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Valve bringing Steam to Mac
- stcredzero 17y agoGive this seamless integration with Front Row. (In the UI but have it be a modular add-on install.)
- jrockway 17y agoWhy? So you can select the game with a remote control, and then walk over the the computer to play it?
- jcl 17y agoWhy not? Many games can be played with controllers instead of mouse and keyboard. If you're using your computer as a media center hooked up to your TV, then being able to select the game via remote could be quite convenient.
- stcredzero 17y agoExactly. Hide the "computer" aspect and just make it part of the entertainment center. Release an Apple controller with pre-configured button/key mappings for all of the Steam games. Have a "Widget" style window display these. Make the Mac Mini into even more of a multi-use device. The thing could soon have enough horsepower to support a lot of the Nintendo Wii portfolio.
- jrockway 17y agoMost of the Steam games are wasd-based, which you really don't want to replicate with a controller. I played Portal on my XBox, which was OK, but TF2 sucks with a controller. The keyboard and mouse is a great control combination for serious games. Even Peggle would be hard to play with a controller.
- jcl 17y agoMost of the games are wasd-based by default, but many can be configured to use a controller, if desired -- especially the games that are also released on the PS3/360. Whether a game is particularly suited to a controller is another matter, but this is in part a function of popularity; if more people played using controllers (as they might with a media center setup), companies will make more games that cater to them. Valve in particular is especially aware of the hardware hooked up to a player's machine, through their regular Steam hardware surveys and fanatical in-game tracking. And while I agree that I can't see the appeal of playing a competitive multiplayer FPS with a controller against opponents with keyboards/mice, that doesn't stop a lot of people from trying: http://www.google.com/search?q=pc+counterstrike+controller&btnG=Google+Search http://www.google.com/search?q=pc+counterstrike+controller&#...
- whimsy 17y agoI play on a computer because I prefer a keyboard and mouse.
- dboyd 17y agoMy experience with Steam on windows has not been entirely pleasant. Granted, the poor user interface, and the endless amount of intrusion into the startup and gaming process can quickly be forgiven in light of the fact that I got one of the most entertaining games I've ever played through Steam: Portal. Still, as someone who really doesn't want to have to own a high-end windows box for the sole purpose of gaming, this announcement make me (cautiously?) optimistic.
- tialys 17y agoThey've just released an early version of the new UI, and it's MUCH faster and less intrusive (I think). That said, I can't really say it's all that bad when compared to most any other similar tool. Plus, SteamFriends and other things are just plain amazing for gamers -- frankly I don't know how I used to get by without them.
- noilly 17y agothe current steam beta ui has been ported from ie to webkit (which was a hint that they were going to introduce mac support)
- hristov 17y agoLast time I used Steam I spent a couple of hours trying to debug a game that crashed on startup. Eventually I figured out how to start the game without Steam interfering, and found that when I start the game without Steam I would get a very helpful error message, that told me exactly what the problem was. When I started the game with steam, the game would just crash with no error messages. After that, I did a lot of cursing at Steam.
- CoryMathews 17y agoI did the same thing and have swore to never buy another game by them again. I never got the game to work...
- 17y ago
- weaksauce 17y agoI love that the mac is going to be treated as a tier-1 game device by valve and that you don't need to buy both a mac version if you have already purchased the PC version. This could be the catalyst that the mac world was looking for to be more gamer oriented and not an afterthought.
- potatolicious 17y agoWhat's even better I think is the expansion of Steam Cloud into savegames altogether. The ability to sync progress on a game seamlessly and automatically across multiple machines is going to be a real treat. It's already useful for hardcore gamers now - go to a gaming cafe, log into your Steam account, and all of your control schemes and settings are just the way you like 'em.
- metachris 17y agoThis also means a lot more games will be developed with OpenGL rather than just DirectX, which might bring many more future games to Linux as well.
- MikeCapone 17y agoThat would be awesome. The only game I play is Call of Duty 4 because it's too annoying to reboot my Mac Pro in Windows mode.
