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A gamer's lament: Apple please let us game on the Mac!
- Thread starter groove-agent
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Sorry, I don't follow your reasoning. Are you saying that because one game looks tacky there are no games that qualifies as being art? The quality of video games are as broad as the quality of books and movies. Of course there's some subjectivity added to that, but still; one bad book or movie doesn't make all books and movies bad.
Pretty big game that was released recently that also has a macOS version:
store.steampowered.com
Save 50% on A Total War Saga: TROY on Steam
Inspired by The Iliad and brought to life through the award-winning strategy game series, A Total War Saga: TROY brings a blend of grand, turn-based empire management and spectacular real-time battles to the heart of the Trojan War.
Makes sense for them. The engine is multi-platform, despite being 12 years old. Kinda surprising though they release something based on such an old engine. They've dropped native Linux support (which they have available) in favour for Valves Proton which is the recommended way to run it. Guess it saves a few bucks letting Valve hunt bugs in Proton instead of doing it for a native Linux version.Pretty big game that was released recently that also has a macOS version:
Save 50% on A Total War Saga: TROY on Steam
Inspired by The Iliad and brought to life through the award-winning strategy game series, A Total War Saga: TROY brings a blend of grand, turn-based empire management and spectacular real-time battles to the heart of the Trojan War.
Pretty big game that was released recently that also has a macOS version:
Save 50% on A Total War Saga: TROY on Steam
Inspired by The Iliad and brought to life through the award-winning strategy game series, A Total War Saga: TROY brings a blend of grand, turn-based empire management and spectacular real-time battles to the heart of the Trojan War.
System requirements are absurdly high on the Mac end of things compared to Winders.
That's what we get when games are not ported to the Mac by competent developers (like Feral).
Maybe that's because it on the Mac requires a newer version of Metal that only more recent computers can handle?
But I'm just guessing.
It is done by Feral: https://www.feralinteractive.com/en/mac-games/troytw/
Also funny that the requirements are different on their page compared to steam and no native M1 version.
This is kinda funny too “This game is not currently supported on volumes formatted as Case-sensitive.”
?
I hadn't looked at the requirements, but it turns out that the Mac requirements are reasonable.
Doesn't seem so out of this world to me. But oddly macOS requires 6GB more space for installation?!?
Not sure if @leman can confirm, but doesn't macOS/Metal require shaders to be precompiled (versus compiling at launch and storing in shader cache)?
It doesn’t really require anything, the developer has the choice. The usual shaders in Xcode projects are precompiled to an immediate format by default, but they still have to be compiled to the GPU-specific code on runtime (but it’s faster than compiling from text source). You can also build GPU-specific binaries to make everything even faster but frankly I never tried it so I don’t really know.
Still, 6GB for compiled shaders sound excessive…
With proton working this well native Linux gaming is as good as dead. Microsoft and DX12 are dictating the pace now. I am also worried about the future of Vulkan at this point. Once Vulkan stops being a priority target for windows, it stops being a priority target altogether and Linux gaming is in trouble.
Unless it is an HD Texture pack or more voice acting clips. ??♂️
Which can be an issue for MoltenVK ports.
This is quite a biggie, no?
www.macrumors.com
Eve Online Now Available Natively on Macs, Optimized for Apple Silicon
CCP Games today announced that popular MMORPG Eve Online is now available to play on both Intel and M1 Macs thanks to the launch of a new Mac client....
www.macrumors.com
It is a good thing, especially for folks that are paying to play. Though folks in that thread were saying that the launcher is native, but the game still needs Rosetta. Not sure how true that is (I don't have a AS Mac and haven't played EO in over a year).This is quite a biggie, no?
Eve Online Now Available Natively on Macs, Optimized for Apple Silicon
CCP Games today announced that popular MMORPG Eve Online is now available to play on both Intel and M1 Macs thanks to the launch of a new Mac client....
I hear you brother.
