Slashdot Mirror
Claims of Apple Games Just PR Fluff?
GameSetWatch is running an editorial written by Alex Handy, the former editor of Game Developer magazine and a well respected figure in the games journalism business. Today he's discussing the recent show of support from EA and id Software for the Apple platform, essentially saying that he doesn't think much of it because it's all been said before. "We've been here before. I've been here before. Waaaaaaaay back in 1999, id was right there at MacWorld, with Carmack talking about how rad the OS was, and demanding that a multi-button mouse arrive. And this was Mac OS 9! People applauded. Those, like myself, who covered the Macintosh gaming world for a living saw a bright future ahead. EA wasn't there, but Activision was, and Aspyr was bringing Madden to the Mac anyway. MacSoft was bringing Unreal Tournament over, and StarCraft was still on the Mac, and still kicking ass. And then, nothing happened. There was a little while there when Mac game companies were expanding, and the best PC to Mac game porting house, Westlake Interactive, was barely able to keep up with all the demand for its services ... By 2001, the brief flash that was the Mac game boom was gone."
7600 GT 256mb on my iMac. Sure, not the quickest card, but not bad. Don't know where you're getting your info from.
1920x1200 native resolution. Runs just fine.
I'm just saying...
"Leo Fender was in a 'state of grace' when he designed the Stratocaster." -- Paul Reed Smith
I used to do Mac game development/ports for several years from 1999 to 2003, including a couple high profile games. I've since moved on to 'real' work - non-port console and PC games. Since leaving Mac development I've managed to find a job in the games industry that has kept me employed longer than 12 months at a time without the company going bust (going on almost 4 years at the same company now).
The real problems with developing Mac games during that time frame:
The work didn't pay well (on the other hand, telecommuting was often a viable option)
The projects were few, and it was a highly competetive market
Support from Apple was effectively nonexistant
Quality assurance procedures were often mediocre - what you'd expect from a shareware company
The market wasn't large enough to make it financially viable to develop an original high quality Mac-only game
The market wasn't large enough to make most ports worthwhile unless the game was a proven hit seller already.
I doubt any of the above issues have changed.
I believe all of the Mac game developers I knew 5-6 years ago have moved on to other work. The 3 most well known Mac game port houses of that time shut down or ceased Mac development years ago.
Hunt your preferred prey at Aliens vs Predator MUD. Join the war at avpmud.com port 4000
"When the president does it, that means it's not illegal." - Richard M. Nixon
Macs are still waiting for the Antialiasing bug to get fixed by Apple too. If you notice, when you try to use AA in WoW, it always just jumps back to no AA. Though it may have to do with Nvidia cards. I can't remember.
Blizzard says it's a bug with Apple's OpenGL. They say hopefully it's fixed in Leopard.
We'll see.
"Leo Fender was in a 'state of grace' when he designed the Stratocaster." -- Paul Reed Smith
WoW on the Mac has always been multi-threaded also. Just now the OpenGL part is multithreaded. As far as I'm aware, no one has gotten Multithreaded OpenGL working on the PC... well, ok, ID had it working with Quake3 in certain very specific cases, but overall, multithreaded rendering processes are by far in the minority, and I'm pretty sure that WoW falls into this category.
WARNING! This girl exceeds the MAXIMUM SAFE standards established by the FDA for BRATTINESS
Huh? I have the Mac version of Halo installed on my iMac. Universal binary and everything. So if "Microsoft just stepped in and ended that whole thing" then they did it in a weird way...
Neither is my Compaq nw9440 mobile workstation, but it's still fast enough to run half-life 2 with most options turned up and at the native panel res (1920x1440.)
If you have a mac pro, or a g5 or something, you can upgrade your video card.
I don't think you know what you're talking about.
"You're right," Fisheye says. "I should have set it on 'whip' or 'chop.'"
However, there's one exception; Macs are now on Intel processors, and OpenGL is still relevant. BUT, most affordable Macs have weak video cards.
Excellent Point. I'd like to say as someone who has worked in Xbox 360/ Windows game development, that Microsoft has excellent developer support. Considering the flakiness of most game studio types, this sort of warm, helpful reception to your partners can make a huge difference in who you make your ties with.
From a purely HR perspective, a full 360/GFW development studio is generally happier and less stressed out because of this support.
Premiere game, yes. Would it have brought the masses to the Macintosh? I don't know. Wind the clock back to 1994. Marathon.
The best the PC had going was still Doom. Marathon did everything Doom did and more, actual story, 3D environment (you actually had to aim up at that guy on the high platform,) overlapping map areas, etc. Yet most outside of the Mac world never heard of it until now (perhaps even still,) even with the port of M2 to Windows.
The PC side didn't one-up them until Quake in 1996; characters modeled in 3D, angled platforms...Marathon couldn't do true ramps, but instead stair-stepped such areas. (I only checked the dates for Doom(93), Quake(96), Duke(96), Unreal(98), any I missed?)
Welcome to /. where false information can sadly get you a +5 informative moderation.
WoW has always been multithreaded on both Mac and PC. It was only with the 2.0.1 patch that Multithreaded OpenGL support was added, and then only to the Intel Mac client. There is no Direct3D equivalent, and from this technote, likely no equivalent from DirectX 9.
It is true that the PC version is faster than the Mac version on similar hardware in certain situations. Most of these involve video driver issues; think Vista driver problems but with the video card companies in less of a rush to get better drivers out.
Go here for some more video information by both blues and greens.
Samkass, your timeline is incorrect.
In 1999, Bungie announced their next product, Halo, which featured a world-beating physics and AI system. Halo's public unveiling occurred at the Macworld Expo 1999 keynote address by Apple's then-interim-CEO Steve Jobs (after a closed-door screening at E3 in 1999). However, on June 19, 2000, (also known as Black Monday), Microsoft announced that they had acquired Bungie Software and that Bungie would become a part of the Microsoft Game Division (subsequently renamed Microsoft Game Studios) under the name Bungie Studios. As a result, the Mac and PC versions were delayed, and the game was re-purposed for Microsoft's Xbox, on which it became the console's killer app. Bungie's sale to Apple's long-time rival Microsoft was seen as a betrayal to the Mac community at the time. Mac and Windows versions of Halo were eventually released two years later.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Bungie_Game_Studios
Get it right fanboy: MS specifically targeted Bungie because they were a premiere Mac developer. It didn't take years; the acquisition took place roughly 6-8 months after the 1999 MacWorld. I had nothing to do with Bungie not delivering on schedule.
If you want to lie, do it about something people can't fact check you on, or wait for more folks who were actually alive at the time and paying attention to die.
I don't think you could do a better job of making it obvious you don't know what you're talking about. For the last few years, Carmack has only had good things to say about DirectX. A simple google search provides a few obvious quotes:
"DX9 is really quite a good API [application programming interface] level. Even with the D3D [Direct3D] side of things, where I know I have a long history of people thinking I'm antagonistic against it. Microsoft has done a very, very good job of sensibly evolving it at each step--they're not worried about breaking backwards compatibility--and it's a pretty clean API."
"DX9 has its act together well. I like the version of DirectX on the 360. Microsoft is doing well with DX10 on tightening the specs and the exactness. The new features are not exactly well-thought-out. Most developers are pretty happy with DX9. The changes with DX10 aren't as radical. It's not like getting pixel shaders for the first time. Single-pass shaders are nice with DX10, but it's a smaller change."
He isn't too hot on Vista (specifically, DX10 being Vista only), but then, who is?