In 3 years, 50% of all computers capable of playing AAA games will be Macs

[Amenard]

Because only few people only get computers for gaming. If you have a lot of money and space, sure. As I was saying, most folks out there that enjoy games do it on a machine bought for study/work/home use.



I don’t know the context of this quote, but it just sounds terribly wrong to me. No, a Ghz is not a GHz and no competent computer engineer would claim that. They mention AltiVec... so I guess it was back in times of PowerPC. Times have changed. I spent last couple of weeks building various open-source projects for my M1 and you know what? Almost everything just works. People just don’t write assembly code per hand anymore.



That’s what people were claiming ten years ago. Fast forward to today and there is actually talk of console makers quitting the business because the hardware is getting to large and too expensive. In mid-term perspective, my money for high-end gaming is on closure gaming services.

Apple Silicon has a potential to be a game changes simply because it’s a different paradigm. They need less space, power and memory bandwidth to do the same work graphics-wise.



I think your definition of a „gamer“ might be a bit restrictive. Sure, there are a lot of people who build large gaming PCs and buy latest 300Watt GPUs... but they are just a small part of the gamer demographics. Look at the steam hardware survey and will see what an average gamer uses. I certainly consider myself a passionate gamer and yet my primary gaming machine fir the last 8 years was a 15” MacBook Pro... and I could still play all the games I wanted.

It’s very unlikely that Macs will ever appeal to the „elite“ gamers (or whatever you want to call them). But as far as the gaming capability of a Mac goes... the original post is spot on. Rom the capability (performance, features) standpoint, any Apple Silicon Mac will be perfectly capable to run any contemporary AAA game - not on highest settings of course, but smooth enough to allow satisfactory gameplay. The same won’t be true for an average PC.

The majority of games on Steam aren't AAA titles. The majority of games on Steam are variation of Ios/Android games or Indies.

And "Gamers" do in fact buy the hardware upgrades. They're the main market for it. Companies like Asus, MSI, Gigabytes live and die by gamers upgrading their system to the best of what is available.

What you're and Senttoschool are mixing up with gamers are "casual". Those are people who play only occasionaly or younger kids playing on their parent computers or their first computer that their parents bought them on the cheap. Those aren't what the hardware market considers "gamers".

 

[leman]

The majority of games on Steam aren't AAA titles. The majority of games on Steam are variation of Ios/Android games or Indies.

And "Gamers" do in fact buy the hardware upgrades. They're the main market for it. Companies like Asus, MSI, Gigabytes live and die by gamers upgrading their system to the best of what is available.

What you're and Senttoschool are mixing up with gamers are "casual". Those are people who play only occasionaly or younger kids playing on their parent computers or their first computer that their parents bought them on the cheap. Those aren't what the hardware market considers "gamers".

Ah, and now we are arguing about nomenclature. I would very vocally disagree with your dichotomy of "gamers" vs. "casuals", but that's besides the point. And of course people who like games buy hardware upgrades... but what's important here is the fact that the high-end (and even mid-range) is only a small fraction of the market. The vast majority of people who consider themselves gamers use GPUs that sell for under $200... and AAA games need to run on that hardware (and they do). If "gaming" started at RTX 2060 and up, there wouldn't be much gaming to talk about, since the market would be too small. The reason why there is so much attention on the high-end is because it's prestigious, because that's where the bi money is and because that's what ultimately drives sales. But very few gamers will ever own an RTX 3070, and even fewer will ever see a real RTX 3090.

I would love to see a more detailed breakdown of gaming-grade hardware shipped in 2019/2020... I would be surprised if RTX 2060 or better even got 15% of the gaming market.

 

[diamond.g]

With such a large audience, why have we not gotten a port of Witcher 3 on iOS or macOS?

Has anyone gotten CP2077 running via CrossOver?

 

[thejadedmonkey]

Ah, and now we are arguing about nomenclature. I would very vocally disagree with your dichotomy of "gamers" vs. "casuals"

It's actually not besides the point at all. The people buying the AAA games, are gamers. The people buying Uno and Battleship for the mac, aren't buying Skyrim or Witcher 3.

And where do the people playing AAA games go? They all use a PC. Why do they all use a PC? Because Apple doesn't support AAA gamers at all, in any way shape or form. Until just this past month, you couldn't even get a mac that could play AAA games for under $1600 (compared to ~$800 for a PC).

If Apple continues to court gamers, and developers, then the AAA games will follow. If they don't, gamers will continue not buying macs, and developers will continue not developing for them.

Also keep in mind that the 1050 is a great card for yesterday. The PS5 and Xbox series S|X sets the bar for today, and that bar is, again, far beyond the $999 Macbook Air. This means that games will be written for the PS5/S|X and then tweaked to run on acceptable hardware that gamers own. And in 2 years, when a gamer upgrades the GPU, they'll have a whole new slew of games to play. In 2 years, a macbook air is only 1/4 through its lifecycle.

