If Apple was actually serious about gaming and wanted to create it's own version of a Steam Machine how should they do it?

[OptimusGrime]

Nobody is bothering to write about it because nobody cares. Apple and the publisher aren't providing any data because that data would show those releases flopped. They're not going to embarrass themselves.

Again this is just nonsense. It doesn’t logically follow. You don’t have data and you think your lack of data proves a flop. Complete gibberish. To make assertions you need proof. You are making the assertions that they have been a flop and you are providing no evidence.

"Apple has done a pretty good job funneling people to their App Store, which has hurt Mac gaming on Steam."

I was responding to this, not coming here to make a case.

You are making the case that EVERYONE uses Steam. Ignoring GOG, Epic game store even if we discount the MAS.

Well to be honest it really is EVERYONE who uses Steam except you and maybe some of your friends. Nobody uses the App Store outside of YouTubers and a tiny tiny group of people.

Don't even know what you're saying here. Aren't those apps universal? You buy it on Mac or iOS, same purchase.

You said “all we have to go on is this”. And “this” is? Nothing apparently.

If you truly think the games on the Mac app store are actually meaningfully competing with Steam, all I can say is have

I never said such a thing. I asked for evidence of your claim that EVERYONE uses Steam and no one use the MAS. If it’s true it should be easy to show proof.

fun.

I'm not going to waste my time providing citations for something that's bleedingly obvious. Look it up your own self and waste your own time.

Why not? You wasted much of your time already claiming things are “bleedingly obvious” but providing no proof. You can’t because you don’t have any evidence.

Most people who play games on computer are already long and well bought in to a non-Apple store.

This I think is true. People are seriously interested in games will generally have a gaming pc or a console.

The fact you can't take this information in tells me everything about the value of your opinion.

Hard to take in information which doesn’t exist.

 

[teh_hunterer]

Again this is just nonsense. It doesn’t logically follow. You don’t have data and you think your lack of data proves a flop. Complete gibberish.

It logically follows perfectly: these games launched and caused such a tiny splash that almost no journalistic entities bothered to even write about it. No buzz, no money, no interest.

Apple and publishers aren't providing sales data because that data would be embarrassing. Like Blizzard stopped providing WoW sub numbers once they started declining.

You are making the case that EVERYONE uses Steam. Ignoring GOG, Epic game store even if we discount the MAS.

EVERYONE is using Steam compared to the Mac App Store.

I never said such a thing. I asked for evidence of your claim that EVERYONE uses Steam and no one use the MAS. If it’s true it should be easy to show proof.

Why not? You wasted much of your time already claiming things are “bleedingly obvious” but providing no proof. You can’t because you don’t have any evidence.

You are straining so hard for the Mac App Store to be relevant. You don't need a cited thesis, you just have to think about it.

1. Games are always full price. Why pay that much?
2. They lock you in to the Apple platform whereas a store like Steam allows you to keep and use that game on any device
3. Anyone trying to game on a Mac now that Apple silicon is making Mac a great gaming device is already bought into a non Apple store and isn't going to want to split their gaming library for no reason

Compared to it dumps things in the library folder and it's an electron app, for actual consumers, that stuff matters a thousand times more.

As I said, "the number of traditional PC gamers, now using Macs, who are willing to part from their massive decade+ backlog of games from Steam or other stores, in order to pay full price so they can use a worse store and be able to play the game on their phone sometimes, has to be only a few thousand people in the whole world."

 

[maflynn]

EVERYONE is using Steam compared to the Mac App Store.

Steam reportedly has close to 80% marketshare in the game launcher market. Epic is struggling with about 8% and gog doesn't seem to have any percentage worth mentioning. Most people who play games will by default go to steam.

You are straining so hard for the Mac App Store to be relevant.

The MAS has such a reputation if being irreverent, especially given the number of games and apps on the ios app store.

For non-games, many, if not most developers push or at least highly recommend that you buy from them directly and avoid the MAS. They tend offer versions that are more functional with extra features.

I know its not scientific but most people I've run into or know, generally will get their games from steam instead of MAS if possible, and for non-games many developers generally try to get customers to skip the MAS and go direct.

Because apple is so secretive, they don't report any statistics, so statements of fact regarding usage, is pure conjecture - yes, even my post here is making assumptions.

