Rejoice, Steam is coming to OSX!

[Winni]

I wouldn't expect the entire Steam catalog to be ported to Mac.

Neither would I. On Windows, Steam began its life with Half-Life One and Two and the fistful of other Valve games and add-ons. The success of Steam was tightly coupled to the success of Half-Life 2.

But as they say: "If you build it, they will come." And they all came to Steam.

If they're serious about this, then Steam for Mac OS X will be launched together with Half-Life 2: Episode Three.

And Valve is about quality. They won't settle for some half-baked pseudo ports of their games. They will either provide the real thing or leave it completely.

However, I wouldn't put my hopes up. Gabe Newell and most of the other folks at Valve are either Ex-Microsoft employees or full Microsoft heads, and none of them ever had an affinity for Apple or the Apple platforms. Just as Apple never had an affinity for games before they needed a label for the iPod Touch that did not say "it's an iPhone without a phone".

Somehow, this whole things sounds like a highly unlikey marriage.

 

[Shunnabunich]

Valve is not going to port Steam and then have an empty store--there would be no point.

Agreed...although, IMHO, this is the reason it simply isn't gonna happen, rather than the reason developers are suddenly, inexplicably going to fall all over themselves to port games to OS X. My posts at AI's counterpart to this article:

Absolutely zero chance of this, or reason for Valve to do it. Next article, please.

OK, I realize I sounded very much like a troll in my previous post, but none of the opposing arguments so far have convinced me otherwise. Rewriting the Steam client for OS X isn't a trivial task (although I'm sure it's nothing like trying to port a game), and they'd be doing it for a handful of existing casual games, essentially providing a place to keep them in a list (which I already do with a stack on my Dock) and keep track of how many hours you've spent on each (which, admittedly, stacks don't do).

I've played Ciderized games, and they're such pale, quivering shadows of their former Windows selves that I'm tempted to say they simply don't count at all. Plus, we can't delude ourselves into thinking that any DirectX-based games would be given any more effort than a quick Cider wrap and boot out the door. It's all that's been happening in Mac gaming since the Intel transition, with the exception of developers like Blizzard and Id who were already developing games cross-platform from the ground up.

OpenGL is a graphics library, which only addresses one portion of what DirectX addresses — and from the anecdotal evidence I've seen around the web, DirectX is apparently easier, or more pleasant or something, to program for than OpenGL. The fact that a newer iteration of OGL is being adopted now doesn't change that. The amount of effort needed to rewrite a DirectX-based game engine to use not only a completely different underlying graphics framework, but a whole other set of OS-specific APIs is most likely monumental. As much as the Mac market has grown relative to its old size, it's still very small, making it doubtful whether it's enough to justify that kind of work.

I don't mind rebooting for more serious games (i.e. the HL2 series) because, having played Mac "ports" of them, the speed, graphical performance and hardware support they have on Windows is unmatchable. If Apple gave two shi—uhh, hoots about gaming outside of the iPhone OS, this might not be the case, but they've made it painfully clear for the last decade that they don't.

I'm sorry if this makes me a "Debbie Downer". There are many things about OS X that we can be exceedingly proud of. Games aren't one of them.

 

[Mr. Gates]

Puke !!! Just look at that Ugly GUI . Lets hope the Mac Port is a little easier on the eyes

 

[Shunnabunich]

Puke !!! Just look at that Ugly GUI . Lets hope the Mac Port is a little easier on the eyes

Hey now, I like it better than Luna!

 

[Demigod Mac]

They're probably going to have a Mac-specific store. Dig the legacy OS X games out of the dustbin, and cut deals with publishers like Aspyr and Feral to get new Mac titles in the store.

Valve's been moved to action since Apple is seriously gearing up for their gaming section, notably on the Apps store. (which Valve may see as a future threat to their commanding lead in digital download gaming sales, and porting Steam to Mac would make headway into the market)

Up until now, Valve has been able to ignore the Mac market without consequence. They see this changing in the near future.

 

[J Radical]

Please!

I will jump for joy is this turns out to be true, Steam rules.

It would give Mac users access to what is by far the best game distribution platform. Developers will take notice of OSX, and finally, after years of disappointment, Macs could get some games.

All we'll need then are Macs with decent graphics cards.

Gaming is an area Apple has long neglected, and Microsoft has excelled in.

 

[Dragonforce]

All we need now are Macs with decent graphics cards.

Hey, me got a GTX 285

 

[kainjow]

Somehow, this whole things sounds like a highly unlikey marriage.

I disagree. They had a few reps at WWDC 09 (June) and were definitely wanting to hire Mac devs. I spoke briefly with one of them. I would say it is a highly likely marriage.

 

[ARF900]

Dont get too excited guys, even if steam does come to mac, only Valve games that valve takes the time to port would work, GFW will never work for mac, and that alone is a large portion of the steam catalog.

EDIT: As I was going to youtube to check out the appearance of the steam beta (dont feel like booting up the PC) flash crashed safari and took iTunes with it. Guess ill check it out now.

 

[Glideslope]

Steam sucks.

 

[mattgoldey]

Valve, if I can just play Portal on my Mac I will promise to love you forever and ever and ever.

Greatest. Game. Ever.

Fact.

This can not be debated.

 

[meltingice]

Something tells me a lot of people reading this don't know anything about programming and cross-platform compatibility. Most modern games we play rely heavily on DirectX which is not supported by any means in Mac OSX. There are projects such as Cedega and Wine which attempt to emulate DirectX but do so poorly. In order to port games from a Windows environment with DirectX to a (Unix) Mac OSX environment you would need not only the source code for the game, but you would also need to rewrite pretty much the entire game engine to use something like OpenGL, which Mac OSX supports wonderfully.

