OS X Mac Gaming is Awesome!

[Madd the Sane]

Also, Windows had 3D sound via APIs like Directsound3D since the late 90's. Even Windows games could use some work in the sound department though. Especially after they've moved towards more Xbox oriented APIs for the sound rather than DirectSound. Although games like Alan Wake use those APIs perfectly.

AMD is making hardware accelerated sound chips into their latest GPUs with enhanced 3D sound capabilities and software to go with it (TrueAudio). But I don't know if OS X support is in the cards. Also, I don't know if Nvidia is working on anything similar.

Even if you aren't a sound nut or you don't care about surround sound having a well implemented and optimized sound would benefit you as well at least from the performance standpoint. Or even just making stereo sound have better panning.

DirectSound 3D is deprecated and is not available in Vista and later. DirectSound is just deprecated. I think Microsoft's new method is to use a new API called XAudio.

Creative Audio, whose sound cards used DirectSound 3D, suggests you use OpenAL instead. There's even a wrapper that will wrap DirectSound 3D calls to OpenAL.

 

[smoketetsu]

DirectSound 3D is deprecated and is not available in Vista and later. DirectSound is just deprecated. I think Microsoft's new method is to use a new API called XAudio.

Creative Audio, whose sound cards used DirectSound 3D, suggests you use OpenAL instead. There's even a wrapper that will wrap DirectSound 3D calls to OpenAL.

I mentioned that.. Xaudio is that Xbox oriented API I was talking about. Most Unreal Engine games use that now rather than OpenAL even though OpenAL is more cross platform and can give better hardware accelerated audio for the most part. The majority of recent UE3 titles use Xaudio in Windows without an option to use anything else. Even if there's entries for it in the .ini files they don't work.

More game still use DirectSound than you might think though even though it's deprecated. I've noticed this because I've wrapped a lot of games in Wine and only Xaudio or OpenAL based ones give true multichannel surround sound when it's enabled in the sound card. On many games that don't including quite a few made within the past five years I've noticed it's because they use dsound when I would check the error logs and latest Wine revisions it explicitly says it don't have full support for that right now in dsound so it lowers their sound output to two channels.

There's at least one exception though.. Dead Space with an older version of Crossover's Wine engine. Somehow that enables 5.1 dsound channels with that particular game.

By the way that wrapper (ALchemy) you are referring to really only helps people out who have creative labs cards in Windows. It doesn't help out at all in OS X. Perhaps in parallels (or of course bootcamp) when one hooks up an external creative labs card to it. Which speaking of parallels there seems to be a bit more compatibility for software based multichannel dsound there than in Wine at the moment.

Either way multichannel sound support seems to be rather scattered in that most games don't seem to support it properly whether they use Xaudio, Dsound or OpenAL. Creative Labs hasn't really been supporting OpenAL much from what I've read either. It's mostly porting studios that are using it when porting games from Windows to Mac these days from what I can tell.

Many studios just port to basic stereo sound though and others don't test to see if the channels are used correctly. Certain games seem to only have proper multichannel sound by serendipity (such as the Batman Arkham games in OS X).... and many just inherit the problems the game originally had on Windows especially Xaudio based ones being wrapped to OpenAL. Such that even though it's working it doesn't send onscreen dialog for example to the center channel as it should. As with anything there's always exceptions however such as Alan Wake uses Xaudio and has perfect channel usage no matter if ran in Wine or a Parallels VM.

Also, not all OpenAL implementations are made equal and some only support two channels. OpenAL-Soft is the best but not everyone uses it.

 

[mintfan7200]

It should not be that hard for developers to port PC games to the mac , I just think it comes down to Mac users not being a big enough market for game companys . They probably do not care as much either because they know Mac users can just run windows in bootcamp or a virtual machine , so at that point why should they care ? Developing games costs a lot of money and it just is not worth it to them . Also Computer Gaming has been less popular over the years and even though I think Computer Gaming is better than consoles it does not matter they are in the market to make the most money that is why you see less computer games in general the big money is on the game consoles and in the mobile market .

