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Apple Businesses Entertainment Games

Mac OS X NWN Technology Demo Released 303

Posted by michael from the late-to-the-party dept.
h0tblack writes "At long last the Mac OS X demo of Neverwinter Nights has been released. We now have a torrent running to get the demo distributed and take the load of off the official servers (macgamefiles should have the demo soon). Download the BitTorrent for Mac OS X client if you don't already have it. Then grab the torrent file for the tech-demo from bytemonsoon.com. After downloading the demo, PLEASE leave your BitTorrent window open, this will mean that the load is shared amongst us all and more people can download faster."
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Mac OS X NWN Technology Demo Released More

Mac OS X NWN Technology Demo Released

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  • ok, then (Score:5, Funny)

    by SweetAndSourJesus ( 555410 ) <JesusAndTheRobot&yahoo,com> on Tuesday June 17, 2003 @01:09PM (#6224628)
    see you all in about a month.
    • Sadly, I'm uploading faster then I'm downloading :(

      • Re:ok, then (Score:5, Funny)

        by digitalsushi ( 137809 ) * <slashdot@digitalsushi.com> on Tuesday June 17, 2003 @01:29PM (#6224825) Journal
        Well you must be a real blast at Christmas then!

      • Re:ok, then (Score:5, Informative)

        by Jucius Maximus ( 229128 ) on Tuesday June 17, 2003 @01:55PM (#6225065) Journal
        " Sadly, I'm uploading faster then I'm downloading :("

        To undertand this, you've gotta realise that clients will upload to YOU based on the upload rates they directly experience from you.

        When you join the torrent swarm, you initally have no pieces so the download is slow at less than 5 K/s. Eventually you will have one chunk (about 1 MB) and then, in an effort to boost your node's 'ranking' with other nodes, it uploads furiously, making the upload rate faster than the download rate.

        But then your node will rise in priority among other nodes because you are uploading, thus they will upload more data to you. In the long run, your upload and download rate will be equal unless you already start with a chunk of the file you got elsewhere that can be shared, or there are a lot of seeds (nodes with the complete file that are uploading only) and bandwidth to spare.

        At the end, look at the count for data uploaded and downloaded. They should be quite similar.

    • You'd have a hard time strretching that demo out for a month!

  • I guess that's it for bytemonsoon (Score:5, Interesting)

    by Anonymous Coward on Tuesday June 17, 2003 @01:11PM (#6224643)
    I guess all the downloads I was doing at bytemonsoon.com will have to wait for a couple of days... the server will be melting down now.

    Why don't the /. guys run their own torrent tracker?

    • Mirror of the .torrent file (Score:5, Informative)

      by Motherfucking Shit ( 636021 ) on Tuesday June 17, 2003 @01:19PM (#6224727) Journal
      I've mirrored the .torrent file here [shaunc.com]. I removed the spaces from the filename, but it's otherwise identical to the copy from ByteMonsoon and I'm downloading from it now.

      Any other mirrors? :)
    • Isn't Bit Torrent designed precisely to prevent the slashdot effect, and to distribute the load among people that are downloading the file? I have never ran a torrent on a website, but according to the author, you can even pull the original file from your server, as long as enough people have left their clients open after the download (in torrent terms, the seed is alive).
      • thats true, up to a limit. if too many people try to download from the same tracker, it will overload, and start dropping connection.
        in this case, the whole of bytemonsoon will probably be down shortly.

        also, there was a site for /. trackers. its down for maintenance right now, but i dont know for how long, so have a look:
        http://torrents.slash0.org/ [slash0.org]

      • Re:I guess that's it for bytemonsoon (Score:5, Insightful)

        by mhesseltine ( 541806 ) on Tuesday June 17, 2003 @01:47PM (#6224985) Homepage Journal
        Isn't Bit Torrent designed precisely to prevent the slashdot effect, and to distribute the load among people that are downloading the file? I have never ran a torrent on a website, but according to the author, you can even pull the original file from your server, as long as enough people have left their clients open after the download (in torrent terms, the seed is alive).

        Yes, the transfer of the files should be alleviated by using BT as opposed to the server having to serve the files. However, BT still relies on a single point of failure per download, that being the tracker.

