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Apple Businesses Entertainment Games

id, EA Show Support For Apple 149

Posted by Zonk from the i-what dept.
The iPhone may have been the star at today's Apple event, but Joystiq points out that id software's debut of 'id Tech 5' is just as beautiful. There are no current details on the first title slated to use the engine. Just the same John Carmack had a few things to say, pointing out the technology's strong graphical and cross-platform performance: "What we've got here is the entire world with unique textures, 20GB of textures covering this track. They can go in and look at the world and, say, change the color of the mountaintop, or carve their name into the rock. They can change as much as they want on surfaces with no impact on the game ... We're going to be showing on a Mac, PC, PS3, and Xbox at E3, we'll have another Mac announcement at E3." Game|Life also points out that EA will be throwing support behind OS X, with releases of major titles like Command and Conquer 3, Battlefield 2142, Need For Speed Carbon, and Harry Potter and the Order of the Phoenix.
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id, EA Show Support For Apple More

id, EA Show Support For Apple

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  • Woopee (Score:1, Interesting)

    by bvimo ( 780026 )
    Another cross platform gaming engine, but where is the Linux support?

    • Re:Woopee (Score:5, Insightful)

      by Broken scope ( 973885 ) on Monday June 11, 2007 @04:00PM (#19469303) Homepage
      I can't remember the last id game that didn't run on Linux.

      • Re: (Score:1, Interesting)

        by Araxen ( 561411 )
        Is Apple going to release a Mac Gamer model or are we stuck going Mac Pro for our gaming needs?

        • Re: (Score:2, Interesting)

          by Broken scope ( 973885 )
          why are you asking me? I don't pay attention to macs at all.
          • Troll? I honestly don't pay that much attention to macs. I don't own any and I don't really have a reason to own one. I use them for math lab at school sometimes during my calculus classes. Jesus...
        • The next mac pro chip may be better for games I head that intel may drop FB-DIMMS and the next chip will have the pci-e lanes for 2 full x16 slots.
      • Yup, and it's surprising that they went back on their word. The last time J.C. worked with apple he swore he'd never come back. He must be getting desperate.

        • Re: (Score:2, Interesting)

          by DeltaSigma ( 583342 )

          When J.C. says he's never going to work with someone again, that doesn't mean id intellectual property will never hit that platform. They just happen to be a game studio that isn't at the complete whim of their publisher, and thus are not forced to entertain business dealings they find unsavory.

          I never heard anyone from id software saying they would never work with apple... actually, I don't remember anyone from id software actually working with apple. Nevertheless, if such statements were made, why is i

        • It shouldn't really be surprising. He's not an idiot. The Macs that he worked on for Q3 are nothing like today's Macs, and I guarantee you that Steve is making sure that whatever happened between id and Apple before is never repeated. Steve's no idiot either. We all say "never this" and "never that" and we don't always mean it. I used to say I'd never use a Mac, but now that it's a much better platform, I've been giving it serious contemplation that I never did before. I actually respect it now. Things chan
      • Commander Keen?

    • Re: (Score:3, Informative)

      by Paralizer ( 792155 )
      id games always have native Linux binaries.

    • Re: (Score:2)

      by hal2814 ( 725639 )
      Right. Stupid id never makes gaming engines that run natively under Linux.
    • Where's the support in Linux for an application hogging the entire UI, setting its own resolution and asocially hogging a load of resources?

      • Re: (Score:2)

        by BobPaul ( 710574 ) *
        Yes! When's EA going to make one of those for Linux?

      • Re: (Score:1)

        by cswiger ( 63672 )
        Linux supports X11, which seems to have all of the attributes you've listed....
        • Really? How do you create a full screen application and set the resolution and screen depth using API calls?

          • Re: (Score:1, Informative)

            by Anonymous Coward
            Various Linux games have been doing exactly this for at least seven years, and that's only as far back as I care to remember.

            The modern approach is to use a combination of WM hints (to tell the WM that your window is full-screen), and XRandR (to set up your screen resolution). There's no concept of a full-screen application, but there doesn't need to be one. The WM knows how to handle the window, as does the composite manager if you have one, and the driver is smart enough to use whatever full-screen render
  • Game on, baby... :)
  • I've got 3 macintosh computers sitting in front of me. They represent more than 4 thousand dollars total of hardware that I use for income. When I put Doom 3 into them - the game is wholly unplayable.