 

[edddeduck]

It should not be that hard for developers to port PC games to the mac.

It's the same amount of work as porting to a console or PC. It's still months of work to target and optimise for the platform. Sometimes it requires large rewrites or optimisations specific to the platform (often every platform has platform specific optimisations to get performance and work around that platforms limitations).

Edwin

 

[N19h7m4r3]

Also Computer Gaming has been less popular over the years and even though I think Computer Gaming is better than consoles it does not matter they are in the market to make the most money that is why you see less computer games in general the big money is on the game consoles and in the mobile market .

It's the opposite actually PC gaming is going from strength to strength, and constantly growing.

http://hexus.net/gaming/news/industry/65265-idc-predicts-pcmac-gaming-revenue-will-grow-5-2017/

http://www.techspot.com/news/52070-pc-game-sales-hit-20-billion-last-year-no-signs-of-slowing.html

http://www.mcvuk.com/news/read/pc-now-the-uk-s-fastest-growing-games-platform/0123518

http://ie.ign.com/articles/2013/09/04/why-pc-gaming-has-exploded

Things are constantly improve, and Valve are working with other Developers on moving to OpenGL, as they've noticed the Chinese market is still using Windows XP. Which means no current Direct X versions, while the latest OpenGL is supported.

 

[mintfan7200]

It's the same amount of work as porting to a console or PC. It's still months of work to target and optimise for the platform. Sometimes it requires large rewrites or optimisations specific to the platform (often every platform has platform specific optimisations to get performance and work around that platforms limitations).

Edwin

Thats why they do not do it , it does not benefit the game companys in any way because the Mac market is too small for them to care . That is why you have mostly windows games . All we can really hope for is that streaming games will become a reality because that would allow you to game on any operating system and any hardware and it would also allow cross-platform multiplayer which would be amazing .

 

[thejadedmonkey]

This is simply saying that judged on its own merits Mac gaming is awesome and I still maintain it is.

...

I think we need to stop comparing OS X to Windows here. It isn't Windows. It doesn't offer DirectX. It also isn't Playstation 4 or Xbox One. It isn't Nintendo either. It's Mac OS X and there's a lot of good games one can enjoy on Mac OS X. That's all I was saying.

Well sure, if you compare something in a vacuum it's always great. Hell, the graphics on my SNES are out of this world, as long as you only compare it to an Atari or NES.

But if compare PC gaming to Mac gaming, PC gaming is always going to win. Hands down. Heck, Apple doesn't even make a computer that you can upgrade the GPU on anymore. I'm not sure what your point is OP, besides 'compared to nothing, something is better than nothing'.

 

[Dirtyharry50]

Well sure, if you compare something in a vacuum it's always great. Hell, the graphics on my SNES are out of this world, as long as you only compare it to an Atari or NES.

But if compare PC gaming to Mac gaming, PC gaming is always going to win. Hands down. Heck, Apple doesn't even make a computer that you can upgrade the GPU on anymore. I'm not sure what your point is OP, besides 'compared to nothing, something is better than nothing'.

I think you missed my point entirely. I'm not comparing anything to anything in a vacuum. I'm not comparing anything at all. I was saying that taken on its own merits, Mac gaming today is awesome. I think that it is. There is lots of really great stuff to play nowadays and more keeps coming out each month. There are more games available that I like than I have time for on Mac. I think that is great. It has nothing to do with Windows or any other platform. I think it is possible to celebrate the Mac platform doing well without needing to compare it to other platforms in a negative way.

I own a Macintosh computer. So I'd rather play games made to run on it. Considering there are plenty of good ones to choose from that works for me. I understand there are a lot of titles on Windows that are not on OS X. If those are important to someone (they are not important to me) then by all means they need Windows. But this is not different from needing a PS4 or a Xbox One for their exclusives really except that I will concede that the numbers are higher. The thing is, I only have so much time. Games like Borderlands 2 or XCOM or the Baldur's Gate I and II remakes are all 100+ hour experiences alone. Replayable strategy games such a Civ V or the Total War series put out by Feral are hundreds of hours. So are the Paradox grand strategy games very time consuming to play. I play World of Warcraft and I don't want to admit how much time I've spent there. Then there is stuff like Diablo III and StarCraft II that can also eat up quite a lot of gaming hours and the list goes on. These are not games that suck, you know? Well, some may argue about some of them but I think you get my point.

