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macOS 26.7 Code Hints at Two Unreleased Apple Game Controllers
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pdfu
macrumors regular
Fair point. We don't know. Obviously everything that hasn't been announced by Apple is internal. As I say in the original post, macOS 26.7 included customer-facing support for these controllers. If one of the unreleased controllers connected to a Mac running the RC, the OS could expose the controls to games.
Apple has a different, more relaxed path for internal-only controllers, so they didn't need to use this fully-fledged path.
Okay good explanation. Hopefully ternus is taking gaming seriously. A beats controller sounds cool. Maybe brand a beats AAA games store with more adult games
Populus
macrumors G3
It could be a nice addition to the ecosystem, but the main shift Ternus should make, is in the Apple Arcade service. Along with the usual casual games we get each month, add one AA title every three months. And include access to a AAA game that rotates every three months.
Aside from this, and regarding game controllers, I really hope they also add support for the latest Steam Controller.
Aside from this, and regarding game controllers, I really hope they also add support for the latest Steam Controller.
TruthAboveAllElse
macrumors 6502a
Who has an Apple TV? One of the most useless products Apple currently makes. (I mean I have one, but because I’m fanatical about privacy and UI. When every TV is smart, Apple TV needs some killer app that places it above smart TVs. Or Apple needs to make an actual TV.)
kiranmk2
macrumors 68020
I'm sure they considered this when GPTK didn't unleash an avalanche of developers porting their games to MacOS and making them available in the App Store. It likely didn't progress as Windows games would come from Steam, GoG, Epic etc, with no way for Apple to take their cut from the game sales.
Hajj.david
macrumors 6502a
Every TV of mine uses one and nearly every single TV in our company has one. They "just work" run super fast, and great for airplay
TruthAboveAllElse
macrumors 6502a
I’ve tried to convince multiple people to use them, even bought them for people, but they’d rather just use the default smart TV app. You don’t have to convince me they are nice. But they don’t have a killer app.
Release the new pippin with handheld console like switch Apple we need some competition in here.
Abazigal
Contributor
I wouldn't mind paying a little more for a game controller that sports better integration with iOS. For example, there really isn't any easy way to tell the remaining battery life in your PS5 controller, and patching it is flat out impossible if you don't have a PS5. Or AirPods-style ease of switching (I pretty much have to first forget the pairing of my PS5 controller first if I want to use it with another device).
Kinda like what the AirPort Time Capsule was to other routers. 🙂
Maybe because it will automatically switch between whatever device you're using, just like AirPods do.
That would be worth the price of admission for me.
But I'm sceptical that Apple could make a competent controller when they don't seem to really have much in the way of deep gaming knowledge. It would be a pleasant surprise for them to come out with a controller that was actually good.
Mainyehc
macrumors 6502a
Apple is famous for having extended the Bluetooth spec on occasion to fit their needs, including to reduce latency, so… Maybe they will?
GregoryPeckEPA
macrumors 6502
The battery life is shown on the battery widget. My Xbox controller shows an actual controller icon but even my 8BitDo Ultimate 2 Wireless controller is supported in the widget albeit it just shows a generic BT icon. Apple added global support for all major controllers thru an accessible API in Sequoia and iOS 18.
I don’t know how how easier you want it.
There is also settings to remap every single button and even set up mutilple controller profiles in Settings.
I don’t know what else anyone needs. Most everyone who games has a console by some existing manufacturer already making yet another controller seem like a low priority. If Apple were to make their own, it would be for diehard Apple fanboys.
I see someone suggested it could have fast switching but no one is playing a game on their Mac and moving it to their iPhone lol. A truling puzzling product if real.
GregoryPeckEPA
macrumors 6502
They would do better to focus on getting more studios interested in gaming on their platforms. The largest games still don’t support Apple silicon despite it finally being able to game on. The biggest hurdle they had back on Intel was that 80% of their products just didn’t have the muscle to play even remotely demanding games. Apple silicon solved that massive problem and they halfheartedly released the GPTK to inspired game devs but that largely fell on deaf ears.
If they spun up a gaming studio and created exclusives, like Nintendo does with their core IPs like Mario, they could entice more players. But they seem happy with cash grabby mobile games or stripping them and shoving it all under Apple Arcade because it makes them ludicrous money. But that’s not gaming, that’s just monetization of the space.
If you look at the Steam charts, Apple represents something like 1.2% of gamers. Which is sad because even an M1 MBA can play AAA titles on med settings at 60 fps. They have the hardware, just not the interest from gamers.
Even games like RE 4 and Village pale to their PC counterparts. A game built on Metal (not ported thru abstraction layer upon layer) would be a sight! Even the Neo could get on board and do more than Apple Arcade. Infinity Blade 2 was released during the iPhone 4S era, which is a mere glimpse at what is possible when you design for the Apple ecosystem.
GPU is one slice of the pie, which is the easiest, but games need storage too, lots of them, here is the real problem, specially with AAA games, nobody will buy a AAA game for mac, specially with apple storage upgrades and locked to not use standard MVMe drives.
It's not necessarily being built for Metal or not that's the issue, it's the fact that games built for the IM GPUs that AMD/Nvidia/Intel make need a lot of work to make them run comparably on the TBDR GPUs that Apple make. They're just fundamentally different graphics architectures and pipelines built for one don't translate well to the other.
To get those games to run even competently let alone comparably is a lot of work.
The answer isn't necessarily that games need to be Apple exclusive for them to run well. Newer engines make it easier to make games that run well on both, but the fruits of this won't be apparent for a while yet.
Plus Apple seems to be building in more ways their GPUs can run IM style pipelines with each generation (starting really from the M3). That's why there are some games that are borked on the M1/M2 via Crossover but run on M3. Or glitches that only don't happen on M5 generation chips.
Games that ran well and looked good on the old iPhones aren't because they were built for Metal necessarily, but because they were built from the ground up for the GPU architecture in the phone.
Part of the reason so many Switch 2 ports are so good despite it being somewhat low powered is that despite Nintendo using its own operating system and APIs and the ARM architecture, when it comes to graphics it's a fairly standard Nvidia GPU in there that doesn't require your graphics pipeline to be rewritten.
You can use Microsoft dongle with XBox controllers, so no Bluetooth needed.
I do. Smart TVs are trash when trying to watch any streaming platform, Apple TV smokes Amazon Firesticks (Even the best and newer by far), which already smokes probably the majority of Smart TVs streaming apps.
Arctic Moose
macrumors 68000
I use a Nintendo Switch Pro Controller for RetroArch on Apple TV, it works fine.
DocMultimedia
macrumors 68030
... but what games will these game controllers be used with?
Don't think Apple have managed to bribe anyone else to port their games to Mac OS since Cyberpunk?
Note that app store exclusive ports don't count. I want to have indefinite access to my games library and wrt to that I trust Apple about as much as I trust the recent Sony. I.e. I want access to the other platforms as a backup.
Don't think Apple have managed to bribe anyone else to port their games to Mac OS since Cyberpunk?
Note that app store exclusive ports don't count. I want to have indefinite access to my games library and wrt to that I trust Apple about as much as I trust the recent Sony. I.e. I want access to the other platforms as a backup.
Will see. Not for me. I see rumours focussing on gaming since the Apple TV HD. But other than casual arcade games Apple doesn't seem commit to it. Those licensed game controllers at the time also were really expensive and since it is possible to connect Xbox/Playstation controllers I prefer that as I already have those.