Valve games, Steam headed to Macs
Thanks to Valve's Steam, gaming on the Mac will be very much alive.
(Credit: Screenshot by Dong Ngo/CNET)It looks like gamers can finally start taking the Mac platform seriously. Confirming recent stirrings, Valve announced Monday that it will bring its gaming service Steam, and Source, its proprietary gaming engine, to Macs.
Started in 2003, Valve is now arguably the biggest online distributor of games. By last month, Valve revealed that it had more than 25 million active Steam user accounts and, at any given time, about 2 million gamers are using the service. There are more than 1,000 games available on Steam. Not all of them will be immediately available on the Mac platform as this will depend on developers.
According to Valve, Steamworks for the Mac supports all of the Steamworks APIs, and a new feature, called Steam Play, allows customers who purchase the product for the Mac or Windows to play on the other platform free of charge. This means a gamer can play the PC version of a game via Steam Play, then continue on the Mac version without having to pay extra.
Valve's library includes titles it developed: Left 4 Dead 2, Team Fortress 2, Counter-Strike, Portal, and the Half-Life series, which will be available in April. As these games belong to Valve, they will likely be the first games ported to the Mac platform.
John Cook, director of Steam development at Valve, revealed that games will be ported to Mac as native versions, as opposed to via an emulation, and in the future Valve will release games simultaneously for Windows, Mac, and the Xbox 360. Mac and Windows players will be part of the same multiplayer universe, sharing servers, lobbies, and so forth. Cook said the first Mac Steam client is currently in beta testing.
If nothing changes, Portal 2 will be Valve's first simultaneous release for Mac and Windows. That game is due in the fourth quarter.
Dong Ngo is a CNET editor who covers networking and network storage, and writes about anything else he finds interesting. You can also listen to his podcast at insidecnetlabs.cnet.com. E-mail Dong. 
Granted, it would be helpful if Apple loosened up the tight control over the drivers available. I still remember how the same PCI-E video card would cost $50 on a PC, but the Mac version of the very same card would be $250-500. The only difference was a firmware change and you cold flash that yourself with a PC. Even with that trick, you are really limited to what video cards work.
BUT, it's a step in the right direction. :) :) :)
You CAN take your Mac to an Apple ASP center and have them install Apple-approved hardware though. If that means I have to pay several hundred dollars more to get a more current video card in my desktop, then that's what I'll do. BUT, by that same token, I expect that card to be 100% compatible and supported by Apple as a result.
Since when did they start to lisense hardware?
thats why i own a ps3 and 360!
Can't wait! No emulation, nice!
But then again I'm not stupid enough to go and post that comment on car forums ;)
Unless you are one of those PC gamers who bought their computer at Best Buy and think you are hardcore pwning at medium graphics at best.
Or built an AMD ATI box for less than half that.
Anyway, I put together a very fast AMD box for about $500. It has a Radeon 5750, which is about as fast a graphics card as you can buy with an Apple computer, and the GPU is what matters for gaming.
(P.S before anyone flames me I own a Mac with Windows on it, a 360 and a PS3)
Gee thx for your promt attention to your gross oversight.
Snore.
...it IS 1998, right?
...oh. Well then that's not funny, it's moronic.
The sad thing is that you have to plug on in on your Macbook to get a second button. Newer ones were the whole touch pad is the button/s are a bit different.
On a positive note, Mac gamers, you've got some great games that the PC gamers finished a few years ago, so you'll be able to help PC gamers wax poetic about the good ole days. And thanks to Mac users sense of security superiority, they can at least rest well knowing that some virus was not slowing down their games, but rather it was their antiquated graphics hardware.
If I can run call of duty: mordern warefare 2 and left 4 dead on a LCD in 1080p with all setting on medium, get a good framerate on my white MacBook. I sure the he'll think the iMacs are capable of running any game that cones out on the market.
Only think I'll agree with is windows based pc's have better graphics card and are better for hardcore gamers but apple is sure the he'll catching up slowly.
No no.. let's assume that most people that use Macs are instead Macbook 13" owners which is more likely the case since it is Apple's most price accessible option for the fashionista hipsters who want them oh so badly to prove their worth and competence to conform to emerging trends via consumerism. The Macbook 13" runs a lowly Nvidia 9400m (that may or may not even be a dedicated and may in fact be IGP based upon the 9100 which means it is really, really slow). Per my Google search, at 1024x768, Macbook owners should get at least, with fingers crossed and a good tail wind, approximately 13.2 FPS when playing Crysis. The issue with this is, of course, that these numbers assume that the Macbook owns a current gen Macbook and has been bitten by the upgrade bug if they've indeed purchased a Macbook before. If they run a last gen Macbook, oh those poor souls who must hang their heads low in shame, not only are they a generation behind and possibly looked at in disgust by people who own the current gen of Macbooks, but they cannot even run Half Life 2 without having to come back every few minutes to see the next frame rendered.
