iGame
Apple could make a really great gaming machine.
4 cell 1.2 G5 processors
2 GB RAM
Ethernet port
Your saves and settings are stored on .Mac along with what games you own.
the games run OS 10.4 specialy tweaked to fit the games need. These games would come from Aspyr.
.Mac would have all the games online. You simply load the game you want to play off .Mac (out of the games you own) load it onto RAM and PLAY!
You could by games off of the Apple store, creating impulsive buying as a great market. You could also rent games really easily.
Best of all the gaming ports are USB ports allowing you to use any USB controller!! Including a mouse for games like Sim City 4.
4 cell 1.2 G5 processors
2 GB RAM
Ethernet port
Your saves and settings are stored on .Mac along with what games you own.
the games run OS 10.4 specialy tweaked to fit the games need. These games would come from Aspyr.
.Mac would have all the games online. You simply load the game you want to play off .Mac (out of the games you own) load it onto RAM and PLAY!
You could by games off of the Apple store, creating impulsive buying as a great market. You could also rent games really easily.
Best of all the gaming ports are USB ports allowing you to use any USB controller!! Including a mouse for games like Sim City 4.
Comments
Move along please, nothing to see here.
Originally posted by AdvocateUK
One word, Pippin.
Damn. You beat me to it.
The console market is more than saturated. Getting into it now would be very unwise. How can you compete with industry giants whose intentions are to loose money with every system sale?
MS can afford to loose a hundred bucks on every system. They've got OS and office suite monopolies to support their unprofitable divisions.
Apple simply cannot get into the business of loosing money for each machine it sells. MS can. Apple can't.
Originally posted by PBG4 Dude
Damn. You beat me to it.
Just a thought (that would remove the OpenGL-only limitation from the Mac gaming world, and/or ease the porting issues).
Originally posted by AdvocateUK
Oh how I would love to see DX9 or DX10 on OSX (and all that would mean for gaming on OSX and developers) but alas I don't see that happening.
Yea, one thing MS can't seem to handle is competition so I don't see them porting the crown jewels of Windows gaming to any platform they don't control.
the machine could also act as a better version of the "media pc's"
you could web surf too
Originally posted by PBG4 Dude
Yea, one thing MS can't seem to handle is competition so I don't see them porting the crown jewels of Windows gaming to any platform they don't control.
I think I disagree...and I think there's actually a strong business case to be made for Microsoft porting DX9 to the Mac...
Between the xbox-next dev work being done on G5's, and the new VirtualPC, it wouldn't surprise me at all if there was at least some groundwork already laid for porting DX to Mac. And keep in mind that Windows is far from being MS' only product. They make a lot of money selling Office for the Mac, and could also make a lot of money selling all of their games for the Mac. It also stands to reason that with the VG industry growing the way it is, and MS' success and commitment to gaming both via xbox and PC game releases, MS would profit considerably by having another platform on which to sell games. And I'd be willing to bet that any substantial research would prove that increasing the Mac gaming market would not impact the PC gaming market. Both will grow.
Originally posted by concentricity
I think I disagree...and I think there's actually a strong business case to be made for Microsoft porting DX9 to the Mac...
Between the xbox-next dev work being done on G5's, and the new VirtualPC, it wouldn't surprise me at all if there was at least some groundwork already laid for porting DX to Mac. And keep in mind that Windows is far from being MS' only product. They make a lot of money selling Office for the Mac, and could also make a lot of money selling all of their games for the Mac. It also stands to reason that with the VG industry growing the way it is, and MS' success and commitment to gaming both via xbox and PC game releases, MS would profit considerably by having another platform on which to sell games. And I'd be willing to bet that any substantial research would prove that increasing the Mac gaming market would not impact the PC gaming market. Both will grow.
Just as a FYI: Microsoft doesn't sell games. Microsoft sells consoles (leaving the PC side of things out of this for a moment.) and makes money from licensing fees on the games that OTHER companies sell for the Xbox. Porting DX to the Mac would do nothing for Microsoft at all.
[EDIT] At the most M$ could port DX and charge a fee for its use on the Mac in the same vein as Criterion do with their 3d engine. I sorely doubt this will happen though. Face it, M$ isn't about to port DX to the Mac for general consumption (it HAS ported it to Mac but only for the Xbox2 devs) and any wishing for this to happen is a waste of time. [/EDIT]
Originally posted by AdvocateUK
Just as a FYI: Microsoft doesn't sell games. Microsoft sells consoles (leaving the PC side of things out of this for a moment.) and makes money from licensing fees on the games that OTHER companies sell for the Xbox. Porting DX to the Mac would do nothing for Microsoft at all.
