4 ms·
The economics may make sense, but it's also a self-fulfilling prophecy: People don't play Steam games on Macs because there are hardly any games! There's a rea
by lobster_johnson 9y ago
The economics may make sense, but it's also a self-fulfilling prophecy: People don't play Steam games on Macs because there are hardly any games!
There's a reason lots of people dual-boot into Bootcamp. I would love to play more games on my Mac, as opposed to under Windows or on my console, but the selection is terrible. Even when the engine the developers have used compiles for Mac, developers often don't do a port. That extends to indie games, too; still no Downwell for Mac, for example, despite the fact that it was made with GameMaker, which supports macOS as a target. Wadjet Eye, which produces a lot of technologically basic point and click adventure games, are very inconsistent about their releases; some games are releases on macOS, but most aren't.
Mac is also treated as a black sheep by the Steam app, to the extent that it's its own distinct item [1] in the genre list, next to "Action", "Adventure" and so on, and if you're a Mac Steam will still happily bury you in Windows games, despite the fact that they aren't playable.
Apple may be blamed on the AAA game situation, but for everything else (and most games aren't AAA), it's squarely on publishers, developers, and Steam.
[1] http://i.imgur.com/lE4NZsj.png http://i.imgur.com/lE4NZsj.png
- emsy 9y ago>(and most games aren't AAA) You're right, but AAA sells make up the biggest fraction of game sales. Why should I buy a Mac for gaming if I can't play games like Call of Duty, Overwatch, GTA V or The Witcher 3? AA and Indie games are a niche market, not driving factors. There is also a factor that you can't really blame on anyone: OS market share. Even if more Mac (and Linux) users would buy games, the time worked on porting and support would likely still result in a net loss.
- vbezhenar 9y agoPorting shouldn't be too hard, if you're using good engine. Support for users is proportional to number of users. Very limited choice of hardware and generally up-to-date software should tremendously help with support as well. It might be a net loss for very niche games, but for a few thousand sales it shouldn't be that bad IMO. Also the fact that there are not that many games on macOS helps as well. I wouldn't buy Civilization, but I bought it, because there was a moment I wanted to play something and Civilization was one of the few recognizable titles I've found in AppStore.