Guild Wars 2

Hi guys,

I hope Anet management is aware of this:
in the last calendar year 2015 alone, according to Gartner estimates, Apple have shipped over 20 million new Macs.

I think there are potentially lots of Mac users who currently don’t have a registered account with GW2, which can be potential new customers and potential revenue opportunities for Anet.

Isn’t this a reasonable business case for Anet management to take OS X client more seriously and start focussing marketing on the Mac users? Perhaps, publish GW2 on Apple App Store as an additional sales channel?

I think GW2 is such a beautiful game, and many Mac users are known to be creative minded and are more willing to spend money on something beautiful…

Many thanks for reading my post!

You know those numbers include business sales too? A lot of companies use Macs for graphics work. I used to date someone who sold macs to businesses. Unless you can show that number being solely residential use for gaming, it doesn’t show Anet anything.

There has been next to 0 development on the ‘beta’ they gave us in 2012. It is a pretty open secret that it is a (pretty bad) wrapper to run windows stuff on macs so I am not sure why they insist on calling in a beta for this long, but hey. Anyway, they initially put some investment in as it is not freeware so I am not sure why they refuse to do so now. We have to put up with minimal graphics settings and crashing because of a memory leak in that old 32 bit wrapper.

Quoting a quote:

JustTrogdor.7892:

They are testing it/working on it.

When we shipped the game originally we used a third-party shell to ‘host’ the Windows version. While this got the product out the door on Mac there are some things we haven’t been able to do to make it a true Mac application. We are actively experimenting with getting native code that runs directly on the Mac with OpenGL etc. I don’t know how long it will take to make it “real” but I can say that this week we finally got it compiling, linking, and starting up on a Mac before it crashes at the login screen.

But no promises.

We don’t have much to say about it. That’s often why we are silent. I don’t want to give you all hope of something only to take it away if it doesn’t work out.

Quote taken from https://forum-en.gw2archive.eu/forum/support/support/Mac-Native-Client

You have a valid point as to why development should have a bigger initiative around macs, however one reason why I personally think it shouldn’t be a huge priority would be that mac users can just dual boot into Windows to play games. Lets be honest, people don’t buy mac to play games with, its usually people who want a simpler UI / more user friendly technology interaction.

Personally, I don’t want my mother to start playing Guild Wars, so lets just keep the focus on windows :P

(jokes, I really do want her to play. eh, not really though)

If you have the money to buy a Mac-pc and you want to play games then you should buy a Windows-pc also. Or else don’t cry about it. It’s really ridiculous that you want to play games and decide to do it on an Apple computer… -.-

FOX.3582:

If you have the money to buy a Mac-pc and you want to play games then you should buy a Windows-pc also. Or else don’t cry about it. It’s really ridiculous that you want to play games and decide to do it on an Apple computer… -.-

Times are changing, it’s not 1996 anymore.

FOX.3582:

If you have the money to buy a Mac-pc and you want to play games then you should buy a Windows-pc also. Or else don’t cry about it. It’s really ridiculous that you want to play games and decide to do it on an Apple computer… -.-

lol, still do not get how anyone can have that kind of attitude. (I personally run windows)
First of all, A-Net is clearly lossing money by not supporting mac or Linux as mentioned above or shown in any other post.

Asking people to not cry about it, when all they want is A-Net to include more players to the game……seems rather ignorant all around, beside the company actually lossing money if they had a childish attitude like that, the sentence alone is a hate complaint, as if to say, that the player base have bought mac, so therefor they should not be supported by any company, even though a suggestion like this would improve everything for everyone.

There are different reasons to have bought a computer of a certain kind, even if just becoming a gamer or interested in games a few months ago even tho you only got mac……

In conclusion, I DO NOT UNDERSTAND YOU, if everyone wins by supporting mac, I truly do not get this message at all, A-Net wins, the playerbase gets bigger so we win, the mac users wins, since they can play, there is no downside, so therefor i truly can not see your complaining of forcing people to stay in their place based on the brand of their computer……..

Beside the obvious hateful fact of “its an apple so you should not be able to do anything that is game based”

zengara.8301:

FOX.3582:

If you have the money to buy a Mac-pc and you want to play games then you should buy a Windows-pc also. Or else don’t cry about it. It’s really ridiculous that you want to play games and decide to do it on an Apple computer… -.-

lol, still do not get how anyone can have that kind of attitude. (I personally run windows)
First of all, A-Net is clearly lossing money by not supporting mac or Linux as mentioned above or shown in any other post.

