98 replies to this topic

[teflon]

Personally, Alkar, I think that Feral's Legends series is one of the best things to happen to mac gaming. One of the problems weve seen is that people want cheap games that run well on their machines. Seeing as its difficult for the porting houses to get contracts which allow them to drop the price over time, Feral are stepping in from the other end, get the game when the original devs dont care about it any more, so they'll just grab a smaller cut and be glad for the money. Then release the game cheaply.

Add to that the simpler graphics, less shaders in particular, new improved porting methods (though they wont have changed much over the last few years, theyll have been optimised), and presumably quicker porting times, and Feral have effectively created a market within a market, which almost anyone who owns a mac from the last 3 years can play.

[D-M.A.]

alkar, on October 9th 2008, 05:04 PM, said:

I guess MacBook owners will get to play this game though, good for them.

Um, I think the game requires a dedicated GPU with 128 Mb VRAM. Not even the latest MacBooks can run this game unless I'm totally wrong here.

[alkar]

edddeduck, thanks for your clear answer.

Of course the game isn't 28 years old, it was just a way of saying it's old.

What I'm cleary disappointed in all these latest ports is you port more and more old games now. I was happy with the TRA port, because while it was 9 month late compared to the PC/PS2 version, it was still the latest Tomb Raider in the series.

The same goes with Aspyr and CoD4 : while they had lots of delays (the game is now 11 month old compared to PC), it's still the latest CoD (not for long though). They took the risk of porting a very demanding game to OSX, which is a risk you don't seem to really take at Feral.

If you ever consider to port Tomb Raider Underworld, I guess we will see it in years considering it's demanding (PS 3.0, HDR, etc, like CoD 4) and only some Macs would be able to run it correctly. While I do understand that you get more money if it runs on lots of Mac, you need to understand, just like it was the case with Crysis on PC, that some people like to play the latest demanding games, even in Low details (better than nothing). Hell, even the DS is getting its port ! Why not Mac people ?!? Eidos is clearly not interested, but I'm sure NO developper ever consider a Mac version for it.

While I do understand porting is expensive, as I told you in my other post, I think you guys need to make some agreements with PC publishers, very much like EA did with Transgaming to port their game with Cider (which is less work than porting a native game, I agree...). Anyway, I'm sure there is a way. Look at Blizzard, they manage to have a Mac team dedicating to MAKE their game work on OSX (see it as not even a port !), and I'm sure, you, at Feral, have the ressources to co-develop the latest game with PC devs I guess...

Of course it costs a lot for publishers to make X360 to PS3 ports these days, but they manage to do it in time. Why is it not the case for OSX ? Lately, the only game that was Native (i.e. not Cider) and that was out for PC/Mac at the same time was Guitar Hero 3 i think (bad port btw).

With Intel Mac, I'm sure i'm not the only one just buying the Windows version years ahead the Mac version and enjoying it with proper optimizations. I hate rebooting though, but it's just a choice you have to make : wait years for maybe a bad port, or play now, just by rebooting ?

I see that I am the only one complaining there, but you need to know, that I'm not the only one who is not happy with the direction Mac gaming is heading. At least, you aren't desperate enough to use Cider, which shows that Feral is smart after all.

BTW, the same happened with ColinMcRae Mac : while I did try the demo back then just for fun, I was asking myself : why are you playing this when you played it on your PS2 years ago and you now have DiRT ?

Hopefully, you'll take everything I said into consideration. I like how I'll be able to play diablo 3 or Starcraft 2 without rebooting to Windows at the same time as PC users, but I don't like playing diablo 2 when people will be able to play diablo 3 (which is like playing TOCA 3 when GRID is out to me).

Sorry if you find me "impolite", but that's how I feel.

[Eric5h5]

alkar, on October 9th 2008, 02:15 PM, said:

Sorry if you find me "impolite", but that's how I feel.

Sounds like Mac gaming isn't for you, then.  You should also understand that some people don't actually care that much about how new the game is...what matters more is whether it's any good or not, especially since later games in a series aren't always better.  Whether a game was released last week or two years ago is essentially irrelevant to me.  If I played multiplayer online games I would care a lot more, because in that case it does matter, but I don't; I only play singleplayer games.

