Apple CEO Tim Cook spotted at video game designer Valve's headquarters - Page 3

OS overhead might be marginal, but their graphics drivers and general gaming perfomance running games are just horrible all around. Every Valve game I have takes at minimum a 50% hit in framerate on the exact same settings, extremely long hangs/load times, and the sound never works right. Boot into W7, get a 50% jump in performance, no hanging/long load times, and no sound issues. This isn't limited to Valve games or Cider ports either. True 3D graphics performance is awful. Something is wrong, and it's all down to Apple and OS X.

Are you some kind of Windows troll? The comparison between the app store and Steam is just that: a comparison. It's not a competition. It's not AppleInsider maliciously trying to suggest that Steam is a copy of the iOS app store. It's just a comparison (a comparison that is accurate no less) to familiarize the service for people who may not know what Steam is, but most likely do know what the App store is.

Your hostility makes no sense. Ironically you're the only one who sounds like a fanboy here given how upset you are over the mere association between Steam and the App store.


Game Center is shit and performance could be a lot better than it is on OS X. This isn't news, but Tim Cook visiting Valve can only suggests good things for Apple and its consumers in the future.

Valve can't tell Apple how to write proper OS X graphics drivers. The drivers they provide with BC are easily 6 months out of date and then they make it extremely difficult to update to vanilla driver from the GPU maker. They don't get gaming and I suspect they never will. They need to be visiting ATi and Nvidia if they want to get into gaming because their drivers are just awful. Valve can give them pointers, but Gabe Newell can't give them some magic idea or advice and turn OS X around in even 12 months to make it game friendly. It's good they are getting help to fix their deficiency, but Apple has a long way to get to get to even 3/4 of Windows game performance.


The App Store in iTunes works nothing like Steam except for the sale of software (games). It doesn't update your games, it merely tells you what updates are avaiable and then you have to download the entire app again. No delta updates, Steam does this while iTunes doesn't. They couldn't be any more different. The comparison that Steam works like the iTunes App Store is patently false, moreso when Steam existed a full 4 years before the App Store and the two only have sales of software in common. Steam is easier to navigate, isn't bloated with tacked on crap and isn't crashy like iTunes. Thought Steam for Mac is pretty craptacular itself I'll admit.

Most Apple blogs are quick to compare what others do in relation to Apple and this is no different. It's worded as though Steam followed in Apples footsteps and then released Steam onto the Mac because of it. (Maybe I read it wrong, but it sure reads to me as Steam being compared to Apple as if the App Store was being copied by Valve). If you're going to compare two services, I'd think you'd mention the one that came first and compare the later services to it, not the other way around. No, I'm not a Windows troll. I love OS X but the vast majority of Apple users are extremely degrading of anything not-Apple. Steam deserves far more credit that it's given here. Also, AI is pretty notorious for their ridiculous bias and the commentors are even worse.

That was a response to Lukeskymac who said that 'real gamers' wouldn't regard the iMac spec as high-end enough for gaming. My comment was along the lines that this definition of 'real gamer' is not accurate, given that the bulk of gaming these days is done on consoles.


Where? What is the job advert for? It said x86/ARM experience. What else could they be making?

Tim Cook has no reason to drop in to Valve casually.


Developers have complained about piracy and having to target multiple configurations as reasons not to develop for the PC. They rarely bring up licensing. GTA 4 wasn't a terrible port because of licensing.


Skill is relative. You can't say that someone is more skilful using a mouse if it's easier to hit a target with it. It takes more skill to hit the same target with a controller. I've never noticed enlarged hit-boxes with a controller (shots just to the side of a head don't register). I could understand them doing this in easier game modes.


I'm with you on that, those games have reduced players to little more than spectators, which is not a good direction to go in. Compared to older games like Double Agent, they have appalling amounts of player engagement.


This comes back to the piracy issue though. DLC is used as a means to counter piracy because you have no option but to connect to an approved store for the content. Also, you shouldn't confuse mods with DLCs. DLCs are extra content created by the developers at great expense, mods are community projects done by volunteers.

I don't recall PC developers offering new rich content for free before DLCs and community mods generally suck. You can't for example put Lair of the Shadow Broker on the same level as a fancy hat mod for Skyrim.


No, I'm saying that the bulk of the expense in that PC is used to play games, the other tasks can be done by a much lower-end PC.


I'm not going to get into the whole 720p vs 1080p discussion but to most people the difference in quality is negligible. While you are playing the game, it doesn't matter if your draw distance is half and you get some pop-in or some textures are blurry here and there. When you are on a sofa playing a console, you are much further away than a PC screen so it looks the same. Even in split-screen, the difference just doesn't stand out:

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=IreUoD9v19Q

It does when you drop to something like a Wii but the powerful consoles are fine.


10c per kWh on 160W XBox 360 vs 800W SLI PC. If you play for 18 hours per week, you use 11.5kWh more per week = $60 per year. It's a minimal expense and the console communities are much bigger.


I don't think everyone feels that way. To do movements on a keyboard, you need to use 4 fingers and thumb (w,a,s,d + modifier for sprint). On a controller this is a single thumb stick as you can click the stick to sprint, leaving 4 fingers free for buttons.


