Is Cryptic Studios alienating Mac Users?

[M.Robison]

Following Cryptic Studios development of Star Trek: Online this past year has been wonderful and exciting as the February release date draws near (For U.S. Gamers 2 Feb, Europe, 5 Feb) I have been pondering an issue.

I am primarily a Mac user, and have been for several years now. I experimented a few years back and purchased a Macbook. I fell in love with the product, and aside from a few small issues I have not been disappointed, purchasing a new Macbook this year. I have a Windows based Alienware laptop as well, but I do not use it nearly as much.

This is not meant as a fierce debate over Mac and PC, but a thought for other users here. Waiting with baited breath for the game to debut, I was let down to hear that there currently will not be a Mac supported format for ST:OL.

Although Cryptic has speculated that there could possibly be A linux and Mac version later, it is not written in stone.

Perhaps I am just kvetching here, but I feel alienated once again by yet another software developer and it is rather frustrating. (Much like the 300 dollars I spent on the Xbox 360, and here a year later and no fixed red ring of death, I regret not holding out for the PS3)

Although I am sure there are legit reasons that there are no Mac supported versions of ST:OL currently in the works, more than likely due to development issues and deadlines it is still disappointing.

 

[FreddyE]

What is the percentage of games available for mac compared to pc anyway?
At least some years ago it was like "eureka!" to even find one of the major pc games as a mac version.

 

[M.Robison]

I really am not sure of the ratio. I bought the Alienware PC to primarily play games. I use my Mac for most other things. Actually a coworker saw this post and asked me why dont I simply use one of the various Windows emulators such as Parallels. I gave him a stern look....

I for sure had more than one of those "eureka!" moments..

 

[Owain Taggart]

I also have a MacBook, but Cryptic have stated that they have no plans to release a Mac client. There are tons of posts asking about it on their forums each week.


I agree with you though. You'd have to think some company would want to take a risk. I mean, there's WoW, but other than that, there isn't much. And to think Bungie was a dedicated Mac developer at one point. It would be nice to see a big dedicated Mac developer again.

 

[137th Gebirg]

I'm a long-time Mac user myself, and I gave up waiting for good Mac ports back in the Armada 2 days. I still use my Mac for everything else but gaming and I built my own PC to satisfy my gaming needs.

With regards to STO specifically, it is now in question whether or not they will successfully deploy ports to consoles in time, if at all, which is a much larger money-maker than Mac/Linux ports.

Sorry, bro. I definitely feel your pain on this one.

 

[Vance]

The big problem is that the Mac userbase is so small that even ports of the most successful games don't make their money back. Add that to Apple's infamous hatred of game development, and you've got nearly no incentive for a games manufacturer to work on a Mac version.

Sad fact, but there it is.

 

[Tyson]

removed

 

[TheBrew]

 

[Admiral Buzzkill]

I thought Mac users were too busy sitting in coffee shops, jerking themselves off while they listen to Coldplay and Feist to care about video games.

No, but they need an outlet after playing second fiddle to John Hodgman on TV.

 

[Owain Taggart]

I thought Mac users were too busy sitting in coffee shops, jerking themselves off while they listen to Coldplay and Feist to care about video games.

No, but they need an outlet after playing second fiddle to John Hodgman on TV.

John Hodgman is a Mac user

 

[Arrqh]

It would be nice to see a big dedicated Mac developer again.

If you're looking for someone to blame, all you have to do is look at Apple. Mac's are the second (or third or fourth) fiddle when it comes to games because the market isn't there and no 3rd party company is going to take on the risk of forging ahead in that environment. It will pretty much only happen when Apple foots the bill to create some exclusive titles to help grow Macs as a gaming platform. As long as they're unwilling to do so, places like Cryptic will simply not be able to afford to produce Mac versions of things until they've already starting making money from other platforms.

 

[intrinsical]

Cryptic has Mac versions of City of Heroes/City of Villains, so I believe its just a matter of time for them to come up with a Mac version of ST:O

I've played their games long enough to know they tend to keep things close to their chest. They'll only leak news about the Mac version when they are confident its working well and their marketing department is ready with some serious PR.

 

[Klaitu]

If you want to play games on a computer, you're going to be disappointed without a PC. PC's dominate the computer market.

That being said, STO is going to be awful, so I wouldn't go out of my way for just that.

 

[Tyson]

STO is going to be a lot of fun, but only if you're not an aspergian loser who obsesses over pointless minutiae and spends hundreds of hours poopsocking their way to the top levels of MMOs that they "hate" because they're "awful."

If you're none of those things have fun blowing shit up with phasers and photon torpedoes.

 

[Kadratis]

OP, you have a valid response, but I'm sure the console owners on the same side of the coin. Unfortunately, that side is down, but I hope it will change in the near future.

 

[Alpha_Geek]

In addition to cross-platform development tool usage, it becomes a question of economy for a game developer. Will the returns over the viable lifespan of their MMORPG product for a seperate client for 10% of the market be profitable compared to the development overhead?

Not pointing at market penetration of the Mac here, just showing what questions are asked by the bean counters behind the developers.

 

[Aeolusdallas]

Following Cryptic Studios development of Star Trek: Online this past year has been wonderful and exciting as the February release date draws near (For U.S. Gamers 2 Feb, Europe, 5 Feb) I have been pondering an issue.

I am primarily a Mac user, and have been for several years now. I experimented a few years back and purchased a Macbook. I fell in love with the product, and aside from a few small issues I have not been disappointed, purchasing a new Macbook this year. I have a Windows based Alienware laptop as well, but I do not use it nearly as much.

This is not meant as a fierce debate over Mac and PC, but a thought for other users here. Waiting with baited breath for the game to debut, I was let down to hear that there currently will not be a Mac supported format for ST:OL.

Although Cryptic has speculated that there could possibly be A linux and Mac version later, it is not written in stone.

Perhaps I am just kvetching here, but I feel alienated once again by yet another software developer and it is rather frustrating. (Much like the 300 dollars I spent on the Xbox 360, and here a year later and no fixed red ring of death, I regret not holding out for the PS3)

Although I am sure there are legit reasons that there are no Mac supported versions of ST:OL currently in the works, more than likely due to development issues and deadlines it is still disappointing.

If you had wanted to play games on a computer you should have bought a PC or a Mac that can run windows. It's not the developers fault that you bought an overpriced computer with such a tiny market share.

 

[Guartho]

It's not the developers fault that you bought an overpriced computer with such a tiny market share.

Uh, they're the number 3 computer maker.

 

[Aeolusdallas]

It's not the developers fault that you bought an overpriced computer with such a tiny market share.

Uh, they're the number 3 computer maker.

lol lol
You really have no idea how large the PC market share is do you? They are not even playing in the same league. Apple is not even at 10%

 

[FordSVT]

It's not the developers fault that you bought an overpriced computer with such a tiny market share.

Uh, they're the number 3 computer maker.

There are dozens of PC manufacturers and one Mac manufacturer.

While Apple has 9.3% of the consumer OS market in North America and sells about 8% of the hardware (some new OS sales are for pre-owned machines), it's worldwide market share is only 3.4%.

As of this time last year anyway, new numbers aren't available yet.

But yeah, with a 3-5% of the worldwide share the only reason anyone is creating any software for the Mac is because of their popularity in America. It's really kind of funny when it comes down to it, because they are seen as being quite popular here, probably more popular than they really are and definitely more popular than they are in other parts of the globe. Macs are really what amount to niche, luxury products aimed at a couple of very specific types of computer user. One of these types is not "16-48 male who buys 6-20 video games a year and upgrades his computer every year or two to play the latest and greatest things".