Unreal Tournament 2003 Mac OS X

[MacRumors]

MacGamer reports (http://www.macgamer.com/news/item.php?id=6317) that Unreal Tournament 2003 was shown at MacWorld San Francisco:



The first-person shooter is currently in development for the Macintosh platform and was being shown in nearly complete form at the show. Epic Games indicates it is deep in beta testing and is expected to be completed for a first quarter 2003 release.


Apparently, UT2003 OS X was in good enough form for daily tournaments (http://www.macgamer.com/news/item.php?id=6322) at MWSF.

[8thDegreeSavage]

Lets hope they get it cleaned up and out the door....

[ibjoshua]

bring it on!

i_b_joshua

[mangoman]

Yayy-Yahhhh! Goodbye free time!

[dsamsa]

The "Whats next for Apple" article on that site is sad, yet true... Hurry up Apple!

http://www.macgamer.com/features/?id=1396

[Megaquad]

I am soo in prison..
All I want is a 17" powerbook on 1.43 GHz and super graphics.. :(

[JOHNGAETANO]

After reading that article, it's obvious this is a problem Apple will have to deal with. With everything in place to steal market share, the MHZ issues with the desktops is like an anchor on a Battleship. Sure, we know and understand the MHZ myth, put 95% of the population don't understand computers, let alone the myth. Apple needs to address this issue this year, or anythng they have gained will be for not. They need a bad as! desktop, and iMac, now!

[thies]

They don't just need to bump up the MHz, they also need to convince gamepublishers to release major titles a) for the Mac at all and b) at the same time as the Windows counterparts and c) for the same or lower price.
What pushes the hardware on PCs and is responsible for a good portion of the sales are... games. something which is mostly absent on the mac.

[Tue12]

I predict in 2003 this phrase will rear its head again in the news media: "Beleaguered Apple ..."

The Mac CPU issue is without a doubt at a critical point. They need a new CPU and "FAST" (pun intended).

[thies]

I guess with luck the IBM cpu will debut in towers at the end of the year. laptops middle of next year the earliest. ibook and imac will switch to g4 from g3 at that point.
laptops are competitive now. desktops are not if you go for raw bang per buck in reference to cpu power.

[Tue12]

I just wish Apple would cut with the crap and create a new baseline specification for all their Macs.

What I mean is, refresh all models to a minimum of 1Ghz - no Mac less than 1Ghz. Both for G4 & G3 models.

That would be the baseline for the year. We'd stop feeling nickle'n'dimed and Apple can make some pretense of not being a slow-ass platform.

[Steradian]

the ATi radeon(sp) 9700 pro was on display at MWSF and had UT03 running pretty soild, it is disappointing to knoe that a top of the line powermac MDD was running UT03 at only 80 FPS. Thier is somemore info in this previous fourm Here (http://forums.macrumors.com/showthread.php?threadid=15534)

[thies]

sad, yes. but in the end if you are a gamer you'd be insane to switch to a mac if only because it lacks games and those that are there get released late. Personally I own a PS2 for my gaming needs. I'm curious about possibly replacing my Shuttle barebone running FreeBSD with a PB12 once I saw it in a store.

[synergy]

Originally posted by thies
They don't just need to bump up the MHz, they also need to convince gamepublishers to release major titles a) for the Mac at all and b) at the same time as the Windows counterparts and c) for the same or lower price.
What pushes the hardware on PCs and is responsible for a good portion of the sales are... games. something which is mostly absent on the mac.

Its not Apple's job to convince game makers. Sales will do that.
As for same or lower price, as well that speaks to sales. Higher prices are charged for the lower volume on Apple games.
If the volume increased due to demand then it would be easier for the game making companies to justify porting as well as justify a lower/equivalent price tag compared to PC games.

The Mhz myth does not help much at all. That is Apple's main job to do.

[thies]

So you want to rely on massive sales of Macs for games to be ported? dream on. you won't get the gamers that way as for them the games are important. they won't switch to aplatform with no games which is also behind technology wise compared to what they have now.

[Sauron1440]

AS someone who pplayed in those MWSF tournaments - I can tell you that this game is SWEET! I also talked to Ryan Gordon, the guy who singlehandedly did the Linux and Mac ports - he said that Linux was started only for the dedicated server, then when he endedup porting the engine in the process, Epic asked him to do a mac port as a 'charity' case.

Seriously - the only way we're going to get mainstream, simultaneous release games is to prove that they can sell on the Mac. SO let's do our duty to Apple, Game Companies, and the economy by going out and buying this game when it comes out!

[mangoman]

Well said. If you've got a job, and you dig UT, then shuck out the bucks and buy the damn CD. Show 'em the money! :D

[wchamlet]

Even if Apple comes out with IBM's new chip at the end of this year, how many software programs are going to use the 64 bit function of the chip? I'm guessing about 6. Photoshop, Apple's iApps, and hopefully Maya, being that they already have a unix(Irix) Maya that is 64 bit. Other than that, everyone will still have to put up with the old 32 bit coded software that we have now. Meaning, we'll receive very little speed boost from IBM's new chip, over the current crop of G4's. Especially if Apple doesn't intend to have DP units with IBM's new chips.

But anyway, to remain on topic, I wonder if the Mac version of UT2003 will include the plugin for Maya that allows you to develop game objects? That's all I'm interested in. That to me, would be great.