        For each person that wants to connect, they have to connect to the same tracker, which needs to manage telling each client where the peers are, mananging the throttle, etc. While not as bandwidth intensive as serving the actual files, under a good slashdotting, the tracker itself will get overloaded, and as a result, become ineffective for people.

        The logical conclusion would be for /. to run a tracker, because it's obvious from their traffic that they could probably handle it. Maybe even make that a subscriber perk? Taco, are you listening?

        • Sites like bytemonsoon.com or torrentse.cx use a single tracker for hundreds of different torrent streams, so the fact that the tracker can't do all of that and then handle a really big demand generated by slashdot isn't as damning as it might seem at first.

          • Sites like bytemonsoon.com or torrentse.cx use a single tracker for hundreds of different torrent streams, so the fact that the tracker can't do all of that and then handle a really big demand generated by slashdot isn't as damning as it might seem at first.

            Agreed, and I wasn't trying to condemn bytemonsoon or torrentse.cx for not being able to handle the load. Just pointing out that, while they aren't having to serve the entire files, they still suffer from having to make connections.

            In other words, I d

        • [quote]The logical conclusion would be for /. to run a tracker, because it's obvious from their traffic that they could probably handle it. Maybe even make that a subscriber perk? Taco, are you listening?[/quote]Unlikely at best, for much the same reasons [slashdot.org] that Slashdot doesn't mirror linked articles. Of course, in this case the distribution of the file in question is expressly encouraged, so the FAQ section doesn't really apply. That's not typically the case though.
    • actually, we're now getting slashdotted AND dos'd at the same time. now THAT's some good fun.

  • Not bad... (Score:2, Funny)

    by mahdi13 ( 660205 )
    Only one full year behind schedule! BioWare is suprising us all! Next thing you know they will get the FMV working in Linux!
    • Yeah, it is pretty funny...But as someone who waited a very long time for the Linux client, I gotta at least say "Better late than never". I'm actually quite happy with the game as is. Maybe next time the whole game will be built around something a bit more portable...but I'm not expecting miracles at this point.

      It's a good game, and though it's probably not extremely profitable for Bioware (if at all---YET...), they're sticking to their original statements and following through. (So Thank you Bioware

  • Should be Interesting (Score:5, Interesting)

    by GotSpider ( 682283 ) on Tuesday June 17, 2003 @01:12PM (#6224654) Homepage Journal
    Should be interesting to see how the Mac platform manages to incorporate intensive 3D graphics, especially now since they have radeons and nvidia chipsets in most of their newer/higher end computers. Enter the complaints about one-button mouse commments, but keep in mind that most of these RPG's have a ridiculous amount of required buttons and commands... when the "Quick Guide" has 10 pages, you're spending too much time learning how to play, instead of actually just playing.

    • Re:Should be Interesting (Score:2, Informative)

      by Anonymous Coward
      especially now since they have radeons and nvidia chipsets in most of their newer/higher end computers.


      Newer? My iBook was the bottom of the line 2 years ago, and it has a radeon in it.


      Enter the complaints about one-button mouse commments, but keep in mind that most of these RPG's have a ridiculous amount of required buttons


      It's a good thing I can hook up my 5 button MS mouse to my iBook.

    • Re:Should be Interesting (Score:5, Insightful)

      by Richard5mith ( 209559 ) on Tuesday June 17, 2003 @01:38PM (#6224913) Homepage
      Should be interesting to see how the Mac platform manages to incorporate intensive 3D graphics...

      Probably about the same way as it did a couple of years ago when the first public test of Quake III Arena was released for it (a week before the PC version).
    • Comment removed based on user account deletion

    • Re:Should be Interesting (Score:3, Interesting)

      by Arker ( 91948 )

      It's real interesting how ignorant posts about Macs get modded up like this.

      My little tibook runs Wolfenstein 3d better than my PC with 3 times the mhz rating (both have 64mb Radeons too.) Remember, mghz does not reflect performance when you're comparing two different architectures, the PPC is a lot more efficient. Macs deal with graphics just fine, thanks.