The experience isn't inferior though. The reality is that not many people invest in gaming rigs. The majority of PC buyers (70%) are buying laptops and the majority of laptops sold have Intel integrated graphics or some other low power GPU. This means the experience most people have of PC gaming is overly intrusive DRM like always-on internet connections, root-kits, inputting serial codes that prevent resale or mandatory graphics driver updates, defragging hard drives, random crashes/freezes, most of which don't exist on the consoles because it's an end-to-end model.

The only people I ever hear complain about console gaming are PC gamers. Where are the complaints from the 200 million+ console gamers?

I guarantee Valve gets more support requests for PC games than any console game publisher. Just check the Steam forums - it's not pages and pages of PC gamers bragging about their superior gaming experience.

Really dude?

http://www.extremetech.com/computing...windows-rt-arm

Windows 8 will run on both x86 and ARM. Don't you think it would be a smart idea for Valve to support that? Consoles don't run on ARM processors.


And current DRM restrictions have proven to be more harmful and more useless (due to DRM being cracked easily and quickly) to the paying customer. Xbox games aren't that hard to pirate, if you know where to look. (I don't but I do know where to get it) What's your next excuse?


So I guess game tournaments where people pay for thousands of dollars in prizes are overrun with people playing with gamepads? Nope. Sorry. Skill is not relative. You pit a console gamer with a controller against a PC player using a mouse and keyboard (both professional or very very good) and the console gamer will get destroyed. Full stop. Controllers are inferior, plain and simple. I also never said it was easier to hit a target with a mouse, I said games were dumbed down (larger hitboxes and so on) so players using a controller could be more accurate and enjoy the game. Play against someone using a mouse and you'll lose every time. Aim assist on consoles is also well known and well practiced by developers.

Rahul Sood, founder of VooDooPC and now employee at Microsoft talks about the rumored link between Live and PC gamers getting to enjoy cross platform play. The console players got completely destroyed.


DLC is to combat piracy? Do you even know what DLC is? It's add-ons for an existing game, and a lot of it is released the day of and at an inflated price. DLC has nothing to do with piracy, it's about selling you small chunks of content for an inflated price. Hell, some are just updated maps from previous games, no huge team required to do that. Volunteer doesn't mean low quality. Quite a few maps on left4deadmaps.com are much better than the ones Valve makes. Much better. I literallu threw away my copy of Forza 3 because I found out that content burned on the disc I had already paid for required $10 to unlock because it was "day 1 DLC." I don't pay for content twice and Turn 10 will NEVER get my business again.


Valve tried to with Portal on the Xbox and Microsoft told them to gtfo. They weren't allowed to release maps without charging money for it. On the PC? 100% free. Same with Bastion. That's why I mentioned the two previously. Ever heard of Team Fortress 2? Complete mulitplayer game that Valve decided to give away for free. No questions asked, download it and play it. EA would NEVER do that. Had you taken two minutes to look around Skyrim Nexus you'd see that it's not all fancy hats. The majority of it is very good, great, and even fantastic content. Not a dime charged for any of it, no matter how good or bad it is. No use giving you all of the information if you're just going to put your fingers in your ears and yell "lalalalalalalalala" now is it?


I never said it couldn't. I said that those expensive parts used for gaming can and are used to make other things the PC can do faster, more enjoyable and better. Yes it is majorly for gaming, but that doesn't mean it can't and isn't used for other things. Two birds, one stone and all that.


So it's okay to buy a device that says it outputs HD graphics, it doesn't, and that doesn't matter. Would you play any of your games on a CRT? Didn't think so. It DOES matter, you're just ignoring poor console performance because you sit on a couch to play. Trust me, hooking my MBP up to my TV and playing the same games on a console is a MASSIVE improvement. The stable framerate alone sticks out like a sore thumb. I guess when you're used to having your games look like garbage with poor textures and pop-in, you'll put up with any garbage they burn on a disc an overcharge you for. You console players must be gluttons for punishment. If my games didn't render at native resolution and had pop-in crappy looking textures I'd return that shit immediately. Even if I didn't get my money back I'd toss that shit in the trash, that's inexcusable.


$60 a year to power the PC isn't the same as paying $60 a year to unlock functionality to allow online play. The PC is on for other uses same as the console. Apples to oranges. You're comparing using the two to having to pay to use one as you would the other. Also, I'm not so sure console communities are bigger, I think they are about even and that has nothing to do with having to pay for the ability to play online. Most players I've encountered on Live are vile children that hurl horrible insults at one another, that's why I don't play on Live any more.


Analog movement I'll give you, I seriously wish this was on the PC. But turning rate, key combos, hotkeys and having a mouse with a few buttons like on a controller allows me to do anything you can with a controller more accurately, much more quickly, and just as easily. I have a button that specifically drops the DPI for sniping, controllers are fixed rate movement. That's a MASSIVE disadvantage in gaming. Having your hands on a keyboard and mouse with buttons that do the same things that a controller does is different how? I can move, strafe, reload, chuck a grenade, zoom in/out, and jump all without having to put any more movement into it than I would with a controller. You're confusing holding the input device with being able to do more with it.


I don't buy those games or from those publishers for that exact scenario. I wish more people did the same.


...have your identity stolen because Sony stored your info in plaintext and then shut down online gaming for a month or two.. (not to mention the rootkits Sony themselves have written for PCs over the years)


http://www.gamespot.com/news/volition-developer-blasts-used-game-business-6349861
http://www.gamesradar.com/used-game-sales-could-be-outlawed-in-the-us/
Console game publishers are already in talks of getting rid of used game sales, no difference there.

mandatory graphics driver updates[/QUOTE]
Sony won't allow you to play games or online when an update is pushed out, and if you do accept it you agree to not sue them should your identity get stolen from their incometence. Which has almost happened to a shot load of people recently. You're grasping at straws.