I can come up with thousands of hours of Native Mac entertainment that is good stuff and there is only so much time to play. That is why I feel that at this point, Mac gaming has reached awesomeness I guess. There is a ton of great stuff to play. Yes, Windows has even more, a lot more but who has the time?

What it really comes down to is how important are certain exclusives more than anything else. I'm not arguing somebody shouldn't get Windows if they want those exclusives, fine, get Windows in some fashion then. But I will still argue that Mac gaming is great and has a lot to offer.

 

[thejadedmonkey]

Mac gaming has a lot to offer, don't get me wrong. I just don't know that you can give it a qualifier without something to qualify (or compare) it against.

 

[Huntn]

Mac gaming has a lot to offer, don't get me wrong. I just don't know that you can give it a qualifier without something to qualify (or compare) it against.

The same in physics...

 

[smoketetsu]

All we can really hope for is that streaming games will become a reality because that would allow you to game on any operating system and any hardware and it would also allow cross-platform multiplayer which would be amazing .

And say goodbye to user made mods and being able to play offline for starters. Also, not everyone has great low ping internet connections. I'd just as soon quit gaming if push game to shove and streaming was my only option.

Anyway, especially with native ports, virtualization, wine and as a last resort bootcamp I don't think Mac gaming is so bad that we have to sit around hoping for cloud gaming to take off. I don't even bootcamp at all at the moment. I'd do that or get another spare gaming PC before I ever put my eggs into the cloud basket. To me cloud gaming is like cutting off ones nose to spite their face.

And yeah, PC Gaming is not dying.. on the contrary it's gaining momentum yet again. Windows PC is getting more and more titles some studios are even returning to PC such as fighting game developers and Japanese gaming developers. Square Enix is even talking about bringing more Final Fantasy games to PC.

I've been playing quite a few games in parallels lately since those games that I want to play aren't available in Mac Steam.

 

[edddeduck]

All we can really hope for is that streaming games will become a reality because that would allow you to game on any operating system and any hardware and it would also allow cross-platform multiplayer which would be amazing .

I don't think we should hope for streaming games, it is a flawed technology and will mean no more modding, offline play, and laggy experiences (until the entire internet has gigabit speeds and 1ms pings).

Turn based or slower games work fine but even when steaming on a local network you get noticeable lag on fast twitch games (try and play racing games on streaming for example) so it will never be a perfect solution and locally hosted games will always be better.

Edwin

 

[mintfan7200]

I don't think we should hope for streaming games, it is a flawed technology and will mean no more modding, offline play, and laggy experiences (until the entire internet has gigabit speeds and 1ms pings).

Turn based or slower games work fine but even when steaming on a local network you get noticeable lag on fast twitch games (try and play racing games on streaming for example) so it will never be a perfect solution and locally hosted games will always be better.

Edwin

I am not saying its going to happen tomorrow but just look at the PS4 it is already happening with being able to stream PS3 games . I think that is where the gaming industry is heading , people may not like it but it is going to happen eventually as the technology evolves over time .

 

[mintfan7200]

And say goodbye to user made mods and being able to play offline for starters. Also, not everyone has great low ping internet connections. I'd just as soon quit gaming if push game to shove and streaming was my only option.

Anyway, especially with native ports, virtualization, wine and as a last resort bootcamp I don't think Mac gaming is so bad that we have to sit around hoping for cloud gaming to take off. I don't even bootcamp at all at the moment. I'd do that or get another spare gaming PC before I ever put my eggs into the cloud basket. To me cloud gaming is like cutting off ones nose to spite their face.

And yeah, PC Gaming is not dying.. on the contrary it's gaining momentum yet again. Windows PC is getting more and more titles some studios are even returning to PC such as fighting game developers and Japanese gaming developers. Square Enix is even talking about bringing more Final Fantasy games to PC.