[MacKid]

Originally posted by thies
I guess with luck the IBM cpu will debut in towers at the end of the year. laptops middle of next year the earliest. ibook and imac will switch to g4 from g3 at that point.
laptops are competitive now. desktops are not if you go for raw bang per buck in reference to cpu power.

I highly doubt that they will upgrade the CRT iMacs up to G4, but I think that you are right about the iBooks going up.;)

[thies]

I don't think there will be any CRT iMacs at that point which could be upgraded.

[alset]

Did anyone see this at MacWorld? I'd love to hear some reports on it.

Dan

[skotmiller]

I say screw them, if they think the Mac is a charity case. We have waited how long for this game? If they did their charity work sooner we could of had an America's Army port too. I say we ALL buy DOOM as soon as it comes out and make EPIC see what they missed. At least ID will port their games winthin a reasonable time frame.

Just my 3¢

[thies]

that way EPIC will realize that they sshouldn't port any more games. also others will see that porting is not a good idea if a good game like UT03 isn't a success. Being a gamer on mac you really aren't in a position to boycott and put pressure on anyone.

[skotmiller]

Maybe if EPIC sees how good DOOM sold because it was ported in a reasonable time, they might get the hint. Plus, if we ALL buy DOOM and it is a top seller then other will be encouraged to port to the Mac.

[MacsRgr8]

Originally posted by Tue12
I just wish Apple would cut with the crap and create a new baseline specification for all their Macs.

What I mean is, refresh all models to a minimum of 1Ghz - no Mac less than 1Ghz. Both for G4 & G3 models.

That would be the baseline for the year. We'd stop feeling nickle'n'dimed and Apple can make some pretense of not being a slow-ass platform.

Totaly agree here.
Let's step over the psycological 1GHz barrier.
I don't believe that Moto can't give Apple enough G4's running at 1GHz.

[Abstract]

It also doesn't help that Doom will probably not run on any Mac. And even if the new dual IBM 970 chips are put into the high-end Macs, and single 970's into the iMacs and eMacs, there's still one problem: only 3-4% of the market is Apple's; out of this 3% Apple Market, less than 2-3% of Mac owners will have computers fast enough to run the game; less than 10% of people who own Macs intend to play games on it, since most people who buy Macs don't actually expect games to be much of an option on this platform (plus, we're including businesses); and out of this small crop of Mac gamers, we can assume that 20% of them will even want this game. Performing some simple mathematics, we get:

Computer Market = (0.03)(0.03)(0.10)(0.20)=0.000018=0.0018%


There's the problem. This is much less than 0.01% of the market who would even consider buying this game. Don't be picky. Charity or not, Mac gamers are lucky to even have this game.

[thies]

I too would admittedly feel better if the PB12 which I'm pondering to buy this spring would sport a 1GHz CPU and not run on just 867MHz. It shouldn't matter for a lot of stuff I do (heck, I was fine with BeOS on a dual Celeron 333MHz just 2,5 years ago) but somehow it makes people, me included, feel better to have a higher MHz count associated with an expensive purchase.

[MacKid]

Originally posted by MacsRgr8


Totaly agree here.
Let's step over the psycological 1GHz barrier.
I don't believe that Moto can't give Apple enough G4's running at 1GHz.

Personally, I think all the processors are playing catch-up to each other. The G3 (although it might be already reaching speeds of 1GHz+) can't be released at more than 900Mhz because it would cut into the eMac, the other "super-el-cheapo" mac. Likewise, the eMac can't be pushed farther, or it would take a chunk out of the iMac sales, for people who don't need to pay 300 dollars more for a positionable LCD. The iMac can't be raised, because it would indulge in the potential profit of the PowerBooks and PowerMacs, for people who want a powerful G4, but don't need dual processors or even more importantly, don't want to pay 2,000+ for a large screen. The PowerBooks can't go up for the same reason that the iMacs can't (I'm almost finished). And finally, the PowerMac G4's are halted at 1.25 for stability and cooling issues. It's like a food chain, and the PowerMac is the main reason that it's not progressing. So, let's just hope that Steve wasn't lying when he talked about some good happenings in the desktop area too.:D

[ibjoshua]

Originally posted by Abstract
It also doesn't help that Doom will probably not run on any Mac. And even if the new dual IBM 970 chips are put into the high-end Macs, and single 970's into the iMacs and eMacs, there's still one problem: only 3-4% of the market is Apple's; out of this 3% Apple Market, less than 2-3% of Mac owners will have computers fast enough to run the game; less than 10% of people who own Macs intend to play games on it, since most people who buy Macs don't actually expect games to be much of an option on this platform (plus, we're including businesses); and out of this small crop of Mac gamers, we can assume that 20% of them will even want this game. Performing some simple mathematics, we get:

Computer Market = (0.03)(0.03)(0.10)(0.20)=0.000018=0.0018%


There's the problem. This is much less than 0.01% of the market who would even consider buying this game. Don't be picky. Charity or not, Mac gamers are lucky to even have this game.

Does anyone else see something wrong with the 'simple mathematics' here?

Your maths suggest that of the 5 million Mac users running OS X only 90 of them would buy Doom III. Is that what you meant?

i_b_joshua

[thies]

no, because you started at 5 million OS X users while he talked about the Entire Computermarket. Got it? good.

