Apple to reinvent computer gaming?

[jeanlain]

The new Macs are powerful enough to play the latest games (though not necessarily at high settings). It's just that we don't have Mac versions of these games.

 

[Homy]

BG 3 at Ultra settings 1080p on M1 in this video at 6:45: https://developer.apple.com/videos/play/tech-talks/10859/

Intel UHD Graphics 630 in Mac Mini 2018: 3.150 GPixel/s, 25.20 GTexel/s, FP32 403.2 GFLOPS

M1 Mac Mini 2020: 41 GPixel/s, 82 GTexel/s, FP32 2.6 TFLOPS

A12Z FP32 1.1 TFLOPS
Radeon Pro 560X 2.056 TFLOPS
Radeon Pro 5300M 3.2 TFLOPS
Radeon Pro 5300 4.2 TFLOPS
Radeon Pro 580X 5.530 TFLOPS

 

[gkarris]

I don't think we'll see any sort of comparisons between consoles and the ARM macs. Sure the new Macs can play candy crush or temple run, but not COD or Red Dead Redemption II and in all honesty I don't think we'll ever see those types of games.

Did not Apple Demo "Shadow of the Tomb Raider" when they did the Mac Silicon Reveal at wwdc 2020?

 

[maflynn]

Did not Apple Demo "Shadow of the Tomb Raider" when they did the Mac Silicon Reveal at wwdc 2020?

No question, but you're neglecting the fact that AAA publishers are not flocking to the ARM platform, Macs are not gaming PCs and given the marketshare of Macs nothing about the change to ARM will tempt publishers to suddenly embrace the Mac, If publishers didn't produce a game for Macs prior to ARM what makes you think they're willing to do that now?

 

[Horselover Fat]

I am confused.

On the one hand, we saw a Rosetta2-emulated 'Shadow of the Tomb Raider' with smooth framerates (just 1080p, but still). This suggests that there's a lot of horsepower under the hood.

On the other hand, Apple just compares the GPU performance of their SoC with 'integrated graphics', for instance 2.9 x the performance of an Intel Iris Plus Graphics 645. This seems rather sobering. And yet Apple praised the performance of the M1 as suitable for gaming. I'm sure Baldur's Gate 3 will have outstanding qualities, but it is not exactly the latest and greatest in graphics.

Anyway, I think there are two major obstacles to make macOS as attractive as Windows for gaming at the moment:
- no PCIe slots / support for high performance GPUs
- the huge number of developers/publishers ignoring macOS

 

[Washac]

$5000 reasonably priced, excuse me but, LMAO
This pricing proves that Apple are no longer interested in the average home market.

 

[Absrnd]

I also thought Apple was mentioning gaming a lot.

 

[maflynn]

the huge number of developers/publishers ignoring macOS

My unofficial and non-scientifict opinion is that the money just isn't there. I mean if devs and publishers thought they'd make a decent profit they'd be all over the platform. i've said this before, with only a tiny subset of 10% of the marketshare wanting to game, it doesn't provide publishers a lot of warm and fuzzies.

If Publishers were unwilling to produce mac versions of their games while the Mac was on Intel (and had access to EGPUS), how much less they must be to entertain a completely different platform

 

[Plutonius]

My unofficial and non-scientifict opinion is that the money just isn't there. I mean if devs and publishers thought they'd make a decent profit they'd be all over the platform. i've said this before, with only a tiny subset of 10% of the marketshare wanting to game, it doesn't provide publishers a lot of warm and fuzzies.

If Publishers were unwilling to produce mac versions of their games while the Mac was on Intel (and had access to EGPUS), how much less they must be to entertain a completely different platform

I think that the number of games for the Apple OS will go up considerably with the new Macs.

Unfortunately, almost all the games will be Apple Arcade iOS games .

 

[maflynn]

I think that the number of games for the Apple OS will go up considerably with the new Macs.

Unfortunately, almost all the games will be Apple Arcade iOS games .

Yes, iOS type games will be on the Macs and less traditional games that are on Steam. Apple has been cold to gaming on the Mac since day 1, but with its subscription service and the ability to run iOS games, they're suddenly very interested (but only for their subscription)

 

[cardfan]

Yes, iOS type games will be on the Macs and less traditional games that are on Steam. Apple has been cold to gaming on the Mac since day 1, but with its subscription service and the ability to run iOS games, they're suddenly very interested (but only for their subscription)

And even before this mac launch Apple is in the top 5 easily for gaming revenue. You think PlayStation or Xbox for gaming but Apple is quietly right there with them. Some times surging ahead. Eventually they will surge ahead for good. Just on simple iOS type games.

