The Lord Of The Rings: Gollum bites the dust

[Ethosik]

If Apple isn't to blame for weak iGPU that can't handle recent games then who do we blame, developers, users? Nobody wants to talk about it but at least half of the 2.3% Steam MacOS user base with base M1 and Intel integrated graphics can't handle recent games. That's far worse than initial game launch issues that can be corrected with updates. And, how likely are those users going to repeat the same mistake when they can just get a console or PC with much better performance at lower cost?

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Uh no? This is like saying I shouldn't develop for PC gaming because Dell sells $1,000 systems that still have Intel iGPUs. Also on Windows Intel and AMD integrated graphics make up for the whole of Mac's marketshare or very close to it at around ~ 1.6 + 1.5 percents.

There are hundreds of games on PC that do NOT exist on Macs that run perfectly fine on Intel graphics.

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It is PURELY marketshare. I don't know how else to say this, and I have said it in dozens of these threads. This is PURELY why I am developing my game for Windows only, even though it can run just fine on integrated Intel graphics from a 2013 Windows laptop. Targeting Windows gives me the biggest pool of users to offer my game to. This is the only reason. Apple is not being hostile towards me as a developer.

 

[Ethosik]

And that is exactly the excuse. If they don't rush, people lose jobs and the studio is gone. Nothing is going to change that. The "game" is much harder in the entertainment industry than any other type of software engineering/development. And if you've worked for Microsoft, Sony, Apple, EA, Ubi, Capcom or similar large companies in the gaming business you know this. Good for you that you can focus on your indie game now and don't have to play by the same rules.

Yes it can be changed. People need to stop supporting these companies and making excuses for them. Stop buying games with empty promises that these issues will be fixed in a future patch 6-12 months from now. Do that, and things will improve. PC gaming has not always been this frustrating.

 

[diamond.g]

Yes it can be changed. People need to stop supporting these companies and making excuses for them. Stop buying games with empty promises that these issues will be fixed in a future patch 6-12 months from now. Do that, and things will improve. PC gaming has not always been this frustrating.

PC Gaming has gone through periods of time where things were great And period of times where things were not great (who here remembers having to boot DOS on special disks to have enough memory to start games, or rearranging IRQs).

 

[Homy]

Mac gaming sucks (and is not dead), because many, many great games are available on basically all platforms except macOS, because we can't play 32-bit Mac games anymore and because performance is generally lower than on Windows, due to the Mac being an afterthought.

And this isn't going to change.

Well, that’s an improvement from ”sucks and is dead and done”.

You speak in general terms and while it’s true from certain perspectives I’m curious about your personal experiences. Many gamers act like wolves among sheep, especially when younger. It’s no secret it’s a common joke among gamers themselves and that’s the size of their backlog. With all the new games released every year and all the different sales they keep buying and collecting games and can’t stop like wolves can’t stop killing sheep despite not being able to eat them all. It’s not unusual people have a library of thousands of games on Steam, GOG and Epic, not to mention consoles.

I only have time to play and finish 2-3 AAA Mac games a year if I’m lucky. A game that is supposed to take 30 hours to finish can take 100-150 hours for me because I don’t speedrun games, something many PC gamers do to have time to play the next title waiting in their library. People say it’s about having free choice but at the same time 80% of the available games are garbage according to PC gamers themselves. So if the majority of the games are garbage and people have backlogs with thousands of games they don’t manage to play anyway what difference does it really make? At least when it comes to Mac devs mainly port successful games because they want to make money. So while there are fewer games they are games you really want to play.

So how many games do you own and how many of them you’ve actually played and how many have you finished? Which 32-bit games or great titles have you played and finished that you couldn’t do on your Mac (if you have one)? What games have underperformed on your Mac to a degree of disappointment and which Mac have you used for your gaming? I mean there is no need for 300 fps if you don’t need it just like you really don’t need 2000 unplayed games in your library. I’m curious about your own experiences, not all the titles not available for Mac.