[NitroPye]

Let's all remeber our wallets are the most powerful tool for influencing game publishers to port to our platform ... avoid piracy of this one ok ;)

[mattmack]

Even if Apple comes out with IBM's new chip at the end of this year, how many software programs are going to use the 64 bit function of the chip? I'm guessing about 6. Photoshop, Apple's iApps, and hopefully Maya, being that they already have a unix(Irix) Maya that is 64 bit. Other than that, everyone will still have to put up with the old 32 bit coded software that we have now. Meaning, we'll receive very little speed boost from IBM's new chip, over the current crop of G4's. Especially if Apple doesn't intend to have DP units with IBM's new chips.


Will that matter to the public? I think not as long as it says1.8GHz or more

[mattmack]

Originally posted by alset
Did anyone see this at MacWorld? I'd love to hear some reports on it.

Dan

Yeah I was there and it looked pretty trick
Also the 9700 will be in an 4x or 8x agp slot. Looks like I'll have to buy a new tower instead of my gigabit ethernet;)

[Performfreak]

It also doesn't help that Doom will probably not run on any Mac. And even if the new dual IBM 970 chips are put into the high-end Macs, and single 970's into the iMacs and eMacs, there's still one problem: only 3-4% of the market is Apple's; out of this 3% Apple Market, less than 2-3% of Mac owners will have computers fast enough to run the game; less than 10% of people who own Macs intend to play games on it, since most people who buy Macs don't actually expect games to be much of an option on this platform (plus, we're including businesses); and out of this small crop of Mac gamers, we can assume that 20% of them will even want this game. Performing some simple mathematics, we get:

Computer Market = (0.03)(0.03)(0.10)(0.20)=0.000018=0.0018%


There's the problem. This is much less than 0.01% of the market who would even consider buying this game. Don't be picky. Charity or not, Mac gamers are lucky to even have this game.

Well, the way the math was presented the final result would be about 3000 buyers.

Of course, practically everything that was said was based on opinion, and not based in actual fact. The actual market share of mac users is not a definite fact. That 2-3% figure comes from total computer units sold in all markets (business and consumer and other) in the past year, so I don't put too much weight in that figure.
Okay, first, there will obviously be more OS X users by the time this game arrives. Second, we don't know what the system requirements for the game will be. Maybe it will be dual processor aware like Quake 3 was... in fact, you can almost bet on it. Go to Barefeats.com and check out how macs did compared to PC's in Quake 3 tests. You'll probably be suprised. Oh, and less than 10% of people who own macs use them for games... come on! How many of you out there really don't have at least one game title purchased? Even if it's not everyone, I bet it's a hell of a lot more than 10%. And last, no one knows what the demand will be for this game, of course, becuase it hasn't been released yet!

Don't be so negative.

[ibjoshua]

Originally posted by Performfreak


Well, the way the math was presented the final result would be about 3000 buyers.

Of course, practically everything that was said was based on opinion, and not based in actual fact. The actual market share of mac users is not a definite fact. That 2-3% figure comes from total computer units sold in all markets (business and consumer and other) in the past year, so I don't put too much weight in that figure.
Okay, first, there will obviously be more OS X users by the time this game arrives. Second, we don't know what the system requirements for the game will be. Maybe it will be dual processor aware like Quake 3 was... in fact, you can almost bet on it. Go to Barefeats.com and check out how macs did compared to PC's in Quake 3 tests. You'll probably be suprised. Oh, and less than 10% of people who own macs use them for games... come on! How many of you out there really don't have at least one game title purchased? Even if it's not everyone, I bet it's a hell of a lot more than 10%. And last, no one knows what the demand will be for this game, of course, becuase it hasn't been released yet!

Don't be so negative.

thanks Performfreak!

Of course I see my calculation was entirely incorrect thies (I forgot to miss off the first .03). Thanks.

But what Performfreak says is actually what I was thinking - if not writing. The original equation was based on too many (negative) assumptions.

i_b_joshua

[FattyMembrane]

i kind of wish epic had skipped the ut2k3 port and just gone ahead with porting unrealII (if they're even going to do that) so that we could get it some time close to it's pc release. the performance problem is a big issue. going with moto has left apple in a hole where they can't upgrade anything without canibalizing sales of the pro line. there's also the problem with graphics card manufacturers. osx has the best opengl implementation of any system but graphic intensive apps still run more slowly. why? crappy drivers.

it really just a bad cycle; graphics/processor manufacturers treat the mac as an afterthought, so it can't run high-end apps, so the user base does not grow, so companies treat it as an afterthought, so it can't run high end apps, so the user base does not grow, so it can't...

[iShater]

Originally posted by Abstract
less than 2-3% of Mac owners will have computers fast enough to run the game;

I would not be surprised that the number of Macs being able to run the game is much higher. If we get the 970 chip sometime this year, I would not be surprised if Apple sells a record number of PMs for folks who 1) need the speed 2) have been holding off any purchases until they got the speed 3) folks who have been waiting forever to brag about the speed.

That should be more than 10% :D


Of course, assuming they all are able and willing to shell $$$.

[Gelfin]

Macsoft also had an almost-ready-for-prime-time build of Neverwinter Nights on display at MWSF. The guy I spoke to there said that it was effectively complete, but running on 10.2.2. Apparently some graphics changes in 10.2.3 broke their port somehow, and they're in the process of fixing it.

He said he'd be surprised if it wasn't officially announced within a month or two.

