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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.
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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.