    Anyone see any concrete mention in the TFA (I checked) that they're going to run higher than 5fps without a Dual-Core Xenon and a top of the line graphics card? At this point only the Quake 3 engine gets any play on the Mac because it doesn't bog down (too badly - Aspyr? You suck!).

    Until I here more FPS and eve

    • Re: (Score:1, Interesting)

      by Anonymous Coward
      "Hope it actually works"

      It won't.

      Writing and keeping OpenGL drivers up to date with the latests extensions and performance improvements is very costly and requires a company wide commitment of resources.

      Apple has never made any such commitment of manpower and resources. For Apple to be able to even be competitive with Windows gaming would require huge and fundamental changes to how OS X handles graphics/drivers, how drivers are updated and released to developers and gamers, and large numbers of engineers ac

    • Re:Hope it actually works (Score:5, Funny)

      by Glacial Wanderer ( 962045 ) on Monday June 11, 2007 @04:42PM (#19469961) Homepage

      I've got 3 macintosh computers sitting in front of me. They represent more than 4 thousand dollars total of hardware that I use for income. When I put Doom 3 into them - the game is wholly unplayable.


      I've got a 486 dx sitting in front of me. It represents more than 3 thousand dollars. When I put Doom 3 into it - wait the cd doesn't even fit into the floppy drive...

      • Re: (Score:1, Insightful)

        by mgabrys_sf ( 951552 )
        Fine jackass nitpicker. Circa 2004 G5 Tower. Circa 2005 Mac Mini. Circa 2006 MacBook. I see Wintel-ers getting at least 25FPS or more with just about every hardware config out there for Doom 3 - can we get an engine that is playable - just fucking PLAYABLE - on currently selling or sold in the last year hardware? (No I'm not talking 60fps with a 30 inch lcd at peak resolution on a Voodoo-whatsit-Alien-piece-of-crap-I-wouldn't-bur y -in-my-backyard-it's-so-fucking-ugly-it-scares-chi ldren - I'm talking 25-35

        • Re: (Score:2)

          by hab136 ( 30884 )

          Circa 2004 G5 Tower. Circa 2005 Mac Mini. Circa 2006 MacBook.

          Two of those - Mac Mini and MacBook - have horrible, horrible integrated Intel graphics instead of a discrete graphics card like Nvidia or ATI. My brand new Dell work computer also has Intel integrated graphics, and despite being super-fast in every other respect, also gets like 5fps in any 3d game.

          Integrated graphics suck, on PC or Mac.

          Macbook Pro, most of the iMac models, and Mac Pro have decent graphics cards.

          • Only one of them has integrated intel. 2nd version g4 mac-mini (circa october 2005).

            I've seen better than 5fps on most Wintel's I've run across including the 700-dollar Dells. Not 60 with massive res- but better than 5.

            • Re: (Score:2)

              by frankie ( 91710 )
              Yes, the 32MB ATI 9200 in the G4 Mini is technically better than integrated graphics. But you're being quite unfair expecting to play an FPS on it. And what's the problem playing games on your G5?

              • Re: (Score:1)

                by KDR_11k ( 778916 )
                I played through most of Doom 3 on a Radeon 8500, it's choppy but playable. I don't know how the 8500 and the 9200 compare, though.
                • I played through most of Doom 3 on a Radeon 8500, it's choppy but playable. I don't know how the 8500 and the 9200 compare, though.

                  Yes, the Radeon 8500 64MB was originally the target platform for Doom 3, although it soon became the low-end when ID delayed the game a year to polish it up.

                  The 9200 is a replacement for the 9000, which is a cut-down version of the 8500. It has half the texture units of the 8500, and slower ram.

                  The onboard 9200 GPU in the Mac Mini is actually a 9200 SE (64-bit memory bus). The
    • I think it's fairly common knowledge that DOOM 3 requires a high end graphically capable computer. Having 3 computers that fall short does not somehow magically combine system specs into one giant computer capable of running DOOM 3. You need to have a strong processor, copious RAM, and a powerful video card. Expecting DOOM 3 to run without these can hardly be reflected back to Id Software as a criticism of their work.

    • Re: (Score:2)

      by norkakn ( 102380 )
      It runs fine on my first gen G5. I think something may be wrong with your setup.
      • No it's the fact that the best unit for the job only runs it decent in 640x480. That's stretching the idea of "running" to "limping". I'm on an LCD and only can take so much blurry shit. I don't need it running native - but COME-ON - 640x480? WTF!

        I won't get into the fact that the 1.6 g5 first-gen also has SERIOUS MEMORY issues - which is why it's pretty much delegated to file-server status. But hey - a 2006-circa laptop humms just fine with an engine from 19-frigging-97. Spiffy wowies!

        • Re: (Score:2)

          by log0n ( 18224 )
          So really, Doom 3 runs on your G5, but you have a crappy LCD (or just an old one - before gaming was LCD-conscious) which is now the G5s fault (?). I've got an old iMac G5 (1.8) that ran Doom 3 just fine. Hell, I played (and beat) Q4 and Prey on it as well.

          I just bought a new Macbook Pro (17) and loaded those same Q4 and Prey games onto it - rediculously fast. Buy a new computer or change your expectations.

    • I've got 3 macintosh computers sitting in front of me. They represent more than 4 thousand dollars total of hardware that I use for income. When I put Doom 3 into them - the game is wholly unplayable.
      I've got 3 PCs sitting in front of me. They represent more than 4 thousand dollars total of hardware that I use for income. When I put Doom 3 into them - the income is wholly unviable.
    • Doom 3 was simply a very shitty port. Don't let that taint your idea of Mac games.
      • Well I'm addicted to Return to Castle Wolfenstein multiplayer which runs on the Quake engine - but between the Doom 3 engine port of the sequal and talks of this new engine (which 'might' fix some issues) the Quake III engine is looking long in the tooth. I'm just waiting for successor that doesn't - suck.
  • Why can't /. produce blurbs that are decipherable without reading the link - yeah yeah, I know -, doing a google and wikipedia search, and having extensive industry insider knowledge?

    • Re: (Score:3, Insightful)

      by Snowgen ( 586732 )

      Why can't /. produce blurbs that are decipherable without reading the link - yeah yeah, I know -, doing a google and wikipedia search, and having extensive industry insider knowledge?

      It's called "writing to your target audience." It's actually something that a good journalist is supposed to do. That way every news story isn't filled with three paragraphs defining what "murder" is when the target audience already knows.

      • I'm aware of this. I picked a bad sample story to bitch about this, but /. is littered with submissions which are littered with unexplained and unlinked terms and acronyms that are gibberish to even those of us who read /. daily, like me.

    • Re: (Score:2)

      by BobPaul ( 710574 ) *

      Why can't /. produce blurbs that are decipherable without reading the link
      Isn't the purpose of a blurb to get you to RTFA?

  • Thoughts From A Former Mac Game Developer (Score:4, Interesting)

    by Anonymous Coward on Monday June 11, 2007 @04:23PM (#19469655)
    Here we go again with Apple and games...

    It's the same old cycle over and over again for the past couple of decades:

    1) Someone at Apple, once again, stands up at some meeting and says we need to have better game support to grow marketshare.
    2) Apple hires some new game guys. Meet the new Apple game guys, same as the old Apple game guys.
    3) Apple woos/pays for some big game/company to make Mac versions of their game or games
    4) Apple trumpets gaming on the Mac at one of the big Mac conferences
    5) Sales of the Mac versions of the games do poorly
    6) Performance of the Mac versions of the games are worse than the pc versions due to crappy, for games, Apple GL drives or various other issues with Apple's OS due to the fact that game support has never been any significant concern
    7) Bean counters at the new Apple friendly companies start asking why they are spending so much money developing games for the Mac with such relatively poor sales
    8) Mac versions of the company's games start to get delayed or canceled
    9) Life returns to normal and the pc gaming world continues right along oblivious to the last Apple gaming episode

    Gaming for Apple is just something that isn't in the company's culture. This latest outbreak of Apple interest in gaming is in for an even tougher time now that they have been dumped into x86 land and every sane x86 game dev house is perfectly happy letting Mac users reboot into Windows to play their games.

    • But thats the thing, now that Apple is on Intel game developers don't need to do nearly the amount of work that they had to do for PowerPC based games. Its going to have the same underlying processor and graphics cards, just a slightly different API, like OpenGL versus DirectX. Not a huge conversion. Just wish Apple would go with OpenGL so developing for Linux as well would be a non issue.

      • Re: (Score:3, Interesting)

        by cyborg_zx ( 893396 )
        Um, it's the APIs that are the real problem, not the ISA.

        Since most development code NOT going to be assembler changing the choice of ISA is in most cases going to be a (relatively) simple case of compiling your code to a different compiler architecture. It becomes significantly harder if you have to deal with API changes if you have to use different libraries for different architectures - it just screams 'fragile code' at you. I don't think most developers are going to be too bothered what hardware dongle
        • Yes, and no. For high-end graphics intensive games, hardware optimizations are a must. Add that to the fact that PowerPC was falling behind in the Mhz and bus speed wars it really became a pain to develop Mac games that ran on anything but the best Macs out there and those were owned by so few people it was hardly worth it.

          • Re: (Score:1, Interesting)

            by Anonymous Coward
            > Add that to the fact that PowerPC was falling behind in the Mhz and bus speed wars it really became a pain to develop Mac games

            Wrong, although it is an appealing fiction that people who own x86 Macs like to believe in.

            There's a reason that all three console companies are using IBM/PPC chips in their consoles, and why Microsoft went through the extraordinarily painful dumping of x86 chips in their new system when the majority of their developer support comes from the x86 game development community.

            Apple

          • Re: (Score:2)

            by aliquis ( 678370 )
            Atleast the iBook had Radeon 9200 instead of Intel 950 GMA...

            And I would guess a dual/quad G5 with whatever decent graphics card would handle the games just fine..

            It's not like the G5 is slow, even by todays standards.

    • Bean counters at the new Apple friendly companies start asking why they are spending so much money developing games for the Mac with such relatively poor sales Mac versions of the company's games start to get delayed or canceled

      Umm, take a look at the top 10 selling games of 2006. Notice how many had a mac version? Yeah, pretty much all of them. Take a look at 2005, hmm same story. 2004, was different with a lot fewer. Times have changed.

      If you are making games and you're pretty sure it will be a success an Mac version costs a lot less than it makes in sales. If you plan for it from the outset, the development costs even less. There are three kinds of people who don't want to plan a Mac version at the outset: 1) people who hav

    • ... is if Apple didn't put junk graphics cards in them, or even better let them be user replacable... And no retarded special Mac version either.
    • Yeah, those guys at Blizzard are sure having a tough time selling and getting good performance out of that world of warcraft game for the mac. I feel bad for them, just no love on the mac.

  • Safari on Windows (Score:1, Offtopic)

    by windside ( 112784 )

    This is kind of exciting! I'm a long-time Firefox user, but I'm getting tired of the bloat and the gmail-related memory leaks. Although I know these are tentatively going to be fixed in Firefox 3, I'm interested in seeing what Safari has to offer. I've installed it and it looks really pretty and all, but I'm kind of agitated by the fact that there doesn't seem to be an easy way to customize its keyboard shortcuts: I'm all about ctrl+tab to switch between tabs... this ctrl+shift+] crap doesn't really float m

  • I'll be interested to see if the Mac version is released at the same time, and without the 130% price markup that has traditionally accompanied Mac versions.

    Shouldn't this go away, now that the chips are the same? Or have I missed some x-factor that will perpetuate the status-quo?

    • Re: (Score:1)

      by alxbtk ( 1009019 )
      Yes, you've missed one x-factor : the direct x factor. Most of the "killer apps" games scheduled for the next years are currently being developped for DX9 or 10.

      • Most of the "killer apps" games scheduled for the next years are currently being developped for DX9 or 10.
        Killer apps for what platform? Mac uses OpenGL. Linux uses OpenGL. PS3 uses OpenGL ES, and PSP uses a similar API. The Wii and DS use Nintendo's GX API, which resembles OpenGL more than it does DirectX. This leaves Windows and Xbox 360 as the only platforms where DirectX graphics API even works, let alone is preferable.