One huge advantage that steam has over the MAS is if you buy a game on steam, you can play it on any platform, that is, if you get rid of your mac, and buy a Pc you still can play cyberpunk (if purchased from steam). If you buy cyberpunk from the MAS, then you're SOL. I think most people aware of this, i.e., casual, avid, pro gamers will largely choose steam over the MAS

 

[theluggage]

If they want to be real innovators, and make another ton of cash, they should turn the Vision Pro into an immersive game platform. Imagine all the accessories they could sell for it, from weapons to joysticks to simulator pods.

...and start from scratch against Meta Quest etc. and a bunch of other options which already have a ton of supported games? Oh, and I think Steam just launched a headset, too... again, they have a massive established market.

The purpose of the Vision Pro is pretty clear: open up a new, currently neglected market for Augmented Reality for serious use in business/personal productivity/communication. Not produce a "Me Too" device for playing VR shoot-em-ups & flight sims. I'm healthily skeptical about the Vision Pro - I don't think it's going to fly until the hardware is far lighter and less obtrusive & it may turn out to be the modern Newton - but I can see where they're going and it's still at the Mac-only FireWire iPod/AT&T-only iPhone 1 stage at the moment.

 

[teh_hunterer]

One huge advantage that steam has over the MAS is if you buy a game on steam, you can play it on any platform, that is, if you get rid of your mac, and buy a Pc you still can play cyberpunk (if purchased from steam). If you buy cyberpunk from the MAS, then you're SOL. I think most people aware of this, i.e., casual, avid, pro gamers will largely choose steam over the MAS

This is the biggest one for me. Yes I like the idea that some games are universal across iOS, iPadOS and macOS, and you can play it across all your Apple devices. But it's not worth losing the ability to play on other platforms like Windows or SteamOS in future. It's not worth splitting up my big games library that I've had for over 15 years.

And from what I've read from randoms on the internet, in those cases where a game is ported and launched on the Apple app stores universally across iPhone/iPad/Mac, the deal is they aren't to release it on other stores like Steam.

As much as I like my iPad and my iPhone, I'm not splitting up my Steam library just so I can play AAA games on tiny screens.

 

[maflynn]

But it's not worth losing the ability to play on other platforms like Windows or SteamOS

With the popularity of the steam deck, most people will choose steam imo. There are apple folks who live, breath, all things apple, they want to support apple in everything, and that's fine, I'm not knocking that, but I do believe it colors their perception of what's really happening.

I think we all forget that people outside of Macrumors are decidedly just normal consumers, students hobbyists and most of them will just head to steam for games, as that's where you go to play game.

 

[maflynn]

they should turn the Vision Pro into an immersive game

Not at its current $3,500 dollar price tag

 

[diamond.g]

@OptimusGrime very few people are willing to pay for the same game multiple times, so storefronts like Steam/GoG/Epic allowing you to use your purchases across multiple platforms is ideal. In the Apple sense, it is even more important to have options since there is a chance that older games could stop working in the future (Apple has set the precedence) and there is no guarantee that developers will revisit old IP to fix whatever needs to be fixed to get them working again.

Yes things are made worse because Apple doesn't have any user facing means to tell how well AAA games are selling (as one would hope games that are selling well would continue to get support), which leaves developers and users to gravitate towards freemuim games (which typically are not AAA games) and then the cycle repeats itself.

I stand by what I said about Apple not doing a Steam Machine, I know @leman says it is the Macbook Air which isn't really meant to be hooked up to a living room display and navigated with a controller, because they make so much more gaming money in microtransactions. They don't have any incentive to push macOS gaming, and for whatever readon they are also ignoring tvOS gaming (which is as close to SteamOS big picture as you'll ever see from Apple ecosystem).

 

[artifex]

Steam reportedly has close to 80% marketshare in the game launcher market. Epic is struggling with about 8% and gog doesn't seem to have any percentage worth mentioning. Most people who play games will by default go to steam.


The MAS has such a reputation if being irreverent, especially given the number of games and apps on the ios app store.

For non-games, many, if not most developers push or at least highly recommend that you buy from them directly and avoid the MAS. They tend offer versions that are more functional with extra features.

I know its not scientific but most people I've run into or know, generally will get their games from steam instead of MAS if possible, and for non-games many developers generally try to get customers to skip the MAS and go direct.

Because apple is so secretive, they don't report any statistics, so statements of fact regarding usage, is pure conjecture - yes, even my post here is making assumptions.