This can and is done at a time when you aren't using the computer. Windows and OS X specifically can be made to do this. Irrelevant.


So consoles don't randomly freeze or crash? The PS3 didn't choke completely when your Skyrim save file got above about 8 megabytes? Console lockups happen all the time, they are no different or better than PC games.


I guess you forgot the first three years of the 360 having outrageous failure rates? Mine died and I barely played about 10 hours a month.

You're looking at this completely wrong. Tim Cook didn't visit Valve to get advice on how to improve OS X's graphics drivers. He's there to collaborate on some kind of market strategy. That could mean a lot of things, but my guess would be that it has something to do with Apple's long rumored push into the living room. With all the rumors of a "Steambox" console Valve is obviously interested in doing the same thing. All of a sudden it makes a lot of sense for Tim Cook to be paying Valve a visit.

Obviously I'm just speculating here, but if Apple is serious enough about gaming in the living room to be visiting Valve (which they should be given that the idea of "smart tv" has increasingly been moving towards consoles like the Xbox) then that's eventually going to have a trickle-up effect back to OS X.


You're being pedantic. Just because the two services handle updates differently doesn't mean they aren't essentially the same service. They're both a front-end for selling applications, one of which focusing entirely on games. That's all there is to it.

Furthermore, please show me where in AppleInsider's wording it suggests that Steam followed Apple's footsteps because I fail to see that anywhere in the original post. As far as I can tell this is just the result of your own paranoia.

Those "rumors" have been denied multiple times by Valve. There's literally nothing to this story except the normal bullshit that flys around the internet. All that BS started with Valve talking about having a 10 foot interface, which is what PC gamers have been begging for since it was announced, and then Valve dropped it. Nothing more has ever come from it, people are making shit up to get page clicks. Go look at 9to5mac to see that. Apple is rife with these kinds of rumors, can no one see the forest for the trees? Valve isn't making a console within the next 5 years if at all and Apple with have nothing to do with it. Take that to the bank, you'll make millions. Same as Apple making an HDTV. Ain't gonna happen.


One is a store, an update service, a friend tracking and communication service, does matchmaking, handles updates on an automatic basis rather than ignoring incoming updates, one allows you to update the game rather than download the entire app again (ridiculously stupid by the way), and isn't overly bloated and slow. The other is iTunes. The only thing they have is common is selling software.


This is written as Steam follows the workings of the App Store. It should be written as both handle the sale and updating of software, Steam selling games rather than applications for just about anything.

Yes, they denied the Steambox rumors (rather softly), but they have still shown a lot of interest in expanding their reach into the living room. This is a quote from Newell himself:

"I suspect Apple will launch a living room product that redefines people's expectations really strongly and the notion of a separate console platform will disappear."

Newell believes the "PC" segment is eventually going to move into the living room and with all the quotes about how he'd prefer not to do hardware if he didn't have to, some sort of partnership between Valve and Apple doesn't seem far-fetched at all.

Either way, Tim Cook obviously didn't show up just to have to tea. What do you think they were doing? You seem to suggest that it was for some kind of iOS development by your other posts, but here's why that seems unlikely. For one thing, Valve doesn't actually develop that many games itself. It has a small library of in-house titles and they're pretty much all big name games. I can't really see them putting their resources towards mobile (read: casual) games, and even if they were they certainly wouldn't need Tim Cook to visit to discuss that. That leaves you with distribution, and neither Apple nor Microsoft (were talking metro apps on ARM) allows third-party app installation.


You're still arguing details. They are similar services. Period. It's a fact that is not up for debate.


No it isn't. No where in the wording does it imply that. There's another fact that is not up for debate.

Where is that from? I haven't read that before and would be interesting to see the rest of what he had to say.


Where has he said this? Is there an interview where he states the market is moving towards the living room and away from a desk? Steam is making a killing, always has, and they don't seen to be affected by entertainment moving to the living room at all. Valve hasn't given any indication that the living room is where the companies efforts are headed. The 10 foot interface was shown and then quickly pulled from the public eye, nothing more has been said about it since. Same with HL2E3 and just about everyone has given up on that coming to market any time soon.


I have no idea. But with rumors being what they always are, I don't see them doing anything the rumors point to. The ARM job posting could be nothing more than getting ready for Windows 8, I don't know. Apple has shown zero interest in desktop gaming, and this doesn't show me that they are doing anything to change that. None of their product lines are built to even have easily switchable graphics cards and the ones that are switchable are grossly and offensively overpriced. I seriously doubt that will change, Apple has never been nice to the customer tweaking the guts of their machines like gamers are so fond of doing.

Meeting with Gabe means absolutely nothing about desktop gaming or living room gaming in my eyes, there are no quotes from either about this meeting and I've not heard anything about Valve heading towards a console other than rumors based off of serious stretching of ideas. They've all been for nothing but page clicks. Valve keeps their cards close to the chest, but we'd have heard something by now officially or from within the company. They've put out a half ass port of Steam on the Mac, released Portal 2 that was long in development, rekajiggerd their existing titles to work on a Mac (which are largely horrible because of driver issues that Apple has yet to address) and nothing since. But, they've been raking in the dough from Steam and Gabes been getting fatter.