        • Re: (Score:1)

          by KDR_11k ( 778916 )
          Yes but 360/Windows is the best choice for making a graphically intensive game if you aren't going to make it API independent, seeing how the PS3 is struggling to sell (and Vista's OpenGL support is awful, especially with Ati) and the Wii isn't meant for graphically intense titles. Besides, how many Macs are sold with hardware that can handle graphically intense games? They come with nice CPUs but Apple skimps on the graphics card like a second rate OEM.
  • I will buy a Mac for sure if more people throw their support behind it, I am wondering where the EA Sports line is though, that should be ported over, it may move some Macs for Apple.

    • I am wondering where the EA Sports line is though

      It's right here [engadget.com]. (Well, okay, there's a lot there... more specifically, it's around the 10:10am mark. In the pic [blogsmithmedia.com] you can see that they're even giving the boxes their own little "MacDVD" header, just like console games and (lately) PC games have their own individual headers.

      • That is awesome, does anyone have any idea about what sort of Mac I will need to buy to get these things to play smoothly?
        • ... thought some mac fanatics thinks a shitty graphic card is good: macrumor comment [macrumors.com].

          Also you shouldn't but macs who haven't been updated for long since their prices are almost always fixed until the next update. You can see when a modell where last updated here: http://www.macrumors.com/ [macrumors.com]

          Anyway, here goes the current situation:
          Mac Mini, not updated for long, integrated Intel graphics, rumor says it will be discontinued.

          Macbook, recently updated, integrated Intel graphics, sucks for gaming.

          iMac, n
  • I really hope that game developers start seeing how easy it is to code games that work across every major platform (GNU/Linux, OS X, Windows, BSD, Solaris, etc). All they need to do is code with the correct libraries(OpenGL and SDL mainly) instead of DirectX. Hopefully once they start porting more and more to OS X they will realize that if they code this way all it is is a simple recompile for a GNU/Linux port. While I know id software does this they seem to be the only ones that do, hopefully EA and other

    • Re: (Score:1)

      by BobPaul ( 710574 ) *
      AFAIK, OpenGL on Win and Mac both require some extra considerations beyond OpenGL for the rest of the *nix world. With Vista, OpenGL runs using an OpenGL to DX10 API translator, so there's also a performance loss to be expected from that, though the Mac should run it the same as any other *nix. Definitely support for Mac, or SDL/OpenGL at all, is a step in the right direction for multi-platform support.

      XBox uses DX. Anyone know if OpenGL is also supported, perhaps in the same way it is on Vista?
      • The OpenGL to DX10 API translator is only if you don't install any drivers on Vista. As long as you install drivers from NVIDIA, ATI, Intel, or anyone else you should be fine. As for the extra stuff you can use SDL which has networking and sound APIs as well as handle all of OGL stuff, all of which is the same cross platform. My point is OpenGL can be programmed the same and runs with similar performance on every platform. As for the XBox I'm not sure I know Doom3 is on the XBox which is an OpenGL game I d

    • Hopefully once they start porting more and more to OS X they will realize that if they code this way all it is is a simple recompile for a GNU/Linux port.

      While porting to yet another platform is easier if you've already ported to at least one other, a simple recompile is unlikely to work in all but the simplest programs. In the real world, you'll have to deal with all sorts of incompatibilities.

      Outside of the initial technical problems, your technical support will have to deal with Yet Another Platfor

      • What I was saying that the API would be the same between all platforms this way. I realize that there still will be minor differences especially when using different compilers. But it shouldn't be that hard to port if you program things correctly. As for support you could do what id software does. They offer official support for Win and OSX but your on your own for GNU/Linux support. The GNU/Linux community would be very happy with that.
        • What I was saying that the API would be the same between all platforms this way. I realize that there still will be minor differences especially when using different compilers ...

          Mac games use platform specific APIs such Carbon and Cocoa. Whoever told you that everything is done with standard UNIX APIs didn't have a clue.

          ... They offer official support for Win and OSX but your on your own for GNU/Linux support. The GNU/Linux community would be very happy with that.