[EDIT] At the most M$ could port DX and charge a fee for its use on the Mac in the same vein as Criterion do with their 3d engine. I sorely doubt this will happen though. Face it, M$ isn't about to port DX to the Mac for general consumption (it HAS ported it to Mac but only for the Xbox2 devs) and any wishing for this to happen is a waste of time. [/EDIT]
MS does certainly have a games division. Even before their acquisition of Bungee (those Halo guys) they put out games like Flight Simulator, HellBender, and of course, Solitaire!
concentricity,
You do make a compelling argument for porting DX to Mac, but I'm going to stick to my guns. I don't think MS would do it (even if 99% of the work has been done for XBox-next) since it could increase acceptance of the Mac platform for gaming which many people see as Apple's biggest stumbling block to selling more computers. This could lead to fewer Windows licenses being sold, and anything that could possibly endanger the Windows franchise just won't happen, IMO.
Originally posted by PBG4 Dude
MS does certainly have a games division. Even before their acquisition of Bungee (those Halo guys) they put out games like Flight Simulator, HellBender, and of course, Solitaire!
Jesus the whole reason I made a point of saying that I was ignoring the PC side of things was that porting DX JUST so that your own games can be ported to the Mac is plain dumb!
The previous poster was assuming that M$ makes a potload of cash from DX games which just isn't true!
M$ only makes money from licensed Xbox/Xbox2 games NOT from any game that uses DX. M$ originally started the DX project to make writing games for the PC easier (and of course because it didn't already control OpenGL, and M$ hates not to be in control of anything that can run on or has an influence on the PC).
Originally posted by AdvocateUK
Jesus the whole reason I made a point of saying that I was ignoring the PC side of things was that porting DX JUST so that your own games can be ported to the Mac is plain dumb!
Ummm, Halo is an XBox game. That's where it was first released. My comment was to the effect that MS does indeed make their own games as well. Granted, Flight Simulator, HellBender & Solitaire are all PC games and could be considered bad examples, but Halo & Halo 2 are both XBox games first & foremost & MS would be taking in all revenues from all sales on all platforms for these games.
Maybe I missed something in your post, but it's nothing to have a conniption fit over. After all, this is just friendly discussion, right? Not trying to offend anyone here.
Originally posted by PBG4 Dude
Ummm, Halo is an XBox game. That's where it was first released. My comment was to the effect that MS does indeed make their own games as well. Granted, Flight Simulator, HellBender & Solitaire are all PC games and could be considered bad examples, but Halo & Halo 2 are both XBox games first & foremost & MS would be taking in all revenues from all sales on all platforms for these games.
Maybe I missed something in your post, but it's nothing to have a conniption fit over. After all, this is just friendly discussion, right? Not trying to offend anyone here.
Yeah ok sorry if I came across a little annoyed there but take a serious look at how much money M$ would make from its games division porting games to the Mac. Not enough to make porting (and supporting) DX worthwhile.
Originally posted by BenRoethig
If M$ were to port DX over to PowerPC, they'd be slapped with an anti-trust suit. The big reason they've been allowed to keep their DX monopoly is because they've convinced everyone it is so x86 dependent that it'd be impossible port over.
Wow this is news to me! Who would file the anti-trust suit? Why would they file an anti-trust suit?
Again FYI DX isn't a monopoly, say hello to OpenGL which believe it or not also exists on the PC platform. Doom 3 uses it and erm...not a lot else but you get my drift
This is not a serious issue.
The issue, in this case, is: Would Apple want to debut a whole new platform in a whole new market, build up a whole new roster of developers, etc., and compete in a seriously cutthroat market? What's the payoff?
If Apple sells more Macs, and more Mac users buy games for their Macs, Macs will get more games.
Originally posted by AdvocateUK
Wow this is news to me! Who would file the anti-trust suit? Why would they file an anti-trust suit?
Again FYI DX isn't a monopoly, say hello to OpenGL which believe it or not also exists on the PC platform. Doom 3 uses it and erm...not a lot else but you get my drift
If a product give a company an unfair advantge over its competitors, it is a violation of U.S. anti-trust laws and the Department of Justice and/or the attorney generals of the state/ territories has the right to sue.
Originally posted by Amorph
There's a third-party port of DX9 available, and the various Mac porting houses have in-house ports of DX9 that they've built up from, well, porting games.
This is not a serious issue.
DX's directplay component is. It breaks the posibility of Mac-PC communication.
Originally posted by BenRoethig
If a product give a company an unfair advantge over its competitors, it is a violation of U.S. anti-trust laws and the Department of Justice and/or the attorney generals of the state/ territories has the right to sue.
I'm sorry I don't know a lot about US law. What unfair advantage would porting DX to Mac give anyone? If anything NOT porting DX gives M$ an unfair advantage. I may be entirely wrong here (and I often am, just ask the wife!) but surely whether M$ ports DX or not doesn't give them an unfair advantage in anything.
Maybe it's the vodka but one of us is missing something here and I don't think it's me.