Will games ever run well in OS X?

[TheSpaz]

I'm getting tired of buying Mac games only to find that they run way below the Windows version on the same hardware. I also don't like booting into Windows every time I wanna play a game because it can be annoying to constantly reboot my machine.

Will Snow Leopard change anything for Mac games or are we always going to be stuck bootcamping? I wonder if Apple would ever allow Windows games to run natively in OS X... thus making it unnecessary to even buy a crappy Mac port to begin with.

 

[Mackilroy]

I wonder if Apple would ever allow Windows games to run natively in OS X... thus making it unnecessary to even buy a crappy Mac port to begin with.

That would require DirectX to work under OS X, which it does not.

If a game is ported well, it'll run fine. If not, you get the idea. It's up to the quality of the port, not OS X.

 

[TheSpaz]

That would require DirectX to work under OS X, which it does not.

If a game is ported well, it'll run fine. If not, you get the idea. It's up to the quality of the port, not OS X.

I've heard that even the graphics drivers aren't the greatest in OS X. As for the quality of the port... How do you go about finding out how well a Mac game will run in your system without being able to download a demo of it.

 

[Ol3s]

I've heard that even the graphics drivers aren't the greatest in OS X. As for the quality of the port... How do you go about finding out how well a Mac game will run in your system without being able to download a demo of it.

Developed simultaniously as pc version (blizzard): expect it to run well enough

native porting (feral, aspyr): more likely to run well

cider port (EA, Ubisoft): more likely to suck

 

[rasmasyean]

Macs will prolly never get DX10…or DX11 for that matter so if that means anything to you, you’re likely out of luck.
If they do cater to advanced graphics, it will take a few years at least for developers to jump on…if there’s a market.

Gamers build PC’s for games and scale them up to be better for new games (and to brag ), but you can’t do that with a Mac so no one buy’s Macs for games and hence only the few “popular” titles warrant a port effort. And a port is always…well…2nd rate.

You have to install Windows. Vista if you want DX10. I'm not sure if Vista is good for the models below the Pro...but I wouldn't try it on the white one. It will prolly be slow.

 

[gregorsamsa]

I'm getting tired of buying Mac games only to find that they run way below the Windows version on the same hardware. I also don't like booting into Windows every time I wanna play a game because it can be annoying to constantly reboot my machine.

Will Snow Leopard change anything for Mac games or are we always going to be stuck bootcamping? I wonder if Apple would ever allow Windows games to run natively in OS X... thus making it unnecessary to even buy a crappy Mac port to begin with.

No doubt many will agree with you &, no, sadly SL isn't likely to improve Mac gaming significantly.

Agree with others: there are some excellent Mac-native ports out there, but increasingly we seem to be getting Cider ports with inevitable performance loss. I see no grounds for any great optimism here in the foreseeable future, if at all.

 

[Huntn]

I've always wondered how much money is allocated in a Mac port of a PC title to improve it's performance. My impression is that the game code is not really changed, only enough to get the game to run on the Mac. That would mean optimization would be nill also hurt by Direct X emulation (forget the name).

Blizzard is the exception, helped along by *I think* they programmed WoW for Direct X on the PC version and Open GL on the Mac version?

 

[TheSpaz]

I just played the Kung Fu Panda demo and it is SOOOOO choppy that it's not even funny. Yes, this game uses Cider. They should be ashamed to put that piece of crap on the Mac. I'm running an ATI Radeon 4870... it should be well over-capable of playing that game smoothly. Cider sucks.

 

[Rodus]

Yup Cider does have a major performance impact, far more so then CrossOver usually. Any game natively written in OpenGL should, I believe, perform well as there's no need for DirectX translation. I think I read on another forum that ET:QW performs as well on OS X as it does on the Windows side whilst bootcamping.

 

[rasmasyean]

I've always wondered how much money is allocated in a Mac port of a PC title to improve it's performance. My impression is that the game code is not really changed, only enough to get the game to run on the Mac. That would mean optimization would be nill also hurt by Direct X emulation (forget the name).

Blizzard is the exception, helped along by *I think* they programmed WoW for Direct X on the PC version and Open GL on the Mac version?

Blizzard has a history of record breaking titles. They KNOW they will make extra money via a mac version. So they develop it simultaneously. Other games face a bigger risk. When you're a product manager and you have to justify your startegies, it's not so easy to say "Well...we made money, but we lost half what we could have because we made a Mac version that no one bought."

Anyway, since Mac's can run Windows, it makes it much less of a thought to make a Mac version. They figure a good portion of the gamers would bootcamp it. If not...then they aren't likely to buy the game anyway. So it's even worse, now that Mac uses Intel chips!

But one reason why they use it is so Windows users would consider buying Macs. Again...you have to look where the money is. If it's really important to you just buy a cheap OEM XP from ebay or something. Or OEM Vista Basic is cheap too and that's all you really need.

 

[jabingla2810]

Gamers build PC’s for games and scale them up to be better for new games (and to brag ), .

Haha, yeah, I love those people who post on the internet.

"Hey, I have the following PC will it run Half life 2?

5TB HDD
5.8Ghz Extreme Overclocked
Nvidia® GeForce® GTX 295 extreme edition
2800MHz DDR3 Memory
Water cooling system
50" widescreen monitor


On a seperate note, I want to install vista with bootcamp, but ive lost my bloody OSX disc that came with my laptop.... anybody know If I can get hold of another?

 

[0098386]

Haha, yeah, I love those people who post on the internet.

"Hey, I have the following PC will it run Half life 2?

