And people say I'm crazy for saying Apple should implement a system wide compatibility layer
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And people say I'm crazy for saying Apple should implement a system wide compatibility layer
Oh, I admit I have my objectivity issues here!!!
To be fair, adopting Windows gaming APIs (if that is what you mean by compatibility layer), I would be happy with that too!
Nope, I don’t see the benefit for either there.
I’m in the “I have no clue how Apple could dig themselves out of the hole” camp.
This is probably the most accurate take on this.
Well, I certainly cannot tell either. That being said - maybe, just maybe, it has something to do with wanting out of the hole in the first place? Just a random, uninformed thought, admittedly
Yeah well only if it doesn't tank performance that would be okish.. But still I remember Proton and Steamdack the game developers still need to adjust or fix stuff to make it work on that layer. Are they going to do that for Mac?
So I rather prefer native, but then again games like World of Warcraft which I play regularly is ARM native but really not optimised.. There still big performance dips because they need to optimise the engine for Tile base rendering which they are not going to do as the Blizzard's Apple support is the lowest of the lowest priority which sucks tbh and doesn't look good for the future. The engine is crap anyways with only FSR as FSR2.2 would cost them a lot of time to make.
WoW is still also very cpu dependent which is in favour of the M cpu's cpu's.
Making something native is doable, but the support is another thing.
The thing people forget about Proton is it took years to get to where it is now. Years of work from Valve and the Linux community that most can now just load a game up through Proton without the developer's input and it just works, and for those that don't it takes just a slight tweak either from the community or the developer themselves and in less than 24 hours boom it now works perfectly. It's why Feral stopped doing Linux ports and people don't care that most games aren't even native on Linux since Proton made Linux ports essentially obsolete with how good it is and the fact it takes little to no effort. Less than 24 hours after Elden Ring came out, boom it was instantly Deck Verified.
There would be growing pains with a Mac compatibility layer yes, yes at the start it wouldn't be nearly as good as native, but overtime that would change as the layer gets more refined through input from Apple and third party developers that Mac ports themselves would also become obsolete. Remember Rosetta 1 ran like ass but Apple took what they learned from that and made Rosetta 2 which runs Intel apps better on the M Series chips than they do on an actual Intel Mac.
There's no harm in at least trying, something the hardcore Mac gamers have already been doing for years with CrossOver. Not to mention the benefits of a system wide compatibility layer wouldn't just benefit games on Mac, but other applications too. Windows exclusive programs like Sony Vegas would finally be able to run on Mac through a system wide compatibility layer, as I know many video editors who use Vegas and cite the only reason they don't have a Mac is because Sony Vegas isn't available there.
Apple seems to think they have a shovel and a plan to use it, right?
Hideo Kojima announced his new game last night at the Game Awards, a horror game codeveloped with Jordan Peele called "OD"
Unknown if this game will come to Mac or not like Kojima's other games, probably not since it's an Xbox exclusive. (But hey since it's an Xbox game that means it'll be playable on Mac through Game Pass for Cloud)
Pay attention to their eyes in the trailer. Also notice the sentence they all say, it's a pangram, a sentence that has every letter of the alphabet in it.
Unknown if this game will come to Mac or not like Kojima's other games, probably not since it's an Xbox exclusive. (But hey since it's an Xbox game that means it'll be playable on Mac through Game Pass for Cloud)
Pay attention to their eyes in the trailer. Also notice the sentence they all say, it's a pangram, a sentence that has every letter of the alphabet in it.
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Saw this on PCGAMER and couldn't resist. Funny (and brave) roast by Kratos/Christopher Judge himself of CoD MW III last night. I guess that's one reason PCGAMER rated the game 47% "Flawed and disappointing". Watch the audience's reaction. 😄
www.pcgamer.com
www.youtube.com
Christopher Judge delivers sick burn about CoD's campaign at The Game Awards
The God of War actor returned for another clippable Game Awards moment.
âï¸ Christopher Judge burns CoD
43 seconds · Clipped by Tyler Wilde · Original video "THE GAME AWARDS 2023: Official 4K Livestream (Monster Hunter, Marvel's Blade, Light No Fire)" by thegam...
www.youtube.com
Bzzzt is a cool retro-future platformer, released recently that is getting very positive reviews from journalists and players. Said to be very addictive and one of the best. It uses Metal and has a Mac demo.
store.steampowered.com
Zenless Zone Zero is coming to iOS/Mac according to IGN next year. The beta test page mentions Mac but says "currently unsupported".