I've been playing quite a few games in parallels lately since those games that I want to play aren't available in Mac Steam.

PC gaming is not going away and I do think it is a better experience than consoles but all I am saying is game developers make the most money on the consoles and in the mobile market . If streaming games became a reality all of the different markets could play together which really is not a bad thing . It may take 5 - 10 years but gaming is moving towards streaming technology .

 

[star-affinity]

Kingdom Come: Deliverance

Yes! That game is something to look forward to for sure.

On topic: I agree that Mac gaming hasn't been better when it comes to the amount of titles being released (even if it's still quite a bit from Windows) but the problem I have is simply that the same game always runs better in Windows on the same hardware. This is of course not noticed when playing simpler games, but it's quite obvious on more demanding games. The frame rate can be fine fine in simple scenes but as soon as som action is going on the frame rate drops much lower than it would have if playing in Windows. This ruins a lot of the experience in my opinion.

Even League of Legens which is a relatively simple game graphics wise drops in frames per second on my computer as soon as there's a little action. If I boot into Windows there's a steady 60 frames per second no matter what. I know LoL is considered beta for OS X at the moment, but still. There's similar behaviour in many other games (WoW, Dota 2, Borderlands 1 and 2, Diablo 3, Starcraft 2 etc.)

I know the thread started asked not to discuss performance, but now I did it anyway, sorry. But it's of big concern for me (and many others).

 

[edddeduck]

I am not saying its going to happen tomorrow but just look at the PS4 it is already happening with being able to stream PS3 games . I think that is where the gaming industry is heading , people may not like it but it is going to happen eventually as the technology evolves over time .

There have been a number of streaming companies in recent years they all have failed or have issues with performance and lag even when on a super high performance internet connection. I think the games industry is interested in streaming but it does have some massive costs associated with it along with technical issues that might well mean it is never the primary way of doing things.

For example right now everyone buys a console each that is paid for by the user. If you have streaming every games company will need to have computers that equal a very large percentage of the entire install base. If you have two smash hit games that sell 10 million copies each within 3 months you need the server and internet bandwidth to run and stream 20 million games at once.

Instead of having the customer own the hardware you have to buy and maintain the hardware and the streaming technology and bandwidth costs with multiple server farms worldwide. Suddenly a smash hit game could be a negative thing as all your other games and your entire service could get degraded performance. The opposite thing could happen and you could get a poorly selling title yet you have just paid for half a billion dollars of hardware and internet bandwidth and you are not using it. Unlike with a console all publishers will likely want to have their own streaming service so you get even more fixed costs...

The more you look into streaming the more you can see it is not the super simple solution it looks like at first. I am not saying it will never happen but I personally can't see it happening for well over a decade as the problems are large and the solutions are not simple.

Edwin

 

[mintfan7200]

There have been a number of streaming companies in recent years they all have failed or have issues with performance and lag even when on a super high performance internet connection. I think the games industry is interested in streaming but it does have some massive costs associated with it along with technical issues that might well mean it is never the primary way of doing things.

For example right now everyone buys a console each that is paid for by the user. If you have streaming every games company will need to have computers that equal a very large percentage of the entire install base. If you have two smash hit games that sell 10 million copies each within 3 months you need the server and internet bandwidth to run and stream 20 million games at once.

Instead of having the customer own the hardware you have to buy and maintain the hardware and the streaming technology and bandwidth costs with multiple server farms worldwide. Suddenly a smash hit game could be a negative thing as all your other games and your entire service could get degraded performance. The opposite thing could happen and you could get a poorly selling title yet you have just paid for half a billion dollars of hardware and internet bandwidth and you are not using it. Unlike with a console all publishers will likely want to have their own streaming service so you get even more fixed costs...

The more you look into streaming the more you can see it is not the super simple solution it looks like at first. I am not saying it will never happen but I personally can't see it happening for well over a decade as the problems are large and the solutions are not simple.

