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mac compatibility

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Schmung:
The debate isn't about how well it runs on the mac, it's the fact that the PC, pound for pound (or dollar for dollar) will give you better gaming performance than the Mac. Simple as that.

If you love Macs and only want to play a few games, by all means get one. If you love games, get a PC.

Mnementh:
I've had Mac OS Systems for well over a decade and never had a problem finding and running major release games.  My previous system (before my PowerBook) was a G3 266 and still running new games at the time (MOH:AA, Baldurs Gate II, Return to Castle Wolfenstein, Warcraft 3, UT) well when it was six years old.

My current system is three years old I haven't had any problems, though I don't game much other than WoW anymore and that infrequently, I seem to have gotten bored with it in general.

My two cents.  Oh, and I have Civ3 for the Mac.

Lug:
Ug...

I hate it when people compare Mac to "the PC". A Mac is just as much a personal computer as a standard dell "PC", the only difference between a "PC" and a Mac is is the processor used. Mac uses a PowerPC processors (RISC) while your standard "PC" uses x86(CISC).

Comparing speed is kinda hit and miss. Technically the x86 processor performs more clock cycles per second then a PowerPC (but I believe that the PowerPC can perform more floating point instructions per second then the x86), What really makes a differnce is the types of opperations performed. PowerPC is better at some then the x86 is and vice versa (therefor PowerPC can run certain programs faster then x86 can  and vice versa).

The only thing that causes few games to be ported to  Mac is the same thing that pervents games from being ported to Linux: 90% of the market runs Windows, why bother catering to the other 10%.

Valrus:
Anyone who knows me will tell you that I'm a huge Mac evangelist, but even I have to admit that if games are your main thing, you're gonna want a PC. The stock video cards on any but the most expensive Macs are underpowered and non-upgradeable, and there are just not as many games for a Mac.

If all you want is (most of) the big names, a Mac will do ok, but the simple fact is that the gaming market is heavily skewed toward PCs. It's getting better, but it's still not even, not by far.

I'd be happy to tell you that in my opinion, a Mac is better for just about anything else. Games, however, are the Achilles heel, an area where I'm just not willing to try to argue the Mac's superiority or even its equality. I will say, however, that a Mac is adequate for games.

It's really just a question of how important gaming is to you.

Oh, and as someone else mentioned, pretty much any games besides Blizzard's will have to be re-purchased if you already have the PC version.

nexus:

--- Quote from: Kanno ---It has nothing to do with "performance issues".  I run UT2k4 on my mac, and that is something I would consider to be hardware intensive, and it runs like a dream.  No problems whatsoever.  

I'm just sick of dealing with these stupid stereotypes about macs that come from people who don't use them. It's almost like, computer racism or something, and I'm sick of it.
--- End quote ---
If I turn down the settings on Half-Life2 I can get it to run on a Pentium3/GeForce3. The $3k G5 system defaults with a Radeon 9600! That card is like 3 years old! I'm not attacking the Mac or using stupid stereotypes or false generalizations. Nor have I ever intended to start a Mac vs PC "war." And where did I say I don't use a Mac? Not as my regular machine, no. But I have used a G5 system extensively and have a Mini which I enjoy very much.

The fact remains that a Mac is not a "gaming system" which is apparently the only reason this post exists is the help someone answer that question. Here are game-specific benchmarks between Mac and PC systems: (althought both use a top-of-the-line configuration)
http://www.barefeats.com/mac2pc.html

So here's what my original post was before I shortened it:

--- Quote from: Gryff ---How do you know if a PC game is compatible with OSX?
If I was to buy, say, Civilisation 3 would it work on a mac (given that the specs were sufficient) or would I have to buy a special mac version of the game?
--- End quote ---
Most PC games are written for the DirectX API which is Microsoft-only. This means their graphics engine is written for Direct3D. The alternatve graphics API is OpenGL which is available to any system (Windows, Linux, Mac). Neither API is inherently better than the other (Half-Life 2 is written in Direct X, Doom 3 in OpenGL). There are also differences between programming for an x86 system (Intel, AMD) and the PowerPC (Apple).

If a developer writes a game in OpenGL (e.g. the aforementioned Doom3) it will be much easier to convert it to Mac. If a game is written in DirectX, then the majority of architecture code will need to be re-written for OpenGL.

Things like textures, text files, and sound files will not need to be converted because they would use a standard format which PC and Mac both accept (with the exception of audio encoded with WMA)

The only game I know of that has a Windows and OSX install on the same disk is Warcraft 3 as 'will: wanton sex god' informed us.

Unless the industry has been sneakily providing Mac installs of its games akin to Apple having an Intel version of OSX ready for 5 years, you will have to buy a different version of a game for Mac and PC. (Aspyr Media, which I mentioned above, develops a large number of game which are ported from PC to Mac. I'm sure they have a list of "coming soon" titles which may be of use to you.)

--- Quote from: Gryff ---Are there likely to be performance problems due to the transition from pc to mac?
--- End quote ---
There won't be performance problems if the developer ported the game correctly.

What you may see is slight differences in the graphics (due to conversion between DirectX and OpenGL) or having to run at lower settings/less detail, however this would almost exclusively apply to 3D games. Here are some random links I got from Googling various combinations of "game performance", "mac", "apple", and "issues" I'm sure you could come up with more information with a little better searching:
http://arstechnica.com/news.ars/post/20050315-4704.html
http://www.accelerateyourmac.com/games/mac_wow_performance.html
http://www.macworld.com/news/2005/03/02/doom3/index.php


I doubt how much more useful all that was to Gryff than what I said in my first post.

Regardless, no more comments from me in this thread. Gryff has enough information to make a decision and that was my only purpose.


[edit]
Ok, no more comments from me, after this edit ;) (Four posts between the time I started my post and the time I finally submitted it.)

--- Quote from: Lug ---I hate it when people compare Mac to "the PC". A Mac is just as much a personal computer as a standard dell "PC", the only difference between a "PC" and a Mac is is the processor used. Mac uses a PowerPC processors (RISC) while your standard "PC" uses x86(CISC).
--- End quote ---
Yeah, I know, I do too. Unfortunately that's become the accepted terminology and I have no intention of refering to Windows when talking hardware. But there are many more differences than just the CPU (and the distinction between RISC and CISC is essentially moot with modern CPUs)
Besides, how will we distinguish once Apple is running on Intel?


--- Quote from: Schmung ---The debate isn't about how well it runs on the mac, it's the fact that the PC, pound for pound (or dollar for dollar) will give you better gaming performance than the Mac. Simple as that.

If you love Macs and only want to play a few games, by all means get one. If you love games, get a PC.
--- End quote ---
Perhaps I should have just said that.
[/edit]

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