Hello Games annonced Light No Fire, "a game about adventure, building, survival and exploration together. Set on a fantasy planet the size of Earth." The game has been in development in the last five years and reminds me of the new Avatar game. Assuming it uses the same engine as NMS there's a good chance it will come to Mac. No platforms have been announced.
www.theverge.com
BZZZT on Steam
Become a tiny ZX8000 robot and begin your journey through a beautiful, pixel-art world inspired by games iconic to the platformer genre. Follow a cute story, upgrade your skills, beat challenging levels, and compete with other players for the fastest speedrun!
Zenless Zone Zero is coming to iOS/Mac according to IGN next year. The beta test page mentions Mac but says "currently unsupported".
Hello Games annonced Light No Fire, "a game about adventure, building, survival and exploration together. Set on a fantasy planet the size of Earth." The game has been in development in the last five years and reminds me of the new Avatar game. Assuming it uses the same engine as NMS there's a good chance it will come to Mac. No platforms have been announced.
Light No Fire is the next ambitious game from the studio behind No Man’s Sky
Say hello again to Hello.
www.theverge.com
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Mac support? Oh no...Mihoyo found me.
NO! I WILL NOT PLAY YOUR GACHA WAIFU GAMES! YOU CAN'T MAKE ME! NO MATTER HOW MANY HONKAI ADS I SEE I WILL RESIST!
If someone plans to launch their game on a Mac, developers need to purchase a $600 Mac computer and spend a lot of time learning new game engines or metal graphics interfaces (because their engines use OpenGL or Directx 11), then conduct extensive testing in unfamiliar environments, endure poor performance issues and errors, and after successful repairs, spend $99 per year on author fees and put the game in store for review. This is something many people are unwilling to do, it's too troublesome.
Another thing to pay attention to is that the Mac market is very small, and they are all worried about whether their games have considerable sales to support them in doing so. If there is not a lot of profit, I believe they will not leave their seats.
Similarly, Linux is also a platform with low appeal, although it is very similar to the Windows platform.
Another thing to pay attention to is that the Mac market is very small, and they are all worried about whether their games have considerable sales to support them in doing so. If there is not a lot of profit, I believe they will not leave their seats.
Similarly, Linux is also a platform with low appeal, although it is very similar to the Windows platform.
Did you read the prior responses on the last 96 pages? This has been more-or-less covered...
You could claim the Mac back on tax? Or use the Mac to develop for Windows as well?
Or maybe the game's actually being developed on a Mac, or the developer has an artist or sound designer who uses a Mac?
Or maybe the developer releases on iOS as well?
Or maybe the game's actually being developed on a Mac, or the developer has an artist or sound designer who uses a Mac?
Or maybe the developer releases on iOS as well?
Yes, this subject has been beaten to death here and elsewhere. Even you have posted about it here and in other threads before with similar arguments about the graphics APIs. You’re stating the obvious. Game development on any platform is not for everybody. If people don’t have the time, money, knowledge, audience, creativity, game quality or other resources they shouldn’t make games for different platforms, or at all.
At the same time some of such arguments sound as usual overblown. It is in the nature of things that you need a Mac to develop and test Mac games just as you need a PC to do the same. At the same time the cost can be the same. With so many different PC configurations with components and drivers from Intel, Nvidia, AMD and Microsoft and all third party manufacturers of computers, motherboards and GPUs it can cost quite a lot to test and make sure your games run on as many combinations as possible. Depending on your game you can’t always buy the cheapest PC either. Sure, you can buy a RTX 3060 but it gives you about 20 fps in Unreal 4 according to Puget Systems. RTX 4090 gives you 92 fps but it also costs between $2000 and $3200 (Asus ROG Matrix Platinum GeForce RTX 4090) alone. Many developers buy the top systems due to use of many different game development tools. So HW for game development is not always cheaper on the PC side.
That’s why many game developers also say it is harder to port games to PC than consoles. As Disparity Games cofounder Jason Stark points out:
”Gamers ask, ‘Why can’t they just release the version they develop with?’ Then, when developers do just release [that] and it’s a buggy mess, they ask: ‘Why are developers so lazy?’ Well, It’s because they released what they had. Think about how many components that make up your setup. Each runs on drivers that may or may not be up to date and interact with one another in complex ways. Throw a game that hasn’t had much troubleshooting into this soup of software and hardware and it’s no wonder tweaking game settings is a foundation of PC gaming. In this context, the difference between a ‘good’ and ‘bad’ PC release can come down to how much time and money you can throw at your title. Bringing a game to consoles is difficult, but at least you know that a bug that happens on your Xbox One is going to happen on every Xbox One.”