Asking people to not cry about it, when all they want is A-Net to include more players to the game……seems rather ignorant all around, beside the company actually lossing money if they had a childish attitude like that, the sentence alone is a hate complaint, as if to say, that the player base have bought mac, so therefor they should not be supported by any company, even though a suggestion like this would improve everything for everyone.

There are different reasons to have bought a computer of a certain kind, even if just becoming a gamer or interested in games a few months ago even tho you only got mac……

In conclusion, I DO NOT UNDERSTAND YOU, if everyone wins by supporting mac, I truly do not get this message at all, A-Net wins, the playerbase gets bigger so we win, the mac users wins, since they can play, there is no downside, so therefor i truly can not see your complaining of forcing people to stay in their place based on the brand of their computer……..

Beside the obvious hateful fact of “its an apple so you should not be able to do anything that is game based”

Your right that being able to support a mac client would be beneficial for the ANet and the player base, but i don’t think that a mac client is the most beneficial thing. Everything that ANet does will be beneficial; if they make a great expansion alot of people will buy, the player base increases, and everybody is happy. Releasing alot of content on the current expansion like raids, living world, wvw, in game events, and legendary weapons (ya i know) will keep people playing, which gives us more content and maintains a higher player base, which helps everyone, and gives us more confidence in the next expansion, getting them future revenue. In comparison to these things, i dont think making a mac client is better than these 2 options.

Making a mac client when there are other options available is a substantial gamble. It depends on if a mac client can be made quickly, if it can be maintained, and if there is a player base that want to play this game on a mac. Maintaining the current player base and increasing it slowly is likely a better option than bleeding the player base to make a mac client.

Macs are kittening useless for gaming

PC Master Race

zengara.8301:

FOX.3582:

If you have the money to buy a Mac-pc and you want to play games then you should buy a Windows-pc also. Or else don’t cry about it. It’s really ridiculous that you want to play games and decide to do it on an Apple computer… -.-

lol, still do not get how anyone can have that kind of attitude. (I personally run windows)
First of all, A-Net is clearly lossing money by not supporting mac or Linux as mentioned above or shown in any other post.

Asking people to not cry about it, when all they want is A-Net to include more players to the game……seems rather ignorant all around, beside the company actually lossing money if they had a childish attitude like that, the sentence alone is a hate complaint, as if to say, that the player base have bought mac, so therefor they should not be supported by any company, even though a suggestion like this would improve everything for everyone.

There are different reasons to have bought a computer of a certain kind, even if just becoming a gamer or interested in games a few months ago even tho you only got mac……

In conclusion, I DO NOT UNDERSTAND YOU, if everyone wins by supporting mac, I truly do not get this message at all, A-Net wins, the playerbase gets bigger so we win, the mac users wins, since they can play, there is no downside, so therefor i truly can not see your complaining of forcing people to stay in their place based on the brand of their computer……..

Beside the obvious hateful fact of “its an apple so you should not be able to do anything that is game based”

How can you be certain they’re “losing” money? I don’t have any numbers on how much they’d make from extra sales with a better mac client or how much said client would cost, and I’d be surprised if you did have them (I’d be surprised if Anet had anything better than a decent guess).

And I’d say the only way they could lose money on a mac client is by spending money making it and then not selling enough extra to recoup that investment.

And don’t call people who disagree with you hateful or ignorant, it just seems like a pathetic way to trick people into agreeing with you.

OSX has hardware limitations and thus not viable option as a gaming platform because PCs evolves every year with newer and more powerful hardware that gets released every year.

I rather ArenaNet put their resources in adding new content instead of making OSX or Linux support. Content is what keeps players and brings new players in. Sure adding another platform could help business sales but right now content is what we need. The rest can wait. Windows has always been dominant in gaming for a reason, and that reason is Windows doesn’t have hardware limitations. It just works with all the latest hardware that come out each year.