You must have me confused with another person, I don't believe I've said Valve and Apple were working on iOS development together. I don't think they are working on anything together because joining forces with Apple in any capacity in a gaming sense would be a perceived slap in the face to the PC gaming community. Do you have any idea what the PC gaming world would say if Valve lifted the sheet on hardware that was attached to the Apple name in any way? They would be apocalyptically pissed off!


They've never had to. Every game they've ever made has been an industry leader for years after it's release. Half Life was so far beyond anything that came before it that it single-handedly changed FPS gaming forever, and possibly gaming as a whole. There wasn't a single game like that with story telling, plot, acting and overall polish that Half Life had. No game will ever make the impact it did. Portal was very close though. They didn't come up with the idea, but they planted it and let it grow. It was a smashing success and the talk of the Orange Box. Portal 2 was the same. Valve has never depended on volume, they've always nailed it on quality. Why do you think that HL2E3 is wanted so badly by PC gamers? It's going to be epic.


Which is why I don't understand why people think that Valve and Apple are somehow incahoots to replace consoles or what have you. Valve doesn't need Apple for anything, they've made their mark and held themselves to a such a high standard that they don't need anyone to succeed in any market. Same with Apple. Distribution and low turn rate of new titles makes them oodles of cash and I've literally never heard one person or read one article that said they didn't like a Valve game. Apple I don't think will ever be serious about gaming because it's completely against the Apple ethos of "it just works." Gaming PCs and consoles don't "just work" all the time and having driver issues, hardware failures, game bug issues, and a whole host of other problems when it comes to gaming isn't something Apple seems chomping at the bit to get involved in. At least I can't see it, I very well could be wrong.

Yeah they could use Windows 8 but as I say, would Microsoft really be all that happy supporting a rival console? They'd do something to cripple it like make sure games didn't come out of Windows.

The PS Vita runs on ARM and is about half the speed of a PS3.


It's well known that console games are much harder to pirate and there's little incentive due to the option for game resale. The PS3 has almost zero piracy because of the size of the games.


But you're saying that because a controller is harder to use, that makes a K&M user more skilled. If you want to compare skill, everyone has to use the same tools.

http://www.pcadvisor.co.uk/how-to/ga...eyboard-mouse/


http://kotaku.com/5421466/ea-ceo-i-t...-a-marketplace

"They can steal the disc, but they can't steal the DLC"


Maps only apply to certain games. Will there ever be extra story-driven levels for Mass Effect made by a community? They don't have the means to do professional audio recording. MW3 is derided as just a map pack for MW2. People don't just want new maps as that doesn't make a game.


Do you think the mods that help your precision are making you a better gamer or worse? They are making the job easier for you.


Consoles in general offer a far easier and more reliable gaming experience. Consoles failures and lockups are rare occurrences.

I'd like to see accurate and reliable data for this statement. I won't say PCs don't crash, but you're comparing devices that have different component options. Consoles have one set, PCs have hundreds and even thousands. It's a knock against the PC I'll admit, but there's probably no accurate data to make that statement with any validity. PCs do suck when they don't work right though. :/ I've been fortunate over the years because I've had very few problems and about even with my POS Xbox.


Are you actively ignoring the entire first 3 years of the life of the 360? Seriously? Failures were more common than non-failures.


No I don't have to use the same tools for a comparison of which tool is better for the job. It's no different than saying a scope is better than iron sights on a rifle. They both allow you to aim on a specific target, but the scope is almost always better. You made the statement that dual analog joysticks made the K&M irrelevant, that is completely false. If it's so "irrelevant" then play the same game, with the same weapons against someone using a K&M and you'll get your ass kicked. It's simply because the mouse and keyboard is a better tool to use on the vast majority of game types.


Do you milk your own cows? How about making your own cheese? Do you make your own soap at home? Do you hammer out your own belt buckles on an anvil in your garage?

Just because you use tools that make your experience better or easier doesn't mean you are less skilled. It means you take better advantage of tools available to you and expand your skill set. I can still snipe without the DPI drop, but it makes me more accurate.


What I meant was DLC doesn't combat piracy. Piracy still survives and thrives even with DLC on the market. It prevents them from getting that extra content, but not the game itself.


Doesn't matter if it's difficult, it's being done every day. And what exactly does resale value have to do with not pirating. If someone pirates a game, money never comes into the equation with the exception of not wantint to pay for it in the first place. Pirated games are sold too you know. Go to any East Asian market and you'll find just about any game you could ever want, I've seen it with my own eyes in multiple countries.


You completely misunderstood what I wrote. Having someone with ARM talents inside Valve would prepare them for supporting and releasing software for Windows 8 when it hits the market. Nowhere did I say that Microsoft had any intention of supporting other hardware, you came up with that on your own. Again, no console runs on ARM and won't for a very long time. Performance, heat and cost are nowhere near x86 and won't be for some time.


The Vita is nowhere near half the speed of a PS3. I'd love to see the data you have to back this up. Also, it's not a console it's a handheld device.


