The Mac Gamer

I had a chance to ask Glenda Adams, Director of Development for Aspyr Media, some questions recently about the future of Mac gaming.

TMG: How’s Apsyr doing these days?

Glenda: Things are going well for us, we’re shipping Call of Duty 4 Mac now, which is a huge release for us. It took the combined efforts of i5works and some of our own internal Mac developers to get it all finished up. The complexity of the graphics systems in recent games and the difference between DirectX and OpenGL implementations of graphics pipelines are really making porting games to Mac a tricky business.

TMG: Any new games planned for the future that you can let us know about?

Glenda: We don’t have anything new announced yet, but hope to have something to talk about soon.

TMG: What are your thoughts on Snow Leopard? The press haven’t been that kind, I think because there aren’t going to be any snazzy new features. To me, low level optimisation and Grand Central could really change the way things work, big time.

Glenda: I think it’s a really good idea - for Apple to take a deep breath and just work on the internals of the OS, without adding more and more functionality. It will help stability and speed for everything from day to day apps to games, and keep OS X running smoothly.

TMG: We’ve had Intel in our Macs for a few years now. Has how the switch changed game development for the Mac?

Glenda: It’s lessened some of the work we have to do, but unfortunately the graphics side of games has just exploded.  The amount of shader code and complex rendering is probably 2-3 times as much work as it was for games a couple years ago, so that has more than offset the efficiency gains we had from the
Intel switch. 

TMG: Why hasn’t there been a flood of games for the Mac that some predicted?

Glenda: I think there are several reasons - Mac game sales are still fairly constant, and haven’t expanded with Apple’s market share increases over the last two years.  So there isn’t loads of money to be made.  And the complexity of games has made it more difficult to port them to the Mac. Lastly, the PC market has been really beat up in 2007 and 2008, and there just aren’t as many AAA PC games out there that make sense to bring to the Mac.

TMG: The Mac has undergone some serious operating system changes in the last decade. It’s a shame that certain games have been left out of the loop, especially those from the OS9 era. Any chance that Aspyr could bring back some of the old classics like Deus Ex?

Glenda: We tried to do this with a few games in the past and what really killed them were licensing issues.  Going back to a PC publisher and trying to re-sign the rights to a 5 or 10 year old game is nearly impossible, especially if you want digital distribution rights so you can sell it online. Even when something could happen technically, the legal side of things throws the brakes on.

TMG: What are your thoughts on Cider? My experience is that it runs at about half the speed of Windows versions, Eve online up to four times slower.

Glenda: It’s an interesting piece of technology but I don’t think the best way to get a game running on the Mac. Having access to the original game’s source code and being able to recompile and change it will always give you more control over the end result.  And I think that leads to a better gaming experience.

TMG: Transgaming initially stated that many developers would have to rethink their business model due to Cider’s effectiveness. Have you had to rethink your business model?

Glenda: Not from the impact of any technology like Cider.  We’ve had to shift our business to more platforms mostly because there are fewer and fewer PC games that can be licensed to bring to the Mac.

TMG: What happened with ET:QW? It was originally destined for a Christmas release but was postponed till March.

Glenda: The last three or four games we’ve done for the Mac have all had 3-4 month delays that were tied directly to issues with graphics performance and stability. From Neverwinter Nights 2 to Call of Duty 4, and ET:QW in between.  The sheer complexity of modern graphics engines has somewhat overwhelmed the ability of OS X’s OpenGL framework and drivers to keep up, from a performance and stability standpoint. We’ve had to spend many extra months on each project working very directly with Apple, AMD/ATI and nVidia to get the widest support for hardware we can while avoiding some of the known problems in the graphics drivers.

TMG: What does the future hold for GameAgent?

We’ve just launched the new GameAgent.com, with our first digitally distributed Mac game, Call of Duty 4. We hope to bring a lot more content to GameAgent.com in the coming months, and plan to keep tweaking the distribution system to make sure it works well for our users.

TMG: How do you see gaming progressing in the next few years?

Glenda: The shift to console is undeniable. There are just so many benefits to working on a stable and well defined hardware platform.  But I think things like the iPhone will become almost mini-consoles in their own right. Where that leaves the traditional PC & Mac game business, I’m not sure.

TMG: Does platform agnostic programming worry you? Would it put a dent in your business?

Glenda: I love it. If every developer wrote platform independent code it would make our lives a lot easier. Most of the time the reason a game doesn’t come to the Mac isn’t technical, it’s business.  So having more games that are easier to release on multiple platforms would help us.

TMG: What’s the most frustrating thing about developing for the Mac?

Glenda: Lately it’s been frustrating dealing with things beyond our control. Contracts, legal negotiations, etc. It’s no fun having to shelve a project because the license details just can’t be worked out.

TMG: What are the limitations of the platform at the moment and what could be improved?

Glenda: Distribution is the #1 issue for games on the Mac. The Apple retail store is about the only place to sell games, and games aren’t a focus there. We’re hoping digital distribution will open things up to more customers, although even with our GameAgent.com running now I’d still love to see Apple
do an “App Store” for the Mac.

TMG: What hardware would you like to see come out of Apple?

Just personally I’d like to see a tablet notebook. The multitouch system on the iPhone is so slick, it’d be very cool to have a device to surf the web, play games, and send email from with a nice 8-9 inch screen.

TMG: Thoughts on the iPhone? Will you be developing anything for it?

Glenda: We’re actively working on several games for the iPhone, and it is a very exciting platform. We can’t wait to get our first apps out and in the store. 

TMG: One last question; what’s the deal with Texas? Some of the best companies, bands and artists have come out of Texas! It seems to be the centre of the universe. Should we move there?

Glenda: It’s just a great place to be, especially in Austin.  If you can deal with the heat in the summer, definitely move here!

With thanks to Glenda Adams and Karri Scott.