[R3z]

I imagine apple is working their @ss off to get those IBM processors out the door. Frankly, they're getting beaten like a redheaded stepchild when it comes to CPU growth, and wherever the blame lies, THIS IS A PROBLEM. When we have PC's going at 4ghz and Macs still haven't crossed 1.8, it's going to be a problem. The Mhz myth however true is becoming a bit tired, and Apple needs to find a different way to dispel it, like faster proccessers. :rolleyes:

Most of us barely use 20% of our processors (unless you got some pretty impressive porn :D ), but how many of us look at the speed when buying a new computer? When you have the brand new shiney 1.25ghz Apple sitting next to the 3ghz Dell, it just looks bad. I'd say thats one of the biggest challenges Apple currently has, and I think that might even be why we didnt see the speed increases at this macworld...

[Abstract]

Originally posted by Performfreak


Well, the way the math was presented the final result would be about 3000 buyers.

Of course, practically everything that was said was based on opinion, and not based in actual fact. The actual market share of mac users is not a definite fact. That 2-3% figure comes from total computer units sold in all markets (business and consumer and other) in the past year, so I don't put too much weight in that figure.
Okay, first, there will obviously be more OS X users by the time this game arrives. Second, we don't know what the system requirements for the game will be. Maybe it will be dual processor aware like Quake 3 was... in fact, you can almost bet on it. Go to Barefeats.com and check out how macs did compared to PC's in Quake 3 tests. You'll probably be suprised. Oh, and less than 10% of people who own macs use them for games... come on! How many of you out there really don't have at least one game title purchased? Even if it's not everyone, I bet it's a hell of a lot more than 10%. And last, no one knows what the demand will be for this game, of course, becuase it hasn't been released yet!

Don't be so negative.


Yes, but I was talking about the new Doom game because it is supposed to be one of the most cpu and graphics-intensive games ever. Also, people were talking about it before. I know that no game is as cpu-heavy as that game, and so its unfair for me to pick that particular game, but why should it be? The fact is that the 4% figure represents the entire Mac market. I included the business and education sectors, plus the home buyer into the figure, which is what the 4% market share figure is based on. And maybe you're right about the 4% figure being correct, but even if its 5%, it doesn't make much of a difference calculation-wise.

I'm not trying to be pessimistic, but I AM trying to be realistic. Someone posted and said that with UT2k3, the PowerMacs were only getting 40 fps, which is low in my opinion. What happens when Doom comes out? Its true that the 970 may come out and take care of this "little" speed issue, but what percentage of Mac owners do you think will have a 970 machine? I assumed that 3% of Mac owners would have this type of machine, and that only a small fraction would buy this particular game. Not that people who own Macs don't play games, but its not as if the FPS style game is the type of game that everybody can enjoy. Take most women and older people out of the market, take the education and business proportion of Mac owners out of the picture, and what do you have? You'd have a small percentage of people who would buy this game. Oh, and then there's the speed issue, which takes away from most of this remaining crop of people.

Personally, I don't even have a Mac. I'm just studying about it, since I don't know much about computers or games. I want an iBook (or maybe a 12" Powerbook :D), but when I purchase my ibook, I know I'm going to give up the luxury of simply taking my computer case off and easily installing a new video card in order to play games. I can't even understand why I can't do this on a Mac, but I'm just under the impression that you can't do something like this easily. So when I buy a Mac, I know I'm going to give up this luxury for a machine that (hopefully) is as good as Mac owners say it is. Otherwise, I'll be coming back here pissed. :)

[MacBandit]

Originally posted by Abstract
Someone posted and said that with UT2k3, the PowerMacs were only getting 40 fps, which is low in my opinion.

Yes it should be quite low in your oppinion. That figure seems way off scale. I'm guessing that it came from a prerelease version of the game seeing how it hasn't been release yet and should see drastic improvement before release or the equipment it was being tested on is subpar.

Seeing how a G4 2x1GHz can get nearly 250FPS with a G4Ti at 640x480 in QuakeIIIArena and 175FPS at 1024x768. I suspect that UT2k3 should be at the minimum half those scores. Also if the ATI9700 comes out expect very playable numbers for UT2k3.

[Abstract]

Originally posted by Steradian
the ATi radeon(sp) 9700 pro was on display at MWSF and had UT03 running pretty soild, it is disappointing to knoe that a top of the line powermac MDD was running UT03 at only 80 FPS. Thier is somemore info in this previous fourm Here (http://forums.macrumors.com/showthread.php?threadid=15534)


Sorry, I remembered wrong. This person said 80 fps on the 1st page of this thread. To me, this also sounds fairly low. :p Imagine what Doom is going to be like.

[thies]

Actually, 3000 copies for an average game given the other factors is not too far of the mark. I know a couple of guys who ported games to alternative OSes (ie not windows) and the above are pretty exact estimates compared to what they experienced.

[NicoMan]

Originally posted by Abstract
when I purchase my ibook, I know I'm going to give up the luxury of simply taking my computer case off and easily installing a new video card in order to play games. I can't even understand why I can't do this on a Mac, but I'm just under the impression that you can't do something like this easily.
You know you are going to run into the same kind of problem if you buy a subnotebook from any other manufacter. Those laptops are not really optimized for an easy replacement of graphics cards, whether it is a Dell, a Toshiba, an Apple or whatever. Not being able to change your graphics card, in my opinion, has more to do with your choice of a laptop vs a desktop (ok you can't change your graphics card in a iMac G4, but that's beside the point) than Apple vs PeeCee. I agree that choosing an Apple computer also restricts your choice of graphics card, but that's old news.
Anyway, the iBook is not known to be a 'game machine'. And I am going to try playing some games on my dual 867 with geforce4ti at work to see if there is a real handicap with those machines...