"Macs don't game" is an unfortunate reality us Mac gamers have to accept, but don't have to accept you know?
The truth is Apple doesn't know anything about AAA gaming.
30 years and 2 trillion dollars later, Apple has done nothing to address an obvious issue on their computer platform - The Mac.
In light of the M1 Pro/Max as "high end" laptops one would expect the complete computer experience of: - 'Work and play' but Macs can't play and is most likely the biggest reason why Macs/MacOS is but a small percentage of the total Computer/Desktop OS market with Windows ruling the roost and Linux potentially usurping MacOS overnight with Linux Proton and Steam Deck.
If many Mac users think that AAA gaming is not a big deal and is not the reason why Mac numbers are relatively small compared to Windows should think again.
MS owns the Enterprise market, consumer market when it comes to PC gaming, their number of software dwarfs Apple, Linux is embedded Infrastructure and the Internet, which leaves MacOS with only some pro-sumers and video/photo editors -- whoop tee doo.
No one wants to get Macs besides those who already have Macs and small segment of pro-sumers.....so what chance in Hell does Apple think it will draw PC, Xbox, PlayStation, Nintendo Switch and soon to be Steam Deck/Linux gamers to Macs?
Apple thinks they can wow a casual audience from mobiles on to Apple Arcade , when there is a good chance that same audience who game on their mobiles have a better device for the play at home experience.
Let's think about it.
Apple makes ok video, audio editing software and has efficient chips, BUT they don't know anything about games. The decisions and ideas are made from execs at Apple who don't know anything about AAA games, sure some might play some AAA games but it definitely does not reflect in how Apple goes about doing "gaming".
Which is why.....
Apple should employ those who work in the games industry to head up and lead a dedicated AAA gaming division of Apple.
Microsoft with all its resources and money KNEW they knew nothing about gaming, so left those who have experience, know how understanding to develop the Xbox disregarding the entrenched corporate culture in Microsoft.
The same needs to happen to Apple.
Don't excuse or defend Apple, demand better other wise Apple doesn't bother to do better.
"Macs don't game" is an unfortunate reality us Mac gamers have to accept, but don't have to accept you know?
The truth is Apple doesn't know anything about AAA gaming.
30 years and 2 trillion dollars later, Apple has done nothing to address an obvious issue on their computer platform - The Mac.
In light of the M1 Pro/Max as "high end" laptops one would expect the complete computer experience of: - 'Work and play' but Macs can't play and is most likely the biggest reason why Macs/MacOS is but a small percentage of the total Computer/Desktop OS market with Windows ruling the roost and Linux potentially usurping MacOS overnight with Linux Proton and Steam Deck.
If many Mac users think that AAA gaming is not a big deal and is not the reason why Mac numbers are relatively small compared to Windows should think again.
MS owns the Enterprise market, consumer market when it comes to PC gaming, their number of software dwarfs Apple, Linux is embedded Infrastructure and the Internet, which leaves MacOS with only some pro-sumers and video/photo editors -- whoop tee doo.
No one wants to get Macs besides those who already have Macs and small segment of pro-sumers.....so what chance in Hell does Apple think it will draw PC, Xbox, PlayStation, Nintendo Switch and soon to be Steam Deck/Linux gamers to Macs?
Apple thinks they can wow a casual audience from mobiles on to Apple Arcade , when there is a good chance that same audience who game on their mobiles have a better device for the play at home experience.
Let's think about it.
Apple makes ok video, audio editing software and has efficient chips, BUT they don't know anything about games. The decisions and ideas are made from execs at Apple who don't know anything about AAA games, sure some might play some AAA games but it definitely does not reflect in how Apple goes about doing "gaming".
Which is why.....
Apple should employ those who work in the games industry to head up and lead a dedicated AAA gaming division of Apple.
Microsoft with all its resources and money KNEW they knew nothing about gaming, so left those who have experience, know how understanding to develop the Xbox disregarding the entrenched corporate culture in Microsoft.
The same needs to happen to Apple.
