Game makers hit out at Apple
Too many controls
GAME MAKERS have hit out at the Apple for being a bit silly about the way it controls graphics hardware.
Many of them see that Apple could easily be kicking some pastel coloured bottom in the games area but its insistence on tight hardware controls are killing it off.
Oliver Buchmann of Application Systems Heidelberg, a company that does offer games for Macs, told Earth Times that Apple has refused to allow graphics cards for games to be installed in its machines.
The current rate of game development requires a serious game user to upgrade graphics cards once a year and run two graphics cards in the same machine.
However Apple ownership forbids this, mostly because their design forbids two graphics cards and while specialists will install good games cards under the bonnet this means chucking your Apple warranty out the window.
So those games developers who are brave enough to take a punt at the Apple games market have to do without things like DirectX which is a mainstay of the industry.
Dual booting is an option for Mac users, but that is still a nuisance to reboot the computer just to play a game.
The thing is that Apple's target market are the same age group that play games. It is killing this market just because it does not want people installing graphics cards that are not blessed by the sainted Steve Jobs
More here. µ
Comments
Oh, the irony
I can remember when the Macintosh II first came out, in 1987. The first full-colour Macintosh! It had 6 NuBus slots, and you could put in multiple video cards, each driving a separate monitor, and the QuickDraw graphics engine would transparently combine them all into a single gigantic desktop. In a Macworld Magazine article, Bruce Webster actually tested this out, by getting five monitors working at once--for some reason, when he put in the sixth card, the machine wouldn't boot.Today, it is the Dimdows PCs running rings around the Mac in terms of graphics capabilities, while Apple won't even support one measly extra graphics card. How the mighty have fallen...
Strange article
A Mac these days is exactly the same as a PC in terms of hardware, the only differences being OSX, the motherboard and the exorbitant price for what you get.The main problem with Mac gaming is that Apple equip their consumer machines (ie the iMacs) with piss-weak graphics cards. A £1000 iMac comes with a £50 graphics card and a mobile processor. You need to go up to the £2000 Mac Pros to get a machine with a card capable of playing games for the next few years, and there won't be many willing to buy what's basically a workstation to do that.
As for games manufacturers recommending SLI/ Crossfire for games, that's simply not true- I don't think I've ever heard a publisher say that. Also, most PC gamers don't upgrade on an annual basis, as there really isn't any point. A slightly less than top-of-the-range graphics card has a useful lifespan of at least 3 years. There are some that always want the latest and greatest, but they're a small if highly lucrative sub-sector of the market.
If Apple want to produce computers capable of being taken seriously by gamers, then they need something around the £750-1500 price mark which can compete. Until then, they can forget it. It simply isn't worthwhile for publishers to cater to a small-ish fraction of 5% of the market.
Bingo!
Interesting. This is the exact reason I don't own a Mac. I built a "hackintosh" once and was unimpressed at how few things I could do with it. Non Linear Video Editing was about all it was good for. But I think PC's do that better now anyway.Nose Surgery
The technical term for St Steve's predicament is........."Cutting one's nose off, to spite your face".
Well one reason could be...
We all know ... at least those of the informed ilk know ... that MacOSX is pretty *nix with IP sitting ontop of it. By Mac OSX opening up this will make it a credible alternative to Winblows as a gaming platform but would also allow for other *nix systems as a alternate as well. Mac OSX does not use DX but OpenGL just as Linux.... now porting over to linux from Mac is a little easier when talking graphics API's then what would be the reason to buy an OS when a free one would do just fine for everything.... think about it for a sec.... Linux still has some issue with SLI/CrossFire but I'm sure AMD and nVidia heck even Intel (on linux Intel gfx tends to be a little more performing then Windows platform) have no problems at all in developing easy to install and fully functioning above par drivers (in comparison to Windows, currently not the state win drivers are more performing then linux)This is all about maintaining the control of the OS.... wish MS and Mac would learn for Google, ad space, ad space, ad space.... the content is what makes money not the medium but hey if Mac doesn't have an OS to flog then what do they have .... nuffin think about it and you wonder why they cripple their systems to make everyone happy.
@least this is my two cents
Cheers
strange comments
The Macintosh is not a hard core game platform, and wants nothing to do with that market. DirectX support is out of question. I don't understand, when PS3 and XBox are so powerful and inexpensive, why would anyone want a PC to play games?