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ShortcutToMoncton · Sep 19, 2002, 03:55 PM

Okay, I fired up UT X preview 3 to check out the update. Everything loaded, the screen switched...to black. No opening movie came up. Nothing. Tried to press escape, quit, force-quit...no response. I hard restarted.

What gives? Anyone else seen this problem?

greg

Guy Incognito · Sep 19, 2002, 05:59 PM

I've given up on UT X...while it was half usable in previous OS X releases, it hasn't seen a much needed update in a long time. I realize that Glenda is doing this on her own free time but c'mon...was this a tease or an actual project? I've got 'free-time' projects too...but I finish them. You can't tell someone you're gonna help them with some math homework and then all of a sudden tell 'em "screw you, this is my free-time and I don't feel like helping you anymore"...well, you can, but I'll be damned if that person ever looks at you the same way again.

When are we going to get a polished native version of UT X? Soon? Never? UT 2003 is this Winter. While it won't make UT X obsolete to some, it will make it obsolete to me.

And my biggest peeve is that Westlake knows f**k all about OS X. Of all the port houses and game companies, Westlake has been to worst at trying to adapt to the new OS X way. This includes playing games in a window, the bundle concept (this includes the drag and drop install concept), app hiding (Blizzard games are doing this).

I won't go into the 'Steve kills OS 9' speech because I can understand that Westlake still makes lots of money off OS 9 users but this is a vicious circle thing...if you keep making OS 9 games, people won't upgrade to OS X.

I'm glad MacPlay (Omni) is pushing towards MacOS X-only releases. Supporting both OS X and OS 9 (two completely different OSs connected by a a very thin string) always spells trouble. You don't get the best of both worlds...you get the **** of both worlds.

Flame away...I deserve it.

RobbR · 08:49 PM

Originally posted by ShortcutToMoncton:
Okay, I fired up UT X preview 3 to check out the update. Everything loaded, the screen switched...to black. No opening movie came up. Nothing. Tried to press escape, quit, force-quit...no response. I hard restarted.

What gives? Anyone else seen this problem?

greg

Guess I'm lucky....UTX preview3 works fine on my X.2.1 system. Just got done with a game of Rocket Arena. Maybe it helps not having too many mods. All I have is RA and Eavy's Assault Bonus Pack.

If there was anyway I could transfer my UT folder over to you, I would let you try it. Do you have AIM or iChat (they file share right). Let me know, I'll check back on this thread.

I don't really play UT that often anymore, as the newer games fill that spot. Plus UT2K3 will be coming out. That should be lots of fun. But I really want to see UT2 for OS X. It looks incredible. Bet it will be too. The developers are really taking thier time to get it right.

...Bob R.

ShortcutToMoncton · Sep 19, 2002, 09:34 PM

...hmmmm. I have no extra mods whatsoever, it's just a clean install of UT GoTY with the X preview 3.

I'm on iChat...user name is same as here, but it won't connect at the moment....

greg

RobbR · Sep 19, 2002, 10:11 PM

Originally posted by ShortcutToMoncton:
...hmmmm. I have no extra mods whatsoever, it's just a clean install of UT GoTY with the X preview 3.

I'm on iChat...user name is same as here, but it won't connect at the moment....

greg

I have my iChat up....my name is macnutx

I'll be up for a while, if you want to give it a try when you connect.

Brad Oliver · Sep 19, 2002, 11:14 PM

Originally posted by Guy Incognito:
And my biggest peeve is that Westlake knows f**k all about OS X. Of all the port houses and game companies, Westlake has been to worst at trying to adapt to the new OS X way. This includes playing games in a window, the bundle concept (this includes the drag and drop install concept), app hiding (Blizzard games are doing this).

...

Flame away...I deserve it.

You sure do. ;-)

All of our Q3-based games are playable in a window. All of the games I've worked on, and I'm guessing most of our Westlake titles, are hideable - this includes the Q3-based games, Civ3, Galactic Battlegrounds and probably others. In most cases, you hit either Command-H or Command-P (pause).

I'm unable to hide Soldier of Fortune 2 via Command-H when running fullscreen, but I may be doing something wrong. Similarly for Giants, I'm unable to determine how to hide it at all, or make it run in a window. Again, I may be missing something.

One other Mac-like thing is Command-Q. Most (if not all) of our games support this combo as a means of quitting the game. A number of games that were not done by Westlake do not support this on the Mac.

About the drag-n-drop installs, I'm looking at what other porting houses have done and I see some examples of OSX-only apps that have installers: Giants and Soldier of Fortune 2 come to mind. You mentioned Blizzard, and their titles all use installers. Oh, the humanity! While I haven't looked at every Westlake title shipped recently, I know that Galactic Battlegrounds had a drag-n-drop installer. Obivously if the game has more than one CD, an installer is going to be necessary.

Anyway, I'd challenge you to find one game that does everything in a perfect, Mac-like way. I don't think such a thing exists yet, although I haven't played every game out there either.

