Any hope for GENUINE answers?
+1 to this. It’s the one question that is always avoided and it is the one in most need of an answer.
This question continually comes up and it baffles me. What, exactly, to people think “beta” software means?
It will be “beta” software until it’s not. Really; it’s that simple.
Bugs will be patched, performance evaluated, customer experience reviewed … If the software reaches a point where it can be promoted to production-level software then it will be. If the beta testing determines that the Mac OS X project isn’t worth any more time and money then the software will die or left as-is.
People seem to think that “beta” is some sort of commitment. It’s an experiment. It might succeed. It might fail.
Considering the constant trouble that some people have to even get the software running (or stay running), if I were Arena Net, I would abandon the project. Just tell Mac users to use Bootcamp and get a better play experience than they are ever going to get from OS X – “beta” software or not. I would not like that decision, since the beta runs fine for me and I’m satisfied with it. But I were the product manager at Arena Net, that’s what I would do.
No one here is confused about what beta means; it’s been two years, we want an answer if ArenaNet is going to work on creating a native client or not. It has nothing to do with commitment and everything to do with just wanting an honest answer about what the future holds for those of us using Macs to play GW2. :P
The GW2 store page claims that GW2 runs “well” on a particular list of macs.
I happen to own 2 of the macs on that list (Mid-2011 iMac, and a mid-2012 Macbook Pro), and I can assure you it runs far from “well” on either, especially when compared with performance under Windows on THE SAME MACHINE! 15 FPS on lowest settings (OSX) or 55+ FPS on nearly maxed settings (Windows) on an NVIDIA GT650M 4GB.
ANet really need to either kitten or get off the kitten about this. I believe the shoddy performance of the Mac client is more likely to drive people away than to attract new people.
No one here is confused about what beta means; it’s been two years, we want an answer if ArenaNet is going to work on creating a native client or not. It has nothing to do with commitment and everything to do with just wanting an honest answer about what the future holds for those of us using Macs to play GW2. :P
Easy. I can answer that for you: None of your business. No money-making company is going to shoot it’s mouth off about what products it plans to create. That would be stupid to reveal that to competitors.
You also DON’T know what “beta software” means if you think there’s some sort of timeline attached to it or suggestion of some magical “native” software in the future.
No one here is confused about what beta means; it’s been two years, we want an answer if ArenaNet is going to work on creating a native client or not. It has nothing to do with commitment and everything to do with just wanting an honest answer about what the future holds for those of us using Macs to play GW2. :P
Easy. I can answer that for you: None of your business. No money-making company is going to shoot it’s mouth off about what products it plans to create. That would be stupid to reveal that to competitors.
You also DON’T know what “beta software” means if you think there’s some sort of timeline attached to it or suggestion of some magical “native” software in the future.
it is in their store though, available for purchase, this is pretty much a product created. if you paid money for a product that is advertised as running well on certain machines and if it turns out this is not the case, it sure is ones business.
perpetual betas are a thing but since the game itself is feature complete, the only thing left is performance optimization but this is limited due to the wrapper not being able to use more than 3gb ram (2gb on 32bit, 3gb on wrap?) and gw2 can be quite taxing
I logged on to post an error I’ve been receiving since the last upate, and noticed the reason is most likely because of the Mac client being wrapped instead of native. As a developer of sorts (not windows or mac), I completely understand ANet trying to save time/money by not hiring Mac developers, but Todd….seriously…you have no idea what you are talking about.
First, beta does not mean until its production status. It is a programming phase after Alpha…you probably haven’t ever played a game in Alpha because its 99% of the time not open to the public. Beta is the phase that is somewhat stable and being PROGRAMMED currently. The Mac client is NOT being programmed at all…it is being written for Windows, converted to something that will “hopefully” run on Mac and failing. A more suiting name for the Mac client would be something like unsupported or As-Is no warranty.
Secondly, saying that ArenaNet should tell everyone on a Mac to just “use Bootcamp and get a better play experience” is completely stupid. Bootcamp is free from Apple, but the Windows OS is not, so is ANet going to buy every Mac user a license for Windows? You also have to repartition your hard drive to allow Windows + the game files and some people might not have that option. Also, its a little technical and bothersome to install and use Bootcamp, so a lot of people probably couldn’t get through the process.
In closing, the Mac client is not a beta client. Bootcamp is not the solution. GW2 on Mac is a pity, what a great game when it runs smoothly.