NicoMan

[NicoMan]

Originally posted by FattyMembrane
i kind of wish epic had skipped the ut2k3 port and just gone ahead with porting unrealII
I thought that UT2003 was the new name for Unreal2... Am I talking rubbish or what ?

Nicoman

[Bengt77]

UT2003 is the sequel to UT, and is therefore purely multiplayer. U2, on the other hand, is the sequel to U, which is (mainly) a single player, story-based gaming experience.

I too really hope U2 will come out pretty soon after the PC version. I'm really in for that game! I'm not too fond of multiplayer games (mostly because I lose them all the time), but I totally dig a single player shooter with a good story (like Unreal, Deus Ex, Alica, MoH:AA and the like).

Only sad thing is, I need a new computer to run all the games that come out from now. Even though I only bought a new one last year's February (15" LCD iMac with 800MHz G4), and that's not really funny, especially when you don't have the money to do so...

[robbents99]

Forget UT2003....waiting for Halo and Neverwinter Nights....


(hey one can dream. ;) )

[mangoman]

Halo..... Heh. That IS a dream. :D

[iShater]

Originally posted by mangoman
Halo..... Heh. That IS a dream. :D

I think I read it on one of the Bungie sites, Halo port is being done by some other company, and last I read it was more than 40% completed and should come out to the PC AND Mac this summer. I don't remember which site said it though.

[iShater]

Originally posted by Abstract


What happens when Doom comes out?

If ID keeps supporting MP machines in their code, I don't think there will be a problem running the game on DP Macs. Like someone posted, QIII scores are pretty impressive as the game utilizes the two processors. If DOOM III can do that, we could probably get close to 60-70 fps, which is playable I would say.

[MacBandit]

Originally posted by Abstract



Sorry, I remembered wrong. This person said 80 fps on the 1st page of this thread. To me, this also sounds fairly low. :p Imagine what Doom is going to be like.

Two things, Unreal Tournament is not dual processor aware. Unless they added it recently and this was a prerelease version that according to the developers will not be out for another month or two. Think about it. That's at least another month of debugging and optimizing. That means the code they are using could possibly be sped up a lot. Also another good think to look at is the FPS for Unreal Tournament the original very few PCs or Macs ever achieved over 50FPS because of poor coding. I would expect very little different in the quality of ther hardware optimizations with UT2k3.

I just went hunting around the net for PC scores with UT2k3 and found that the absolute best hardware on the planet as of yesterday can just barely break 100FPS at high quality 1024x768. That means if the Dual/1.25/DDR PowerMac is getting 80FPS on a prerelease that's pretty impressive. Expect Macs to be nipping at the heels in gaming frame rates of some of the fastest computers on the planet.

[ExoticFish]

MacBandit, the fastest PC's out there can run UT2k3 at like 1280x1024 at over 100 FPS here's a graph from www.tomshardware.com. Running on an Athlon XP 2700+ and a Radeon 9700 Pro at 1024x768 the frame rate is 177 FPS.

[MacBandit]

Originally posted by ExoticFish
MacBandit, the fastest PC's out there can run UT2k3 at like 1280x1024 at over 100 FPS here's a graph from www.tomshardware.com. Running on an Athlon XP 2700+ and a Radeon 9700 Pro at 1024x768 the frame rate is 177 FPS.

Definitely beats the tests that I was coming up with. I am definitely humbled but continue to stand by my statement that the DDR PowerMacs will run Ut2k3 with plenty of speed well in excess of 100FPS with an ATI9700Pro once the final release is made.

I even looked at tomshardware but I must have been looking for the wrong thing I was looking for reviews of the ATI9700Pro that showed tests of Ut2k3.

[ExoticFish]

I don't want you to think that I was being down on you, not at all! UT2K3 is one reason I upgraded my powerbook! I can't wait to play it as my powerbook is now more powerful than my PC which is only 900MHz.

[MacBandit]

Originally posted by ExoticFish
I don't want you to think that I was being down on you, not at all! UT2K3 is one reason I upgraded my powerbook! I can't wait to play it as my powerbook is now more powerful than my PC which is only 900MHz.


Not at all I come to these boards looking for a good discussion. Also through these discussions we often share knowledge and sources such as you did. Now I know for sure what sort of FPS we should be shooting for with a Ut2k3. On the other hand as I've said before look at the original Unreal Tournament they haven't shown a vast knowledge of being able to optimize there code for the systems there right for.

[ExoticFish]

Originally posted by MacBandit

On the other hand as I've said before look at the original Unreal Tournament they haven't shown a vast knowledge of being able to optimize there code for the systems there right for.

That is an understatement to say the least. Quake 3 has higher system requirements than UT on the PC and for good reason. But under OS X, Quake 3 outperforms UT by a huge margin. My 1 GHz powerbook handles Quake 3 like a bat out of hell, but in UT it doesn't feel like it's running all that great. I get awesome frame rates don't get me wrong, but it's no where near as responsive as Quake 3. I think it has a lot to do with ID Software created Quake 3 for multi-platform where UT has always been an afterthought.