--Eric

[iRolley]

Excellent... I just tried the demo and it runs really well (Core Duo 2Ghz, X1600). Handling is very fun too.

I am having a veeeery strange issue though : In manual gears mode, from time to time the gear would shift up or down, on its own  . I am using a logitech rumble cordless something, a using the top "finger" buttons to switch gears.

Looks like an excellent addition to our mac racing sim library. Good job, thanks Feral.

[iRolley]

Eric5h5, on October 9th 2008, 02:32 PM, said:

Sounds like Mac gaming isn't for you, then.  You should also understand that some people don't actually care that much about how new the game is...what matters more is whether it's any good or not, especially since later games in a series aren't always better.  Whether a game was released last week or two years ago is essentially irrelevant to me.  If I played multiplayer online games I would care a lot more, because in that case it does matter, but I don't; I only play singleplayer games.

--Eric

That, and guess what : I'd rather have an older game that provides a great experience on my Mac (Core Duo 2Ghz - first gen Intel Mac) than a new one that doesn't support it

[iRolley]

teflon, on October 9th 2008, 10:57 AM, said:

Add to that the simpler graphics, less shaders in particular, new improved porting methods (though they wont have changed much over the last few years, theyll have been optimised), and presumably quicker porting times, and Feral have effectively created a market within a market, which almost anyone who owns a mac from the last 3 years can play.

A great aspect is indeed quicker porting time. I am not sure if it really is, but as with Tomb Raider and Battlestations, Feral announced the game and released it (or a demo) just a few days later. That is definitely much better that having users wait months and then start loosing interest. I also think it stimulates "impulse" buying... at least it does on me.

[alkar]

I actually think porting is quicker because of Intel Macs. While Feral doesn't use Cider, it's still easier to port a X86 code to another X86 code rather than PPC code. Oh, and since it uses X86 code, Feral now uses some D3D to OpenGL wrapper, so they don't have to redo this from scratch. You'll notice, lately, that Feral ans Aspyr games (except Quake Wars which is an OpenGL one for Windows too) think they 'run' on DirectX while they are using some kind of Direct3D to OpenGL wrapper to actually display all these games.

That's pretty much why performances aren't as good as on Windows IMO. But most of today's games aren't that slower though so I guess it's a good method, as long as they recompile the EXE and it runs on a native mach-o, which Cider doesn't and eat all your CPU use.

iRolley, on October 9th 2008, 03:56 PM, said:

A great aspect is indeed quicker porting time. I am not sure if it really is, but as with Tomb Raider and Battlestations, Feral announced the game and released it (or a demo) just a few days later. That is definitely much better that having users wait months and then start loosing interest. I also think it stimulates "impulse" buying... at least it does on me.

[Eric5h5]

alkar, on October 9th 2008, 06:18 PM, said:

Oh, and since it uses X86 code, Feral now uses some D3D to OpenGL wrapper, so they don't have to redo this from scratch. You'll notice, lately, that Feral ans Aspyr games (except Quake Wars which is an OpenGL one for Windows too) think they 'run' on DirectX while they are using some kind of Direct3D to OpenGL wrapper to actually display all these games.

That's nothing new...a lot of PPC games do this too, and have been for quite a few years.  Nothing to do with x86.

--Eric

[mattw]

Eric5h5, on October 9th 2008, 09:32 PM, said:

Sounds like Mac gaming isn't for you, then.  You should also understand that some people don't actually care that much about how new the game is...what matters more is whether it's any good or not, especially since later games in a series aren't always better.  Whether a game was released last week or two years ago is essentially irrelevant to me.  If I played multiplayer online games I would care a lot more, because in that case it does matter, but I don't; I only play singleplayer games.

--Eric

I have to agree. If along with your Mac you have a console, a PC or use Bootcamp then you are always going to have the option of getting pretty much any game earlier and that is fine if you don't mind playing in front of your TV, playing with a game pad or rebooting. There are however those of us who find it much more convenient to play on our Macs and don't want to invest in a second solution just for games. In this situation the games are still "new" and what really counts is whether it is entertaining and the quality of the port (and on going support).

