Why is the 64-bit version of Godot not available on Steam?

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0 votes

I'm unable to run the 32bit version on my computer, which has 64bit Windows 10.

I can download the 64bit version from the website and it will work fine, but I would like to use the Steam version, which has only the 32bit version for some reason.

Why isn't Godot's 64bit version available on Steam?

in Engine by (30 points)

1 Answer

0 votes

Because Windows is 10 years behind macOS and 15 years behind Linux, and still doesn't promote 64-bit as much as it should, so it's the norm to distribute Win32 applications, which incidentally work just fine on Windows 64-bit.

So far there hasn't been much demand for 64-bit Windows binaries so we haven't pushed them to Steam, but we might if there is community interest.

by (1,957 points)

The question is: Why is he unable to run the 32bit version?

by (713 points)

That's not the case, in a Steam thread he mentioned he can run the 32bit version if he browses to the Steam directory. It's just the Steam lib messing things up.

by (1,957 points)

Ah okay. Didn't know that.

by (713 points)

I can actually think of two great reasons, although they may not be of immediate importance:

  • Increased Address Space: (I could see games, these days at least, needing more than 2/4 GiB of RAM)

  • Future proofing in case the developers decide to add support for 64-bit positioning (I have no idea if that's even on the radar or not)

by (10 points)

It's not incidental that 32-bit works on 64-bit Windows, it's intentional and the result of a lot of foresight. The opposite of being "behind". You can still compile something on Windows XP 32-bit and have it run on Windows 10 64-bit, and vice versa. Try doing that on a Linux system!

by (21 points)

I do that all the time on my Linux system what are you talking about? I know for a fact though that you can not run 64 bit on a 32-bit machine, that would mean that the program is not actually 64-bit, or that there is so much behind the scenes compatibility things happening that you might not even be able to run the program any ways.

by (663 points)

The person writing the answer is trying to tell us that the only reason 32 bit Windows programs work on 64 bit Windows is "just by accident" and just the result of laziness, which couldn't be further from the truth.

This is called "backwards compatibility" and is quite intentional and the result of a lot of effort.

by (21 points)
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