But hey, you've got iLife and iPhoto and those are almost as fun as real gaming on a Windows PC. Happy slide show, Mac gamers!
Building a nice gaming rig is quite expensive. It not thousands of dollars, but it is still more than a standard PC. It will probably cost more if you buy a Mac with the same specs.
And lets not forget that hardcore gamers customize their PCs for better performance. I'm not sure that you're able to do this with a Mac.
But, maybe this will change Apple's mentality, and allow for more customization (doubt it). This move may also casue for ATI and nVIDIA to port some new graphic cards to the Mac.
Let me know when you can upgrade your graphics in that iMac. 9x series is basically two generations behind now and the new 470/480 cards are less than 3 weeks from release. So for the life of your iMac you will still be using mobile graphics that will never get upgraded. So when newer more graphically enhanced games come out, you will have to start reducing more and more settings. Apple WILL never catch up with the iMac as long as they solder in the graphics chip onboard. Unless you plan on buying a new iMac one a year.
I PLAY CRYSIS AT GAMER LEVEL
Thats one down from top level graphics, its also a 4 year old computer.
All this talk about macs not being able to handle graphic games blah blah, have never owned a mac or even played on a mac and should do more listening then talking.
Allow me to be skeptic. A 2006 computer that runs Crysis... At what resolution? What is the frame rate?
An old computer may be able to run Crysis at the lowest settings, but what is the fun in that?
As a gamer you need to upgrade your PC from time to time (specially the graphics card), so you'll be able to keep up with the advances in gaming. You can always play a new game at the lowest settings. But are you able to do that with a Mac? As far as I know you can't.
But again, this may encourage things to change at Apple's camp.
I have updated my graphics card twice and the ram and hard drive once since I have owned it. The Mac pros are entirely upgradeable and far easier to do then pcs as the HD's and ram just click and there are no wires to get around.
This computer cost the same as a similar pc, specs wise, thats why the switch was easy. Alienware was beyond more expensive for less. Whether thats the same now, idk, haven't looked at new computers recently.
My windows experience index is also 5.9, the barracuda keeps it back from a 6.3.
You had a great rig for that time.
Point taken.
The real stealth bomb will be when Apple decides to unleash Mac OS for use on other hardware... ;)
AHAHAHAHAHHAHAHA!!!! Oh man, that was a good one... I need to catch my breath. Alright now... you really think that they are going to let people run osx on other hardware? After they spent all this time and money suing the hell out of psystar? When their entire claim to fame is the stability provided by the lack of hardware choices? When they could no longer charge twice as much for the same hardware because of some actual competition? Not a chance.
Ummm, Apple sells h-a-r-d-w-a-r-e, not software. The OS is just there to make the most of their product. Why on earth would they want to support all that low-end commodity crap?
And their terms of use and enforcement of same is no worse than what MS has done. Try moving OEM Windows from one system to another...
They did before.
Steam is just a distribution platform. It's not a "gaming engine". Developers would still have to make Mac versions of everything available on Steam. All this means is that the eight games available on a Mac just might all be available for download in the same place.
However you are right. Steam by istelf won't move any one game to Mac. That's up to developers.
Wow! Those DOS boxes were so much better at gaming than Amigas and Atari systems! I suppose MS grabbing the majority of the desktop business market had no effect whatsoever?
Simple. 1) Games on a mac. 2) Games on Apple Hardware. 3) Apple's console is gameless.
The math is simple from there.
Yes juvenile minds will make jokes, but with luck you'll all grow up some day.
...it IS January 27, right?
...oh. Well then that's not funny, it's moronic.
I was just making the point that games are still capable on the newer macs. Apple keeps making these jumps for better performance. The last gen MacBooks which had the gma graphics card was just horrible for playing games without a doubt . I don't think you could get more than 20 fps on cod on the older ones =p
but most of the people that buy macs use gaming simply as a past time And not hardcore gamers. If they are they usually have a desktop rig for that. The only reason I have a mac right now is for my recording and video editing and the fact that I can play games on it now is just a plus.
I am not trying to start a which computer is better thread here , just sply stating the facts.
Same is true of PC's, though. And Wiis and DS's. Doesn't mean they DON'T have their share of serious gamers.
I particularly like that I'll be able to re-download my copy of Orange Box to my Mac drive at no additional cost (and even go back and forth between the two if I wanted to -- I don't really have any reason to, but I can see that as an attractive option for anyone who has a desktop PC and a MacBook Pro); that's a real value-add. Even among publishers who release for both platforms, most don't sell both versions in the same box -- Blizzard is a notable exception, of course.
I'm hoping other publishers who use Steam will follow Valve's lead and Mac ports will become more plentiful.
(And if they started doing it for Linux, I'd never have to reboot my machine, but of course I'm not going to hold my breath on that one. I'm happy just to see OSX getting some love.)
- by iamrta March 9, 2010 9:06 AM PST
- could the apple computer become a tad more relevant now? nahhhhh :P
- Like this Reply to this comment 1 person likes this comment
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