      And yes, you can use any USB mouse you like on your Mac, you're not limited to one button. Macs are designed so that you can use a one button and do

      • 1: Not all "64M Radeons" are equal. Your PC might have a completely different chip than the Mobility Radeon 9000 in your laptop. Perhaps it has a Radeon 7500. I don't know.
        2: OK, MHZ is not an viable measure of performance. But the PPC isn't any more efficent than a PIII (unless what you are doing is Altivec optimized). At least not according to most benchmarks. So a 1Ghz PPC G4 should perform like a 1.5Ghz P3 (after some Altivec optimization), which is roughly equivilent to a 1.6Ghz Athlon XP, which is rou

        • Re:Should be Interesting (Score:3, Interesting)

          by Arker ( 91948 )

          Not all "64M Radeons" are equal. Your PC might have a completely different chip than the Mobility Radeon 9000 in your laptop. Perhaps it has a Radeon 7500. I don't know.

          Nonetheless, they're comparable, and if all this hype about Macs being so 'underpowered' was true you'd certainly expect the AMD with 3 times the clock speed and a comparable videocard to toast the poor little TiBook. In fact, it doesn't, and that's my point.

          OK, MHZ is not an viable measure of performance.

          Exactly.

          Saying that Macs are

  • Good old Bioware (Score:4, Insightful)

    by d3faultus3r ( 668799 ) <willp@earthli n k .net> on Tuesday June 17, 2003 @01:12PM (#6224658) Homepage Journal
    putting nwn on all three major operating systems. I hope this will start a trend for Bioware.

  • Will this really be viable? (Score:5, Insightful)

    by Anonymous Coward on Tuesday June 17, 2003 @01:12PM (#6224659)
    Will this really be viable? There are some serious man-hours spent on this port, is it reasonable to expect this project to be profitable?

    Probably not. However, it appears Bioware are pressing ahead (and doing it inhouse) because they are a games company that wants to be around in the long run, and stay one step ahead of its competitors. Writing portable code isn't something that comes as second nature to most Windows coders, least of all games coders, but they clearly think (correctly) that Linux is going to be a force in the long run on the desktop.

    By teaching themselves the ins and outs of porting games, they've learned (the hard way it seems) that portability has to be a concern from the beginning. Using SDL isn't hard, but it makes porting so much easier it's untrue. Make sure any 3rd party engines you use will run on other platforms or are easily made portable. And so on.

    I think it's telling they outsourced the porting of the Mac client, but kept the Linux port in house. They could have easily hired LGP for instance to port it, or done what was done for Unreal Tournament and get a freelancer in, but they didn't. That makes me think they value the experience and want to keep it internal to the company. Assuming BioWare stick around, I'd expect to see more Linux ports in future.

    • Re:Will this really be viable? (Score:5, Informative)

      by lpp ( 115405 ) on Tuesday June 17, 2003 @01:21PM (#6224750) Homepage Journal
      FYI, BioWare did the Mac port themselves. MacSoft is only the publisher for the Mac version.
    • I'm buying a copy for myself and every friend that has a mac and will play it. I have a lot of unix savy friends that love OS X, me included. Games are generally an after thought when you work an average of 80 hours a week. I'm really looking forward to getting a 64bit laptop that doesn't kill the pocketbook (a la the tadpole ones with ultra sparcs). Hurry up with the 970 Powerbooks!

      I have NWN for PC already and have downloaded the Linux files as well. I was disappointed that the mac/linux versions weren't
    • I wonder if this makes them a target for Microsoft purchasing them... (anyone remember that post a few days about)?
    • Writing portable code isn't something that comes as second nature to most Windows coders...

      Is it really second nature to any coder?
    • If nothing else, it makes the Aurora Toolset available to Mac-heads. Since there are a LOT of Mac-based graphics people out there, expect to see a lot more art assets made available over the next several months. This causes the game to last longer, enabling them to sell more Mac _and_ PC copies, and at a higher price point. Here we are, a year after the release, and Best Buy still carries it, and for $30. Heck, there are a lot of year-old games that go for $10.
      • And while I'm thinking about it....
        Happy Birthday Neverwinter!
        Tomorrow is the 1-year anniversary of the game coming out. Mac users get NWN, and PC users get Shadows of Undrentide. Life is good.

      • Re:Will this really be viable? (Score:4, Informative)

        by lpp ( 115405 ) on Tuesday June 17, 2003 @03:15PM (#6225864) Homepage Journal
        I hate to burst your bubble, but the Aurora Toolset is only available to those using the Windows platform. BioWare opted not to port the toolset to Linux when they discovered that Borland would not have a Linux capable C++ Builder version available in time for their major development push. Likewise for the Mac. In addition, MacSoft explored the possibility of farming out the toolset port to a third party Mac porting house (OmniGroup as I recall), but the time estimate was 1 year of development and thus the plan was scrapped.

        The last I heard, BioWare still wasn't planning on porting the toolset even now with a C++ Builder Linux environment available from Borland, likely because it uses the CLX framework and the version BioWare used was likely only using VCL.
      • Except that the toolset is not being ported. [bioware.com] You'd think the wisdom of porting content-creation tools would be obvious given the creative bent of Apple's demographic, but Mac users just keep on getting the shaft. So let's everyone lighten up on the "portable code" accolades.
    • I believe that they started the project with portability in mind. Of course, doing the Linux port probably brought them 90% of the way to having a Mac OS X port, too.
    • I don't think the ports (Linux or OSX) will be profitable anytime soon. There's too much of a learning curve. But there's three good reasons to continue with the ports:

      First, it makes the Aurora engine much more appealing to potential licensees, especially if they follow id's model (buy the engine, and get all platforms included). The Linux and Mac gaming markets are miniscule compared to those running Microsoft OS's, but having all versions available may give a 1%-2% increase in sales. It's still an advan
    • they clearly think (correctly) that Linux is going to be a force in the long run on the desktop.

      I'm worried that what you're saying here won't prove true. Think about it. Every Linux user who is also a gamer is already dual-booting Windows. With me so far? So a game developer has to choose:

      1. Don't spend the time/money to make a Linux version and sell 1 million units. To windows users. Including the Linux guys who'll just reboot to play.

      2. Spend the time/money to make a LInux version and sell..
    • Probably, they've ported previous products like Baldur's Gate, Icewind Dale and Baldur's Gate II -- so they obviously have a business plan.

      Remember there are two parts to the system, the game and the engine. The game is already done for the PC version (and is probably MOST of the work) all they need to do is port the engine.

      Finally, I'll buy it :-)

    • Re:Will this really be viable? (Score:4, Insightful)

      by SideshowBob ( 82333 ) on Tuesday June 17, 2003 @07:13PM (#6227894)
      "However, it appears Bioware are pressing ahead (and doing it inhouse) because they are a games company that wants to be around in the long run, and stay one step ahead of its competitors. Writing portable code isn't something that comes as second nature to most Windows coders, least of all games coders, but they clearly think (correctly) that Linux is going to be a force in the long run on the desktop."

      I wanted to respond to this even though its pretty late in the day and this topic is no longer near the top of the stack on Slashdot.

      Writing portable code has benefits in and of itself, regardless of the economic factors of any particular platform. (I believe most games are profitable on the Mac however)

      Portable code that has been run through multiple compilers, run in multiple environments, QA'ed by multiple testing teams, etc. is in my experience a damn sight more bug free than single platform code.

      Just the differences in compilers can bring to light surprisingly subtle bugs in code.

      Do yourself a favor and try to compile your projects with different compilers on different platforms. You may be surprised at the things that you find that would've slipped under your radar using only 1 toolchain on 1 platform. This does not mean GCC on Linux and BSD on x86. It means GCC on Linux/BSD for x86, GCC on Darwin/PPC, VC++ on Win32, and maybe another combo.

    • Well, a few of their friends as well as some of the
      guys at Bioware themselves are Macheads. They did it
      partially to shut us up. =)

  • My modem is blazing away! (Score:5, Funny)

    by Anonymous Coward on Tuesday June 17, 2003 @01:12PM (#6224668)
    >After downloading the demo, PLEASE leave your BitTorrent window open, this will mean that the load is shared amongst us all and more people can download faster."

    Right-o! As someone who is keen on the whole "distributed" part of the internet, I shall leave that window open as soon as my download is done. You will all have the benefit of the uplink of my 2400 baud modem! Torrent away!
    • "You will all have the benefit of the uplink of my 2400 baud modem! Torrent away!"

      That's not so funny to me! I was actually seeding three torrents on a lame 28.8 connection last weekend!

      My downloads (collectively about 500 MB) were between 86 and 96 percent done, transferring over a lovely cable connection. But I was planning to go to my parents' place on the weekend where the best internet available is 28.8 dialup due to the remoteness of the location and bad phone loops.

      I was pretty annoyed when m

    • I'm uploading faster than I'm downloading. I've uploaded 4.5 MiB but only downloaded 3.2. What's going on? Is my mac using HyperTransport to send data that doesn't exist yet?
      • "I'm uploading faster than I'm downloading. I've uploaded 4.5 MiB but only downloaded 3.2. What's going on? Is my mac using HyperTransport to send data that doesn't exist yet?"

        You can upload the same data to more than one peer in the swarm ;-) The lopsided transfers are only a temporary effect at the start of the download. See my explanation here [slashdot.org].

  • Don't even run OSX (Score:3, Funny)

    by Xzzy ( 111297 ) <`gro.h7urt' `ta' `rehtes'> on Tuesday June 17, 2003 @01:16PM (#6224710) Homepage
    But I'm letting a torrent run on my station at work just to be a nice guy. ;)

    Not that I suspect bandwidth is going to be a problem, I peaked at 2030 kB/s downloading. But I've always felt bad for mac users getting shafted and wanted to help.

    Just don't tell my employer.. not sure they would be too impressed watching me output the 1300 kB/s I'm doing atm..

    • Re:Don't even run OSX (Score:2, Funny)

      by Anonymous Coward

      I've always felt bad for mac users getting shafted and wanted to help.

      I've always wanted to shaft Mac users too.
      Signed,
      Bill

  • BitTorrent or NWN (Score:5, Insightful)

    by allenw ( 33234 ) on Tuesday June 17, 2003 @01:17PM (#6224711) Homepage Journal
    One and a half sentence about NWN.

    Four and a half sentences about BT.

    I think the heading should have read "OS X NWN Demo Available via BitTorrent".

    • Submitters, enthralled with the idea of having their story ran on Slashdot, dread the inevitable bandwith-monster that in some cases renders the story near-useless (the poor server someone uses to blog melts before the story hits ~70 comments). Therefore, never being able to trust Slashdot with their bandwith and at the same time wanting their news to reach as many as possible, the submitters are starting to make the preperations we all wish the editors cared about.

      With a file this size the Bittorrent may
    • umm,

      One and a half sentence about NWN.
      Four and a half sentences about BT.
      One year sentence about posting the two sentence above
      Death sentence for modding funny post as insightful

  • confusing (Score:5, Funny)

    by Boromir son of Faram ( 645464 ) on Tuesday June 17, 2003 @01:24PM (#6224779) Homepage
    Okay, so I guess I see what BitTorrent is. It seems to make sense. Now, what is "OS X", and can I get it for WinME? Thx.

  • And, tada: Linux installer/binaries in SoU Expack. (Score:4, Interesting)

    by 2Flower ( 216318 ) on Tuesday June 17, 2003 @01:32PM (#6224852) Homepage

    It was announced yesterday that the Shadows of Urentide expansion pack which goes on sale tomorrow comes on disk with a linux version.

    Yes, it's way the hell after the announced simultaneous three platform release, but at least it's here and if you're not too busy playing Tux Racer and complaining about lack of instant gaming support, it's the most extensible and community supported RPG system to date. Have fun and remember, the campaign the game ships with ain't nothing compared to some of the great stuff the community has produced, so don't limit yourself. (Although the story in SoU's single player campaign looks pretty good in its own right.)/p

    • Amazing, considering that the NWN Linux Client is on Beta 6 and not yet official...