Deleven.7508:

zengara.8301:

FOX.3582:

If you have the money to buy a Mac-pc and you want to play games then you should buy a Windows-pc also. Or else don’t cry about it. It’s really ridiculous that you want to play games and decide to do it on an Apple computer… -.-

lol, still do not get how anyone can have that kind of attitude. (I personally run windows)
First of all, A-Net is clearly lossing money by not supporting mac or Linux as mentioned above or shown in any other post.

Asking people to not cry about it, when all they want is A-Net to include more players to the game……seems rather ignorant all around, beside the company actually lossing money if they had a childish attitude like that, the sentence alone is a hate complaint, as if to say, that the player base have bought mac, so therefor they should not be supported by any company, even though a suggestion like this would improve everything for everyone.

There are different reasons to have bought a computer of a certain kind, even if just becoming a gamer or interested in games a few months ago even tho you only got mac……

In conclusion, I DO NOT UNDERSTAND YOU, if everyone wins by supporting mac, I truly do not get this message at all, A-Net wins, the playerbase gets bigger so we win, the mac users wins, since they can play, there is no downside, so therefor i truly can not see your complaining of forcing people to stay in their place based on the brand of their computer……..

Beside the obvious hateful fact of “its an apple so you should not be able to do anything that is game based”

Your right that being able to support a mac client would be beneficial for the ANet and the player base, but i don’t think that a mac client is the most beneficial thing. Everything that ANet does will be beneficial; if they make a great expansion alot of people will buy, the player base increases, and everybody is happy. Releasing alot of content on the current expansion like raids, living world, wvw, in game events, and legendary weapons (ya i know) will keep people playing, which gives us more content and maintains a higher player base, which helps everyone, and gives us more confidence in the next expansion, getting them future revenue. In comparison to these things, i dont think making a mac client is better than these 2 options.

Making a mac client when there are other options available is a substantial gamble. It depends on if a mac client can be made quickly, if it can be maintained, and if there is a player base that want to play this game on a mac. Maintaining the current player base and increasing it slowly is likely a better option than bleeding the player base to make a mac client.

You make it sound like as if the whole company will stop making other things, as if the designers, story tellers etc will just stop doing what they are doing.
It is not my idea to have the whole company stop what they are doing and create a client.
You are partly right on anything they make will increase their income, as long as it is a service they get paid for, tho it is like you are tryieng to say that they can only make 1 thing at a time, as the once claiming that raiding is all A-Net did, even tho it was 5-6 people in the raid team, and the reason it came out so early, is because they just did amazingly well
https://youtu.be/5PjlrvmZNmc?t=878

I get your idea of putting everything behind another as if to say, isnt there something more important, as to create things in the game? But it is not how it works, tho how everyone act like it works in the forum, as if you can que them 1 at a time.

Beside all this, it is a system they are opening up to, I am guessing that people will not buy a whole new system for 1 game when their system is working fine.

yes I get A-Net can do other stuff, but this is improving their overall range of people to collect, they limit their own game based on how many people that can play it, and increasing that will also create a steady group for mac players, and in my mind, doing that will always bigger than any expansion.

Etienne.3049:

zengara.8301:

FOX.3582:

If you have the money to buy a Mac-pc and you want to play games then you should buy a Windows-pc also. Or else don’t cry about it. It’s really ridiculous that you want to play games and decide to do it on an Apple computer… -.-

lol, still do not get how anyone can have that kind of attitude. (I personally run windows)
First of all, A-Net is clearly lossing money by not supporting mac or Linux as mentioned above or shown in any other post.

Asking people to not cry about it, when all they want is A-Net to include more players to the game……seems rather ignorant all around, beside the company actually lossing money if they had a childish attitude like that, the sentence alone is a hate complaint, as if to say, that the player base have bought mac, so therefor they should not be supported by any company, even though a suggestion like this would improve everything for everyone.

There are different reasons to have bought a computer of a certain kind, even if just becoming a gamer or interested in games a few months ago even tho you only got mac……

In conclusion, I DO NOT UNDERSTAND YOU, if everyone wins by supporting mac, I truly do not get this message at all, A-Net wins, the playerbase gets bigger so we win, the mac users wins, since they can play, there is no downside, so therefor i truly can not see your complaining of forcing people to stay in their place based on the brand of their computer……..

Beside the obvious hateful fact of “its an apple so you should not be able to do anything that is game based”

How can you be certain they’re “losing” money? I don’t have any numbers on how much they’d make from extra sales with a better mac client or how much said client would cost, and I’d be surprised if you did have them (I’d be surprised if Anet had anything better than a decent guess).