One huge advantage that steam has over the MAS is if you buy a game on steam, you can play it on any platform, that is, if you get rid of your mac, and buy a Pc you still can play cyberpunk (if purchased from steam). If you buy cyberpunk from the MAS, then you're SOL. I think most people aware of this, i.e., casual, avid, pro gamers will largely choose steam over the MAS

I'd rather have my games at GOG because they include full offline installers, so if they go out of business I can still put my games on other hardware. That of course also means no store DRM. Not using the optional launcher can mean a couple more steps installing in Linux, however. But in practice most of my games are on Steam, because bundles have been around for a long time.

BTW, back when Steam gave up on 32-bit Macs they had one last store update that intentionally broke the store app, so I couldn't keep using my previously-working installed Mac native games on my Macbook at the time (actually had a 64 bit cpu, but 32-bit uefi). Don't ever assume that just because Steam will probably be around for decades, you'll have that long to use it on the gear you bought it for.

 

[maflynn]

I'd rather have my games at GOG because they include full offline installers

No question, I totally see the allure of Gog, I also have an account there and a handful of purchases. With that said, I think they're a very distant 3rd when it comes to marketshare.

 

[teh_hunterer]

With the popularity of the steam deck, most people will choose steam imo. There are apple folks who live, breath, all things apple, they want to support apple in everything, and that's fine, I'm not knocking that, but I do believe it colors their perception of what's really happening.

Absolutely. I'm all in on Apple in the sense that almost all my devices are Apple, but there's no sense pretending their store is any good for proper games.

I think we all forget that people outside of Macrumors are decidedly just normal consumers, students hobbyists and most of them will just head to steam for games, as that's where you go to play game.

Yeah and these are the people Apple is risking losing with these lacklustre gaming offerings. More people than ever want to use Apple silicon devices, and those people are simply going to want to play their existing game library on their devices. They're not going to want to use the literal worst and most expensive store for proper games.

Apple needs to be careful with their walled garden stuff. It's fine for mobile apps and mobile games (it is the standard for that after all), but when it comes to proper games that gamers actually play, people just have higher standards. The bar was already set much higher and Apple are deluding themselves if they think they can pull the same thing for traditional games as they did for mobile.

 

[Unregistered 4U]

How so? I don't understand your point?

Steam users expect that if they buy a game once, they can play it across different OS’s for free. For example, since Resident Evil games have been available on Steam for awhile, Steam users would expect to get the Mac version of a previously released PC game for free. So, by releasing on the Mac App Store only, they get paid by every Mac user that wants to play it on a Mac.

 

[Unregistered 4U]

These are all from the same couple of sources if I’m not mistaken. Mobilegamer.biz and other such execrable places. These also relate to iOS releases and not macOS. Other than that good job.

For me I avoid Steam at al costs. Refuses to follow platform standards, craps nonsense in my ~/Library and is electron. No thanks.

Anyone that looks into how AppMagic does what they do would know that there is ZERO way they have information on how many people paid for the IAP (and only tangential information on how many sales there were) as that information is between Apple and Capcom. If anyone wants to know if Capcom’s making money on the App Store, check to see if they continue to release games on the App Store. If they are, then it’s not because they’re bored with nothing to do. LOL

AppMagic ONLY has detailed information about companies that sign up with them and explicitly provide their information to AppMagic (and these “Resident Evil not selling” posts are just advertising that they know people will pick up and redistribute, making more developers look into who they are and what they do). Capcom doesn’t. It can be useful for small developers that don’t have the resources for that sort of analysis, it can be useful for tracking “types” of apps, like “note taking”, “calorie tracking”, “journaling”. But, there’s nothing in how they do what they do that would provide any useful information about how well one “Resident Evil 2” app is doing against another “Resident Evil 2” app.

When you see any stats like this reporting a publisher’s sales that AREN’T coming from that publisher, search the page for “AppMagic”. If you see that, you can safely ignore it. As a company, they’ve discovered that posting something every now and then about information they don’t have (like Gurman) gets them attention, so they’ll definitely continue. And, it’s not like Apple or Capcom will correct them, they’re both busy making money.

 

[Unregistered 4U]

You're in a tiny minority. Most people who play games on computer already have a big backlog of all their games on other stores like Steam. That takes precedent over incredibly niche complaints like storing things in the library folder or it being an electron app. Nobody cares.

Mac users, in total, are a tiny minority of Steam users. Right now, there are about 3.3 million Mac users on Steam. Analysts indicate Apple sold 2.7 million Macs in the first quarter of this year, alone. And, in 2024, more like just under 23 million. So, no matter how it’s counted, there’s FAR more Macs in the world that don’t have Steam installed than do.