It doesn't matter what games have free community made content, it exists on the PC and not the console. Whether or not community mods can be made is up to the publisher or the developer, EA won't allow it in the case of Mass Effect so your point is completely irrelevant. Obviously people want new maps because they've set up a whole website for that specific game just to share those with each other. Skyrim had unofficial mods (the nexus) before Bethesda officially sanctioned it and released a section on the Steam store to browse and download anything you see for absolutely no charge. They aren't the only ones and not the only game where the community does this and it helps people that are fucked over by the developer releasing regurgitated maps or shitty content you have to pay for. If you don't like the mod/map/skin/tweak/whatever, you can just delete it. No money lost, nothing stolen. DLC doesn't allow you to do that. DLC is copy protected and if it is bug ridden garbage you're out whatever money you paid for crappy content, you can't return it for a refund. (This is a software/digital media problem so I don't hold it against any platform) Places like that website carry absolutely zero risk of losing money, and the content is frequently as good or better than what came with the game when it was purchased. Supporting community mods instills trust and a favorable relationship with developers and keeps them in business. I will always by Valve games simply because of how they treat me as a customer. I won't but AC games ever again because their PC games require me to be connected to the internet any time I want to play. Asking permission to play a game I've paid for or it's taken away from me is a practice I won't tolerate, fund, or encourage. Single player games have no business requiring continuous online verification and I won't buy any games from anyone that takes that stance, piracy or not. In the case of Assassins Creed, the DRM didn't work. Within 18 hours of release, it was cracked and didn't require online connection to play. When the servers went down who was affected? Paying customers. Pirates had no such issues and played their game happily.

How you can fail to see this point can only be explained by you never having played an PC games in the last 10 years and sticking only to consoles.

lol, no. The pirates can have the full experience that everyone else who paid enjoys. That's DLC, multiplayer, the works.


Absolutely. That's just reprehensible.

I know, but for the sake of the reply I left out that you can get the whole shebang. My point that DLC has nothing to do with piracy still stands because it absolutely doesn't. I don't pirate games, but I know you can get anything you could ever want with a 2 minute google search. DLC doesn't do a damn thing to stop that.

You're talking about one-off hardware failures and no, the rates weren't above 50%:

http://uk.gamespot.com/news/xbox-360...-study-6216691

I'm talking about software failures.


By that logic, I can use a big red button that is programmed to auto-aim and do headshots on any target with 100% accuracy and I can be happy knowing I'm the most skilled player in the world. It's the best tool for the job as it's the most accurate and easiest way to win.

I doubt you'd be happy if I used a big programmed auto-aim button while you used your programmed mouse and likewise, console gamers won't acknowledge the superiority of the user of a tweaked, programmed mouse against a stock controller.


In no way would I be justified walking into a supermarket, buying a carton of milk and proclaiming myself to be an expert cow-milker.

In the same way, you can't use a mouse, which makes aiming easier and proclaim you are more skilled than someone using a controller.


DLC is one avenue of anti-piracy in the form of monetizing a stolen game. Banning online account access is another:

http://www.pcworld.com/article/18201...xbox_live.html

This requires the online account services you objected to earlier.


If it's difficult to do then it's a disincentive. The PS3 is testament to this. There's nothing stopping people from pirating PS3 games but hardly anyone is going to upload and download 30GB+ of data just to save $20 on a game. I say $20 because resale typically allows you to get back a lot of the initial $50-60 outlay on any game.


But it's not a software job. The posting is here:

http://www.valvesoftware.com/jobs/job_postings.html

Hardware engineers required with milling experience, CAD design, power supplies and circuit design. They are building actual physical hardware themselves.


Sony ran an unmodified MGS4 on pre-release Vita hardware at half the FPS of the PS3. It was at a lower resolution I think but it was also not the final hardware. The GPU specs are the following:

PS3 = 275 million polys/s
Vita = 133 million polys/s


It's just semantics, Sony refers to it as a console:

http://community.us.playstation.com/...onsoles/psvita


You don't have a Steam account?

If the Steam service goes down and you haven't manually set each game to offline mode, you can't play offline.

Oh okay. It was only 25%. (that's a pretty much dead link by the way)




Welcome to console gaming! You've finally seen the light! The games regularly use a system of auto aim.


There's a difference between assisting and doing it for you. My mouse does nothing but slow down the rate of movement. Your analog controller does the same, and I even said I wish I had that on a keyboard, did you forget that? Your controller may be stock, but your games make up for it:https://www.google.com/search?sourceid=chrome&ie=UTF-8&q=auto+aim+consoles


And you can't make the claim that the controller made the K&M irrelevant. See how bold and stupid claims work now?



Yet they do absolutely nothing to stop piracy and instead make game devs and publishers a shit ton of money selling crap. Are you an industry shill or something?


They also want an Economist and a Film Editor. Are they going finance and make their own movies now?


They aren't building anything until that position is filled and the listing goes away. Are they starting their own economy too?



You obviously know nothing about polygons and general graphics hardware speed and output if you think raw number=performance. No point in debating this with someone with no knowledge, as you've repeatedly demonstrated that you have none.




I don't care what Sony calls it, it's not a console. If they called it a steamboat, would it be a steamboat? Do you call Gameboys, a 3DS and the iPod Touch consoles? The Vita is a handheld gaming device with awful battery life and Sony standard proprietary memory. A rip off in other words. Just like it's little brother the PSP.


Not the same thing. You obviously can't think critically. I do have a Steam account, and when I log in the games are updated. As soon as it starts I can hit offline mode and can literally never connect my computer to the internet again and play those games until the day I die. Having to have an always on and functioning connection to a game publishers server is in no way remotely comparable. One is completely different from the other.

