Poll: Should newer games be developed for both PC and Mac at the same time?

[Sefa Lagaaia]

I've recently been looking for through steam for some indie games that my friends and I could play but I keep running into the same problem of finding a game that would be a really great time but it only having been developed for PC, limiting how many of us can play. Now I understand the concept of getting a game out for PC first as it's a more common system for gaming then eventually getting out a Mac version much later in the dev process after you work out the bugs from the PC version but even if the ratio of PC gamers to Mac gamers is 50:1 (not an actual figure) you're still limiting your audience and it means that situations like mine come up frequently enough for it to be an issue. I'd like to get an opinion from my fellow escapists, should developers bring their games out for both systems first, or focus purely on the PC version then bring out a Mac version later on when the games been out for a while. (apologies for poor phrasing)

 

[The Lunatic]

Depends really.

Often, it's a very small user base, and it costs money to ensure it works on the system.

It's very often the case that this cost is not enough to make selling to that format worth the time and money.


However, if it's viable, and can be done with minimal interruption to the game and budget. I don't see why not.


However, really, it's on Apple to make their products as compatible as possible, if they want a reasonable share of the market.

So, I don't think, in the current state of affairs, a Mac port is suitable for all games, nor will it be for a while.

 

[AD-Stu]

I think basic economics answers this one - if Mac was a market big enough to justify it then developers would do this. For whatever reason it's not a big enough market, so they don't.

Personally it doesn't bother me.

 

[Supernova1138]

Probably not worth it economically for most developers. Mac OS only has about 10% market share at best in the PC market. Of that 10%, only a fraction of them have a high end Mac that actually has a decent graphics card that can play games reasonably well. As such, it's not really worth it for most publishers to bother with a Mac port.

 

[thesilentman]

Yes, they should make versions for all platforms including Linux. Exactly why people choose to develop for one platform with tools that work on all of them mystifies me. OpenGL isn't that bad for games devs!

 

[ItsNotRudy]

Probably not worth it economically for most developers. Mac OS only has about 10% market share at best in the PC market. Of that 10%, only a fraction of them have a high end Mac that actually has a decent graphics card that can play games reasonably well. As such, it's not really worth it for most publishers to bother with a Mac port.

But a lot of games that aren't sucking your graphics card dry could run nicely on any Mac with a Radeon/Geforce card. Think League of Legends, Terraria, Portal, TF2, Dota 2 (actually anything Source engine runs very well with decent looking gfx)

There is a big share of games that could run on a Mac, but aren't ported for it.

 

[Shpongled]

Probably not worth it economically for most developers. Mac OS only has about 10% market share at best in the PC market. Of that 10%, only a fraction of them have a high end Mac that actually has a decent graphics card that can play games reasonably well. As such, it's not really worth it for most publishers to bother with a Mac port.

But a lot of games that aren't sucking your graphics card dry could run nicely on any Mac with a Radeon/Geforce card. Think League of Legends, Terraria, Portal, TF2, Dota 2 (actually anything Source engine runs very well with decent looking gfx)

There is a big share of games that could run on a Mac, but aren't ported for it.

There's a big share of all sorts of games that could be ported onto all sorts of platforms. It's not really a question of "should" developers develop for different platforms, just can they afford to do so and do they have the inclination. It's not really up to us on the Escapist what platform they develop for, it's up to them. Obviously in an ideal world i'd be sat here playing Dragons Dogma on my PC. Unfortunately, we don't live in an ideal world.

 

[number2301]

I know you said your 50:1 wasn't real figures, but to be honest it's probably more like 500:1 Besides, you can run Windows on your Mac through bootcamp. That way you get all the benefits of Windows (gaming, compatibility etc), and all the benefits of having a Mac (whatever they are).

Also, and this is a big bug bear of mine, a Mac is a PC. What you mean is should they develop for OSX and Windows at the same time.

 

[flarty]

I hope opengl becomes the dominant over directX this generation, It runs on everything across the board except i bet microsoft will try and force devs to use DirectX on the nextbox.

 

[jklinders]

As small as Mac OS userbase is compared to other platforms it's not surprising to me that Mac versions often go out later, but is is often surprising that devs bother with Mac OS at all. The cost benefit math rarely adds up.

As others said, use boot camp or something to run windows OS for gaming and use Mac OS, for whatever it is you use that for. Demanding that devs shell out good money to make a version compatible for such a tiny user group is not a whole lot different that whining that no one is opening restaurants that serve authentic ancient Hun cuisine. Sure there might be a market for it but is anyone going to get their investment back?

Windows and Mac OS don't play nice. They don't play nice because they are being bitches to each other and their consumers by proxy. Too bad really but not the devs fault.

 

[afroebob]

Probably not worth it economically for most developers. Mac OS only has about 10% market share at best in the PC market. Of that 10%, only a fraction of them have a high end Mac that actually has a decent graphics card that can play games reasonably well.

Oh, not even 10%, its probably around 3%-5%, the Mac OSX only has a 7% market share, and how many people would even consider buying a Mac for gaming? I don't want to be an elitist but Macs really just need to go away, they cost 3 times more than they should, so they shouldn't be used for anything with the exception of MAYBE one or two things for a job, so its more or less better for everyone if game companies just forget Mac. It costs money to port and Macs are just terrible for gaming (and almost everything else) and the less attention we pay Macs the sooner they will either improve or just die.

 

[ItsNotRudy]

Probably not worth it economically for most developers. Mac OS only has about 10% market share at best in the PC market. Of that 10%, only a fraction of them have a high end Mac that actually has a decent graphics card that can play games reasonably well.

Oh, not even 10%, its probably around 3%-5%, the Mac OSX only has a 7% market share, and how many people would even consider buying a Mac for gaming? I don't want to be an elitist but Macs really just need to go away, they cost 3 times more than they should, so they shouldn't be used for anything with the exception of MAYBE one or two things for a job, so its more or less better for everyone if game companies just forget Mac. It costs money to port and Macs are just terrible for gaming (and almost everything else) and the less attention we pay Macs the sooner they will either improve or just die.

The hardware maybe, but I'd miss the OS. Mac OSX is so much better than Windows.

 

[Windcaler]

It would be nice if the developed for PC and Mac simultaneously or at least did a port but the crux of the matter is people dont tend to buy macs for gaming. I dont know how hard it is to port to mac but I suspect if devs thought there was a profit to be made they would be porting to the mac. That may be the crux of the matter, that the Mac just isnt a platform that has enough users to port to

 

[Jordi]

No. I'm sorry, but when you buy a computer you need to consider what you want to do with it. Do you need to write reports for school/work? Then don't get an XBox for that. Do you want to play video games? Then don't get a Mac for that. It really is that simple. Or buy Windows and run Bootcamp. I think this will set you back a similar amount as buying a console would.

To be honest, it baffles me that some companies bother to release anything for Mac at all. According to [a href="http://www.netmarketshare.com/operating-system-market-share.aspx?qprid=10&qpcustomd=0"]NetMarketShare[/a] Windows' market share is over 90% while Macs are not even 7%. Of the people who have a Mac, many people will have realized what I said above: approximately 0 will have gotten it for gaming, and those who want to game have likely installed Windows or bought a console.

Optimistically, targeting Mac will increase their potential audience by maybe 5%, but probably not even that. I seriously doubt that you could port and support a game for a different platform for that fraction of the development cost.

Use OpenGL instead of DirectShit and you already did the first step for a game that runs on Windows, Linux and OSX.
Use an engine that has crossplatform support and you don't even need to bother anymore.

You do realize that this has the potential to add a huge cost for the developer? Even if OpenGL was just as easy to develop for as DirectX (which I hear it isn't quite), DirectX studios would incur a tremendous cost in switching (this is a one-time thing, but still). All of their developers are DirectX people. Their in-house tools and libraries may be geared towards DirectX. Maybe they need to buy/license a new engine with crossplatform support.

Furthermore, virtually nothing is truly crossplatform, so there will always be more effort involved in targeting more platforms. And that is just development. You also need to test on more platforms and support any platform-specific bugs.

And for what? A measly single-digit percentage increase in sales?

 

[PoolCleaningRobot]

No. Why should a developer pay a bunch of money to develop for Mac, when all you have to do is buy a copy of Windows for $90? No hate against macs but I've heard it isn't hard to run boot camp

 

[CabooseVD]

Well it sounds like your own fault for wasting your money on a Mac. If developers shouldn't have to pander to every user. For the same reason not every game hits PS3, the XBox full circle, and the Wii. I can only guess when you got the Mac I wasn't for gaming, it's your job to find a computer that has all your spec and capabilities. No blame on developers.

 

[clippen05]

Or you could just buy a PC instead of getting a Mac and expecting lots of gaming options. Why should developers have to cater to the Mac minority; its certainly not going to be cost-effective for them.