper update for modern hardware:
Native Metal support for macOS (not just MoltenVK/OpenGL).
Native Apple Silicon (ARM64) build so we can stop relying on Rosetta 2.
Official Vulkan support for Linux to match the Windows DX11/DX12 versions.
The Windows version gets all the engine updates, while Mac and Linux users are stuck with legacy tech from a decade ago. Are there any plans to modernize the Prism3D engine for these platforms and finally drop OpenGL?
Would love to hear if this is anywhere on the roadmap. Pavel mentioned smith like that in Christmas stream, but that was 3 YEARS ago... We are still waiting...

[Madkine]

As you are aware, SCS has been working on Vulkan for some time, we just don't know when it will be ready for public release.

[Milashka]

As you are aware, SCS has been working on Vulkan for some time, we just don't know when it will be ready for public release.

That's great, but what about Metal?

[Nilderan]

I dream of a day when I can ditch Crossover and play the native Mac version with the same performance. The current OpenGL in ETS2/ATS is an outdated solution that barely works. However, to be honest, the Mac/Linux player base is so small that a new renderer for those platforms is probably at the very end of SCS's roadmap.

[Milashka]

I dream of a day when I can ditch Crossover and play the native Mac version with the same performance. The current OpenGL in ETS2/ATS is an outdated solution that barely works. However, to be honest, the Mac/Linux player base is so small that a new renderer for those platforms is probably at the very end of SCS's roadmap.

I think ETS2 and ATS are the most popular driving games on Mac, so I won't say that player base is this small. I mean, one of the reasons I bought Mac was that I know ETS2 and ATS being available on Mac natively. Little did I know then that 'native' ports are very poor, but it still counts. If they made proper support I would be happy. For example Snowrunner, being more modern and more graphics heavy game has native M Macs support. It's sad they suddenly dropped any updates for Mac version, but performance of the port itself is very good. Snowrunner on my ancient Air M1 2020 16gb looks and runs stunningly good.

[Nilderan]

I think ETS2 and ATS are the most popular driving games on Mac, so I won't say that player base is this small. I mean, one of the reasons I bought Mac was that I know ETS2 and ATS being available on Mac natively. Little did I know then that 'native' ports are very poor, but it still counts. If they made proper support I would be happy. For example Snowrunner, being more modern and more graphics heavy game has native M Macs support. It's sad they suddenly dropped any updates for Mac version, but performance of the port itself is very good. Snowrunner on my ancient Air M1 2020 16gb looks and runs stunningly good.

I'm also on the M1 Mini and it's incredible what this small machine can do for gaming. ETS2 runs on Crossover with high settings at 2560x1080, mostly locked 40 fps with dips to 30–35 fps in heavy areas. Linux/Mac gaming has become more popular in recent years thanks to SteamOS and M chips. Let's hope that SCS is working on improving performance on those platforms

[zincokates]

Apple is disabling most of the support for Rosetta 2 with MacOS 28, so in a couple of years they’re probably have to make a native Apple build, or leave MacOS unsupported

[ivy parrot]

Hi All
I want to report my experience with ETS 2 on a Mac Mini M4, from the default settings to using this string in the launch options of ETS2 on Steam.

I started using ETS2 on a macbook air m1, at 18 fps, although slow, I accepted this, after a while bought a brand new Mac Mini M4, with 16GB of RAM, had a frame rate increase to 30 FPS, and it was capped at 30 FPS, although great, I felt something was not right...
I tried the crossover trial, and something was not right, maybe I had something wrong with the crossover settings? Anyway, a re-installed ETS2, and accepted the 30 FPS cap..
Something happened, started having truck issues, braking at 50/kmh killed the truck, so removed the game from the mac mini m4, and re-installed, started driving, but I was never satisfied with the 30 fps cap...
Then I found this -rdevice vk -color_mode sdr string, and added it to the launch options...

Well wow, um, I had no idea a game could be this brilliant on a mac mini m4, from 30 fps to 100+, or 90 fps most of the time, insane, you can almost see the atoms that make up the trucks...
So whatever the -rdevice vk -color_mode sdr affects, can we have more of this, so we can go from 90 to 180 fps....

I am only reporting what I have experienced in the last few months... If SCS could make -rdevice vk -color_mode sdr mandatory or whatever this affects the new standard for mac players, wow...

Just so happy now... Thanks SCS!!!