 

[Huntn]

And with Windows being at 96% here, and we are getting horrible ports lately that makes my top end system not worth it from a gaming perspective, why do people think things should be different when Macs have 2.3% here?

If game devs are treating Windows users this bad, again why is the current state of Mac gaming ANY shock? It is PURELY Marketshare driven. Nintendo Switch has more AAA games than Mac does, and you need to do a lot....A LOT of work to get current gen games to work on a Switch, it is severely outdated hardware. But devs put in significant effort into it since it has very high marketshare.

I think it's time we stop blaming Apple for every minor thing here. People complain about the prices, but it wasn't cheap buying a gaming PC either. Certainly not as cheap as a $300-500 console.

Like I said before, I am far more frustrated as a PC gamer than I am as a Mac gamer. The fact that currently at the time I built it there was NO BETTER SYSTEM than a 13900k and a 4090, yet some games struggled with it is very frustrating. So they aren't even treating us Windows users properly. Have these canned "Sorry for the performance issues, we will MAYBE fix them in the future, but still we will take your money LOL" tweets and posts from devs are getting far too common these days.

Game devs have an excuse for Macs - marketshare
Game devs have NO excuse for Windows - lazy, rushed ports

PC gaming is not in a good state right now.

Digital Foundry about how 2022 was, and 2023 so far has been just as bad if not worse.

And here is more people talking about how PC ports are going.

There are some what I would describe as terrific PC games out there. Unless it is a title I'm not familiar with or its getting across the board great user reviews, I may wait for a sale, and that might be a year. Some examples of good enough to stellar games:

• Cyberpunk 2077
• Conan Exiles
• ARK: Survival Evolved
• World of Warships
• Grounded
• Farcry 5
• Fallout 4 (admittedly older)

I'll stop here, but I could put up a long list of good titles, and I'll certainly hesitate before I buy a $70 game, maybe I won't, have not yet. Most of the games I'm buying on Steam run $10-20, and many are early release games. I did pay $50 for Cyberpunk and it was pretty amazing despite my critiques.

 

[Huntn]

Yes it can be changed. People need to stop supporting these companies and making excuses for them. Stop buying games with empty promises that these issues will be fixed in a future patch 6-12 months from now. Do that, and things will improve. PC gaming has not always been this frustrating.

Typically if a game comes out and bombs, this somewhat is a self correcting mechanism, players will hold off buying, I think. 🤫

 

[diamond.g]

There are some what I would describe as terrific PC games out there. Unless it is a title I'm not familiar with or its getting across the board great user reviews, I may wait for a sale, and that might be a year. Some examples of good enough to stellar games:

• Cyberpunk 2077
• Conan Exiles
• ARK: Survival Evolved
• World of Warships
• Grounded
• Farcry 5
• Fallout 4 (admittedly older)

I'll stop here, but I could put up a long list of good titles, and I'll certainly hesitate before I buy a $70 game, maybe I won't, have not yet. Most of the games I'm buying on Steam run $10-20, and many are early release games. I did pay $50 for Cyberpunk and it was pretty amazing despite my critiques.

To be fair most of those games are fine now, but we're messed up at launch.

 

[Ethosik]

To be fair most of those games are fine now, but we're messed up at launch.

Agree. Again this trend of "sorry for the performance, we will fix in a future patch, maybe in 6 months" trend if not a good one lately. I played most of those at launch and gave up on them. I will never buy Cyberpunk again and play it as launch provided such negativity for me. I absolutely will not support the company. No Mans Sky is similar. While its great they made it better, I will not support a company that acts this way.

 

[Ethosik]

Typically if a game comes out and bombs, this somewhat is a self correcting mechanism, players will hold off buying, I think. 🤫

Yet people still buy, and just hope it gets fixed later. We just need to stop buying pre-releases and buying games on day one. I have done this. I fully expect Starfield to be horrible at launch on PC. So I am not going to buy it early or pre order it. Nintendo is the ONLY company (only Nintendo games, not Switch games as a whole) that I buy day one. Metroid Prime Remaster and Zelda Tears of the Kingdom are the two most that I actually pre-ordered.