[MrMacMan]

Originally posted by R3z
I imagine apple is working their @ss off to get those IBM processors out the door. Frankly, they're getting beaten like a redheaded stepchild when it comes to CPU growth, and wherever the blame lies, THIS IS A PROBLEM. When we have PC's going at 4ghz and Macs still haven't crossed 1.8, it's going to be a problem. The Mhz myth however true is becoming a bit tired, and Apple needs to find a different way to dispel it, like faster proccessers. :rolleyes:

Most of us barely use 20% of our processors (unless you got some pretty impressive porn :D ), but how many of us look at the speed when buying a new computer? When you have the brand new shiney 1.25ghz Apple sitting next to the 3ghz Dell, it just looks bad. I'd say thats one of the biggest challenges Apple currently has, and I think that might even be why we didnt see the speed increases at this macworld...

First of all, Tom's Hardware got the P4 to 4 GHZ but
A) intel said inless presured by AMD they will not realese anything above 3.6
B) Tom's Hardware got the P4 to 4GHZ by overclocking so much that they need to freeze the chip. (Under-statement of the year)
They needed hardware to cool it to -52 degress CELCIUS. Yeah no misprint -52 DEGREES.
Intel will *NOT* implement this anytime soon.

Many of use game just not FPS, I will get into them when UT2K3 comes out, heck I already joined a clan, for the pre-release. :D

I'm hoping we get some Decent FPS and that they don't keep batching our game drivers and abality of our processors. Ech.
It aint only the processor and graphics card, it is the game too people.

[MacBandit]

Originally posted by ExoticFish


That is an understatement to say the least. Quake 3 has higher system requirements than UT on the PC and for good reason. But under OS X, Quake 3 outperforms UT by a huge margin. My 1 GHz powerbook handles Quake 3 like a bat out of hell, but in UT it doesn't feel like it's running all that great. I get awesome frame rates don't get me wrong, but it's no where near as responsive as Quake 3. I think it has a lot to do with ID Software created Quake 3 for multi-platform where UT has always been an afterthought.

Even on a PC the FPS suck with Unreal Tournament. Look at this (http://www.barefeats.com/p4game.html) . I know that is pretty old but it gives you an idea of how poor the optimization was for either platform.

[ExoticFish]

hhhmmm... wow, that's interesting to see. I know that one reason Quake 3 runs so good on OS X is because it is duel processor aware where UT is not. That helps, but those FPS for UT look way too low to be true. Now I'm interested in going home and running some benchmarks of my own! =0)

[MacBandit]

Originally posted by ExoticFish
hhhmmm... wow, that's interesting to see. I know that one reason Quake 3 runs so good on OS X is because it is duel processor aware where UT is not. That helps, but those FPS for UT look way too low to be true. Now I'm interested in going home and running some benchmarks of my own! =0)

I rarely see over 40FPS even with my Dual/GHz/DDR powermac with a G4MX in Unreal Tournament. I know a faster graphics card could help but I don't think it will help much with that poorly written game.

[ExoticFish]

sheesh... how do I benchmark UT and Quake 3 to see my results?

[trose]

Why is everyone so hyped about Doom 3? I never liked the original mindless-bloodfest Doom's and Im sure I wont like this one even if they make it so friggin graphics intensive only the best PC's can play it well. Thats poor business practice and I hope the game sells about as much as it deserves to sell,which isnt much. Why is it that hardware is always trying to play catchup to the new games? Maybe developers need to start making things a bit more compatible.

[ExoticFish]

i totally agree that programmers should be more capable of reducing the requirements of their programs and games and such. But the hype of Doom 3 is dear lord have you seen the screen shots????????? ;) I remember when Unreal came out (the first not UT), no machine available could play it the way it was meant to be. People wonder why computers are getting so much faster, all because games are demanding the resources.

[mattmack]

Originally posted by MacBandit


I rarely see over 40FPS even with my Dual/GHz/DDR powermac with a G4MX in Unreal Tournament. I know a faster graphics card could help but I don't think it will help much with that poorly written game.

I agree and the nvidia card is geared for frame rates in Quake

[trose]

Ok,I agree that games do need to come out and look continue looking better,but if they do,they need to be adjustable to appeal to a larger market. Quake 3 is very adjustable,you can make it a ugly blockfest to run on a lowly Beige G3 or pump it up to max settings that still compare favorably with newer games on your brand new G4. From what Ive heard though,Doom isnt gonna allow anything but the top of the line, I may be wrong though,anyone know what the min specs are?

[MacBandit]

Originally posted by trose
Ok,I agree that games do need to come out and look continue looking better,but if they do,they need to be adjustable to appeal to a larger market. Quake 3 is very adjustable,you can make it a ugly blockfest to run on a lowly Beige G3 or pump it up to max settings that still compare favorably with newer games on your brand new G4. From what Ive heard though,Doom isnt gonna allow anything but the top of the line, I may be wrong though,anyone know what the min specs are?

From what I have heard the final version wil allow you to run it at sizes lower then 640x480 and low detail. Though from what I understand even at those setting it will take a pretty decent computer to run it. Meaning pretty much any mac with less then 700MHz will probably be screwed.