Don't excuse or defend Apple, demand better other wise Apple doesn't bother to do better.
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Is that your feeling or intuition of how Apple "really doesn't get gaming", or do you have any facts at hand that you can share?
Finally, when was the last time you played a game on a Mac? You talk around the new M1 Pro and Max chips, but I'm not sure you how radical this change is!
See here:
And here:
And here:
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yes this is my feeling and it is evident it is the case.
Apple has a way of doing things their way and clearly it doesn’t gel with those who want to play AAA games on Macs.
30 years is long enough for Apple to get its crap together, but the FACT is Macs are crap for gaming in particular AAA. Anyone denying this isn’t doing platform any favors in by not improving it.
The M1 Pro/Max
look we all know the M1 chips are fast, efficient and powerful….for Apple applications, rendering, video editing all that work stuff, BUT after we get past all the marketing hype and Apple’s graphic benchmarks we have to see the things Apple didn’t show and for good reason.
The realworld AAA demonstrations are coming in and reviews based on game performance and they resoundly show Macs simply are NOT a gaming platform, they barely keep up with low power GT3060s on the gaming front with many caveats as well.
-slim number of native Mac games, some that no longer work anymore
Tombraider, Counter Strike, Wow? what about Cyberpunk, Doom… actually it’s easier just to list off old AAA games that run on Mac.
Then we have to rely on things like Rosetta 2 to get the 99% of Mac Steam games to run, which is like what 120 or so games?
Then if Mac gamers want to have access most modern AAA games we have to rely on crossover and Parallels and the overheads have shown abysmal performance…there’s heaps of YouTube videos demoing it right now.
Now I’m being questioned if I play games on Macs?
I’m not some Apple hater or Apple fanboy, I use Windows, MacOS, Linux, iPads, Androids, PS4/Xbox etc… I criticize the companies and I am rightfully criticizing Apple for their do nothing effort in trying to make Macs at least competent in running AAA games.
I have played games on Macs and I have to use Parallels to run some games not in the App Store or no longer working e.g. Rage.
Also I play mods and emulation.
I’m not going to excuse or defend Apple because that is half the problem.
Demand better from Apple in this regard or Apple will not bother to do better.
I think we should look at the future when it comes to this. Relatively good graphics hardware is getting into more and more hands of Mac users with Apple's silicon and a capable graphics API is there (Metal). I think the situation is better than it has been historically when it comes to this. But we'll see.
As long as a game performs about the same in macOS as it does in Windows (and Linux for that matter) I think there's a good reason for game developers to be on the platform. And we can see that there's a lot of new games coming out on Steam that's also available for Mac. I take it this is because of the Unity engine in many cases.
The problem is custom engines that are made with Microsoft's DirectX (and also for Playstation). Having to also make this work in macOS with Metal is yet another step. But as long as the hardware and software is in the hands of many Mac users and developers (which I think it will be over the coming years) I don't see why more AAA games shouldn't find their way to macOS.
Really interesting to see what happens with Apple's GPU performance the coming years compared to what AMD, Nvidia and Intel offers.
Well we know that AMD and nvidia are going to offer bigger dies, what is unclear is how much that would actually improve performance. AMD for sure needs to think about including "tensor" hardware and improving their not great RT performance. nvidia needs to be on a smaller node so they can pull less power.
I think Apple is on it's way to gaming with the new Apple Silicon personally. You just have to be patient. "Build it, they will develop".
Yeah, I mean if Apple can offer comparable graphics performance at a much lower power consumption there are even deeper reasons to get more gaming to happen on Apple's platforms.
I don't know if this was posted anywhere else in the thread:
I think that video has been posted before. I actually wonder how many development studios actually make games on a Mac (for PC/PS/Xbox).Yeah, I mean if Apple can offer comparable graphics performance at a much lower power consumption there are even deeper reasons to get more gaming to happen on Apple's platforms.
I don't know if this was posted anywhere else in the thread: