
The state of Mac gaming - mpweiher
https://arstechnica.com/apple/2017/07/the-state-of-mac-gaming/
======
TazeTSchnitzel
I don't want to be dismissive, but this article talks about the graphics APIs
and the hardware architecture (x86) yet fails to address the elephant in the
room there: Cider ports. That is, macOS games which are actually Windows games
running atop the the WINE-based proprietary middleware known as Cider.

Cider has both been a great boon to Mac gaming — it makes it cheap and quick
to port Windows-only titles to the Mac without having to make them internally
cross-platform — and also a great detriment: its Windows translation layer
imposes a performance penalty and prevents true native feel, and crucially,
many such games are using Cider's slow Direct3D-to-OpenGL translator, which is
not only slower than real Direct3D (thus why such games will always run better
under Windows in Boot Camp on the same hardware), and limits you to the
Direct3D 9 featureset, but it is also translating to a graphics API Apple
basically don't care about now (OpenGL).

The good news is that more and more games are using commodity engines, and
those engines usually have proper native macOS support, and ideally Metal
support. Nonetheless, Cider ports are very much a thing that must still be
contended with.

For a recent high-profile case of Cider causing trouble, Square Enix went the
cheap route when they ported their MMORPG, Final Fantasy XIV: A Realm Reborn,
to the Mac, and used Cider. The result was infamously bad and they had to pull
it from the shelves. They did of course fix it up and re-release it, but even
then, the resulting port is slower than and graphically inferior to simply
running the game under Windows, because it's stuck with fake Direct3D 9. On
Windows you get to choose between Direct3D 9 and Direct3D 11.

~~~
dkersten
For me, the big problem with mac gaming is that my $3k+ work laptop has a
fairly shitty integrated gpu and even the dedicated gpu is pretty low end
compared to what you can get in a non-mac laptop.

This means that, even though 1/3rd of my steam library has mac versions, half
of these games don't actually run well.

(Disclaimer: since switching to mac, I typically game only on PS4 nowadays,
which I guess probably doesn't have better hardware, but at least has well
optimised games and lots of awesome exclusives)

~~~
girvo
I have the same issue, for just over $1/hour I run a g2 instance on AWS and
game using [http://parsec.tv](http://parsec.tv) \-- 1440p at 60fps without
breaking a sweat. It's revitalised my gaming hobby, and works wonderfully

~~~
makeset
Wow. How is that possible with non-local bandwidth and latency?

~~~
girvo
Some neat protocols. I've got a 25ms RTT from my home PC to my server in
Sydney, which is basically less than a frame (ish), it's definitely enough for
me to be competitive in-game.

Interesting fact: my in-game ping is usually 1 or 0, because its in the same
data centre as the dedicated servers, heh. Removes another possible bit of
latency, which is nice!

------
legohead
I work for a game publisher. We do not suggest developing for Mac. If you're
building your game in Unity and can export it in Mac, then great (although now
you have to factor in extra support). Otherwise, don't waste your time. Mac
accounts for 3% in Steam [1], and Linux is even worse off.

Development time is better spent on internationalization than getting a
working Mac build.

And I say this being a Mac user myself. Games actually run really well on my
MacbookPro. But from a business standpoint, I wouldn't develop for Mac.

[1]
[http://store.steampowered.com/hwsurvey/?platform=combined](http://store.steampowered.com/hwsurvey/?platform=combined)

~~~
ryandrake
Aren't the major game engines already cross-platform? I'm definitely an
outsider to the industry, but it almost seems like a game developer would have
to go out of their way to NOT support Mac and Linux these days.

Why would one take a cross platform game engine and make the rest of the game
logic Windows-only?

~~~
ashark
Of my ~500 Steam games, IIRC something like 300 have macOS builds, and about
200 for Linux.

My experience is that most small studio or "indie" games will run on all three
platforms, about half of really big games have Mac releases and some much
smaller portion also support Linux, and of course anything that runs under
Dosbox works on all three. ~90% of the Linux games are indie or dosbox. MacOS
is a much more viable platform for a gamer, also aided by being generally much
less fussy/buggy for all things multimedia-dependent like games, though
hindered by generally mediocre graphics cards. _However_ you might be
surprised what runs acceptably on a 2014-vintage Intel Iris graphics chip. I
was.

------
Fej
Mac gaming isn't going to go much of anywhere... I mean, Apple is still trying
to push Metal instead of updating OpenGL on macOS. Practically no one except
the largest AAA developers and engine authors care about Metal. Everyone else
doesn't have the time or money to learn _another_ graphics API and implement
it in parallel. OpenGL performance on macOS is stagnant and Vulkan is
nonexistent.

Apple's hubris is starting to catch up with them. They're trying to pull devs
in with Metal but are instead pushing them away by making it harder or
impossible to use APIs that devs actually want. To add insult to injury, the
games market on Mac is small anyway, even relative to its market share.
Windows has been absolutely dominant in this space for so long that I can't
believe that Apple would try to get developers working on their platform by
making it harder, not easier, to develop for.

~~~
hacker_9
The Steam Hardware Stats [1] also show the following abysmal market share:

    
    
        Windows  96.24%
        OSX       2.95%
        Linux     0.72%
    

If you aren't Windows in the PC gaming space, you really don't have a leg to
stand on when trying to force developers to work your way.

[1]
[http://store.steampowered.com/hwsurvey/](http://store.steampowered.com/hwsurvey/)

~~~
mahyarm
A bunch of us have both a mac and a windows pc for gaming, and would like to
just use one computer for gaming. I wonder what the stats are for users that
have both, and how much more / less they spend than windows PC only users.

------
danso
I've never understood Apple's lack of prioritization for the gaming market.
Weren't games critical (albeit not as much as VisiCalc perhaps) to the Apple
]['s success? Looking at the iOS App Store, games seem to be far and away the
most active and best-selling category with almost more subcategories than all
the other non-game categories combined.

That said, it's nice that we're experiencing a renaissance in indie game
development, which seems to rely more on cross-platform frameworks like Unity.
It's possible to have a full life of gaming if you're into puzzlers/strategy
games like Factorio, Rimworld, and the Fireaxis library (Civ, XCOM).

~~~
mikeash
I think it's a self-fulfilling prophesy at this point. The Mac was never
really a good gaming platform (and I say this as a long-time Mac user and
occasional gamer) and by now the reputation is entrenched. People who want to
buy a computer for games won't buy a Mac pretty much no matter what, so Apple
has no reason to court them, so they won't buy Macs, so....

------
cableshaft
I can play Civilization VI on my Mac. I'm good.

Personally I haven't bought a Steam game that hasn't had the Mac symbol on it
for several years, and I used to be a heavy Windows user (still am at work and
on my 'get work done' laptop). Generally requires me to get mostly indie
games, but that's okay, I have consoles for the rest.

~~~
desireco42
I played V, since it looked ugly, I went to Windows machine, huge difference
in performance and everything, and it is same game. :(

------
shroom
I learned about Nvidias GeForce Now platform a few weeks back. It looked like
a great solution for me for the amout of gaming I do now a days. Looks very
cool check it out :)

\- Pay per hours played

\- 200fps with a 20-30ms delay

If you live in the U.S. you can try beta for free [https://www.nvidia.com/en-
us/geforce/products/geforce-now/ma...](https://www.nvidia.com/en-
us/geforce/products/geforce-now/mac-pc/)

Video of Apple Insider testing the beta
[https://youtu.be/XbVFemjaeP0](https://youtu.be/XbVFemjaeP0)

~~~
Eric_WVGG
It's as good as your bandwidth, which means it won't be great for most
Americans.

~~~
X86BSD
So I have google fiber. And as you note this relies on your connection. But
that's only half the issue. Since getting google fiber I've realized since my
pipe is no longer the issue that the service I'm connecting to is the issue.
All the latency and lag and bandwidth limits I have are coming from the
servers themselves and their less than stellar capacity.

------
mr_tristan
I've often felt that true hard-core gaming machines were best thought of as a
kind of high-end workstation, since, well, when you're a true "gamer", you're
doing it in a nice dark room with booming sound, etc. Ergo, not mobile.

Given that the trashcan Mac Pro was a mess when it came to upgrading, it's
clear that Apple just didn't prioritize high end workstation environments.
We'll see what the next Mac Pro brings, it might be a nicer platform, but
it'll be such a minuscule part of the market, I find it hard to believe many
game studios will jump on it.

Otherwise, you're left with the typical Mac which often prioritizes good
battery life, mobility, etc. So Macs are best left for casual gaming, but...
well, phones are great at that too.

I do notice that cross platform mobile games on iPhones are significantly
better performing then Android devices. So it's not that Apple doesn't
prioritize gaming, just hard core "workstation style" gaming environments.

~~~
jamesgeck0
Most of the same games that run on high-end gaming machines also run on
relatively low-powered consoles like the Xbox One and PS4. Heck, the Nintendo
Switch uses mobile hardware and comes within spitting distance of Xbox One
performance when docked.

Raw power isn't the issue. It's Apple's poor drivers and API support.

~~~
mr_tristan
It's just interesting that the Mac drivers / APIs are just so bad when the iOS
story seems to be so different.

Just today, I'm watching team mates suffer with Android freezes. This is far
from the first time this has happened. There's just a ton of anecdotal
evidence that indicates iOS is superior to Android for gaming.

And it's not like Mac's are having to deal with this "massive ecosystem". I
mean, Windows runs on everything. And Macs, like the iPhone and iPad, really
are pretty much closed ecosystems too.

So it seems there was some decision in the history of Mac OS development that
has somehow screwed it over when it comes to providing drivers and APIs for
game development, and, Apple can't rectify it effectively. I just wonder what
that was.

------
wjakob
I find Apple's lack of commitment to Vulkan incredibly short-sighted on their
part and downright offensive to developers. At a higher level, both Metal and
Vulkan address the same technical issues in previous APIs. The sheer waste of
effort and squandered opportunities resulting from this type of fragmentation
sometimes make me wonder if we need a regulatory agency to step in when big
players show such obvious disregard for interoperability.

~~~
tnoeu7nthoae
If you want Vulkan on macOS, it exists [0].

[0][https://moltengl.com](https://moltengl.com)

~~~
wjakob
That's a commercial emulation layer -- this may be fine for some use cases but
is definitely not a satisfactory state for the graphics ecosystem on Mac.

------
egypturnash
My Mac gaming experience over the past decades has mostly been "fuck it, buy a
console". Every time I try to play something on the Mac it's an uphill battle
to get it to talk to any of my various controllers.

I lose mods, and I lose genres that really do work a lot better on keyboard
and mouse - I've been having an on and off urge to find some kind of Settlers
retread lately, for instance, and this really doesn't exist on consoles - but
I gain a lot of time not spent swearing at incompatibilities.

------
jonny_eh
The one game I play regularly on my Mac is Hearthstone. It's great that
Blizzard made a Mac version, and it runs well enough (it should, since it's
also a mobile game), but after 3 years it still doesn't support retina
monitors. The Windows version does, of course. It's built on Unity, so I don't
know what the problem is.

~~~
j2bax
Blizzard has always been pretty good about cross platform (Windows/Mac)
support, all the way back to Starcraft 1 and Warcraft.

~~~
theandrewbailey
Blizzard is the only large gaming company that I can think of that never
stopped releasing Mac games.

~~~
favorited
Well, until Overwatch...

------
JohnBooty
At this point, after having been a gamer (though I've never really been
fanatical about it) ever since childhood in the 1980s... I just don't _care_
if my Mac plays big-budget AAA games at this point.

Like most software professionals, I work a lot of hours, and my time is
limited.

So when it comes to leisure-time, I generally want my games to "just work."

I don't want to see a game on the Mac App Store and then spend a bunch of time
Googling forums and stuff to see if the port's any good and if it will
actually run decently on my Mac hardware, and then do some more
experimentation with settings and everything to actually get it to run
acceptably.

A little bit of console hacking can be fun; sometimes I enjoy tinkering with
old consoles to get better video output or whatever. But that stuff is 100%
optional.

Besides, these days, I'm more into indie-style 2D games than 60-hour immersive
"epics" that cost $40mil to make but still have the same basic game mechanics
as _Daikatana._ And a lot of those Unity-based 2D-ish games run pretty well on
MacOS.

Plus, I don't know. I think I actually _like_ having my Mac be my "dedicated
work machine." It's hard enough to get work done with the Internet beckoning;
it'd probably be even harder if all my favorite games were just a click away
too. Then again, maybe that's just the Stockholm syndrome talking.

~~~
rz2k
I really enjoyed some of the games for Mac in the 80s. It seemed like the
authors didn't much know what they were doing, but they were really creative.
Almost like it was the work of clever amateurs instead of actual
professionals.

I haven't played games on my computer in a long while. What are some of the
good indie-style 2D games now?

~~~
JohnBooty

        Almost like it was the work of clever amateurs 
        instead of actual professionals.
    

I liked that era too! Not Mac games in particular; just the era when
everything wasn't so same-y. Everything felt almost like outsider art. Created
by small teams on small budgets so they were free to experiment!

But, I think we've returned to that level of creativity. Computers are
powerful enough that neat games can be coded in high-level languages, so we
don't need assembly-language savants to make something that runs well. =)

    
    
        I haven't played games on my computer in a long while.
        What are some of the good indie-style 2D games now?
    

There's been a resurgence of Rogue-likes, many of which use a twin stick
control scheme so you can move in one direction and shoot in another. I put a
lot of hours into _Enter the Gungeon._

There's _Cave Story,_ ten years old at this point, but a loving and amazing
(and cute) tribute to the Metroidvania genre. The original was created by a
single person, and there have been some graphically updated versions.

Those are two I've personally put a lot of time into. There are tons more on
Steam, PSN, Xbox Live, and Nintendo's eShop...

 _Stardew Valley_ and _Darkest Dungeon_ are two I have my eyes on to play
next. Honestly when I need a new game I usually just google "best indie games
of 2015" or "best indie games of 2016" hahaha.

The recommendation engines on Steam and the other online services are actually
pretty good too. I would never buy a game just because Steam recommended it,
but when they recommended something to me, it's usually worth Googling for
reviews and videos of it.

------
on_and_off
I play a lot and used to do so on a mac book pro.

It used to be a good strategy, especially after upgrading my MBP 2011 with an
SSD and more RAM.

Not so much with my last MBP, a mid 2015 model.

I have heard that the thermic paste used by Apple is of very low quality and
degrades over time. It seems to be the case for me.. this laptop used to be
able to run GTAV on windows, now it crawls even when I try a simple
compilation.

I have mostly renounced to play on a mac (whether it is on windows or osx) and
I mostly play on a switch now.

~~~
michelb
This is(was?) indeed an issue, and replacing the paste seems to make the
machine feel like new again.

------
cosinetau
It would be really nice if Apple decided to work with some player like Steam,
who also has an interest in gaming on Unix-y systems. I would be really
interested in the overlap between Steam's work on Ubuntu and Apple's OS X.

A large part of the problem sounds like Apple's commitment to Metal, but if it
drops and and seeks to work with Steam, then they could stand to make a really
great experience on their platforms, and perhaps in the living room, too.

------
etjossem
It's not about software. It's not about Cider or Bootcamp or which OS you're
using. The problem is bigger than that; it's about suitability of form factor.

There's a key difference between gaming and other tasks - like graphic design
and software development - that I think the article misses. Work demands
portability, for being productive both in the office and while traveling away
from it. But barring a few edge cases, gaming doesn't demand portability at
all. There's no pressing reason you can't keep your gaming machine in one
place, your home. That's the entire philosophy behind the console market. What
these systems do demand is physically larger hardware and a slew of
peripherals (displays, graphics cards, cooling, speakers, controllers).

Apple has been doing extremely well in the notebook market, but it has
steadily lost ground in desktop. When the redesigned Mac Pro finally comes
out, that might change. But until then, PCs will continue to dominate the
desktop. And I do not see the desktop losing its spot as the best form factor
for gaming.

------
Shivetya
iMac owner chiming in; late 2013 model.

Gaming on OSX for me is hit and miss. Many of the games I have recently played
have been advanced Wine wrappers and they work out pretty well. One company,
Wargaming, has done pretty good with this model but they don't provide true
support as the wrapper itself does introduce a lot of variable. Blizzard was a
mainstay for my buying but even though I have not tried Overwatch the fact it
was not made available for OSX does not bode well. If one of your longest
supporters suddenly drops off, what does that say?

Was there some scare introduced with suggestions they may move off Intel? I
never put any real faith into it and to be honest it might be the straw for me
if it ever did happen.

Still a lot comes down to Apple really doesn't push their desktops and laptops
as being used for games. They will put a "performance" claim on their website
showing improvement over past models but not much beyond that. I rely on sites
like barefeats to see if performance has ticked up enough to warrant a new
purchase; as you can see for me my system is fine for what is there.

the saving grace has always been, just use bootcamp. It works, I don't need a
new machine, and it can use the latest video drivers from the manufacturers
site.

~~~
TazeTSchnitzel
Perhaps Overwatch seemed too graphically demanding for most Macs to be worth
porting?

~~~
SilverHawk
Do not underestimate modern intel iGPUs! Even games like Fallout 4 can be made
to run on these as long as you can accept lower graphical fidelity, resolution
and 30 fps rather than a smooth 60+ framerate (the latter of which is common
on gaming consoles, anyway).

Here's a video of Fallout 4 running on a Macbook Pro :
[https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=YW3A81BScMU](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=YW3A81BScMU)
Running on Intel's GPU. Macs with dedicated GPUs with either NVIDIA or AMD
hardware will perform much better.

Overwatch has no trouble running on more recent Macs, if you install Windows
through bootcamp. Compared to many other AAA games, it's quite light. Hardware
is not the issue here.

The biggest problem running games on Mac OS X is the terrible graphic stack.
It's simply underperforming. Whether it's the drivers or something else, I
can't say. However, from my personal experience having used Mac OS X, Linux
and Windows on the same Mac, Windows tends to perform best, Linux a close
second, and MacOS a very distant last.

This stays true even for games that were "natively" ported to MacOS, such as
Diablo 3. They still run better on Windows. And as for people who play windows
games through Wine.. those games run better on linux than on MacOS. And that
tends to be a major problem with running games on lower end macs.. for
example, Dark Souls can run fine on a Mac Mini if you play it through Wine
under Linux, or natively on Windows. But Wine on MacOS will perform
significantly worse. Not enough to make the game unplayable, but it's a much
less enjoyable experience.

MacOS is just unfit for the purpose. I'm not a 'hardcore gamer' per se, and do
not chase the treadmill of latest and greatest with the best possible
graphics, but I still enjoy playing games from time to time and I ended up
nuking MacOS from the mini I use as a media center connected to the TV. The
next time I buy a tiny computer to put next to the tv, it will be an Intel
NUC.

~~~
TazeTSchnitzel
> Do not underestimate modern intel iGPUs!

I'm not! It doesn't run very well on my 2013 MacBook Air at lowest settings.

------
ksec
It is both a Hardware and Software problem. Apple's choice of GPU is always
lacking behind in performance, and it was only 2017's update of Mac that got
them the GPU they deserve for their price range.

OpenGL wasn't updated for years. Making any work to port Games to Mac much
more difficult.

With Apple working on its own GPU, and Metal 2 they finally have the
groundwork to moving Mac Gaming forward. Of course that is if Apple decide to
so.

------
germainelol
Anyone have any experience with any cloud computing solutions (like
[https://www.paperspace.com](https://www.paperspace.com)) with their MacBook?
Was thinking about trying it since it's cheap to try out.

------
sudomake
If anyone likes RTS games, Dawn of War 2 and 3 are available on OSX(and
Linux).

Unfortunately for multiplayer you are limited to playing against other OSX
users - so windoze is the superior option again.

------
benologist
The state of Mac gaming is it picks up the scraps from developers generally
using multi-platform engines, limping along despite Apple.

------
fil_a_del_fee_a
I installed Bootcamp on my 2017 MBP and it works very well. I am able to play
several Windows games using Steam Box.

------
digi_owl
Weird seeing an article on Ars Technica ragging on Apple.

but then i see it is from an outside contributor...

