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"2) Special processing like surround, "EAX, etc. "
"-- can't wait for those OS X games to start rolling out "
*falls over laughing* |
Most people who aren't knowledgeable about Macs have this reaction
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| Uh, you all, I would happily use a mac for professional sound applications, and for DVD's, and anything *BUT* games....egad, no decent selection of games is gonna get released for macs... |
There is already quite a "decent" selection of games for the Mac. While the *number* of games for the Mac won't ever approach the *number* for Windows, the *quality* of games for the Mac is pretty good. Mac-only game developers release a lot of good stuff, plus the Mac usually gets the good Windows games ported. The downside is that sometimes it takes a few months to get them. The upside is that the games that do come to Mac are usually good -- we don't get 100 different crappy FPS's
But seriously -- if you're a hardcore gamer who cares about nothing else, go build your own Windows 98-based system and get all the games you want (or go buy a console system). But if you have a Mac, there are a LOT of great games out there, including a lot of the popular Windows games.
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| Shoot, if I wanted a Mac for gaming, I'd get the minimum necessary to play Escape Velocity and Marathon, but, even then, you've got Privateer, Privateer II, Independence War II coming out, Freelancer coming out (instead of EV), and, instead of Marathon, you've got Half Life, System Shock II, Deus Ex.... |
Man, Marathon was a classic -- graphics have gotten better since then, but the gameplay was YEARS ahead of anything on any platform. Even in terms of good network play and storyline it was ahead of its time. That was a great game.
But back to today
You do know, of course, that UT, Quake, Deus X, SiN, Rune, Diablo II, Myst III, Rogue Spear, Tropico, Fly II, Baldur's Gate and many other similar games are available for Mac? (Actually, some of those have been available for a long time, but they're still some of the most popular games on either platform.) All the mods work, too
Quake 3 Arena was actually developed on the Mac, and the new Doom engine is being co-developed under OS X, as is Warcraft III. Games like Halo will be Mac/PC releases. Other games like ShadowBane, Black&White, Max Payne, Myth III, Stronghold, and lots more are being ported now. Microsoft has pledged to release Mac versions of all their games. There is no dearth of good Mac games. Half-life is the only "must-have" game that isn't being ported (stupid move on their part). But I've heard that a couple of the porting companies are trying to pick it up.
On a similar topic usually brought up, anyone who says that Macs aren't fast enough/whatever to run games hasn't played online against a good Mac player at UT or Quake3
As for games for OS X, don't write that idea off -- the Mac games market is MUCH different now than it was a few years ago. Mac OS X is a great development platform, and Apple has finally realized that some people buy computers to play games
. Plus the Mac hardware is great for gaming now, and much easier for vendors to provide tech support for. So while the Mac market may be smaller, the development and support costs are also significantly less. And for those companies that don't want to port in-house, there are a few very talented game porting companies that are porting most of the big Windows games to the Mac.
Sorry, Gluegun, but it sounds like you've been reading too much "Maximum PC" LOL
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| I saw the demo of OS X at the big mac booth at an educational conference, and all I saw was a bunch of flashy stuff that I didn't really care for...... |
LOL, I think you must have saw the demo for Windows XP... the one that tries to look like OS X but is mainly just flashy stuff that doesn't work right
OS X itself is a pretty amazing OS. As someone who has used and supported Macs, Windows-based PCs, and UNIX systems, I'm really impressed -- it's got the ease of use of the Mac, a few really nice features from Windows, and the power/stability of UNIX. You can compile most UNIX programs for it, it runs older Mac software, and developers are really starting to like it. For my job I do a lot of statistical analysis and OS X has been fast and stable.
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| Oh, and Linus Torvalds, the guy who created Linux said that OS X basically made every mistake possible with trying to take the unix core..... |
Actually, what Torvalds said was that he was misquoted and misinterpreted. He said they made the wrong choice when they chose the BSD/Mach microkern. But that's also because he doesn't like microkerns. On the other hand, lots of other UNIX pros feel that BSD/Mach is a great core that provides features others don't.