And I’d say the only way they could lose money on a mac client is by spending money making it and then not selling enough extra to recoup that investment.

And don’t call people who disagree with you hateful or ignorant, it just seems like a pathetic way to trick people into agreeing with you.

True calling people that is a trick, but you gotta admit, him writting something like “cry” etc is to express hate…….’
And it is a “guess” but they are in the end expanding their market which was limited by system requirement, that is always a huge boost, and a pretty important priority.
http://image.slidesharecdn.com/africamarketentrystrategyppt-130117114628-phpapp01/95/market-entry-expansion-strategies-for-africa-factors-for-consideration-eugene-nizeyimana-7-638.jpg?cb=1396667283

I used to be in a business class, A-Net having already expanded market to china, is quiet impressive, but expanding market further based on system is rarely a risk, my teacher always talked about how important it is to expand.
I do not know the requirement of technology behind actually making a client that would be able to do this, but a good guess of how many use apple in EU, USA and China kinda creates a huge opportunity to Market Penetrate.

penelopehannibal.8947:

FOX.3582:

If you have the money to buy a Mac-pc and you want to play games then you should buy a Windows-pc also. Or else don’t cry about it. It’s really ridiculous that you want to play games and decide to do it on an Apple computer… -.-

Times are changing, it’s not 1996 anymore.

Not fast enough, man. If you invest a Mac as a gaming rig, you are still going to be heavily limited in your game choices.

I feel I can safely most of the people e who takes PC gaming as a serious hobby are still not buying Mac products as their gaming rig, not only, because of this limitation in game selection, but because they are closed off systems that you can’t upgrade yourself to keep relevant.

MadRabbit.3179:

penelopehannibal.8947:

FOX.3582:

If you have the money to buy a Mac-pc and you want to play games then you should buy a Windows-pc also. Or else don’t cry about it. It’s really ridiculous that you want to play games and decide to do it on an Apple computer… -.-

Times are changing, it’s not 1996 anymore.

Not fast enough, man. If you invest a Mac as a gaming rig, you are still going to be heavily limited in your game choices.

I feel I can safely most of the people e who takes PC gaming as a serious hobby are still not buying Mac products as their gaming rig, not only, because of this limitation in game selection, but because they are closed off systems that you can’t upgrade yourself to keep relevant.

True, I have a pretty decent computer atm, but I used to have a laptop, pretty bad one that got warm easely and could only run Gw2 on lowest with like 20-30 fps 2 years ago, would not surprise me if there are a lot like me.
You still hear a lot of people saying that they are playing on old laptops. I personally do find it highly unlikely that the majority of the player base should have good computers, but I do not know to be honest, this is personal calculation from asking mapchat teamspeak etc. so in reality it does not mean a lot, but still can see a lot of players going from just playing a few times a day to becomming gamers

If you are a gamer, the chances are, you do not own a mac. I have Frieda who love Mac’s. They will tell me that they are better than a windows PC for anything, with one exception. They agree that if you are going to do gaming, you get a windows PC for that. That’s why they have windows PC’s just for gaming.

I’m actually in that camp. My laptop for work is a Macbook Pro and I don’t play anything on it except for Hearthstone, because the machine can handle the game and it’s design works well with the gesture based touchpads.

My actual gaming rig is and has always been a Windows machine just out of neccessity. The Linux and Mac gaming communities have been gaining momentum over the years, but it’s far from being at a point where it’s a worthwhile investment.

Reverence.6915:

Macs are kittening useless for gaming

PC Master Race

You mean Windows¿ Cause PC stands for “Personal Computer” in which case a Mac can also be a PC…

Hahaha I love it how you all defend your statements. Well go buy a Mac-computer then, install GW2 and shut up. In my humble opinion an Apple-computer is one of the best computers in the world, just not for gaming. Of course most people would like to drive a Lamborghini, but not when you want to win an F1 race.

I dont doubt that there are mac users who would pay gw2 if given more of an opportunity, but its all about return on investment.

If it took a team of five a year to produce a mac client that could cost as much as half a million dollars. The game can be played for free, so that $500,000 might not bring in sufficient revenue to cover cost. Even if it did, spending the same resources elsewhere might bring in more.