As much as Metal Gear Solid is my #1 favorite series of all time, I am not going to pre-order MGS Delta on PC because I expect it to be horrible at launch. This is just the trend of PC games lately. My entire attitude towards the platform is shaken. I will probably stop PC gaming and just move to consoles with the mid-gen refreshes.

 

[GrumpyCoder]

Yes it can be changed. People need to stop supporting these companies and making excuses for them. Stop buying games with empty promises that these issues will be fixed in a future patch 6-12 months from now. Do that, and things will improve. PC gaming has not always been this frustrating.

That is wishful thinking and doesn't work. Never has.
If we all would have stayed at home when the pandemic started, it would have been over within a month. Just look at the Netflix mess. They cancelled shows after one season, so people did exactly what you suggested and didn't jump on a first season, but waited for at least a second. Number of views went down, less profit which lead to even more cancellations, even for shows leading the charts. Fewer people buying games leads to even less resources and effort making games. And no, it doesn't take 6-12 months for patches to fix games. Some games might never be fixed (PoE on the Mac has been broken for years...) and I doubt Gollum ever will be fixed. The whole studio sold for under €3 million, which is nothing and they already moved on to work on the next LotR licensed game. This is franchise licensing. Little effort, maximum profit. Gollum is in the Top 10 UK VG sales charts, so is Jedi Survivor. Mission accomplished.

The Lord of the Rings: Gollum is the highest new release on the charts as it debuted in sixth place. It had a very slow start, however, sales were slightly higher than LEGO 2K Drive the previous week. 70 percent of retail sales were on the PlayStation 5, 20 percent on the Xbox, and 10 percent on the PlayStation 4.

(Source)
And PC gaming never been that frustrating? There have always been tons of broken games, not only on PC. It's just that the amount of games released by everyone has skyrocketed, so it's much more obvious. And not even to mention frequent crashed and issues with batch and sys files configuring the system back in the DOS days. Not exclusive to computers either with all the franchise licensed titles for Nintendo and Sega systems in the 90s, which absolutely sucked.


So if you stop buying games for that reason, good luck with that. You'll be in a minority. If that's a good or bad thing, I'll leave for everyone to decide on their own. Personally I'll just buy what I'm interested in and play whenever I have the time. And yes, I'd always welcome more stable and better software (not just games), but then I could complain about the state of macOS when OS X was so much better and more stable 20 years ago. I'm still on an up-to-date macOS. 🤷‍♂️

 

[maflynn]

You complain about the GPU power of Macs yet give Switch a pass.

Are you really complaining about a 300 dollar hand held camping device? The MBP costs in the 3000 dollar range

Btw I’m not giving the switch’s GPU a pass. It’s hardware has limitations but because Nintendo has done a great job using its catalog it’s a great gaming device

 

[Ethosik]

Are you really complaining about a 300 dollar hand held camping device? The MBP costs in the 3000 dollar range

Btw I’m not giving the switch’s GPU a pass. It’s hardware has limitations but because Nintendo has done a great job using its catalog it’s a great gaming device

The MBP at $3,000 does not include integrated graphics. Even when it was Intel based. Computers are different. Go to any major manufacturer like Dell and you will see $1,000 systems still coming with Intel integrated graphics.

And this is why Apple Silicon is so much better. My $599 M1 Mac mini was better than most of my relatively new but cheap Windows systems with integrated graphics. And one of those was a $1,500 Microsoft Surface Laptop!