 

[Unregistered 4U]

These are all from the same couple of sources if I’m not mistaken. Mobilegamer.biz and other such execrable places. These also relate to iOS releases and not macOS. Other than that good job.

For me I avoid Steam at al costs. Refuses to follow platform standards, craps nonsense in my ~/Library and is electron. No thanks.

Anyone that looks into how AppMagic does what they do would know that there is ZERO way they have information on how many people paid for the IAP (and only tangential information on how many sales there were) as that information is between Apple and Capcom. If anyone wants to know if Capcom’s making money on the App Store, check to see if they continue to release games on the App Store. If they are, then it’s not because they’re bored with nothing to do. LOL

AppMagic ONLY has detailed information about companies that sign up with them and explicitly provide their information to AppMagic (and these “Resident Evil not selling” posts are just advertising that they know people will pick up and redistribute, making more developers look into who they are and what they do). Capcom doesn’t. It can be useful for small developers that don’t have the resources for that sort of analysis, it can be useful for tracking “types” of apps, like “note taking”, “calorie tracking”, “journaling”. But, there’s nothing in how they do what they do that would provide any useful information about how well one “Resident Evil 2” app is doing against another competing “Resident Evil 2” app.

Any stats based on AppMagic “analysis” can simply be ignored. They’ve found that posting something every now and then about information they don’t have gets them attention (much like Bloomberg), so they’ll definitely continue. And it’s not like Apple or Capcom will correct them, they’re both busy making money.

 

[maflynn]

LOL,
I'll leave this here, but he's spot on

 

[progx]

Mac users, in total, are a tiny minority of Steam users. Right now, there are about 3.3 million Mac users on Steam. Analysts indicate Apple sold 2.7 million Macs in the first quarter of this year, alone. And, in 2024, more like just under 23 million. So, no matter how it’s counted, there’s FAR more Macs in the world that don’t have Steam installed than do.

It doesn’t help when most people who buy Macs do not play games. While the same can be said on Windows, that slightly over half don’t play games, the gap between Mac users who game and don’t is much larger.

 

[maflynn]

It doesn’t help when most people who buy Macs do not play games. While the same can be said on Windows, that slightly over half don’t play games, the gap between Mac users who game and don’t is much larger.

You raise such a good point, where only a subset of computer users want to play games. I think that line of thought is largely dismissed or minimized when folks try to justify gaming on macs.

 

[dmccloud]

Absolutely. I'm all in on Apple in the sense that almost all my devices are Apple, but there's no sense pretending their store is any good for proper games.



Yeah and these are the people Apple is risking losing with these lacklustre gaming offerings. More people than ever want to use Apple silicon devices, and those people are simply going to want to play their existing game library on their devices. They're not going to want to use the literal worst and most expensive store for proper games.

Apple needs to be careful with their walled garden stuff. It's fine for mobile apps and mobile games (it is the standard for that after all), but when it comes to proper games that gamers actually play, people just have higher standards. The bar was already set much higher and Apple are deluding themselves if they think they can pull the same thing for traditional games as they did for mobile.

Given that the gaming segment comprises less than 50% of all computer users regardless of OS, you are placing far too much importance on that segment with respect to the Mac. I keep a small (under 5 titles) subset of games on my Mac, and those are the ones I play most often and/or will just jump in for a few minutes when I have time. The rest of my games are on my Windows PC. I just don't use my Macs as replacements for a gaming PC (which I built).

 

[teh_hunterer]

It doesn’t help when most people who buy Macs do not play games. While the same can be said on Windows, that slightly over half don’t play games, the gap between Mac users who game and don’t is much larger.

Mac users, in total, are a tiny minority of Steam users. Right now, there are about 3.3 million Mac users on Steam. Analysts indicate Apple sold 2.7 million Macs in the first quarter of this year, alone. And, in 2024, more like just under 23 million. So, no matter how it’s counted, there’s FAR more Macs in the world that don’t have Steam installed than do.

Most Mac users who game do their gaming on another device. Macs have only been worth a damn as gaming devices from a hardware standpoint for 5 years max. Any gamer who owns a Mac is going to already be gaming on something else.

It's too early in this Apple silicon story to expect gamers to use their Mac as their primary gaming device. The game compatibility isn't there yet. Their existing gaming devices aren't too old yet.

You can't use Mac users vs Mac Steam installs as a suggestion that there's a significant number of people out there using the Mac App Store for traditional/AAA games.