      I do see a post on the forums stateing "Shadows of Unrentide will run fine in Linux"

      I'm still waiting until the Linux client is official before I even consider NWN...major turn down for me is the lack of FMV, the movies might not be important but I'm a story driven person and missing parts of the story just to play the game doesn't fly with me, I'll wait for the "Directors Cut"

  • But is it playable? (Score:3, Insightful)

    by jkabbe ( 631234 ) on Tuesday June 17, 2003 @01:33PM (#6224865)
    I always wonder when they use the term "Tech" demo. Is this thing playable? Or is it just some pretty graphics?
  • Looks like bytemonsoon is getting DDoS'd into oblivion.

    And then a healthy dose of Slashdotting on top of that.

    Read their news blurb at the bottom, if you can get to the site:

    http://www.bytemonsoon.com/

  • .torrent needed for Mac? (Score:3, Funny)

    by psoriac ( 81188 ) on Tuesday June 17, 2003 @01:59PM (#6225082)
    Don't tell me all nine of you hit up their 56k server and blew it up...

    KIDDING! ;-)

  • Performance Notes on NWN Demo (Score:5, Informative)

    by slycer9 ( 264565 ) on Tuesday June 17, 2003 @02:15PM (#6225269) Journal
    Hardware: 17" tiBook, 1GB RAM
    Game Settings: All options MAXED, no anti-aliasing
    Resolution: 1440

    Pros: Runs flawlessly, no hitches, slow framerates or draggy performance.

    Cons: No NPC voices. No speech during spellcasting. No shiny water. (tho I don't remember if my vid card supports it)

    Very nice job, runs great. Now just gotta wait for the DM Client!
    • Reply to cons:

      Bioware slimmed down the download by not including the extra voice files. Apple's implementation of OpenGL doesn't support the calls necessary to create shiny water (sub-pixel shading, IIRC, though I probably don't... ;).

      DM Client: In the Mac box...

  • NWN Performance notes :Edit: (Score:4, Informative)

    by slycer9 ( 264565 ) on Tuesday June 17, 2003 @03:07PM (#6225786) Journal
    Just finished a discussion with some folks at Bioware.
    Turns out a couple of the glitches aren't glitches at all.
    1) Only 4 voicesets were included to compress the filesize for downloads.
    2) Shiny water is not dependant upon your video card under OSX, because the current Mac implementation of OpenGL does not support it as of yet.

    So, in review...neither of the glitches are bugs at all.
    Game still runs flawlessly, smooth gameplay, excellent mouse response.
  • Ok, I'm sure plenty of you have seen it, but for those of you that haven't check this [o1.com] (Quicktime format) out. If you weren't convinced that gaming on a Mac is totally awesome, you will be now!

    Props to redvsblue.com [redvsblue.com] and their work.

  • What you're all forgetting, of course (Score:3, Informative)

    by writertype ( 541679 ) on Tuesday June 17, 2003 @04:38PM (#6226598)
    ...is that the game itself ain't all that hot. Or at least the single-player version of it. Very little story, and it pales in comparison to Baldur's Gate 1 & 2. Personally, I found it as much fun as compiling a Linux dis-... Oh.

    You'll have a ball.
  • My brand new Powerbook doesn't seem to know what to do with it. It's sitting there in my home directory, as shown by:

    : file BitT*
    BitTorrent_OSX_3.2.2a.dmg: VAX COFF executable not stripped - version 3277
    :

    VAX COFF? WFT? No mention that I can find of .dmg files anywhere in the online docs. The web site doesn't seem to point to any help or howto pages. Anyone got a pointer to an explanation for dummies like me? ;-)

    • open Disk Copy (it's in Applications/Utilities).

      drag the file on to Disk Copy's window or the icon on the Dock.

      or, just ctrl+click or right-click (depending on how many buttons your mouse has) on the file and go to Open With -> Disk Copy.

  • ...a problem with the NWN file. It may show up on your desktop as a document. Just Get Info and append the .dmg extension. Problem solved. Happy gaming!

  • At last! (Score:2, Interesting)

    by swelling ( 322179 )
    I have been waiting for this for quite a while and it is definitely worth it!

    I am running a 17" iMac (800Mhz G4/256MB/Ge4 32MB) and the action is excellent, not choppy at all. I was worried that the performance of the game would leave people without a high-end machine in the dust, but everything seems pretty good so far.

    Nice job Bioware and MacSoft!

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