As some people have stated, bringing Steam to Mac could really get the attention of game developers and could help encourage gaming development for Mac OSX, which would be pretty cool. Really curious what Valve has up their sleeves.

 

[ARF900]

Right, so its more of a possibility that Valve would write only new or very popular games to work on the mac. I think their goal would be to boast good sales for the mac and encourage other developers to make mac versions of games, but as I said in my above post. A lot of games out there are games for windows, so they will never be on mac.

 

[kiljoy616]

Interesting to be sure.

I've long since switched to Windows for games though. My gaming tastes are just to specific to settle for the thin outflow of Mac ports.

And the lack of high end graphics cards or SLI.

 

[kiljoy616]

Right, so its more of a possibility that Valve would write only new or very popular games to work on the mac. I think their goal would be to boast good sales for the mac and encourage other developers to make mac versions of games, but as I said in my above post. A lot of games out there are games for windows, so they will never be on mac.

I really can't see Valve porting games to the mac. Unless like Apple they are thinking of porting over low end games which could run on the lower end video cards found on Mac's. They could port over OpenGL based games or start their own little store to sell to the mac crowd.

Considering how much Apple has been selling for the ipod/iphone I could see them setting something similar for casual games for the mac, 2D games would not be a long stretch for them to do. But I don't see them porting over higher end games where most Mac's would find hard to run and forget FPS those are not happening.

 

[TheSpaz]

I was kind of tired of rebooting all the time, so I bought a PS3. The games are guaranteed to work and there's a lot of games for it that they just don't make for computers. (Skate, Uncharted)… the PS3 has been a lot of fun for me lately. It gets me out of my room and instead of hunched over a desk, I can sit on my couch and use my 40" HDTV. It's a bit challenging to get used to first person shooters on the PS3, but it's getting better over time. I'm starting to learn how to take my time before shooting someone.

It would be cool if Steam came to Mac, but I fear that the games will still be under-developed and will not run as smooth as the native PC version. Not only that, but it will take a while to port the games over to the Mac… it will be a very slow process (if they're planning on doing it right instead of just packing it in a transgaming app).

I say… if you really wanna game… get a console… the computer is just too much work.

 

[kiljoy616]

Hey, me got a GTX 285

Sweet!

HAHA, when I see a GTX on an imac then we can talk games for mac, till them is a mute endeavor that we will see anything good for a long time to come.
I know Mac's user been wanting real graphic cards for some time, but they never came, at least not in a way that would benefit high end gamers.

 

[mtnDewFTW]

That's pretty cool, but I never used Steam, or even heard much about it until now. I'm sure this is good news for gamers, but I don't play games that much, and when I do, I do it on my xbox 360. I was never a big fan of computer games.

 

[Legolover64]

Steam sucks.

Wow, that's a really great statement. My favorite is when you backed it up with an apple logo. Great job!

Have you used Steam? Steam is to games what iTunes is to the music industry: it revolutionized the way they were bought and played, and makes managing them a pleasure.

I find incredible comfort in the fact that I can lose my computer, AND all my game CDs AND all my CD/serial keys and STILL have access to ALL my games. For free. Download them, and Valve fronts the bandwidth costs. Absolutely amazing.

Why are so many people just ignorantly hateful against things with no explanation?

 

[Proji]

one word.... sweet!

if this is a sign that steam is being ported to OS X native, and Valve also go on to port HL2, TF2 etc to Mac native then that would truly be the mutt's nuts

i'm keeping my fingers crossed

 

[iansilv]

Not sure if that is definitive proof, but I'd be very happy if that occurred. Pretty much the only reason for me to Boot Camp my two macs is Steam.

Amen to that!

 

[iansilv]

Wow, that's a really great statement. My favorite is when you backed it up with an apple logo. Great job!

Have you used Steam? Steam is to games what iTunes is to the music industry: it revolutionized the way they were bought and played, and makes managing them a pleasure.

I find incredible comfort in the fact that I can lose my computer, AND all my game CDs AND all my CD/serial keys and STILL have access to ALL my games. For free. Download them, and Valve fronts the bandwidth costs. Absolutely amazing.

Why are so many people just ignorantly hateful against things with no explanation?

well put

 

[laelfrog]

Sweet!! Steam on Linux!! Oh yea, OSX too...

 

[Glideslope]

Wow, that's a really great statement. My favorite is when you backed it up with an apple logo. Great job!

Have you used Steam? Steam is to games what iTunes is to the music industry: it revolutionized the way they were bought and played, and makes managing them a pleasure.

I find incredible comfort in the fact that I can lose my computer, AND all my game CDs AND all my CD/serial keys and STILL have access to ALL my games. For free. Download them, and Valve fronts the bandwidth costs. Absolutely amazing.

Why are so many people just ignorantly hateful against things with no explanation?

I close all posts with the apple Logo. Yes, I have Steam on my Win 7 Drive on my early 08 MP Dual 2.8.

I use it for G-T-R EVO, and WTCC 07. I think it's code sucks. Windows Live is a much more stable interface, and that is sad. Even XFire is written better IMO. Only Game Spy ranks below Steam IMO. Which is why 95% of my Windows simulation time is on VATSIM in FSX. If you want to play games OSX is not your platform. Mobile OS 4.0 perhaps, or some day OSX with a Mobile Shell such as the current Front Row implementation, but nothing more.

Developers will not port except for iPad type apps. So get off your personal BS. My opinion was based on experience. It was my opinion, not a comment on your feelings.

 

[ugp]

My iMac can run any game you through at it in Windows with the ATI Radeon 256MB. I have no issues running MW2, Mass Effect 2, or Crysis all at max settings and very much playable frame rates.