          (1) That is a sleezy way to treat
          • A game doesn't need Carbon and Cocoa, a 3D game needs is OpenGL and SDL and if your game does need simple 2D stuff use QT or Java. Those are platform independent. If companies developed all there games for GNU/Linux but did not give the community support it would help bring more and more people to the community which would eventually give companies motivation to give support on GNU/Linux. You cannot have full support all at once, you have to do it in steps.
            • Avoiding Carbon and Cocoa lead to a least common denominator approach, perhaps shareware can get away with that under Mac OS X but not major releases.

              It is not the publisher's role to jump start Linux. Why should they damage their reputation by not supporting paying customers, treating some customers as second class citizens? Also keep in mind that even without support there is still development and testing resources being consumed by the Linux version, and allowing a Linux user to run natively rather th
              • Name one game that needs Carbon and Cocoa. Quake III, Quake IV, Unreal 2K4, and many others don't. Why do they need to start? id software was once asked why they ported to GNU/Linux. There reason was that porting to GNU/Linux helped them weed out any bugs in their games while supporting a platform they all enjoyed using. It helps with quality control and if your going to sell your engine for use in other games (like id does) it adds value to be able to say that your engine works on GNU/Linux, Win, Mac, PS3
                • id software was once asked why they ported to GNU/Linux. There reason was that porting to GNU/Linux helped them weed out any bugs in their games while supporting a platform they all enjoyed using ...

                  The same thing happens by targetting Win32 and Mac OS X.

                  ... and if your going to sell your engine for use in other games (like id does) it adds value to be able to say that your engine works on GNU/Linux

                  Id had stated years ago that Linux clients do not make business sense, that they do them because the
  • I like my mac-centric computing environment at home and at the office, but I'm not going to blindly accept the wisdom of this (from the developers point of view)... simply because the mac market share is so low still. However, two points could prove this move to be wise. 1) If the cost of porting games to the newer intel-based mac hardware is relatively low, then even limited sales could still be profitable. 2) Apple is constantly gaining market share with its hardware, and lately (last 10 years) they have
  • I remember Steve Jobs demoing Halo at a keynote. It was impresive. So impresive MS bought one of the largest mac game shops...Bungie.

  • now apple needs to have better gaming hardware a $2000+ sever / workstation hardware with FB-DIMMS and only a 7300gt is not the way to do it.
    The low end hardware in the mini sucks for gaming as well and it should have 1gb base ram.

    The I-macs are not that good as well, laptop cps and video cards, as well no high end video cards, and you are forced to buy other upgrades to just be able to pay more for a better video card and gamers don't like AIO's.

    The mac book black at $1500 should have better video then gma
    • Riiight. Because if I wanted to put down ~$2500 for a Mac Pro, and I was interested in playing games on it, I wouldn't spend the extra $250 on the 'customise me before you buy' page for the X1900XT.

      [sigh]

      Simon.

    • Re: (Score:2)

      by aliquis ( 678370 )
      Atleast you can change the graphics card in the Mac Pro if you are one of the people who needs something faster, but yes, it's very expensive and comes with a very low end graphics card.

      Mac mini and Macbooks suck for gaming, yes, but hopefully the buyers are aware of that. Sadly it doesn't help that mac fanatics argue that this and that games can play oh so fine on them.. No they can't, the graphics might show up thought.

      Anyway, the reason I answer is because of your iMac point, yes, the iMacs comes with la
  • Well, if Electronic Arts start releasing Mac games, there's goes the much vaunted Mac stability. I jest... somewhat at least. We all know that EA games are notoriously unstable on PCs. My impression is that most Mac software to this day has remained well coded. What will happen when EA starts coding for the Mac? Is there a possibility of crashes, etc. not seen before?
  • Anyone notice how about 40-50% of the Wii games scheduled to be released in the next 6-8 months are Ports of PS2 and PSP games? Well it is the same deal with Macs. Publishers are learning that more platforms the title is released on = more sales - Look at one of the best selling games last year - Cars (on just about all platforms).

    Anyways the Deal with EA's games going MAC is that they are having a third party doing it. So EA gives them the code and assets, and takes care of marketing. A third party ports t

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