 

[Ethosik]

That is wishful thinking and doesn't work. Never has.
If we all would have stayed at home when the pandemic started, it would have been over within a month. Just look at the Netflix mess. They cancelled shows after one season, so people did exactly what you suggested and didn't jump on a first season, but waited for at least a second. Number of views went down, less profit which lead to even more cancellations, even for shows leading the charts. Fewer people buying games leads to even less resources and effort making games. And no, it doesn't take 6-12 months for patches to fix games. Some games might never be fixed (PoE on the Mac has been broken for years...) and I doubt Gollum ever will be fixed. The whole studio sold for under €3 million, which is nothing and they already moved on to work on the next LotR licensed game. This is franchise licensing. Little effort, maximum profit. Gollum is in the Top 10 UK VG sales charts, so is Jedi Survivor. Mission accomplished.

(Source)
And PC gaming never been that frustrating? There have always been tons of broken games, not only on PC. It's just that the amount of games released by everyone has skyrocketed, so it's much more obvious. And not even to mention frequent crashed and issues with batch and sys files configuring the system back in the DOS days. Not exclusive to computers either with all the franchise licensed titles for Nintendo and Sega systems in the 90s, which absolutely sucked.


So if you stop buying games for that reason, good luck with that. You'll be in a minority. If that's a good or bad thing, I'll leave for everyone to decide on their own. Personally I'll just buy what I'm interested in and play whenever I have the time. And yes, I'd always welcome more stable and better software (not just games), but then I could complain about the state of macOS when OS X was so much better and more stable 20 years ago. I'm still on an up-to-date macOS. 🤷‍♂️

That is why I said people, not me. People are adding fuel to the situation. Why would they bother fixing games if they can release them half-baked? People will buy it regardless. We need to come together as a whole and support this. Otherwise nothing will ever change. Even for the almighty holy grail PC platform that this site loves so much.

 

[Homy]

I played most of those at launch and gave up on them. I will never buy Cyberpunk again and play it as launch provided such negativity for me. I absolutely will not support the company.

Another aspect people forget. They say Mac gamers have "funny" logic when they say they rather don’t want such titles and by the time Mac gamers get the fixed version the PC version have been fixed long before but they forget the user and customer experience during the time. There is great risk gamers turn their back at developers and games because of the initial disappointment at a buggy failed release and lack of future trust. They can also loose interest and patience while waiting months for fixes and patches when other new games keep coming and tease players. The big difference is that Mac gamers will have a fresh and better experience in such cases when the games have a more successful release. They wait longer and look forward to games that will meet their expectations from the start instead of disappointing them and make them wait for a better experience. The same logic can be used about many other things, whether it’s a car, house or relationship.

 

[Ethosik]

Another aspect people forget. They say Mac gamers have "funny" logic when they say they rather don’t want such titles and by the time Mac gamers get the fixed version the PC version have been fixed long before but they forget the user and customer experience during the time. There is great risk gamers turn their back at developers and games because of the initial disappointment at a buggy failed release and lack of future trust. They can also loose interest and patience while waiting months for fixes and patches when other new games keep coming and tease players. The big difference is that Mac gamers will have a fresh and better experience in such cases when the games have a more successful release. They wait longer and look forward to games that will meet their expectations from the start instead of disappointing them and make them wait for a better experience. The same logic can be used about many other things, whether it’s a car, house or relationship.

Agreed. And people REALLY seem to like to argue and put all the blame on Macs. Even with someone like me that is a hardcore PC gamer. They simply overlook the current state of PC gaming and just want to nit pick and argue with me. I probably buy way more hardware than most on this site (I also have a total of 12 computers in my workflow. 8 Desktop like system including Mac minis and 4 laptops). Every NVIDIA generation I upgrade, and every couple of Intel generations I upgrade. I still see people with 9900K and 2080s or even 3080s. I however, do NOT typically upgrade to the Ti versions. So my next GPU will be the 5090 and maybe the next CPU will be the 14900k, but have not decided if I am upgrading. Especially if I am going to drop PC gaming which I am very much considering doing due to all these bad ports. I spend so much every couple of years or three depending on when the next NVIDIA comes out, just so I can stay at the top end of PC gaming.

 

[GrumpyCoder]

That is why I said people, not me. People are adding fuel to the situation. Why would they bother fixing games if they can release them half-baked? People will buy it regardless. We need to come together as a whole and support this. Otherwise nothing will ever change. Even for the almighty holy grail PC platform that this site loves so much.