5TB HDD
5.8Ghz Extreme Overclocked
Nvidia® GeForce® GTX 295 extreme edition
2800MHz DDR3 Memory
Water cooling system
50" widescreen monitor

You know a lot of people do that for the most basic of games with the most mid-high end of Macs. "Will my MBP run the Sims 3?" Of course if fekkin will!

 

[iAlexG]

I find the Mac gaming experience really good since my last laptop (HP, bought summer 2008) had a 64mb Graphics Card!!!! 10yr old tech!!!! so I could only play Halo and even that ran horrible. Now I have 13 macbook pro and I can play COD4 and Quake and Sauerbraten etc. (even though the COD4 port is bad) Sauerbraten Rules!!!

 

[BrianKonarsMac]

Macs and OS X will never run games well - in the near or immediate future anyways - without DirectX. DirectX is the standard, and it's simply not available on Mac OS X. Games aren't (in general) coded for OpenGL - and it's VERY rare to find a developer that supports it (afaik, Blizzard is the ONLY developer to do simultaneous releases... there are probably others but none I'm familiar with).

Sadly, my next computer will not be a Mac for this exact reason. I work in computer games and cannot afford to continue to be hindered by my Mac. Mac OS X - how I love (and will miss) thee.

 

[chaos86]

Yeah until DirectX is is either available on the Mac, or is replaced by something more cross-platform, we won't see either the same number of games, or the same performance.

What would be nice would be a new standard made by someone other than Microsoft. It may sound weird, but we already have cross-platform programming environments for other types of applications, like Java, C, etc. Why not a new standard made for games. ATI or NVidia, get on it.

 

[Plutonius]

Macs and OS X will never run games well - in the near or immediate future anyways - without DirectX. DirectX is the standard, and it's simply not available on Mac OS X. Games aren't (in general) coded for OpenGL - and it's VERY rare to find a developer that supports it (afaik, Blizzard is the ONLY developer to do simultaneous releases... there are probably others but none I'm familiar with).

Sadly, my next computer will not be a Mac for this exact reason. I work in computer games and cannot afford to continue to be hindered by my Mac. Mac OS X - how I love (and will miss) thee.

Hmmm, Microsoft developing DirectX for the Mac or even allowing OS X to use DirectX.

Never going to happen........

 

[darkcurse]

Hmmm, Microsoft developing DirectX for the Mac or even allowing OS X to use DirectX.

Never going to happen........

But Apple licensing DirectX technology and using it on OS X has a higher probability of happening. Then again the fanboys would probably go ape over this.

 

[Sun Baked]

But Apple licensing DirectX technology and using it on OS X has a higher probability of happening. Then again the fanboys would probably go ape over this.

But with apple's lust for freeware and open versions of technology to replace paid licenses ... it likely won't happen unless MS goes with the Dolby model and ask pennies.

 

[darkcurse]

Yeah I hate to say it but unless something drastic happens to OpenGL in the near future DirectX will just keep on improving and moving ahead. Aside from the Microsoft Office suite, DirectX is the only other good thing to come out from Redmond IMHO.

 

[BrianKonarsMac]

What would be nice would be a new standard made by someone other than Microsoft. It may sound weird, but we already have cross-platform programming environments for other types of applications, like Java, C, etc. Why not a new standard made for games. ATI or NVidia, get on it.

There is another standard, called OpenGL. It's just that it's not supported by game developers because I believe (feel free to correct me anyone who is knowledgeable on the subject... I'm going off memory of what I read years ago) OpenGL does not provide the same functions/features that are available with DirectX (again, could be totally wrong or may not even be the case as of late).

OpenGL isn't taken very seriously as far as I can tell - the majority of games are designed around DirectX (in general). OpenGL needs to be brought up to par (and probably go beyond) the standard set by DirectX before it will have a chance of becoming the preferred standard.

Kind of like taking down MS Word with another word processor. There are others out there but none that have the same market penetration, and therefore replacing it is an unlikely scenario in the near future - despite there being a plethora of free (or relatively inexpensive) open source alternatives.

Hmmm, Microsoft developing DirectX for the Mac or even allowing OS X to use DirectX.

Never going to happen........

Nowhere did I say it was...read my post.

 

[Rodus]

Anything done in direct x can be done in opengl, and it certainly is an gaming industry standard as both the PS3 and Wii use it, when you take into account these consoles, plus Linux and OS X (and older stuff like gamecube), the user base for opengl systems is actually pretty massive.

 

[manmeet]

What?

I think no.. but why don't you buy vm fusion, if you hate rebooting!

 

[Plutonius]

But Apple licensing DirectX technology and using it on OS X has a higher probability of happening. Then again the fanboys would probably go ape over this.

Microsoft will NEVER license DirectX technology to Apple and allow it to be used in OS X. One big advantage Microsoft has is in gaming and they would never give it up except if the courts forced them to.

 

[Plutonius]

Yeah I hate to say it but unless something drastic happens to OpenGL in the near future DirectX will just keep on improving and moving ahead. Aside from the Microsoft Office suite, DirectX is the only other good thing to come out from Redmond IMHO.

OpenGL is an open standard and any changes have to be approved by the industry (including Microsoft). Microsoft is NEVER going to allow OpenGL to seriously compete with Microsoft's DirectX. Face the facts, games will never run as well under OS X and there is nothing Apple can do.

 

[Rodus]

^^what? Of course OpenGL directly competes with DirectX, it is it's main competitor, and Microsoft is not part of the Khronos group who handle OpenGL so their input is either minuscule or non-existent. Mac gaming could be as good as PC gaming if the drivers were better optimized and games totally re-done in OpenGL, it'll never happen but it's still possible in theory.