Developed by Valve, Team Fortress 2, the pioneer of the hero-shooter, has seen a massive rise in player base over the past few years. While the game previously did run on Intel-based Macs that supported 32-bit applications, the recent shift to Apple SIlicon, while helpful for many games, has also removed support for a lot of games, particularly ones made on the Source 2 Engine.
This begs the question, is Team Fortress 2 coming to the Mac? If so, what can we expect from the platform?
Is Team Fortress 2 Coming to the Mac?
Yes and no. Recent reports from SteamDB have confirmed that Valve is working on a 64-bit version of Team Fortress 2. This means that they’re planning to upgrade the platform of the game the same way they did with Counter-Strike: Global Offensive, eventually shifting it to Counter-Strike: 2.
However, if history is anything to go by, Valve doesn’t have an excellent track record of keeping good with their promises, initially confirming that CS2 would be coming to the Mac, and then deprecating the platform.
This was, obviously, a major blow to Mac gamers, which is why many are not really keeping their hopes up for Team Fortress 2 as well. However, there are a few differences that may lead to Team Fortress 2 eventually being playable on the Mac.
64-Bit Windows Support and Team Fortress 2
Counter Strike 2 has an anti-cheat that you cannot run on macOS, regardless of whether you use CrossOver or Parallels. As of yet, it does not seem like Team Fortress 2 is going to get the same treatment when it comes to anti-cheats.
This means that in the very plausible likelihood that Team Fortress 2 does not come to the Mac, we can anticipate that the already confirmed Linux and Windows 64-bit support will allow the game to be playable via CrossOver or Parallels using the Apple Game Porting Toolkit as an accelerant to its performance.
Team Fortress 2 SteamDB Mac Updates
Let’s take a look at Team Fortress 2’s depo updates. If we do so, we see that a macOS-specific version has recently been added to SteamDB alongside the Windows and Linux 64-bit versions as well.
Will Team Fortress 2 Run On Mac With CrossOver?
Yes, it is very likely that when Team Fortress 2 is ported to 64-bit, it will run on the Mac via CrossOver or Parallels. Obviously, the performance will remain a far cry from what we would have had if we had a native macOS version.
But, recent performance figures indicate that CrossOver has been maturing significantly quickly as a platform, which means that you should be able to get decent FPS out of the game on Apple Silicon devices without much trouble.
Will Team Fortress 2 Run A Base MacBook Air M1?
Yes, Team Fortress 2 will be able to run on a base MacBook Air M1 given that it is either supported via CrossOver or natively. While the exact performance figures will be available when we actually get to test the game, if the system requirements are anything to go by, you can expect 60+ FPS frame rates at near-to-native resolution with no issues whatsoever.
This is because the Source 2 Engine is quite old, and it doesn’t have the highest system requirements. Moreover, Team Fortress 2 is over a decade old, which means that it can run on most modern platforms with ease.
When Will Team Fortress 2 Be Released on the Mac?
If the timeline of CS2 is anything to go by, we can expect Team Fortress 2 to be released for 64-bit in late 2024. However, Valve doesn’t really keep users updated with its development cycle, and we aren’t really sure of how hard the project is being internally pushed.
As of the time of writing this, multiple updates on SteamDB have been pushed out in concurrent fashion, which leads us to hope that we can expect Team Fortress 2 on the Mac, or at least on 64-bit, sooner rather than later.
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