I do not see why creating fictive numbers help in any way, I do agree that if it is doable, it should be made, but saying something like the statement above or that it should somehow end up costing 500 000$ to apply a compiler to let mac computers read the code.
then there still should be 60 million mac users in 2012 + x between the year of 2012 and 2016 and of-course the 20 million in 2016

which gives a huge opportunity to market penetrate, you are basically opening up yourself to a whole new market which almost got no competitors.
Based on the entrance to a new market alone, it gives a huge opportunities, as I said, not only in 1 region as being EU or USA but also China.

What I do not get is, A-Net have been through all this trouble to market penetrate the Asian market, by almost creating a whole new game (Colins words), and you think that having the opportunity to actually take the mac market around the globe……..is risky?

I mean, based on what I have learned from my teachers over the years, they should already be doing it, or already planned when to start

(Again, to anyone thinking that they have to “focus” on more important stuff https://youtu.be/5PjlrvmZNmc?t=878
the example of people thinking A-Net is focussing on raid while it was just 5-6 extremely fast developers)

DreamyAbaddon.3265:

OSX has hardware limitations and thus not viable option as a gaming platform because PCs evolves every year with newer and more powerful hardware that gets released every year.

I rather ArenaNet put their resources in adding new content instead of making OSX or Linux support. Content is what keeps players and brings new players in. Sure adding another platform could help business sales but right now content is what we need. The rest can wait. Windows has always been dominant in gaming for a reason, and that reason is Windows doesn’t have hardware limitations. It just works with all the latest hardware that come out each year.

OSX doesn’t have any hardware limitations… It runs on the exact same hardware that any Windows PC runs on. Just like with Windows there are low end macs and high end macs. And in fact most OSX computers have better specs that what a lot of mainstream consumers have with their PCs… The only limitations are software, and primarily DirectX vs OpenGL.

FlamingFoxx.1305:

DreamyAbaddon.3265:

OSX has hardware limitations and thus not viable option as a gaming platform because PCs evolves every year with newer and more powerful hardware that gets released every year.

I rather ArenaNet put their resources in adding new content instead of making OSX or Linux support. Content is what keeps players and brings new players in. Sure adding another platform could help business sales but right now content is what we need. The rest can wait. Windows has always been dominant in gaming for a reason, and that reason is Windows doesn’t have hardware limitations. It just works with all the latest hardware that come out each year.

OSX doesn’t have any hardware limitations… It runs on the exact same hardware that any Windows PC runs on. Just like with Windows there are low end macs and high end macs. And in fact most OSX computers have better specs that what a lot of mainstream consumers have with their PCs… The only limitations are software, and primarily DirectX vs OpenGL.

OSX has hardware limitations. If it did not have any hardware limitations then any hardware would be compatible with OSX but that’s not the case. Go build a Hackintosh and you’ll know how limited OSX can truly be in regarding the hardware it supports. If you go to an Apple store they don’t sell you a Mac with a dedicated latest gaming Graphics card… or even CPUs… Seriously, DirextX is not the only reason why more game devs stick to Windows platform, the openess to hardware is a big part of PC gaming and innovation. OSX is currently more popular as a general PC than Linux is however, Linux has a higher chance of success for gaming because it’s like Windows in most cases in regarding to being open to hardware choices which matters in PC gaming.

MadRabbit.3179:

I feel I can safely most of the people e who takes PC gaming as a serious hobby are still not buying Mac products as their gaming rig …

I think it is safe to say that most people who play games are not serious gamers with a “gaming rig” in the first place. Most people have a home computer that serves several needs with gaming likely not being a priority. Yet, these same people still comprise the majority of computer users.

A typical person who plays games probably has a family, a job, and many other considerations. The gaming such a person does is probably a couple of hours on a few evenings or whatever during the week. The computer they have is most likely not optimised for gaming.

You are almost certainly right, however, that a serious game hobbiest, as you put it, has a special gaming computer. However, these people are not a majority.