- coderdude 17y agoNow there's a moving target. Given the amount of testing that is required just to get modern games to work across most hardware without problems (on Windows), Linux (which distros?) as a tier-1 platform is wishful thinking. The mass gaming market exists on stable, more or less predictable platforms.
- vorador 17y agoMaybe not linux, but Ubuntu ?
- cookiecaper 17y ago
- sp332 17y agohttp://store.steampowered.com/news/3569/ http://store.steampowered.com/news/3569/ "Please submit the original source. If a blog post reports on something they found on another site, submit the latter."
- scott_s 17y agoI think there is a difference between a blog post and a news article by an established site, such as Wired. Personally, I'd rather see Wired's news article than a company press release. Wired did reporting beyond the press release itself. The part of the guidelines you quoted is, I think, more aimed at blog posts that add no value, just quote another news story verbatim.
- sp332 17y agoI don't entirely disagree, but it should be presented as commentary instead of news. I guess I was just a little ticked that Wired didn't even link to the official announcement.
- Mystalic 17y agoOften times, we (journalists) get sent the news/releases directly. Most of the time we're not even sent the link, so that's what we work off of.
- ptomato 17y agoI think that's probably because the announcement wasn't up until after Wired had published, as Wired and several other news sources just got the release dropped in their inboxes directly.
- threepointone 17y agoI hope this kicks off the gaming peripheral market for macs. It would be lovely to have a a handheld controller to play this stuff. Macbook Pro keyboards are not very good for gaming :) The tiny arrow keys are pissing off. I hear the ps3 controller already hooks up with snow leopard easily, so that's good news. EDIT: Google search for "ps3 controller snow leopard" shows a bunch of hits, just to confirm what I said. http://www.google.com/search?rlz=1C1GGLS_enUS368US368&sourceid=chrome&ie=UTF-8&q=ps3+controller+snow+leopard http://www.google.com/search?rlz=1C1GGLS_enUS368US368&so...
- jimm 17y agoI never use the arrow keys when gaming. A friend showed me the setup I use to this day: look with the mouse, right mouse walks, left mouse fires, shift/c strafe left/right, z secondary fire, x duck.
- andybak 17y agoInteresting. If only I'd been shown that 15 years ago when I still had some ability to rewire my neuronal pathways.
- pavel_lishin 17y agoI can't imagine being too old to get used to a new control scheme. It's like being too old to switch to standard instead of automatic.
- bugs 17y agoIt is more like a well established touch typer switching from qwerty to dvorak, it can happen just takes will to change and a good amount of time.
- nonrecursive 17y agohow do you walk backward?
- matthijs 17y agoI really like the Steam Play concept and hope all the older Valve games I bought will use this feature. Finally no more or at least less reboots to windows
- jkincaid 17y agoAnyone with knowledge of the current generation of video cards know how recent models of iMacs and Macbook Pros will perform (assuming performance of Steam on Mac is comparable to its Windows counterpart). I tried checking out the video card in my 27 inch iMac (by far the most expensive desktop I've ever purchased) and was a bit underwhelmed to find out the card was released in 2008...
- X-Istence 17y agoI am able to play Half Life 2 at full settings on my older generation MacBook Pro with an 8600M when running Windows, on a 1080p monitor. I would be interested in seeing how the 9400M does in the latest MacBook Pro's.
- weaksauce 17y agoSome of the latest MBP's have a 9600 as well as the 9400. The 9600 runs mirrors edge pretty well on a 24" monitor at native resolution.
- ovi256 17y agoI played CoD: MW2 (Bootcamp) on my 27" Core Duo 2 iMac and it ran well. Not at highest quality settings, but about as well as the PS3 I'd say. No crashes either.
- tibbon 17y agoMy 2008 Macbook Pro (C2d 2.5ghz, 512MB Geforce 8600gt, 4GB ram) holds up pretty well with most Steam titles at reasonable settings and resolutions. I'm sure the newer ones fare even better. I wouldn't worry about your graphics card so much- even 'older' ones are pretty good still. Will it play Crysis at full settings on a huge screen? No, but it does TF2 and Portal nicely at 1440x900.
- yashodhan 17y agoThat's the same laptop I have. Do you think it'll last for a while?