The difference seems to be that whatever helps a PC gamer (e.g high-dpi, macro-programmable, low latency mice) makes them more skilled, whatever helps a console gamer makes them more n00b.

Think about the realism of the game. If you were holding a real gun, could you turn 180 nearly instantly? You can with a mouse but not with a controller, so what's more realistic?

There's also the issue that a mouse has very little resistance so when you move to a location, you can get pinpoint accuracy. If you were holding a real weapon, you get resistance from the weight of the weapon. This is more realistic with an analogue stick.

There's no force feedback with K&M either.


The fact that hundreds of millions of gamers are not putting down their controllers in protest of the lack of a K&M suggests that the K&M is not a required item for gaming. iPad users aren't using a K&M for RTS games.


Citation needed.


You do know that they have in-game footage and teaser films?

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=tax4e4hBBZc

They probably need an economist to ensure they spend their hundreds of millions of dollars in earnings wisely.


Ok so what are you basing your 'nowhere near half the speed' assertion on?

Regardless of the difference in performance right now, the vast majority of gamers don't care about the difference any more. As you can clearly see in the Battlefield 3 video, the visual difference is negligible.

For Valve to connect with a large audience, it makes a lot of sense to have a console platform because many parents will buy their kids a console before they will buy them a PC as they don't want them to have internet access. They only have 250 employees though so it's a better idea to get a trusted and experienced company like Apple to do it for them.

Apple could actually buy Valve and use their team as an internal game studio the way Microsoft did with Bungie.

Going forward, the hardware spec isn't going to make all that big of a difference. There are a few visual enhancements that can be seen in next-gen game engines that will be noticeable but right now, even console games are movie-like in appearance.

Here is a demo on a PC using 2x GTX 280s:

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Dg9LNeGKRNQ

That PC is around 5x faster than a PS3 and the next-gen will make that up.

Question is, will people continue to invest in consoles or migrate back to the PC the more that entry PCs become more powerful? The iPad/iPod etc are more PC than console now and are getting a large gaming audience. I think only Apple's PCs and consoles have the right distribution and hardware model and the trend will be away from the traditional PC with K&M and towards touch-controls and consoles.

http://kotaku.com/5903555/gabe-newell-says-valve+apple-meeting-didnt-happen

 

 

CEO of Valve is denying it never happened and he didn't say "no comment" like other CEO's have it the past .  He straight up said it was news to them and actually sent emails around the office to confirm Tim Cook actually wasn't at Valve

 

 

 Gabe Newell is a funny guy:

 

"We actually, we all sent mail to each other, going, "Who's Tim Cook meeting with? Is he meeting with you? I'm not meeting with Tim Cook." So we're... it's one of those rumors that was stated so factually that we were actually confused.

No one here was meeting with Tim Cook or with anybody at Apple that day. I wish we were! We have a long list of things we'd love to see Apple do to support games and gaming better. But no, we didn't meet with Tim Cook. He seems like a smart guy, but I've never actually met him."

We need to implement a 'pics or it didn't happen' policy on rumours from now on. That means it's more likely that Valve is building their hardware entirely on their own.

Turns out you're all idiots.

 

Please explain why you feel you can insult everyone here.

Another bogus article.  Tim Cook never visited Valve.

 

http://kotaku.com/5903555/gabe-newell-says-valve+apple-meeting-didnt-happen

 

Why hasn't this article been updated?

 

 

apple in gaming industry? i'm interested! i'll be looking forward to this!

Too bad this was all false...funny how AppleInsider was the only news/rumor site that didn't post anything on this being false yet they were the original site that posted this. Thanks AI for owning up to your mistakes!

 

Because he's 100% right? Everyone that thought this was true is an idiot. AppleInsider not updating the article to state that they completely fabricated this lie is proof enough. If you were stupid enough to believe that Valve and Apple have compatible business plans you deserve to be called an idiot.

The wording was odd in the original article. They said Cook 'reportedly visited' Valve but then all other online articles quote AI. If AI was the source of this, that wasn't a good choice of words as it made it sound like it was a report from a trusted source. Still, they don't make any guarantees over the articles and they often write articles around what analysts believe Apple will do. The purpose is to create interest and that it did.

Maybe it'll encourage Tim Cook to actually visit Valve. It sounds like they have some things to talk about.

If AI had to apologise for every wrong article, it would start to look like they aren't a credible source of information and that's not an accurate picture. In general, their reporting is above a lot of other tech blogs.

There are forum rules against ad-homs regardless of which side of the discussion people take but I believe his was said in jest. It's fine to tear apart other people's arguments but when you start attacking people directly then it demonstrates a lack of strength in your own argument and a lack of interest in being a constructive forum member. Insults benefit no one. Well, unless they are funny but they aren't the ultimate argument winner as many people like to think.

People would have said the same thing about Steve Jobs meeting with AT&T or TV networks before 2007 when both the ATV and iPhone were introduced. Steam is the top online AAA game distributer in the world. Apple is the top online game distributer in the world. Steam is looking for hardware development based on x86/ARM. Apple is one of the top suppliers of x86 and ARM hardware.