[dxlr8r]

With this type of game how old it is is of no concern. I am a Mac gamer, with the newest Mac Pro and GT 8800 and I don't use Bootcamp. So THANK YOU! Please start selling games digitally online without DRM! That would make me buy alot of more games for Mac. Cracks always come out anyway, why should the pirates have the best editions?

Feral rules! I look forward to the Fable sequel to And ofcourse, no Cider crap!!! Real ports are always the best...

[Gugus]

Great shot with this one Feral !

I was very surprised to discover that the Rumble 2's force feedback was supported !

Its just odd to change from the high level simulation of F1 CS 2000 and the big driving of this Honda tournament… Im now waiting for next week, to judge if the driving is really "simultaion" or most "arcade" style

[Janichsan]

Gugus, on October 10th 2008, 04:33 PM, said:

Im now waiting for next week, to judge if the driving is really "simultaion" or most "arcade" style

Did you try to turn on the "Pro" options? Those affect the handling pretty much. Without those, it's really very arcarde.

[The Animaster]

Damn... how late am I to the news?

I'm downloading this now... although I could have sworn the site said "Intel Only" ??

Is this Intel only?



Due to circumstances, it won't be a looooong time till I get teh next macbook pro...

[Janichsan]

The Animaster, on October 13th 2008, 09:26 AM, said:

Is this Intel only?

Yes, it is.

[maccer]

teflon, on October 9th 2008, 06:57 PM, said:

Personally, Alkar, I think that Feral's Legends series is one of the best things to happen to mac gaming. [...] Then release the game cheaply.

teflon said:

Pricing is around 40 euros

alkar said:

[...] it was still the latest Tomb Raider in the series. Cod4 [...] it's still the latest CoD.

BTW, the same happened with ColinMcRae Mac : while I did try the demo back then just for fun, I was asking myself : why are you playing this when you played it on your PS2 years ago and you now have DiRT ?

I kind of agree. I, too, was a bit disappointed to learn that TOCA 3 was released so long after Grid came out. And as you say, same thing with Colin. On the other hand those new games would probably only be playable on a Mac Pro with 8800GT or a Imac with 8800GS. On my MBP 2.33 / Radeon X1600XT from november 2006 the GRID demo runs like a slideshow even in Windows, and a Mac version would run even worse. I doubt that the MBP:s with Geforce 8600M would run DIRT or GRID the game good enough to be playable unless played at the lowest settings. On a sidenote, let's hope Apple releases some laptops tomorrow that can actually be used for gaming!

If those older games would at least have a reasonable price tag I would not complain so much. However, the games are old but certainly not cheap. TOCA 3 for PC costs about €15 (including shipping) in Sweden. €40 is too much for a game that is old and, most importantly, not the latest version in the series. €25-30 would be a more acceptable price. Same with Colin Mc Rae (but even so I bought it). CMR 2005 costs about €10 for the PC, but CMR Mac still costs a whopping €50 a year after its release and it still doesn't even have all features that the PC version has. I'm mainly thinking of Force Feedback support for Intel Macs - if you have a FFB-capable steering wheel, much of the enjoyment playing the game disappears without proper FFB .

Or worse: I just found a CMR 2005 + TOCA 3 package for €13... compare that with €90 for the Mac versions...

[maccer]

edddeduck, on October 9th 2008, 05:55 PM, said:

Race Driver 3 was released in 2006 so the game is 2 years old

Well, TOCA 3 was released 24:th of February 2006 (http://www.codemaste...es/?gameid=1731). The Mac version will be released 24:th of October 2008 (http://www.gamesindu...ater-this-month), so the Mac version will be released exactly 2 years and 8 months later than the PS2 one (the PC version seems to have been released 20:th of Sepember 2006).

[teflon]

Youre better off taking the PC release date, as thats the one thats been ported. So that makes it 2 years, 1 month and 4 days after the PC version.

[D-M.A.]

teflon, on October 13th 2008, 04:47 PM, said:

Youre better off taking the PC release date, as thats the one thats been ported. So that makes it 2 years, 1 month and 4 days after the PC version.

How many hours, minutes and seconds?

[teflon]

uh, i believe its going to be 7 hours, 18 minutes and 43 seconds.
But dont quote me on that, youd be better off asking Edwin...