- msg 17y agoAs a user who endured many crashes in Team Fortress 2 with the edge versions of Crossover Games, I'm happy that I'll become a first-class citizen soon...
- Flow 17y agoI'm in the exact same position. The crashes are very random.
- snprbob86 17y agoHow long before their achievements and other components are on iPhone too?
- zyb09 17y agoI bet Apple will sooner or later throw rocks in their path. Why? That's just how Apple rolls.
- e1ven 17y agoWorld of Warcraft has been running on OSX for several years, and Apple has helped them to get better performance over time.
- duskwuff 17y agoIndeed, a couple of OS X updates have mentioned OpenGL changes made specifically to boost performance in WoW. For instance, http://support.apple.com/kb/HT1525 http://support.apple.com/kb/HT1525 "... improves the reliability of OpenGL-accelerated graphics in Blizzard's World of Warcraft".
- ptomato 17y agoPer the valve guys in an interview with AppleInsider, Apple provided quite a bit of support and help when they were porting Steam/Source to Mac.
- potatolicious 17y agoIt makes sense - Apple has been interested in Macs as a gaming platform for years, but has never been serious enough to put their considerable muscle behind it. If someone else is willing to throw their money, time, and influence at the problem, all the better for Apple.
- jeroen 17y agoThe interview: http://www.appleinsider.com/articles/10/03/08/valve_apple_worked_closely_to_bring_steam_to_mac.html http://www.appleinsider.com/articles/10/03/08/valve_apple_wo...
- quizbiz 17y agoDoes this mean PC games on Mac? Pardon my ignorance.
- acj 17y agoYes and no. Valve is porting some of its existing PC/Xbox game titles to run natively on the Mac platform, and most (or all?) of their new titles will be released simultaneously on PC, Mac, and XBox 360.
- e1ven 17y agoFurther, Valve is bring it's "App Store for Games" to the Mac, which will encourage other game publishers to port to the Mac, and give them a solid sales-platform to do so on.
- dkasper 17y agoCarrying that train of thought further, they should integrate with Apple's App Store. Everyone on a mac uses iTunes anyway, why should they have to install Steam separately?
- simonw 17y agoBecause Valve don't have to give Apple a cut when people buy through Steam.
- nkohari 17y agoSteam is more than just an app store, though. It's a social network, provides automatic updates for games, etc.
- cookiecaper 17y agoFor the record, when I use OS X, I don't use iTunes.
- bemmu 17y agoAlready many students are using Apple laptops at school, and perhaps have a PC at home since you can also play games on it. If you could play all the new cool games on a Mac, instead of a home PC you could consider either getting a beefier Mac laptop or a Mac desktop system. While there may still be a lot of people preferring a PC, I think their future number just went down a lot. Time to long AAPL?
- ekiru 17y agoOne thing that I'm wondering is whether I'll be able to get the Mac version of Dragon Age, for example, through Steam without having to buy it again since I've already bought the Windows version through Steam. I'm sure there could be some licensing issues there, but if Valve managed to convince other game developers to allow them to do that with non-Valve games, it would make this even better.
- stef25 17y ago"If players already own the PC versions of Valve games, they’ll get Mac versions at no extra charge through a feature called Steam Play." Source: http://www.wired.com/gamelife/2010/03/steam-mac/ http://www.wired.com/gamelife/2010/03/steam-mac/
- lutorm 17y agoYeah, too bad that of the few games I own on Steam, a big fat zero come from Valve...
- illumin8 17y agoUnfortunately, this is really up to the publisher of Dragon Age, EA/Bioware. Steam is just a distribution channel, like the App Store is for iPhone. They take a cut of each purchase and handle electronic downloads and DRM. In order to get a copy for Mac for free, EA/Bioware would have to agree to allow their PC Steam customers to do this. Edit: I'm an idiot, they did release a Mac version This isn't a magic bullet, but it's a great first step. Now that publishers have a known and trusted distribution channel on Mac, we may see more Mac versions of AAA titles.
- CoryMathews 17y agoSteam does not even run well on windows why would they try to port it to mac before making it stable on windows?