 

[maflynn]

Apple is in the top 5 easily for gaming revenue

I'm not knocking their game subscription, its great for the leisurely players.

 

[Horselover Fat]

My unofficial and non-scientifict opinion is that the money just isn't there. I mean if devs and publishers thought they'd make a decent profit they'd be all over the platform. i've said this before, with only a tiny subset of 10% of the marketshare wanting to game, it doesn't provide publishers a lot of warm and fuzzies.

If Publishers were unwilling to produce mac versions of their games while the Mac was on Intel (and had access to EGPUS), how much less they must be to entertain a completely different platform

I think so too.

 

[Homy]

One upside of M1 is that when you choose more RAM at purchase you automatically upgrade your VRAM too. So an iMac with 32 GB can have 20-30 GB VRAM.

 

[Huntn]

Yes, iOS type games will be on the Macs and less traditional games that are on Steam. Apple has been cold to gaming on the Mac since day 1, but with its subscription service and the ability to run iOS games, they're suddenly very interested (but only for their subscription)

iOS games are few and far between that hold my interest For any meaningful length of time. I’ve tried. Now Plants vs Zombies and Plague Inc are excellent but would not substitute for my favorite games.

 

[maflynn]

iOS games are few and far between that hold my interest

My take on this is that these ios games are great on your phone and/or iPad because they're time killers. Waiting for the train or your appointment just play a game.
On the computer its a different issue and while people may play them on their Macs I don't think we'll see the same level of participation - just my.02

 

[Tech198]

I just came across the article:

Apple Rumored to Launch High-End ‘Gaming Focused’ Mac for 2020 for a Somewhat Reasonable Price

A fresh report claims that Apple may launch a ‘gaming’ Mac that takes on the PC market in 2020, and it could be reasonably priced too

wccftech.com

It could be interesting to see how they do it. Will it be a clone of Mac Pro or more like gaming laptop?

Interesting anyway as the market is huge for both software and hardware.

If this is the take on the M1, then probably.. If in general, then no chance

Apple may have their foot in the door with silicon, but unless it's cloud based gaming as the next thing, then moving to silicon will be the nail in the coffin for most games... The ones who would survive would be like Crossover.

Biosock 2 on Catalina? No way i can't see that happening. so, the market is definitely reducing...

Its only those devs. with release the source code like Doom, others could tinker around with it. but even then most of the time you still gotta install Homebrew just to get it working on 64-bit..

 

[Homy]

25 games tested. Very impressive! I mean Bioshock 2 Remastered, Borderlands 2-3 and Deus Ex Mankind Divided on ultra settings on iGPU through Rosetta??? WOW!

 

[maflynn]

Very impressive! I mean Bioshock 2 Remastered, Borderlands 2-3 and Deus Ex Mankind Divided on ultra settings on iGPU through Rosetta??? WOW!

While I agree the computing performance of the M1 is incredibly impressive, the game play performance, is not that great; 20 to 30 fps? That's not really playable.

 

[Homy]

While I agree the computing performance of the M1 is incredibly impressive, the game play performance, is not that great; 20 to 30 fps? That's not really playable.

Then don't play demanding games like Deus Ex MKD and Borderlands 3 on an entry level laptop/iGPU with 10W TDP. Not even laptops with Intel XE G7

and AMD APU, like Ryzen 5 3400G with Radeon RX Vega 11 at 65W can do better than 20-25 fps in Shadow of the Tomb Raider on LOW settings.

In that video he ran the game on HIGHEST settings and got around 20-25 and the game isn't even optimized, running through Rosetta. If that doesn't impress you have unrealistic expectations.

 

[diamond.g]

No one has played Baldurs Gate 3 (Early Access) on M1 yet?

 

[diamond.g]

Claybook [XO, PS4, PC, NX]

I am happy to announce our game Claybook! We have been doing this for almost 1.5 years now with 2 people team. We recently acquired one extra guy to help with content production, so now we have 3 guys in the studio. The game is using signed distance field (SDF) based geometry, custom GPGPU...

forum.beyond3d.com

Wonder if we could get a port of this. Apparently it doesn't use rasterization at all. Apple's hardware is strong in compute this seems right up their alley.

 

[Marsikus]

Are HL2-based games running well with Rosetta?

 

[diamond.g]

Are HL2-based games running well with Rosetta?

Source engine games, like TF2 and CS:GO? Those use OGL which means they work, but not at peak performance.

 

[Marsikus]

Source engine games, like TF2 and CS:GO? Those use OGL which means they work, but not at peak performance.

Thank you.