Hen and egg problem. People boycott games is leading to even less effort put into it. Too much boycott leads to a potential market crash as we've seen before a few decades ago. 🤷‍♂️

Studios would need hard evidence that higher software quality leads to more sales/profit first, which they don't have - on the contrary. They trust in their statistics. See modern macOS vs OS X. People are too emotionally invested in platforms. It happens everywhere. Many don't want to play Don Quixote. It's much easier to buy a game and if it doesn't work wait for a patch a few days or a week later, maybe another two weeks later. If it's not fixed by then, chances are slim (not none) it ever will be, not on the current platform and not on any other one.

 

[Homy]

I'm not denying that statement

Mac gaming is in a sad state - Especially when compared to the PC or consoles.

You're trying to use a tactic of marginalizing PC gaming segment in order to elevate Mac gaming, i.e., bring one down to to raise the other. Weird tactic because most people objectively agree that if you want to game, you get a PC/console - Not a Mac.

Steam's hardware stats for April:
Windows 96.38%
Mac 2.30%
Linux (not in the screen shot) 1.32%

First Linux is in striking distance to supplant OSX's second place. Secondly, the percentage that OSX holds is so miniscule that I do believe it affirms my opinion that if you want to game, you avoid Macs. Third, publishers are intimately away of these statistics and choose the platforms based on the best opportunity to recoup the money they sink into game development and also profit.

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I was reacting to you saying you didn’t have an opinion, not you thinking Mac is in a sad state of gaming, so no need to present Steam charts. Linux has always been about 1% behind so if you ask me it will not overtake MacOS any time soon, if ever, especially now when devs like Feral have stopped porting native Linux games because of Proton and Proton doesn’t seem to have had an impact on Steam charts yet. At the same time Apple Silicon has overtaken the Mac gaming market on Steam and has a better chance to stay ahead with its better GPUs compared to the old Intel Macs and the gaming news since last WWDC.

For the fifth and last time you don’t seem to want to listen to my reasons for creating this thread. My purpose wasn’t to say Mac is a better gaming platform than PC/console but your platform and PC games aren’t as good as people hype. Why would my ”tactic” be wrong when I’m trying to bring down one wrongfully hyped game and platform and raise another unfairly downplayed one? The conclusion of my first and main post is ”No, Mac gaming isn’t dead because the failed Gollum or Redfall weren’t released for Mac”. Simple as that. All other opinions by many made here is putting words in my mouth. Weird that suddenly users of a platform with 96% of the gaming market share feel their platform is wrongfully treated or threatened.

 

[jeanlain]

You speak in general terms and while it’s true from certain perspectives I’m curious about your personal experiences.

I mostly game on Macs and I like FPS games, which is a problem on macOS.

 

[maflynn]

I was reacting to you saying you didn’t have an opinion

Again you misrepresent my words to further your argument.

I said I have not given my my opinion on gaming - that I don't have an opinion - quite a different meaning

Subsequent posts in this thread have opened the door a crack on my opinions on the state of gaming but up until I provided my reply below, I largely kept those thoughts to myself

I've actually have not given my opinion of the state of the gaming.

I find your actions disingenuous in the name of trying to win an argument.

 

[Homy]

Again you misrepresent my words to further your argument.

I said I have not given my my opinion on gaming - that I don't have an opinion - quite a different meaning

I find your actions disingenuous in the name of trying to win an argument.

Win an argument? My only argument from the start was that the absence of some hyped PC games on Mac which showed to be failures was no reason for calling Mac gaming dead and done. Every other attempt after that to win arguments was initiated by people who just didn't want to stick to the facts in my first post and tried to put words in my mouth and turn this into something it isn't.