 

[Amenard]

Ah, and now we are arguing about nomenclature. I would very vocally disagree with your dichotomy of "gamers" vs. "casuals", but that's besides the point. And of course people who like games buy hardware upgrades... but what's important here is the fact that the high-end (and even mid-range) is only a small fraction of the market. The vast majority of people who consider themselves gamers use GPUs that sell for under $200... and AAA games need to run on that hardware (and they do). If "gaming" started at RTX 2060 and up, there wouldn't be much gaming to talk about, since the market would be too small. The reason why there is so much attention on the high-end is because it's prestigious, because that's where the bi money is and because that's what ultimately drives sales. But very few gamers will ever own an RTX 3070, and even fewer will ever see a real RTX 3090.

I would love to see a more detailed breakdown of gaming-grade hardware shipped in 2019/2020... I would be surprised if RTX 2060 or better even got 15% of the gaming market.

Oh poor you... You disagree with a definition on the internet. Sad...

Gaming, like every passtime, has casual people and more serious people. You could compare the videogame industry to the sport/training industry. Casual people do go to the gym or practice sports but you won't name them "athlete". You reserve that title to people who take sport more seriously or even make it a career. Same with gaming! There IS a difference between somebody who play games and a "gamer".

In a discussion about AAA videogames and hardware performances, nobody care about little Sophie playing Candy Crush on a potato computer. But ask those who take videogames seriously and want to be competitive or even just run the game at an acceptable framerate and quality if they want to play on a potato computer.

 

[leman]

It's actually not besides the point at all. The people buying the AAA games, are gamers. The people buying Uno and Battleship for the mac, aren't buying Skyrim or Witcher 3.

Well, I bought Skyrim, Witcher 3, and now Cyberpunk. I haven’t owned a PC in over 10 years. Am I now a gamer or not? I’m very confused.

In a discussion about AAA videogames and hardware performances, nobody care about little Sophie playing Candy Crush on a potato computer. But ask those who take videogames seriously and want to be competitive or even just run the game at an acceptable framerate and quality if they want to play on a potato computer.

What does Candy Crush have to do with all this? You are all over the place. What I am saying is not all people can afford or justify high-end hardware for that. For each UberLeetXXX with a fancy water cooled tower and an RTX 3080 there are 20 or more SimplePete’s who own a 1650 or a 5500RX. The vast majority of people who play AAA games have entry-level hardware, and it’s this entry level hardware that generates the substant part of the game industry revenue. If you have a problem with accepting this simple fact, I am not sure what kind of discussion we are capable of having here.

 

[diamond.g]

Well, I bought Skyrim, Witcher 3, and now Cyberpunk. I haven’t owned a PC in over 10 years. Am I now a gamer or not? I’m very confused.



What does Candy Crush have to do with all this? You are all over the place. What I am saying is not all people can afford or justify high-end hardware for that. For each UberLeetXXX with a fancy water cooled tower and an RTX 3080 there are 20 or more SimplePete’s who own a 1650 or a 5500RX. The vast majority of people who play AAA games have entry-level hardware, and it’s this entry level hardware that generates the substant part of the game industry revenue. If you have a problem with accepting this simple fact, I am not sure what kind of discussion we are capable of having here.

What platform did you buy Cyberpunk on?

 

[Amenard]

Well, I bought Skyrim, Witcher 3, and now Cyberpunk. I haven’t owned a PC in over 10 years. Am I now a gamer or not? I’m very confused.



What does Candy Crush have to do with all this? You are all over the place. What I am saying is not all people can afford or justify high-end hardware for that. For each UberLeetXXX with a fancy water cooled tower and an RTX 3080 there are 20 or more SimplePete’s who own a 1650 or a 5500RX. The vast majority of people who play AAA games have entry-level hardware, and it’s this entry level hardware that generates the substant part of the game industry revenue. If you have a problem with accepting this simple fact, I am not sure what kind of discussion we are capable of having here.

Oh, you're one of those... Ok, I won't waste my time with you.

 

[jeanlain]

With such a large audience, why have we not gotten a port of Witcher 3 on iOS or macOS?

Mac users that are able, or want, to play this game do not constitute a large audience.
Smartphones do not meet the requirements for this game.

 

[jeanlain]

Oh, you're one of those... Ok, I won't waste my time with you.

What's your point? That AAA games require RTX GPUs, DLSS, ray tracing and such? Well, you're wrong.

 

[leman]

What platform did you buy Cyberpunk on?

GOG. I play either on my 16” MBP (it can run it reasonably well under boot camp) or via GeForce Now on the rare occasion where the servers are not overloaded.

 

[leman]

Oh, you're one of those... Ok, I won't waste my time with you.

Yeah, I’m one of those people. I care more about how stuff actually is rather than categorizing people into “real gamers” and “casuals”.