Whether Anet finally decides to get serious about tapping the Mac user market is another question. I am sure they have all of the statistics about the market. And, it is obvious that they are interested (hence the so-called Mac Beta for the last couple of years). We are still yet to see, however, if they can manage to make it work. So far, it has been a poor effort, but maybe they will finally come through with a native client since the wrapper is on lifesupport. In the end, despite wanting the Mac market, they may have to let it go for lack of resources to deliver. Time, I suppose, will tell.

ananda.5946:

MadRabbit.3179:

I feel I can safely most of the people e who takes PC gaming as a serious hobby are still not buying Mac products as their gaming rig …

I think it is safe to say that most people who play games are not serious gamers with a “gaming rig” in the first place. Most people have a home computer that serves several needs with gaming likely not being a priority. Yet, these same people still comprise the majority of computer users.

A typical person who plays games probably has a family, a job, and many other considerations. The gaming such a person does is probably a couple of hours on a few evenings or whatever during the week. The computer they have is most likely not optimised for gaming.

You are almost certainly right, however, that a serious game hobbiest, as you put it, has a special gaming computer. However, these people are not a majority.

Whether Anet finally decides to get serious about tapping the Mac user market is another question. I am sure they have all of the statistics about the market. And, it is obvious that they are interested (hence the so-called Mac Beta for the last couple of years). We are still yet to see, however, if they can manage to make it work. So far, it has been a poor effort, but maybe they will finally come through with a native client since the wrapper is on lifesupport. In the end, despite wanting the Mac market, they may have to let it go for lack of resources to deliver. Time, I suppose, will tell.

I do agree with you. However, Macs are luxary computer due to the price tag unlike Windows based PC which are pretty much for everyone since a PC can go as low as $100. People who usually tend to just need a PC for everyday task and not care much about gaming generally play on Consoles because it just works. However GW2 is a PC exclusive so you can’t really play the game on console… Let’s just see what happens. Though I personally prefer they use the resources on making new content instead cause GW2 does need new content after all.

ananda.5946:

MadRabbit.3179:

I feel I can safely most of the people e who takes PC gaming as a serious hobby are still not buying Mac products as their gaming rig …

I think it is safe to say that most people who play games are not serious gamers with a “gaming rig” in the first place. Most people have a home computer that serves several needs with gaming likely not being a priority. Yet, these same people still comprise the majority of computer users.

A typical person who plays games probably has a family, a job, and many other considerations. The gaming such a person does is probably a couple of hours on a few evenings or whatever during the week. The computer they have is most likely not optimised for gaming.

You are almost certainly right, however, that a serious game hobbiest, as you put it, has a special gaming computer. However, these people are not a majority.

Whether Anet finally decides to get serious about tapping the Mac user market is another question. I am sure they have all of the statistics about the market. And, it is obvious that they are interested (hence the so-called Mac Beta for the last couple of years). We are still yet to see, however, if they can manage to make it work. So far, it has been a poor effort, but maybe they will finally come through with a native client since the wrapper is on lifesupport. In the end, despite wanting the Mac market, they may have to let it go for lack of resources to deliver. Time, I suppose, will tell.

Fine. Then let’s stay that’s true. Let’s ignore this entirely.

The majority of Macs being produced still use integrated Intel graphics cards, which just can’t handle 3D games.

The gesture based controls of the laptops, their highest selling product and what makes laptop such an amazing tool, also doesn’t work well with traditional games.

I have GW2 installed on the MacBook Pro that I am writing this forum post from. The game runs like kitten on the lowest graphic settings.

I play turn based games and card games off my MacBook Pro, because they work really well with the gesture based touchpad.

Apple isn’t serious about gaming rigs and it’s not a great investment for a gaming company to spend resources making a client to target a line of products that is sub par for running their games, even if a lot of casual users own Macs.

Macs as gaming machines are getting there, but it’s still a long way away from being ideal.

If you all arguing about this scroll up in this thread you will see a quote where Anet is working on a Mac client that uses OpenGL. Although they have made no promises. That is smart statement to make because we all know how people get upset if something is “promised” and doesn’t work out.

MadRabbit.3179:

ananda.5946:

MadRabbit.3179:

I feel I can safely most of the people e who takes PC gaming as a serious hobby are still not buying Mac products as their gaming rig …

I think it is safe to say that most people who play games are not serious gamers with a “gaming rig” in the first place. Most people have a home computer that serves several needs with gaming likely not being a priority. Yet, these same people still comprise the majority of computer users.

A typical person who plays games probably has a family, a job, and many other considerations. The gaming such a person does is probably a couple of hours on a few evenings or whatever during the week. The computer they have is most likely not optimised for gaming.