The result of not giving an opinion or not having one in a discussion is the same - no expressed opinion, so why does it matter if I rephrased myself when I was quoting you? The fact that you later confirmed your opinion about ”Mac gaming is in a sad state” and now suddenly sound upset because I pointed out as an explanation that prior to confirming your opinion you hadn’t expressed any clear opinion is quite mind-boggling.

To be honest I sense a disturbing high level of unnecessary nitpicking and twisting in your answers too. It became more evident when I had to repeat myself and explain my intensions 5 times while you kept talking about other alleged reasons. There is no point in continuing this discussion.

 

[Homy]

This is the source if you want to call it of the pushback : “across this forum that Mac gamers couldn't play (hence Mac gaming "sucks" and is "dead)“, tying a failed PC game with perceived attacks on Mac Gaming. Now I’m not saying there are no arracks on Mac gaming at all, I myself, will speak of the relative merits of PC vs Mac gaming in a factual manner, but I don’t use the hurtful terms. And I don’t blame you as a Mac enthusiast, who does not like Mac being picked on as a gaming platform, nor do I think you hate PC games.

Not sure what you mean by this piece. Are you talking about "sucks" and "dead" and believe I'm the one using "the hurtful terms"? If so you misunderstood. Those are the words of people who are unhappy with or mocking Mac gaming. I’m just quoting hence the quotation marks. You see such words used in this discussion too. The same people are the ones who tie the absence of hyped PC titles to Mac gaming being dead and done in various discussions. What I’m doing is just to present the result of the said games and their reception by gamers and reviewers. It’s speculation vs. facts. I don’t just take a random failed PC game and point fingers. It’s the exact same game previously used as ”proof” by said PC gamers.

For that reason my recommendation is if people want to go down that road the least they could do is to wait and see if their hyped games actually prove to be good to avoid later embarrassment. They could also use already recommended games instead of wild cards. So don’t use Starfield as a good example of the state of PC gaming and sad state of Mac gaming. It might as well get caught in the development hell like Bioshock 4 and turn out to be another failed embarrassment like Redfall and Gollum.

 

[Huntn]

Agree. Again this trend of "sorry for the performance, we will fix in a future patch, maybe in 6 months" trend if not a good one lately. I played most of those at launch and gave up on them. I will never buy Cyberpunk again and play it as launch provided such negativity for me. I absolutely will not support the company. No Mans Sky is similar. While its great they made it better, I will not support a company that acts this way.

My understanding is that many of the issues with Cyberpunk2077 was on console. I played it when it first came out on PC and had no issues.

 

[Huntn]

Not sure what you mean by this piece. Are you talking about "sucks" and "dead" and believe I'm the one using "the hurtful terms"? If so you misunderstood. Those are the words of people who are unhappy with or mocking Mac gaming. I’m just quoting hence the quotation marks. You see such words used in this discussion too. The same people are the ones who tie the absence of hyped PC titles to Mac gaming being dead and done in various discussions. What I’m doing is just to present the result of the said games and their reception by gamers and reviewers. It’s speculation vs. facts. I don’t just take a random failed PC game and point fingers. It’s the exact same game previously used as ”proof” by said PC gamers.

For that reason my recommendation is if people want to go down that road the least they could do is to wait and see if their hyped games actually prove to be good to avoid later embarrassment. They could also use already recommended games instead of wild cards. So don’t use Starfield as a good example of the state of PC gaming and sad state of Mac gaming. It might as well get caught in the development hell like Bioshock 4 and turn out to be another failed embarrassment like Redfall and Gollum.

I just quoted what you said as the basis for the pushback you got whether it was deserved or not.

 

[jeanlain]

If they don't rush, people lose jobs and the studio is gone.

Is that a fact? Many studios take the time to do things right, and game releases go smoothly.
Rushed releases cause a lot of drama.

 

[Ethosik]

My understanding is that many of the issues with Cyberpunk2077 was on console. I played it when it first came out on PC and had no issues.

Performance was worse on console. But PC wasn’t perfect. Also bugs existed on PC. T posing and cars going everywhere. Random visual bugs too. Bad AI. It wasn’t good on PC either.