Edwin

It is not ready yet I am aware of that , but as hardware and broadband improve its just a matter of time . There have been a lot of streaming game services that have failed your correct . ONLIVE is one that is still going and it is very interesting but they do not have that many titles . It is not ready for prime time yet . In the next 5 - 10 years I see streaming becoming the way people play games . Who knows maybe I am completly wrong , it is just my opinion . People thought steaming videos and movies would never happen too but it eventually happend .

 

[edddeduck]

as hardware and broadband improve its just a matter of time

My point is it might not be a matter of time. Games always use the most powerful computing power available at the highest resolutions possible. This means no matter the technology level games will likely want to use the most expensive high end options.

This does not rule out streaming but it does mean it will likely cost hundreds of millions if not billions to get a solution working and that might just cost way too much compared to people installing a machine in their house instead. I can see it being more like Steam+ in the future.

People would have local hardware (with no streaming of the actual game) but you stream in the game data to the machine while you play. A bit like Steam but you can start playing while you download the data (i.e. once level one is downloaded you start playing and the rest streams in while you play the game) This would mean you don't need to download the entire game before starting to play but means you avoid the huge costs, internet lag and other issues with a pure streaming device.

I guess we can come back to this thread in decade and see who was right

Edwin

 

[mintfan7200]

I guess we can come back to this thread in decade and see who was right

Edwin

Yup it is just an interesting discussion to me , I may be wrong but who knows . As long as game developers keep making good games I will be happy either way .

 

[whooleytoo]

Mac gaming has a lot to offer, don't get me wrong. I just don't know that you can give it a qualifier without something to qualify (or compare) it against.

Ok, how about: "Mac Gaming is Awesome!!! - compared to staring at a blank wall"

As a platform with a relatively low market-share, it's never going to have a library of gaming titles to compare with PC or consoles; but there are enough titles out there to have fun. As someone who can remember being deliriously happy when I heard just two PC titles were being ported to the Mac - Lemmings and Prince and Persia - I think I can safely say Mac gaming is a lot better now. Not a huge number of AAA titles, no. But several companies brining cross-platform titles as standard, and a large number of very cheap titles on Steam / Mac App Store.

 

[edddeduck]

Yup it is just an interesting discussion to me , I may be wrong but who knows . As long as game developers keep making good games I will be happy either way .

Likewise.

Edwin

 

[Dirtyharry50]

Mac gaming has a lot to offer, don't get me wrong. I just don't know that you can give it a qualifier without something to qualify (or compare) it against.

I think Pecan Pie is awesome. I am sure of it.

Do I need to compare and contrast Pecan Pie with other Pies to validate this for anyone or is it okay for me to just be enthused about a pie I love?

And I'm pretty sure physics don't come into play here.

 

[Solomani]

I think Pecan Pie is awesome. I am sure of it.

Do I need to compare and contrast Pecan Pie with other Pies to validate this for anyone or is it okay for me to just be enthused about a pie I love?

And I'm pretty sure physics don't come into play here.

Physics only comes into play if Pecan Pie hits the face.

Otherwise, you must embrace the truthiness. Olallieberry Pie is the best pie.

 

[Dirtyharry50]

Physics only comes into play if Pecan Pie hits the face.

Otherwise, you must embrace the truthiness. Olallieberry Pie is the best pie.

Hmm, I never had that one. That's a real pie?

 

[Solomani]

Hmm, I never had that one. That's a real pie?

In California it is.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Olallieberry

Sadly, about 90% of Californians have never heard of it either. It might be because peak harvest season is only 4-5 weeks during the summer. Olallieberry Pie is Awesome!!! And I don't need physics to prove it.

If you're in California during June, ask for it at any pie chain (Marie Callenders, Pollys). You won't regret it.

http://www.sfgate.com/food/seasonalcook/article/Olallie-season-is-short-and-sweet-2533292.php

I must now mention something about Mac gaming, like the fact that FTL Advanced Edition is coming any day now (for Mac and iPad!) so stoked, or else face the wrath of the MacRumors Anti-Pie Police.