 

[thejadedmonkey]

Yeah, I’m one of those people. I care more about how stuff actually is rather than categorizing people into “real gamers” and “casuals”.

You care, but I guarantee that the MBAs running EA or Activision don't care. If you buy AAA games, you go into that box. And the number of people like you who go into the AAA gamer box, and don't own a "gamer" spec'd PC, and have no console at home, is ridiculously small.

 

[UBS28]

Who buys a super expensive Mac for gaming when you can buy a $499 gaming console which runs games at 4K@120hz.

In 3 years time, there will be new consoles that will handle games at 8K probably.

 

[diamond.g]

What's your point? That AAA games require RTX GPUs, DLSS, ray tracing and such? Well, you're wrong.

But they sure look prettier with those features.

GOG. I play either on my 16” MBP (it can run it reasonably well under boot camp) or via GeForce Now on the rare occasion where the servers are not overloaded.

Ah so you bought the PC version. So you would count under the PC gamers camp from CD Project Red’s perspective.

 

[diamond.g]

Mac users that are able, or want, to play this game do not constitute a large audience.
Smartphones do not meet the requirements for this game.

It runs on a Switch. Not sure how it couldn’t run on an iPhone or iPad.

 

[redcaptrickster]

Listen, I don't doubt that the hardcore gamers will stick to Windows.

Hopefully, because hardcore gamers are some of the most annoying people on the planet. Imaging having to constantly read their rambling word-salad on these forums. No thanks.

 

[Erehy Dobon]

In three years, more people -- including Mac owners -- will be playing AAA titles via cloud gaming like GeForce NOW, etc.

Apple Silicon's superior performance will be less important because the computer will mostly be a big framebuffer for a fast Internet connection, at least for cloud-based gaming.

Nvidia is already charging a premium for RTX/DLSS for GeForce NOW. That's the future.

 

[jeanlain]

It runs on a Switch. Not sure how it couldn’t run on an iPhone or iPad.

These don't come with a controller out of the box. And how much storage space does the game use on the switch?
EDIT: that's apparently >28GB for the game + expansions.

Anyway, I'm not sure how this relates to our discussion about AAA games in the Mac. iPhones and iPads are not well equipped for AAA games. They don't have buttons, they have limited storage and people using these devices are not used to spending $50 on a game.
Even if there are plenty of iPhones and iPads our there, the number of people willing to pay that amount of money for a game that takes more storage than all their other apps combined, and which requires a game controller, is much smaller.

 

[diamond.g]

These don't come with a controller out of the box. And how much storage space does the game use on the switch?

28.1 GB. Doesn’t Apple have “smart” on screen control mapping?

 

[jeanlain]

Nvidia is already charging a premium for RTX/DLSS for GeForce NOW. That's the future.

I'm still not convinced that's the case. But it's hard to make predictions.

 

[jeanlain]

28.1 GB. Doesn’t Apple have “smart” on screen control mapping?

Never used them. From everything I hear, these on screen buttons are not panacea on games that have been designed with buttons in mind.
IMO, 28.1 GB is too much for an iPhone or iPad app. These devices are not game consoles. People use them to store all kind of things and can't afford dedicating that much space for a single app.
That's doesn't necessarily mean that an iOS version of Witcher 3 won't generate profit. Sometimes, developers and publishers don't make the most judicious decisions and may have preconceptions about mobile gaming.

 

[Erehy Dobon]

I'm still not convinced that's the case. But it's hard to make predictions.

It will grow over time. Certain segments of the gaming audience (like esports extremists) will likely stick with local hardware.

However take a game like Microsoft Flight Simulator 2020 for example. It brings the best PC gaming hardware to its knees and still requires a big fat network pipe to access the petabytes of terrain data, weather, textures, etc.

This is the ideal type of game that could work particularly well as a cloud-based title. The connection to the data servers no longer becomes an issue for the consumer. All of the most complex graphical tasks (volumetric clouds, advanced physics, ray tracing, etc.) are handled by the cloud servers and a little UI latency isn't a dealbreaker for this title.

Even an RPG like Cyberpunk 2077 doesn't really require lightning fast player interaction.

 

[JouniS]

It will grow over time. Certain segments of the gaming audience (like esports extremists) will likely stick with local hardware.

Certain segments like people living in rural areas. Or those using wireless connections in dense cities with many networks interfering with each other.

I'm less convinced about cloud-based gaming today than I was 10 years ago. Internet connections are still unreliable and in many cases slow, and the latency is variable and often high. Some people can play some games in the cloud, but local gaming hardware is going to stay popular for the foreseeable future.

 

[tubular]

It's not the GPU or the CPU... it's the underlying code being used. Microsoft will never abandon DirectX and Apple will never abandon Metal.

And OpenGL will remain deprecated, and Vulkan supported only through a third-party translation layer.