Apple Silicon with its unified architecture is more like consoles and have an advantage there being used in iPhones, iPads and Macs.
We have also cross-platform tools like Unreal Engine, Unity and Godot. I know it’s not like a click on a button but it can be easier than Xcode, even though Xcode is one of the best dev tools according to some.
That $99 fee was mentioned recently and honestly it’s a very lame excuse as some developers here have already explained. We’re talking about 27 cents a day, or $8.25 a month. Many TV streaming services cost twice as much and many people use more than one. Netflix, Max and Hulu cost 15-18 dollars a month. So we must be talking about a fresh broke developer who just has started their business and can’t afford much more than their own home PC.
Fortunately there is a great solution even to that. Many small or even major developers have made it thanks to Kickstarter. It’s becoming more of a rule than exception. The most successful case (leaving Star Citizen out) is Shenmue 3. So you don’t have to buy that Mac or pay Apple’s fee yourself if you have a great idea.
The Mac market is not small with its over 20% of desktop computer share worldwide but I agree that the Mac game market is small. Yet we continue to get both small indie games and major AAA titles that defy everything you said so the market is apparently there and enough for many others. There is also some help to get from Apple. As I’ve said before they helped 4A with Metro Exodus, Larian with BG3, Piranha Bytes with Elex 2 and Hello Games with No Man’s Sky for free to optimize their games and have worked with Capcom, Bloober Team, Fallen Leaf and more.
The best example perhaps of an indie developer defying everything you said is Team Cherry, the makers of Hollow Knight and Silksong. They’re a small team of only three people, they used Unity to be cross-platform to make Hollow Knight and they funded their project with Kickstarter. They needed just AU$ 35,000 to make the game for PC, Mac and Linux from the start but got more than 57,000. It is also the most financially successful low-budget game. It has sold more than 2.8 million copies and made over $42 million. Imagine if they were ”unwilling to do” it because ”it's too troublesome”.
I also posted about Bzzzt before. It’s made in Unity by a single developer from the Czech Republic named Karel Matejka. The game was rated as nr 1 best Hidden Gem on Steam with very positive reviews from journalists and users. He has worked 30 years though in the business on titles such as Mafia, Operation Flashpoint, ArmA, Memento Mori 1 and 2, Star Wars: Assault Team, Nemo's Reef, Toy Story: Smash It and more so he has the experience. ”Undertaking a project like this requires exceptional dedication and incredible skill. In the end, Bzzzt required drawing an unbelievable amount of 10,000+ sprites, crafting hundreds of meticulously hand-made animations, and spending over 1,000 hours on gameplay and control coding and tweaking.”, all made by a single dev.
A recent example of a major title that also proves otherwise is Lies of P, Mac Game of the Year that surprised everybody with its day-and-date release on Mac, using Metal 3 with MetalFX, made cross-platform in Unreal Engine.
Then we have Hello Games that was eager to port NMS entirely in Xcode. They also consider themselves a small developer and started the project a year before Apple jumped in to offer help for optimization.
It’s a good thing then that we have devs like Team Cherry, Capcom, Kojima Productions, NEOWIZ, Hello Games, Sports Interactive, Bloober Team, Fallen Leaf, BlueTweleve Studio, Piranha Bytes, Saber Interactive, SGRA Studio, Rockfish Games, BlackMill Games, Feral, 4A, Larian Studios and Nimble Giant that can afford a $600 Mac and a $99 Apple fee and aren’t afraid of learning and using Metal to make native ports for Apple Silicon despite the small market share.
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You mean your previous post? It added nothing to the discussion.
Taking on the costs (or most of them) of bringing native games (and I'm not just talking about existing games) to their platforms. They need to be more serious about publishing games I feel.
IIRC @Ethosik develops their game on macOS but is only going to publish it for Windows.
There are some things you'd need a really new Mac to develop for (basically anything using UE5 and Nanite/Lumen RT). I'd imagine game studio's with custom engines (like Snowdrop or whatever Insomniac uses for its games) develop in Windows making it easier to, eventually, do a Windows port.
See:
They’re selling Apple TV+ subscriptions, at $10 monthly.
Some basic math tells me that you could get 5 and a half years of Apple TV+ for the single purchase of a base Mac Mini and one(1) game title.
And given, much to my dismay, how crazy profitable subscription services are, I think your risk estimate is off.
And, lest we forget, Apples goal isn’t to make Mac games. It’s to sell Macs.