It turns out they want to do some R&D on wearable computing:

http://www.theverge.com/2012/4/13/2947088/valve-reveals-secret-hardware-project-wearable-computing
http://blogs.valvesoftware.com/abrash/valve-how-i-got-here-what-its-like-and-what-im-doing-2/

Google is working on this sort of thing too. This is a technology step that will be taken at some point. There is no other way to allow you to have a 60" screen in front of you while you walk around. Imagine going on a long plane journey with just a displayless iPhone. You sit in your seat with your meal on our table and only you can see a giant TV screen in front of you that you can interact with using gestures.

Sure the technology looks clumsy now but so did every piece of technology before the breakthroughs came to improve them. If you acknowledge that augmented reality has a future then Apple's and Valve's paths will converge at some point.

 

The wording wasn't odd, it was a declaration that something happened that didn't and was nothing more than a fabrication on AI's part. Gabe Newell has flat denied it, and other publications quoting this article have since amended them for making the mistake of believing AI.

 

I ask you a very simple question. Why after knowing this is now false has AI not owned up to their mistake and amended the article stating they were fed false information, didn't cross check their sources and then quote Gabe Newell's denial this ever happened? Because they are lazy and don't want to admit they were fed BS and ran with it. Also pageclicks.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Statement without facts to back it up. Just because a programmer works on it at Valve and you read a false story on AI about the two companies meeting means absolutely nothing about AR and the partnership of Valve and Apple. You are seriously grasping at straws here. Also, Valve is well known for throwing ideas at the wall and seeing what sticks. Just because they are trying something doesn't mean it'll see the light of day. Go read the Valve new hire handbook and you'll get an idea of how they work.

Edited by HKZ - 5/7/12 at 4:14pm

Of course not but all the article says is 'someone told us they saw Tim Cook at Valve HQ'. The article writers weren't lying if that's what someone told them.

Those are then your signals for detecting BS and you can ignore the article.

I didn't say they were.

I wasn't aware this was a contest nor that there was a suggestion of the amount of profit sharing. If Valve had discussed with Apple building a console or modifying their ATV, Apple makes the profit in hardware. Valve's store would then provide the downloads at no expense to Apple. This is exactly how Steam on the Mac works.

Valve has an incentive because Microsoft and Sony already have their stores and Apple has great QA and products. Apple has an incentive because Valve has a strong mindshare and userbase and their own IP. We know it's not happening but I don't see why it's a bad idea.

Obviously now there's nothing to suggest that they even keep an open communication channel and certainly no indication of a partnership but that doesn't mean that they will unquestionably never have any business dealings with each other. Years ago people wouldn't have guessed that book publishers like McGraw-Hill would be dealing with Apple in a big way.

People would have said the same about Sega. Now look at Sega selling titles on the App Store. People say the same about Nintendo and Sony. Maybe they won't ever create partnerships but how can you tell what happens when a company has a direct audience of 1 billion people? Apple will probably reach that goal in under 4 years.

What if Apple switches their mobile products to x86 and iOS and Mac OS converge? Valve will likely be on that platform in a big way.

Also, you know that Steam used to render the store on Internet Explorer's rendering engine - trident? Then Valve switched it to webkit, mostly developed by Apple. It's not any hint of them working together but an example where their respective products come together.

 

Yet they won't amend the article. The people that linked to this have.

 

 

 

Hmmm. Your post must have been oddly worded then. Sure looks from that quote they are both top of the online game distribution ladder. Though I love playing on my games on my iPhone, about 80% of what is available is pretty awful. Most are either free or very very cheap. Not to mention very few of them are above even 150mb, most Steam games are over 2GB. Valve won't just give away the cost of all that bandwidth to host and Apple won't let them make all of the money on sales.

 

And where exactly does Apple create this supply of ARM and x86 hardware? Did they create a fab without telling anyone? They don't supply anyone with a damn thing, how you could think they did is amazing. The Israeli plant they funded was for their own supply, not someone else's. Apple doesn't manufacture anything, they design their own chips to be made by someone else (hello? Samsung lawsuits anyone?), and they get their x86 chips from Intel. They produce zero x86/ARM hardware for the benefit of others. They also don't design hardware and then sell it to other companies.

 

Apple went to AT&T with a list of demands that has never been met by another company. It won't ever happen again in the telecom industry and I seriously doubt anyone would bend to Apple's will in any other market. Especially the gaming market where Steam is the king in software only game sales.

 

 

 

 

So you think Apple is just going to develop/design hardware for Valve to make money off of in software sales? Where exactly does this fit in Apples business plan anywhere? When have they sold hardware and not the software or taken some of the money made of that sale? They wouldn't go to the trouble to design/modify/develop hardware for another company to make money off of. Hello? Mac App Store? Have you forgotten that Apple is trying to head software developers at the pass and have them go through Apple to sell their wares? Steam isn't the App Store, they will NEVER let outside companies profit off hardware they make. Never going to happen. Why do you think iTunes, iBooks and the App Stores are on every device Apple sells? To lock you into an ecosystem. There's absolutely nothing wrong with that, I'm not against it in any way, but Apple will never sell hardware they don't make money off of or have the potential to after the hardware is sold. Not in a million years.