 

[teh_hunterer]

Given that the gaming segment comprises less than 50% of all computer users regardless of OS, you are placing far too much importance on that segment with respect to the Mac. I keep a small (under 5 titles) subset of games on my Mac, and those are the ones I play most often and/or will just jump in for a few minutes when I have time. The rest of my games are on my Windows PC. I just don't use my Macs as replacements for a gaming PC (which I built).

I'm sorry but I don't know what you mean by I'm placing far too much importance on that segment.

I'm saying if Apple wants their Macs to be considered as viable main gaming devices down the line, as the years roll on with Apple silicon, trying to use Mac App Store exclusives to do it, thus keeping their 30% cut, isn't going to work with traditional/AAA games.

In the context of the OP, if Apple wants to say a Mac is a good alternative to a Steam Machine, it better play a decent amount of the same games from the same stores. Having a mishmash of app store exclusives isn't going to cut it.

 

[JayKay514]

The MAS has such a reputation if being irreverent

They are a bunch of take-no-prisoners satirical jokers over there, it's true.

 

[diamond.g]

I'm sorry but I don't know what you mean by I'm placing far too much importance on that segment.

I'm saying if Apple wants their Macs to be considered as viable main gaming devices down the line, as the years roll on with Apple silicon, trying to use Mac App Store exclusives to do it, thus keeping their 30% cut, isn't going to work with traditional/AAA games.

In the context of the OP, if Apple wants to say a Mac is a good alternative to a Steam Machine, it better play a decent amount of the same games from the same stores. Having a mishmash of app store exclusives isn't going to cut it.

A gamer will put up with a lot if the game is good, exclusive, and has a ton of their friends playing it (or maybe any 2 of the three).

 

[JayKay514]

I'm saying if Apple wants their Macs to be considered as viable main gaming devices down the line

Well that's the real question, isn't it? I don't think Apple has ever wanted to position the Mac as a "main gaming machine."

It certainly can be a gaming machine; a very capable one, in fact. But they're not going down the rabbit hole of chasing specs to try to compete with Valve, Lenovo, Asus ROG, Nvidia, AMD, Microsoft, Sony, or Nintendo, for a relatively minor share of the entire gaming market.

They have demonstrated that their focus is on mobile and tablet gaming, because it's a much bigger market, and more profitable for them. And that's fine!

if Apple wants to say a Mac is a good alternative to a Steam Machine, it better play a decent amount of the same games from the same stores.

And yeah, if they wanted to do that, it'd be a logical step. But they don't.

Now, if I were Apple, what I would do is focus on integrating emulation into Apple Arcade, and beating other platforms on ease-of-use.

I have a Retroid RP5 Android handheld. It's designed for retro emulation, running on a Snapdragon APU. It's good! But setting up all the apps, frontends, special folders, tools for auto updates, sideloading stuff, finding ROMs etc, is not unlike setting up your own Linux distro from scratch. It's powerful, but it's not a sleek or unified experience and the UIs are less than intuitive.

On the other end of the spectrum are things like the retro Atari VCS, or Analogue's line of FPGA-based emulator handhelds / consoles, or those "40 games in a joystick" type of things you see at Walgreens.

Apple could easily fund a bunch of those OSS emulator projects, and build a better version of RetroArch / MAME integrated into Arcade... and license games from the rightsholders to make it legit.

Thinking down the line, maybe with good Xcode integration, there'd be a good way to package new "retro" games for those platforms and sell them through Arcade or the App Store.

 

[teh_hunterer]

Well that's the real question, isn't it? I don't think Apple has ever wanted to position the Mac as a "main gaming machine."

It certainly can be a gaming machine; a very capable one, in fact. But they're not going down the rabbit hole of chasing specs to try to compete with Valve, Lenovo, Asus ROG, Nvidia, AMD, Microsoft, Sony, or Nintendo, for a relatively minor share of the entire gaming market.

Why not as a main gaming machine? All that's missing is game compatibility, which they are always working on. Apple silicon is always getting more and more powerful for gaming with each generation.

I'm not sure what you mean re they're not chasing specs - they feature the performance of each new chip and often reference gaming performance in every keynote.

Apple wants you in their ecosystem. If their device is good enough for gaming that you don't need a separate Windows PC, that's a win for Apple. You might take the savings of owning a separate gaming device and put that into a better chip or more storage on your next Apple device.

They have demonstrated that their focus is on mobile and tablet gaming, because it's a much bigger market, and more profitable for them. And that's fine!

They own mobile gaming, everybody knows that, but they are also taking steps towards traditional gaming.