The Mac as a Gaming Platform, the New Era

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Hellbound

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I dont have a mac, and never used one. But I believe this is a good move for Valve. I've never viewed mac as a gaming platform. But this can change things, and maybe somehow create some competition.. And competition is good for us.
 
Sure, from the business end it seems like a good decision, and for one developer, all of whose games run on a fairly unified engine, it may be viable. For the rest of the developers, especially with more demanding titles, this isn't true. Apple can't continue in it's current practice and adopt gaming as a feature to put on the box...they've got to give up something about the aspect of their hardware and business models in order to not give up gaming. Better hardware in more timely intervals, combined with more open software and developer controls - these demands, combined with the classically-radical and immobile nature of Apple will make it a long time before you'll see games (on the PC level) on the Mac, if ever. The rest of the developers are on stand-by, waiting for Valve to get the hard work (which is several years, if you ask me) done with Apple, then they'll all come flooding through the door saying "me too!".
And then, finally, the Apple users will complain about their machines. "What do you mean a 130M can't play Crysis? It's a Mac!"
 

kanji

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I always kinda thought that Apple didnt want games released on their OS because then their customers might realize what over-priced p.o.s's they own. "Why cant my $2000 computer play this game?" That just might ruin the Apple "experience" a little.

I dont really see this doing much for Steam other than getting them a bit more sales $$. Apple's target market doesnt include gamers; therefore how many people do you think will start gaming on a mac now that steam is working for them? When shopping for a computer, if someone thinks that they might game a little, theyve already stopped looking at Apple systems. Doubt steam being on available on Mac's will change that since people still have to swallow the Apple tax to get a mac (that will no doubt, have much worse hardware in it that a equivalently priced PC)
 

aberchonbie

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We don't know the amount of money involved in development, distribution, management, and marketing spent on the steam client/games for Mac now, but I really question if it's worth it since there really aren't a huge amount of people using Macs compared to PC's.
 

Dirtman73

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I'm concerned that this is going to further dumb down PC gaming. If Apple somehow makes it easier (hence cheaper) to develop games on their platform, what's going to stop studios from building a Mac game from the ground up and then porting it to PC? Quality is going to hit a brick wall. Look at what happened with the console explosion- tons of crappy ports with a few gems here and there.

And not only that, you can bet this will raise the price of video games in general. Remember when new PC games were released at around $39-$49? Not any more. $60+ is becoming the average for big-name releases because console owners are willing to pay that much, and PC gamers are now getting stuck with those insane prices. Apple getting into the market is going to increase the price on premium releases.
 

noahjwhite

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I remember all of those games you mentioned. I wasted many school hours on those :) Seriously though, I don't think that $2000 locked platform makes sense for gaming. The PS3 couldn't even sell at $599. Not to mention that 90% or more of apple computer owners are using laptops.
 
Well, the picture of "big titles" might not change for a few years from now (thinking also in Linux), but Indie games might get a full (big bang a like) growth, that's all in all a good thing fro everyone. More Dev Studios working on different platforms at a time make knowledge easier to spread.

Go Valve!

Cheers!
 

Ragnar-Kon

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I can definitely see Apple making a break in the gaming market, but they need to fix several things.

- They need a new version of their Mac Pro. Dump the Xeon processor, and pick up the i5/i7. The Xeon is a great processor, but not cost effective enough for a gaming machine. Then offer some better GPU options for gaming. In my opinion, the iMac will never be able to become a gaming machine in its current state, the case design just doesn't offer enough cooling options.


- They need to push out updates to their graphics drivers. I'm sure ATI & nvidia will be willing to do this if there is money to be made for them. But the current Snow Leopard graphics drivers haven't been updated since June '09.

- They need to more openly adopt OpenGL, perhaps even create a SDK that will use OpenGL to create games on a Mac. Microsoft will never allow DirectX to leave the Windows platform, so they're forced to use OpenGL. OpenGL is great but still isn't up to par to the D3D API. Good news about this... if Apple pushes OpenGL development forward, we'll see it appear on Linux as well.

All said and done, I think there is a great opportunity for Apple to make a huge foot into the gaming world, but probably never the enthusiast part of this world.
Do I think Apple will take the opportunity? I'm not holding my breath.
 

madass

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[citation][nom]noahjwhite[/nom]I remember all of those games you mentioned. I wasted many school hours on those Seriously though, I don't think that $2000 locked platform makes sense for gaming. The PS3 couldn't even sell at $599. Not to mention that 90% or more of apple computer owners are using laptops.[/citation]
Dont forget, the average gaming rig (running games at 1080P- PS3's and XBoxes do 720 and 540)cost ~USD600 or so....very few tigs actually cross USD1000...

