valve

Valve bringing Steam-supported Portal 2 to PS3 in April

According to a press release that went out to GameSpot and others this morning, the PlayStation 3 version of Valve Software's forthcoming Portal 2 will ship this April with support for an assortment of features that tie the game in with Valve's Steam PC gaming software.

Among the announced features, Valve says the PlayStation 3 version of the game will ship with cross-platform chat and multiplayer among PS3, PC, and Mac Portal 2 players, as well as support for Valve's Steamworks cloud-based storage system that lets gamers store saved game files, settings, and other data remotely to … Read more

Valve highlights gaming improvements from Apple

When it comes to graphics performance in OS X, Apple has taken the conservative approach and focused on compatibility and stability in drivers instead of including the cutting-edge and highly tweaked drivers and graphics systems that bring the best quality to performance-related applications like games.

This compatibility-based approach may be good for productivity applications to prevent potential crashes, but has kept Apple behind when it comes to gaming performance. For awhile this was not an issue, but the recent release of Valve's "Steam" client for the Mac along with a few other gaming titles have not only … Read more

Buzz Out Loud 1279: Seven keys to rule us all (podcast)

If the Internet breaks, the Tribe of Seven's secret library cards will re-start it. Also: Running your fingers through Princess Leia's hair... mmmm. And: Toss your zombie cookies now! Special guest: Dr. Kiki!

Modern Warfare 2 error yields free Left 4 Dead 2

Over the past two weeks, Valve's anti-cheat software automatically banned as many as 12,000 Call of Duty: Modern Warfare 2 soldiers on the grounds of bamboozlement.

The Seattle game developer has since overturned (for non-cheaters) the decision and is offering free copies of the zombie-killing shooter Left 4 Dead 2 as payment for time lost.

"This was our mistake, and I apologize for any frustration or angst it may have caused you," Valve president Gabe Newell wrote in an e-mail to afflicted players, according to a Steam forum user.

Get five Call of Duty games (PC) for $29.99

As many of you have written to tell me, Steam is having a colossal sale on games this week (and through July 4). One of the real standouts: the Call of Duty Collection for $29.99.

That includes the original Call of Duty and its two expansion packs, United Offensive and World at War. You also get Call of Duty 2 and Call of Duty 4: Modern Warfare. Given that the latter sells for $29.99 all by itself, it's like getting four bonus games free.

Other deals I'd definitely check out:

Star Trek Online for $16.99 … Read more

Gaming performance to improve soon on the Mac?

Apple's hardware is by no means inferior to the offerings from other manufacturers, and the OS capabilities are definitely there for high throughput calculations. Despite this, gaming on the Mac has had relatively lackluster performance, as was exemplified in the release of Steam for the Mac. While titles are increasingly being developed for the platform, the performance of various games can sometimes be half that of the same title running on similar hardware in Windows.… Read more

Portal 2 closed until 2011; 'public safety' cited

Valve may have only announced Portal 2 a few brief months ago, but the game's development has apparently already run afoul of some evil machination in the Aperture Science laboratories. On Wednesday, the Seattle-area studio announced that its follow-up to 2007's award-winning Portal has been bumped to 2011 on the Xbox 360 and PlayStation 3. The black-humored first-person puzzler had previously been scheduled to arrive this fall.

According to a release from the studio titled "Valve Announces Making Games is Hard," Portal 2's delay came about as part of "the successful completion of an … Read more

Mac gaming development seems to be ramping up

In the past, Mac gamers have had to deal both with delayed releases and poorly ported games on the Mac platform. With game developers using Windows-optimized code and not putting much effort into the Mac ports (at times contracting with other companies to do the Mac version), game titles either have not made it to the Mac, or have shown poor performance when running on the Mac. The Mac has been regarded by many companies as a second-tier gaming platform, but it appears that sentiment is changing.… Read more

Get Portal (PC and Mac) absolutely free

The game Portal is regarded by many to be one of the best of all time. GameSpot awarded it a 9.0 and an Editors' Choice. IGN called it "quirky, clever, polished, and presented with a spark of a subtly evil humor."

Originally part of Valve's The Orange Box bundle, then later a $20 standalone game, Portal is now available absolutely free. And not just for PCs, but also for Macs. (Speaking of which, be sure to check out Rich Brown's recent hands-on testing of Portal on four different Mac systems.)

The one and only string … Read more

Hands-on: Steam gaming on four different Macs

With four different Macs sitting in the CNET lab right now, Valve couldn't have picked a better time to release its Mac Steam client, at least from a testing perspective. We just spent the past few hours with Steam, as well as Portal and Torchlight, two of the more graphically demanding games available for Steam at launch. So far, we find Steam on the Mac just as seamless as the Windows version. The games are also mostly trouble-free.

First, to accompany this launch Valve is offering Portal as a free download until May 24. If you haven't played Portal, or even if you have, we recommend it. It's fun.

The Steam software itself should feel instantly familiar to anyone who's used the Windows version. Valve recently gave Steam a cosmetic overhaul, so even Steam veterans might need a minute to adjust, but overall it remains intuitive to navigate. One considerate touch: In the Steam store you'll see the full list of titles available for download, Windows titles included, but a mouse-over message will warn you if you hover over a game that's unavailable for the Mac. That will hopefully prevent any incompatible purchases. At launch, there were roughly 50 Mac titles available.

For the games themselves, we have few complaints about their performance on our various test systems. Granted, we'd expect neither the older Portal nor the purposefully lightweight Torchlight to challenge a halfway respectable computer. With more games coming to Steam for the Mac from Valve and (presumably) other game manufacturers, future titles may provide more of a challenge to the Macs we tested. For today at least, we find that Apple's higher-end Mac laptops and all-in-ones make capable gaming systems.

Our four test systems:

27-inch iMac with 2.8GHz Core i7, 512MB ATI Radeon HD 4850 27-inch iMac with 3.06GHz Core 2 Duo, 256MB ATI Radeon HD 4670 15-inch MacBook Pro with 2.66GHz Core i7, Nvidia GeForce 330M 13-inch MacBook Pro with 2.4GHz Core 2 Duo, Nvidia GeForce 320M… Read more