Brad

amonitzer · 04:39 AM

Originally posted by Brad Oliver:

Anyway, I'd challenge you to find one game that does everything in a perfect, Mac-like way. I don't think such a thing exists yet

Well, then it's your task to write one!

The best port I've ever seen was Duke Nukem 3D (by westlake - it even added real multiple-monitor support*!), but that was a while ago.

Seriously, saying "the others suck too" doesn't make your recent ports any better. All recent Westlake games I've tried were very crashy here, and Tony Hawk Pro Skater 2 doesn't even have a 128x128 icon.

* For example: Front view = screen 1, rear view = screen 2

Brad Oliver · Sep 20, 2002, 01:33 PM

Originally posted by amonitzer:
Well, then it's your task to write one!

I'm hoping JK2 is going to be The One.

Tony Hawk Pro Skater 2 doesn't even have a 128x128 icon.

The only defense that I can offer is that Tony Hawk 2 was the first Westlake game to ship for OSX, and coincidentally, the first Mac game to ship with OSX support in the box.

Brad

Guy Incognito · Sep 20, 2002, 04:29 PM

Originally posted by Brad Oliver:

I'm hoping JK2 is going to be The One.

I'm looking forward to a bundle that makes use of Application Support for plugins, maps and saved games. It would also have to be playable in a window and hideable (pause the game at the same time). I know it's not always feasible for certain games because of the extra work involved but such a game would be following the OS X direction closely.

Brad Oliver · Sep 20, 2002, 05:49 PM

Originally posted by Guy Incognito:
I'm looking forward to a bundle that makes use of Application Support for plugins, maps and saved games. It would also have to be playable in a window and hideable (pause the game at the same time).

It has all of those features but one: it doesn't pause the game when hidden. That's a tricky one, at least as far as the multiplayer app is concerned.

Brad

ShortcutToMoncton · Sep 20, 2002, 05:52 PM

UNREAL TOURNAMENT, PEOPLE!!!!! IT STILL DOESN'T WORK!!!!!!

greg

Guy Incognito · Sep 20, 2002, 06:00 PM

Originally posted by Brad Oliver:

It has all of those features but one: it doesn't pause the game when hidden. That's a tricky one, at least as far as the multiplayer app is concerned.

Brad

Well...that one is excused.

Guy Incognito · Sep 20, 2002, 06:38 PM

Originally posted by ShortcutToMoncton:
UNREAL TOURNAMENT, PEOPLE!!!!! IT STILL DOESN'T WORK!!!!!!

greg

Dunno how to fix your problem...try reinstalling UT X.

I wonder how Epic's in-house port is going to turn out. Have they any OS X experience? UT 2003 might be a total flop on OS X.

It'll be OS X only...will they use Carbon or Cocoa/coreservices?

Brad Oliver · Sep 20, 2002, 10:43 PM

Originally posted by Guy Incognito:
I wonder how Epic's in-house port is going to turn out. Have they any OS X experience? UT 2003 might be a total flop on OS X.

It'll be OS X only...will they use Carbon or Cocoa/coreservices?

I've heard the same as everyone else. One thing I caught in their PR was that their Linux guy is also doing the Mac port.

Brad

ShortcutToMoncton · Sep 21, 2002, 01:05 PM

Well, I guess I should clarify things a little...I'm on a Quicksilver 733 MHz with a Radeon 8500 card.

Is anyone else with a similar system (especially the video card) seeing any problems?

greg

ShortcutToMoncton · Sep 21, 2002, 01:06 PM

Just as a note I forgot to add...games like Airbust and Racer (OpenGL) are working fine....

greg

SteevAK · Sep 21, 2002, 06:15 PM

Works fine for me too. I think you are experiencing an isolated incident. Have you tried ditching the prefs or reinstalling?

ShortcutToMoncton · Sep 22, 2002, 06:37 PM

Yeah, I reinstalled the UT preview 3 upgrade, then the whole game...works fine now. Ugh. What a pain. I wonder why.

greg

Adam Betts · Sep 22, 2002, 08:15 PM

Originally posted by Brad Oliver:
I've heard the same as everyone else. One thing I caught in their PR was that their Linux guy is also doing the Mac port.

Do you have any idea why they're doing the port themselves? I know you don't have deep information but I would like to hear your guess.

Is they doing this to save money, don't trust mac port company, or can't afford to leak the source code?

Brad Oliver · Sep 22, 2002, 08:43 PM

Originally posted by Adam Betts:
Do you have any idea why they're doing the port themselves? I know you don't have deep information but I would like to hear your guess.

Is they doing this to save money, don't trust mac port company, or can't afford to leak the source code?

I don't think source-code-leaking is the reason, since it's no problem for us to get code if its needed for other projects.

My hunch is that they hired a guy to do the Linux port because they wanted a Linux version really badly, and he told them he'd do the OSX version too, so they went for it.

That's all 100% pure speculation on my part.

Brad