 

 

Sega has been dead for over 10 years. Apple wasn't in the business of selling hardware capable of playing games then. Why would Sega team up with Apple? They don't make hardware to sell games on. Nintendo is losing money on selling handheld devices and consoles. Why would they team up with Sony? Losing way more money than they can manage to lose, or not being able to sell hardware at all. Neither of those things are happening to Valve. You're comparing two completely different markets with one company that was a complete failure and one on a big decline. The thing those two have in common is selling software on their own hardware. Valve is neither of those companies and is not even in the ballpark of being in their respective situations.

 

 

 

 

You really think that? Apple will abandon designing their own ARM chips and go x86? x86 procs are hot, expensive and large. ARM is none of those. Also, you have nothing to go on Valve being a part of anything to do with Apple except one job posting on their website. Literally nothing. This whole article was written on nothing. You're making huge leaps to come to the possibility of Apple and Valve teaming to do anything. Their business practices clash, they don't have an presence in the Apple ecosystem, they have zero history working together and Steve said repeatedly that Apple was a "mobile devices company." The AppleTV hasn't made them any money, it's barely a thing in their world. They make record profits selling mobile devices. How is a console type device hooked to a TV that they don't make money off of app sales relevant to their business? Yes, they have changed markets but on their own terms. They didn't partner with anyone to make the iPhone and iPad. Those two devices dwarf their competitors entire revenue streams. None of that was done with outside partners and outside sales from two diametrically opposed companies.

 

 

 

Steam is top for AAA games. Apple is top overall. As you noted, iOS games are mostly not AAA games.

They design chips for fabrication elsewhere. There was no suggestion of them selling it to other companies.

The same way them making a phone that makes network carriers a profit or making an iPod makes money for the music companies. They take a cut somewhere but I doubt it's 30%. Plus any Mac services like movie streaming or whatever, they don't get a cut.

Yeah, Valve can do what they want, when they want but not all business deals are driven by desperate circumstances.

Their latest Medfield platform isn't too bad. I don't think it's on the cards in the near future but it's a very real possibility. Imagine being able to combine the iOS store and Mac store and being able to run CoD or Team fortress on your iPhone (no K&M but maybe Blackberry will have something suitable).

That's exactly the motivation. People buy an XBox or PS3 and sometimes use them for their media like Netflix and other services. The emphasis is on gaming. The ATV could be the opposite, being a media device with gaming thrown in. That would be huge for families who want to sit their kids down in front of an inexpensive box and keep them entertained. With game prices ranging from free to $10-20, it's way more cost-effective than a console. The more people buy the box for gaming, the more Apple gets their TV audience and leverage with the networks.

They don't have to involve Valve at all of course and have many reasons not to but gaming would be a nice addition to the ATV.

 

 

Really? I guess you meant something different when you posted this:

 

 

 

How would Apple make profit on the hardware unless they sold it to Valve? They aren't and never have been in the business of making/designing/having someone else produce hardware and then selling it to someone else to make money off of. Steam makes money from Mac game sales, but Apple didn't design their MacBooks and iMacs with that purpose in mind, iOS devices they have. I seriously doubt Valve makes a lot of money off of it anyway, most of the games on there are crap, me too games are already on the MAS, and gaming performance for good games is just awful in OS X by in large anyway. Nothing I've played in OS X gets even half the performance that it does in Windows 7. This is a HUGE deterrent for me, if I'm getting barely 50% of the performance I do in Windows on the same exact hardware, where's the incentive for me to buy it for OS X? Teaming up with Valve won't change that unless they kick Apple's ass all over the place and force them/teach them how to make games run half decent. Valve won't work for cheap on that either.

 

 

 

 

The Sega example you gave was driven by desperate circumstances and has no validity to the discussion at hand. You gave an irrelevant example. The Nintendo example is almost exactly the same and is also irrelevant. Valve isn't failing in any way, much less in the hardware business that doesn't exist. Why you brought that up I don't know, it has nothing to do with this supposed meeting. Yes, markets change and unlikely partners do go in business with one another. These two companies are wildly successful though and don't have anything in common with either Sega or Nintendo.

 

 

 

Medfield will fail. Intel only knows how to make CPUs, nothing they've ever made outside that product has been worth a damn. Also, Medfield is about 10 years too late to the fight. There is already a device to play those two games you are talking about, the iPad (and other handheld consoles). While I wouldn't mind having better games on the market, portable games are so crippled with touchscreen (that genre anyway) that I personally couldn't care less about them. Not to mention CoD is a completely terrible franchise to begin with. I'd like to see more RTS type games and that doesn't need anything more than a touchscreen.

 

 

 

 

This is agree with 100%. They don't need to beat the console makers at their own game. I'd be perfectly okay with the ATV being an iPhone/iPad equivalent for the family TV. It won't get anywhere near the power and speed of any current or immediate future console, but that's okay. I'd like to have the ability to play some of the iOS games on my TV but with the ability of the Xbox to play Netflix and other media I don't have a use for the ATV. Might that change? I don't know. I do know that Valve and Apple teaming up to make that happen is almost certain never to happen. Their business plans and cultures are just too different for me to ever see it becoming a million in one chance.

 

 

 

 

And I don't see why they would. Apple has enough engineers and smart people that know strategy that involving an outside partner to sell makes absolutely zero sense. There's nothing in Apple's history that would come remotely close to them making hardware for someone else and then not making a boatload of cash off it for the life of the device. They team up with other companies to produce individual components to make the overall device but they don't share a single cent with Samsung on App Store profits. They won't do it with Valve either and I believe if they pitched the idea to them Valve would tell them to take a hike.