The reason everyone is so hyped is the graphics are a total leap ahead. Also it will run on nearly any mid to high end hardware produced in the last couple years as long as the computer has ram it's just a matter of adjusting the settings.

[NicoMan]

Originally posted by Bengt77
UT2003 is the sequel to UT, and is therefore purely multiplayer. U2, on the other hand, is the sequel to U, which is (mainly) a single player, story-based gaming experience.
Thanks for that. I was sort of missing the point.
I was bowled over by UT but never actually played Unreal...

NicoMan

[Frobozz]

Originally posted by Abstract

Someone posted and said that with UT2k3, the PowerMacs were only getting 40 fps, which is low in my opinion. What happens when Doom comes out?

Different engine, different coders, different porting process. Also, keep in mind that the 970, coupled with greater memory bandwidth (the real issue) and a Radeon 9700 or a GeForce FX is going to be JUST FINE for running Doom 3. I have no doubt this will be the best year ever for the Mac. I'm serious. Say all you want about the processor gap right now, but things will turn around there-- it's not all the CPU's fault. It's a lot of parts that when fixed, as a whole, will yield amazing results.

Also, lets not forget that 40 FPS in a heavy firefight is actually very good. Most machines can quote high 100 FPS when nothing is going on. Your eye can't see anything past a *consistent* 60 FPS, so if you peak higher you don't see it. You want the valley to be at about 40 to 60 FPS. If the valley is that high, you have nothing to worry about.

[trose]

Actualy,I am really impressed by the Mac's ability to game. If you look at pure hardware specs it looks like the Mac should trounced,but if the game is properly coded to take advantage of Mac specific features,they really kick ass.

Quake 3 is just about the only game I can think of that utilizes MP's and Altivec,on Quake 3 "Fastest" setting,which is basicaly a determiner of CPU power,the Dual 1.25 G4 pumped out 298 FPS,while a P4 2ghz achieved 242 and an Athlon 1.67 pulled 215. Infact,the G4 1ghz achived 248 FPS,thats better than both PC's.

So basicaly Apple isnt talking nonsense when they say that Dual G4's kick arse. Thats even with all the flaws in the current design that hinder the G4 and the system from running at its full capacity. If the 970 can really fix all the shortcomings,Id bet its gonna be one hell of a CPU and im excited to perhaps have the chance to see Mac's once again become the speed champs (Remember the G3 vs P2 or G4 vs early P3's?). Rock on IBM!

[MrMacMan]

Well I hope they tweak everything just right so we can get some real FPS!

[NicoMan]

Originally posted by MrMacman
Well I hope they tweak everything just right so we can get some real FPS!
Well as long as good FPS are available to consumer machines (read: GeForce MX in iMac wtf is that all about ??)

NicoMan

[Frobozz]

Originally posted by ExoticFish
People wonder why computers are getting so much faster, all because games are demanding the resources.

... and it's always been that way. It always will be. In a poll last year by a major research firm, more people said theyl'd like to play video games than watch tv, play a sport, read a book, etc. Video games drive the industry.

Personally, I'm not much interested in the plot of Doom 3, as I never thought the originals were very good. However, the graphics look absolutely amazing... and I can't wait to see it running on my Mac!

[trose]

The only reason I will be excited to see Doom 3 would be the potential mods. A new Urban Terror or Team Fortress would be awesome. Though I guess the mod developers are still pretty happy with the Quake 3 engine and will probably wait for Quake 4 before remaking mods.

The Quake engines have always been my favorite,all the way since Quake 1. They are very flexible and thats why they have such a huge Mod selection. I never buy a Quake game for Quake itself,its always for the Mods.

[mangoman]

To (ahemm..clearing throat), get this back on topic, trose brings up a good point. One of the killer things 'bout UT is the mods. Just when I thought the game was feeling a lil' tired, I'd find some crazy ass map like "Biosphere", or some freakazoid weapons mod that would blow my doors off. UT NEVER GOT OLD. And I've never said that about any other game. Ever.

[ExoticFish]

to get this thread back off topic, i feel the same about Quake 3. I've never gotten sick of it!

[Sedulous]

Meaning, we'll receive very little speed boost from IBM's new chip, over the current crop of G4's.

Clearly this guy doesn't understand what importantance BUS speed has (among a dozen other benefits the 970 has)!

Unreal Tournament is not dual processor aware

Um, doesn't matter. If you are running it on OS X (is UNIX based) the programs draw on whatever processors are available.

[ExoticFish]

that is something i don't understand. i know OS X is dual processor aware but then i hear about how program (photoshop) and games (quake 3) are also. where do the two come into play? if the operating system is using two cpu's then why would the program running on to of the operating system need to be able to use two cpu's?

[trose]

Sedoulous,I may not be a complete CPU genius,but I know for a fact that not every program that runs natively in X is dual proc aware,infact,most arent. You probably will get some speed boost playing a game that is singe proc only under X,because since the OS itself is dual processor aware calls to system recources or OpenGL might be faster. Although I doubt it makes much of a difference. Here is an example...

If I play WWIIOL(Does not recognize multi-processor) on my Dual G4 867 and get 25fps with nothing running in the backround,then launch Teamspeak under VirtualPC,I see NO drop in FPS. Why? Because the 2nd CPU was idle while WWIIOL ran,and instead of hogging the active CPU,VPC runs on the 2nd G4.

