I've been thinking about something lately, where are the highly anticipated Mac-only games? A lot of games available are warmed over PC ports with a few being new and original but none really impressive blockbusters despite their quality (Ambrosia et al).
Since a third party doesn't seem like they're going to rise to the challenge of making the Mac-only blockbuster maybe Apple ought to. They wouldn't need to develop it, merely publish it. I'm thinking not just one games but a bunch of games, they could target the games to their consumer level systems so the games would run sweetly on 6-800MHz G3s with Radeon Mobilities and GF2MXs.
Does this make sense for Apple to do? I think it does. If they published some Mac-only games they could serve not only to be revenue generators but also technology demonstrators. If they release a new eMac or iBook and can demonstrate a new 3D game running beautifully on it it makes these systems all the more attractive. They can also show off new OpenGL extensions on the latest and greatest video card. It wouldn't stifle competition from third parties, only inspire them to release some really sweet Mac-only games.
Microsoft's game division does something very similar with their PC games. A lot of games that are published by Microsoft are just showboats for the latest version of DirectX. Apple shouldn't do it because MS is doing but instead because it provides something Macs users want in their daily Mac usage.
After web browsing, e-mail, and music games are the most common use for computers. Consumer level (focused on since they're the low end, high end stuff will obviously play stuff well) Macs are going to be used for these four things by most of their buyers I would posit. If more games became available that ran well on these consumer level systems more people would end up looking towards the Mac platform. One consideration for any college student buying a computer for school is how much gameplay can you get for the least number of dollars. Knowing that there was going to be some pretty sweet games you could only get on a Mac would make them a bit more enticing to some people. A nice collection of high quality and exclusive games would do a lot showing both the power of OSX and its validity as a do-it-all platform.
Enough rambling for this morning.
Top