You are almost certainly right, however, that a serious game hobbiest, as you put it, has a special gaming computer. However, these people are not a majority.

Whether Anet finally decides to get serious about tapping the Mac user market is another question. I am sure they have all of the statistics about the market. And, it is obvious that they are interested (hence the so-called Mac Beta for the last couple of years). We are still yet to see, however, if they can manage to make it work. So far, it has been a poor effort, but maybe they will finally come through with a native client since the wrapper is on lifesupport. In the end, despite wanting the Mac market, they may have to let it go for lack of resources to deliver. Time, I suppose, will tell.

Fine. Then let’s stay that’s true. Let’s ignore this entirely.

The majority of Macs being produced still use integrated Intel graphics cards, which just can’t handle 3D games.

The gesture based controls of the laptops, their highest selling product and what makes laptop such an amazing tool, also doesn’t work well with traditional games.

I have GW2 installed on the MacBook Pro that I am writing this forum post from. The game runs like kitten on the lowest graphic settings.

I play turn based games and card games off my MacBook Pro, because they work really well with the gesture based touchpad.

Apple isn’t serious about gaming rigs and it’s not a great investment for a gaming company to spend resources making a client to target a line of products that is sub par for running their games, even if a lot of casual users own Macs.

Macs as gaming machines are getting there, but it’s still a long way away from being ideal.

But, none of that has anything to do with the fact that many people do have Macs and that there is a market there that Anet obviously wants to penetrate. I also have a Mac and have used them to play games on casually for the last ten years. I know they aren’t top notch for games because iMacs, for example, have mobile graphic cards and so are a sort of desktop hybrid, but they are quite fine (especially for things like MMOs which tend to have lower system requirements, WoW being an excellent example with its native OS X client).

But, the question isn’t whether Macs are an optimal gaming setup, but rather, if they are a market worth penetrating due to the number of potential customers. So far, Anet’s efforts in penetrating the market have been half measures. Soon, we’ll see if they decide to go all the way in or to give up, I think.

If Apple stopped selling woefully underpowered, in terms of graphics, laptops as desktops then maybe Mac gaming could go somewhere. But gaming was never a big thing for Apple. It was considered beneath them. PCs were tools to make your life better, to open up your own creativity, not whiling away your time shooting space marines or pummeling orcs.

If you are going to make an argument, compare PC/Mac numbers between Sims 3 which is a cider port to Sims 4 which is native. But we’ll never see those numbers from EA. Like we will never see the numbers of PC vs Mac in WoW.

ananda.5946:

But, none of that has anything to do with the fact that many people do have Macs and that there is a market there that Anet obviously wants to penetrate. I also have a Mac and have used them to play games on casually for the last ten years. I know they aren’t top notch for games because iMacs, for example, have mobile graphic cards and so are a sort of desktop hybrid, but they are quite fine (especially for things like MMOs which tend to have lower system requirements, WoW being an excellent example with its native OS X client).

But, the question isn’t whether Macs are an optimal gaming setup, but rather, if they are a market worth penetrating due to the number of potential customers. So far, Anet’s efforts in penetrating the market have been half measures. Soon, we’ll see if they decide to go all the way in or to give up, I think.

It has everything to do with that and that question.

If you make an attempt to penetrate that market and you come to the realization that the bulk of that market is casual users who own Macbooks that can’t handle the game optimally to begin with, doing anything more than half measures isn’t necessarily worth it.

That’s what I am trying to get across. It’s why it’s a not very lucrative market and only select games still even bother to try and target it.

I wish it was different, but it probably won’t ever be. The rigs Mac sells that can handle games are, I think, their lowest selling product. That’s because their philosophy is to build closed systems with a high price point that remove the tech from technology and you’ll never get a user like me to buy one. I can spend half the cash to build my own gaming rig with twice the power and make minimal investments to keep it relevant for the next 5 years.

PC gaming is and always has been a niche market and the bulk of the user base is people like me. There has only been a few games to this date that have been very successful as PC only games that attracted a lot of casual users (with WoW and SIMs being among them).

For awhile, there was a lot of question if the PC gaming market was going to disappear completely, but the existence of Steam and a whole lot of bad decisions by console makers have gone a long way in keeping it alive and well.

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