If I run Quake 3 (Recognizes multi-processor) and get 25fps with nothing running in the backround,then launch VirtualPC and Teamspeak I see a signifigant drop in framerate. Why? Because BOTH CPU's were running to give me 25fps in Quake 3,and when I opened VPC,it had to get its CPU power from somewhere, and since both CPU's were already in use,some power had to be taken from Quake 3.

I dont understand why any company who is seriously into Mac gaming doesnt write their programs both Alti-vec and MP aware. It might take a bit of extra coding,but the performance gain is extreme. Right now basicaly every game is running without taking advantage of any of the G4's abilities,effectively giving it about the same amount of power as a single proc P3 of the same clockspeed,which would be considered quite outdated.

Apple's claim that the G4 is atleast twice as fast as Pentium at the same clockspeed isnt that far off,its just that its not being utilized enough.

[Sedulous]

Well, CPU genious or not, you've managed to confuse the issue. I really don't know how VirtualPC would behave in regards to emulated OS and programs run in an emulated environment. Seems to me, a program in an emulated environment doesn't know it is in this environment and thus might not take advantage of the multi-threaded nature of UNIX.

In any case (and back to the topic), unless you plan on running UT2K3 in an emulator, it will probably run more smoothly on a dual processor system. This is true of any other program run in UNIX/OS X.

[bousozoku]

Applications which take advantage of multiple (dual) processors have to be written in a certain way.

You must break down certain pieces of it into separate threads for the operating system to assign those pieces to different processors. For example, you could create one thread for each bot because it works fairly independently. It still needs to communicate and coordinate with the main programme. If you take a game such as UT which wasn't written for threads of any kind, it's difficult to re-design the thing after it's all done. Mac OS 9.x didn't support threads well but you could write applications that way. Even Java applications can take advantage of multiple processors on Mac OS X because Java threads are Mach threads. The only other operating system I know where the Java Virtual Machine does this is on IBM's OS/400 midrange machine, iSeries.

The Quake III engine used by id software is written in such a way that it takes advantage of multiple threads, and therefore, multiple processors. There's nothing to say that, if Apple introduced 4 (or even 32) processor machines, that Quake III wouldn't take advantage of all of them.

I'm certain that newer games will be written to take advantage of the multithreading capabilities before they use AltiVec simply because the design will be easier to port from Windows.

[trose]

Sed,VirtualPC was just an example,because it is a very demanding program yet It didnt cause a performance hit while playing a non-MP game because there was an idle processor just sitting there. I could have just as easily said I was running any other program in the backround.

Anyway,bousozoku explained it exaclty like it is.

[Dunepilot]

With all of this talk about UT vs Q3 and the standard of coding in UT, I feel the need to chime in with another angle. At the time of release, you had to have a reasonable G3 to get anything like a good game out of Quake 3, and ideally you'd have a good graphics card as well. With UT, it would run not only on a pre-G3 PowerPC, but would also do so WITHOUT the need for GRAPHICS ACCELERATION!

That meant that Westlake gave themselves a potentially massive audience for the UT game at the time of release, far greater than Quake 3 had then.

Even if there were some flaws in the coding (I haven't tried UT on my new G4 yet), it was a far more playable game on the hardware of the day, and for my money, i still find it to be subjectively a much more enjoyable game. Quite what they did to the game to make it drag when the engine was used to power Deus Ex is beyond me.

I'd like to raise a toast to all programmers who bear in mind users of older machines:)

[trose]

UT Never ran better on my iMacDV and only slightly better than Q3 on my Beige 266 because it had a Voodoo3 and UT used über Glide. Damn I miss 3dfx :) Atleast ATI are getting better lately.

[MacBandit]

Originally posted by Dunepilot
With all of this talk about UT vs Q3 and the standard of coding in UT, I feel the need to chime in with another angle. At the time of release, you had to have a reasonable G3 to get anything like a good game out of Quake 3, and ideally you'd have a good graphics card as well. With UT, it would run not only on a pre-G3 PowerPC, but would also do so WITHOUT the need for GRAPHICS ACCELERATION!

That meant that Westlake gave themselves a potentially massive audience for the UT game at the time of release, far greater than Quake 3 had then.

Even if there were some flaws in the coding (I haven't tried UT on my new G4 yet), it was a far more playable game on the hardware of the day, and for my money, i still find it to be subjectively a much more enjoyable game. Quite what they did to the game to make it drag when the engine was used to power Deus Ex is beyond me.

I'd like to raise a toast to all programmers who bear in mind users of older machines:)

I don't know where your coming from but UT has never ran as well on old hardware as Quake III in my oppinion.

UT on my B/WG3 400 with an ATI Radeon card would eek out 36FPS average at any screen resolution or setting. I always thoughtthe limiting was the processor. On the other hand with Quake III I could get nearly 50FPS with the right settings.

Now on my Dual/GHz/DDR Powermac I see 112FPS with a G4MX card in Quake III and in UT 36FPS. Doesn't really look like like the G3 was processor limited. It's the poor coding of the game that limited it's playability. The 36FPS average really left you vulnerable in an outside tournament against multiple players. In this situation the only G3 would drop into the teens making it nearly unplayable.

[trose]

UT Didnt even have OpenGL support when it first was released did it? Was just Glide and RAVE. Im betting thats why ATI-Nvidia cards have always run the game so poor. They seem to have optimized the game for Glide.