[citation][nom]Ragnar-Kon[/nom]I can definitely see Apple making a break in the gaming market, but they need to fix several things.- They need a new version of their Mac Pro. Dump the Xeon processor, and pick up the i5/i7. The Xeon is a great processor, but not cost effective enough for a gaming machine. Then offer some better GPU options for gaming. In my opinion, the iMac will never be able to become a gaming machine in its current state, the case design just doesn't offer enough cooling options.- They need to push out updates to their graphics drivers. I'm sure ATI & nvidia will be willing to do this if there is money to be made for them. But the current Snow Leopard graphics drivers haven't been updated since June '09.- They need to more openly adopt OpenGL, perhaps even create a SDK that will use OpenGL to create games on a Mac. Microsoft will never allow DirectX to leave the Windows platform, so they're forced to use OpenGL. OpenGL is great but still isn't up to par to the D3D API. Good news about this... if Apple pushes OpenGL development forward, we'll see it appear on Linux as well.All said and done, I think there is a great opportunity for Apple to make a huge foot into the gaming world, but probably never the enthusiast part of this world.Do I think Apple will take the opportunity? I'm not holding my breath.[/citation]
You missed out on upgrades. And the fact that Apple will never let you use radically fast hardware. Do you really think Apple will let someone run quad 5870's? Or even dual 4850's? And what about upgrades? IN two years time I can easily change my 4870 for a 5970 or a GT400 without any problems whatsoever. Or dump a PHII X6 on the mobo. Apple will never do anything like that....
 

SneakySnake

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[citation][nom]kewl munky[/nom]If they start making Mac exclusives all hell will break loose.[/citation]

Valve is trying to expand its market share, not limit it with a mac exclusive
 

proxy711

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[citation][nom]compfreak93[/nom]so basically only the valve games are going to mac? is that what everyones excited about? what is that like 10 games the half-life series, CS series L4D series, hahahaah this made me laugh[/citation]
All 10 being epic great games. I'd say that's something to be excited about.
 

drowned

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I'll take a positive outlook (hating Macs as much as I do). If Apple made a computer that could do everything my Win machines can do...including gaming....I would buy one in a heartbeat. It would be the same case if linux spontaneously started running win games.

Leaving candy-land I don't think this will ever happen. Macs have never had the foundation to "share" titles with Win machines cause Apple likes to keep everything locked up in the family.
 

sdedalus83

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It's just a natural progression for Valve. There are three markets dependent on OpenGL and their last attempt at reaching one of them failed when they allowed EA to do the legwork. They don't want that to happen again, nor do they want to abandon the platform as a market for their games.
Since the big hurdle for Valve getting games on the PS3 has been to rewrite Source for OpenGL, once they decided to invest in PS3 development, the much-easier-to-code-for OSX and Linux platforms got dragged along for the ride.
 

Gulli

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Maybe this will mean higher sales on desktop computer games, so developers will be more inclined to work on desktop games instead of giving us console ports.
 

thesupermedium

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I predict most of the developers will be too stubborn to jump aboard in any timely fashion, but still I'm glad to see that Macs have evolved from an overpriced work computer to an actual "personal computer". I myself am an avid PC builder, but I see the potential. Macs don't have ancient hardware like the xbox 360, but it does have the constant on hardware. They won't match the value or sheer performance of most enthusiast PCs, but this is definitely a noteworthy option (if you have $2000 laying around :p)
 

Kelavarus

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Actually isn't the 'Can it play Crysis' question pretty fair here? The question is literally, can it PLAY Crysis, not run it at full. I can buy a PC (sans monitor and OS, I have those) for under $400 that will run it at a decent resolution on medium graphics. Exactly as someone said, could it be that Mac owners will wonder why their $1000+ computers are performing so horribly? Granted, on current Source games, probably not. Maybe a little on L4D2, not sure how the GT320s or whatevers perform.

But even then, it is asking developers to code their engines on a whole new API (if they don't support OpenGL already), and that's quite a bit to do, especially for most likely lower performance (hardware, OpenGL is a capable platform), and probably less market.

We'll see, it'll definitely be interesting. I will definitely chuckle if it doesn't pick up very well.
 
Good riddance this is a mac boy's WET Dream a hand full of games vs decades of titles that can still be played on the PC. One can go on all day about the Mac's limitation which are purely artificial thanks to Apple and it's closed market policy.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=YB4jFuTuNWg

Female voice: What's wrong?
Man on monitor: I just bought one of these yesterday, and it doesn't fit my consumer, and the store doesn't have any of the other kind.
[LUH presses a button]
Male voice: For more enjoyment and greater efficiency, consumption is being standardized. We are sorry ...
Man on monitor: This is -
[cut off]
 
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