Mac-Intel Version?

[elias4444]

Any updates? (I'm mostly just curious if anything was decided for sure on what to do)

My work is now telling me it's time to order my next machine, so if I'm going to go Mac, now is my chance. I don't want to do it though if I can't develop my games on it in my off time.  :roll:

[Matzon]

mactel will be supported as best as is possible, however someone needs to commit to doing the work - I will look into the loading of fmod and devil, where possible - I just haven't found the motivation to do it. I dont have access to a mactel, and I have no incentive to fix it. Especially since I've gotten a copy of Oblivion!

[elias4444]

Especially since I've gotten a copy of Oblivion!

Ohhhh! So THATs where you've disappeared off to.
Can't say that I blame you.

Well, honestly, in my games, I don't use devil or fmod. Is openGL and openAL working fine?

Also, for anyone out there that uses a Mac... how good is Mac OSX as a development platform? (mostly Java stuff)

[tanukitzu]

I have the new Intel IMac and it's a nightmare for Java development.  It's painfully obvious that no one at Apple takes Java seriously and they are totally ignorant of the Java Open Source community.

I got an IMac G5 as a replacement and I'm selling both IMacs as soon as Vista comes out.  I'm going to set up a workstation where Vista is controlled by Linux server using Norton utilities.  I may keep a couple Mac minis around just for building/testing on them.

The only people using Macs are artsy types and LAMP/Ruby hackers.   It is not for Java.

[elias4444]

Ouch. Good to know, thanks!

[princec]

Oh I dunno, seems fine to me. The Intel OpenAL lib on the Mac, on the other hand, is causing me a major headache. Keeps crashing.

Cas

[elias4444]

How easy is it to work with Apple's Java implementation as opposed to Sun's "official" distribution of Java? I'm seriously considering the Mac, but am nervous, as I'm really not that familiar with the MacOS (but I've got several friends trying to talk me into it right now).

[elias]

The way I see it:

1. If you're going to support Mac OS X, having a Mac is considerably easier. I know Cas didn't have a mac for at least a few years, but he also bugged us about testing and debugging his games
2. The Intel macs are considerably faster than the PPC ones. So you can finally get PC performance with Mac OS X.
3. The intel mac JVM has worked fine for us. The recent intel mac mini broke TT since the intel gfx drivers has broken ARB_texture_compression support, but that's hardly the JVM's fault.
4. Proper security model which means far fewer (if any) vira, worms and trojans.

If only seen one downside developing on a mac:
1. The Terminal and iTerm programs both suck for regular use. Since I code in VI, this is a problem, but if you're using an IDE then you're not going to notice at all.
2. Most (non-java) games doesn't work for it, indie or non-indie But that's the same story as for linux, so I don't even notice that.

All in all, go for the intel mac

- elias

[elias4444]

Well, now I see no reason why I shouldn't go for an Intel Mac:

http://www.apple.com/macosx/bootcamp/

Exciting stuff! Especially for us cross-platform game developers.  

[Fool Running]

Well, now I see no reason why I shouldn't go for an Intel Mac:

http://www.apple.com/macosx/bootcamp/

Windows on a Mac?!?!?!.... What is this world comming to? :lol:
Next thing you know, Mac OS will run on a Windows machine and there won't be any hardware difference between the two!  :roll:

[miu]

tanukitzu - While I agree that many aspects of Java on the Mac are different from other implementations (packaging), overall it works just fine. Afer all, Linux/Solaris packaging is also different from Windows. LWJGL-Mactel "issues" are not really Java related at all, it's the native dependencies.

elias - good to hear that your (or better said Intel's?) mac mini bug is now fixed!

bootcamp - this is very interesting! We all somehow knew if would happen, I'm surprised that the solution comes directly from Apple and so soon!

I believe it's a good reason to go for an Intel Mac and get the best of both worlds! There is very little HW difference now (anything else than BIOS/EFI?). Still, no one makes anything like an iMac or the mini!

As many observed elsewhere however, this may indeed kill Mac gaming since mainstream games will be available as Windows "originals" without the wait and generally for less $$$. Often there's better performance etc.

Multi-platfrom developers like Oddlabs or Puppygames will not notice (I guess their non-Windows sales are negligible, if they can trace them) but for Aspyr or Feral future may be gloomy.

Fact is that "legacy" Power PC Macs will still be a good market for a while so the "bootcamp effect" may be delayed.

[elias]

We sell quite a lot to mac users (about 40%), but the main point is that I don't think boot camp will be such a big deal for the indie games. No-one wants to reboot just to get a quick fix of Tribal Trouble, Titan Attacks or something else.

- elias

[miu]

That's a surprisingly high percentage, elias! Obviously Java game audience is not "average"...

Luckily, no one needs to reboot for your games since they always come in all varieties.

This bootcamp sub-thread is off-topicky, but still:

My Intel iMac is the most powerful HW in the house now. Ever since I got it I wanted to find something to benchmark/showcase its graphics and processing power. What's better than a game, right? But there was NOTHING available for Intel (I know Apple took everybody by surprise in January). I tried a few PPC game demos, but their performance sucks, especially if you want nice graphics.

Then Doom 3 got a Universal update, but I didn't feel like shooting zombies in dark corridors. Call of Duty 2 should be coming in May, that's a looong wait. Now Quake 4 was released - still too close to Doom for me, but I tried to research and get it.

Compared to the Windows version it costs 50+ % more, and even though I still wanted it, I couldn't get it locally. I know I could mail order, but I'm an "impulse buyer".

Then I found that the Win version already has a multi-core patch out, which dramatically improves performance, also there's an SDK for mods... it may be coming "later" for Mac, but I just grabbed the Win version now. So wow, now I can see how my Mac shines - in Windows  

Now I feel bad about my "impulse" decision, perhaps I should have supported my camp? Their position is pretty bad since they have to deal with PPC code as well as Intel, which will never be as optimized as Windows. I don't think they can justify that effort for a limited market.

I promise I'll get a "real" Mac game one day...

[elias4444]

Well, my new MacBook Pro is on it's way! Is there a universal version of LWJGL available for download for Intel Macs yet? I'd prefer not to have any development downtime once I get it.
:wink:

[princec]

You can grab it indirectly out of Titan Attacks for OSX for now.

Cas