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Weezer · Aug 12, 2004, 08:04 PM

So I just got a Geforce 4 Ti for my 933 G4 and wanted to try out Halo, and it is being super buggy. I'm running 1.05, and I can't zoom with sniper rifles (it gets all messed up), and it also has this little window in the upper left corner, that sometimes will freak out, and it will do a picture in a picture in a picture kinda thing of my game window. Should I revert to a previous version? Am I alone? ahhh

sideus · Aug 12, 2004, 09:48 PM

I don't think you are alone. I've read in other places that zooming in with Halo is glitchy. Do you have the latest OS X update?

Weezer · Aug 12, 2004, 10:09 PM

Originally posted by sideus:
I don't think you are alone. I've read in other places that zooming in with Halo is glitchy. Do you have the latest OS X update?

I'm running 10.3.5 and Halo 1.05. The problems only occur when I turn on FSAA. The card can handle it FPS wise, but the game itself gets buggy as hell..

Truepop · Aug 12, 2004, 10:48 PM

same here with Ti card and Halo 1.05. but for me it was shaders. when I turned them off it worked fine. but it only happened in 1.05 and not the other builds.

Weezer · Aug 12, 2004, 10:53 PM

Originally posted by Truepop:
same here with Ti card and Halo 1.05. but for me it was shaders. when I turned them off it worked fine. but it only happened in 1.05 and not the other builds.

are you running 1.05 still or did you revert?

MilkmanDan · Aug 12, 2004, 11:31 PM

What did you expect from Microsoft?

Weezer · Aug 12, 2004, 11:59 PM

Originally posted by Truepop:
same here with Ti card and Halo 1.05. but for me it was shaders. when I turned them off it worked fine. but it only happened in 1.05 and not the other builds.

Hey you were right, it was the shaders. Is this a panther thing or a halo thing?

blizzard · Aug 13, 2004, 08:18 AM

I know the Halo developer for the PC recommends against using FSAA, and I can't imagine it would be any different for the Mac either. Try that as well and see if matters improve any.

a2daj · Aug 13, 2004, 02:50 PM

The PC version of Halo doesn't do FSAA. The Mac version does. Bugs in the NVIDIA drivers affect FSAA in Halo. Everything works fine and dandy with my Radeon 9800 Pro

Weezer · Aug 13, 2004, 03:24 PM

I read on a site that FSAA doesn't do anything in halo, but the game clearly looks better to me, far less jaggies...However when I turn off the Nvidia shaders and FSAA everything works alright. I guess I can live without those options...

The iMac Man · Aug 13, 2004, 03:54 PM

And don't hold your breath on MacSoft fixing the problems either, it's pretty obvious that all they care about updating is stuff to keep people from pirating the game. I mean, who has ever seen an update that ADDED the requirement of having the CD in to play?!? That's plain stupid, and shows that they couldn't care less about us people that actually paid to buy this piece of crap game....

Maybe if they cared enough to release a demo, people wouldn't steal their game to find out how well/crappy it runs on their Mac....

I will never buy games from MacSoft again.

-iMac

a2daj · Aug 13, 2004, 08:11 PM

Originally posted by Weezer:
I read on a site that FSAA doesn't do anything in halo, but the game clearly looks better to me, far less jaggies...However when I turn off the Nvidia shaders and FSAA everything works alright. I guess I can live without those options...

PC Halo doesn't have FSAA. Mac Halo does. That's always been the case. Whatever site you read it from was either confused or a PC site.

a2daj · Aug 13, 2004, 08:20 PM

Originally posted by The iMac Man:
And don't hold your breath on MacSoft fixing the problems either, it's pretty obvious that all they care about updating is stuff to keep people from pirating the game. I mean, who has ever seen an update that ADDED the requirement of having the CD in to play?!? That's plain stupid, and shows that they couldn't care less about us people that actually paid to buy this piece of crap game....

Maybe if they cared enough to release a demo, people wouldn't steal their game to find out how well/crappy it runs on their Mac....

I will never buy games from MacSoft again.

-iMac

If it's a driver issue, then the fix has to come from Apple. And for me, the CD issue is a complete nonissue. Even if the original product didn't require the CD so many other games do that I don't even care.

blizzard · Aug 13, 2004, 09:24 PM

Probably just a fusion of facts I crossed in my mind from when I went shopping for a video card for my PC a few months ago...sorry.

Truepop · 02:00 AM

Originally posted by Weezer:
are you running 1.05 still or did you revert?

well after the problem I took the punch. I just decided against the whole shaders and FSAA and just stuck with the CD install sans updates. I can play it without a CD and my PC friends are playing the Customizable Edition so I can't play with them anyways and my Mac friends have also decided to stick with the CD install. We leave the UT2k4 DVD in our drives (MacSoft again

)

I was really pissed at MacSoft for making an update that requires a CD after it shipped without the need for a CD in and at their lack of controller support and timely updates that would allow Mac users to play on updated Windows servers as well as poor support for my video card. Halo is a mixed blessing for me, it has been a fun game (would have loved Co-Op like Marathon for the Mac/PC version thought) but it has been the worst over-all experience in Mac gaming I have had.

Truepop · Aug 14, 2004, 01:58 AM

Originally posted by Weezer:
Hey you were right, it was the shaders. Is this a panther thing or a halo thing?

My guess is a halo thing, I haven't had Halo installed on any system but panther and was running 10.3.2 until the .5 update recently.

a2daj · Aug 14, 2004, 03:45 PM

Originally posted by Truepop:
My guess is a halo thing, I haven't had Halo installed on any system but panther and was running 10.3.2 until the .5 update recently.

It's an issue that can be fixed with a new driver. 10.3.3 fixed it then 10.3.4 broke it. 10.3.5 didn't fix it.

a2daj · Aug 14, 2004, 04:11 PM

Originally posted by Truepop:
I was really pissed at MacSoft for making an update that requires a CD after it shipped without the need for a CD in and at their lack of controller support and timely updates that would allow Mac users to play on updated Windows servers as well as poor support for my video card. Halo is a mixed blessing for me, it has been a fun game (would have loved Co-Op like Marathon for the Mac/PC version thought) but it has been the worst over-all experience in Mac gaming I have had.

As I've mentioned before the CD issue is a non-issue to me. Same with controller support. I've played a lot of the Xbox version and the Mac version and I still find the mouse superior for controlling everything in Halo. As for the timely updates, Mac Halo was released during the holiday season. They didn't receive the 1.03 code until after Mac Halo went gold. Then Christmas/New Years came along as well as Macworld SF, a holiday in and of itself to Mac users. Do you really expect a lot to get done? Even if Westlake had gotten a patch done, who would be around the office for QA? A lot of people take large chunks of time off in Dec/Jan, so I wouldn't be surprised if the MacSoft offices weren't very populated.

So, the patch was eventually released about 5 weeks after the game initially launched. There were a lot of network changes that were made, particularly in client side predition related code. That's stuff you want to make sure works as expected. But along with all the changes the PC folks got NVIDIA users got the partially implemented NV Shaders. Many people complained that the GF3 and GF4 didn't get 'shiny effects' so they added at least limited support for the NV Shaders. It was a noticeable improvement in visual quality over Vertex Shaders Only.

The 1.04 patch came out a lot quicker as did a fix for a keyboard issue. In fact, I think the Mac 1.04 came out within a two or three of the PC version. The keyboard fix came out a day later. I don't really see any timeliness issues there.

The 1.05 patch didn't even have to come out but it did and it included more NV Shader graphical improvements (shiny Master Chief for all those thought he needed a new wax job) as well as the option to turn model reflections off altogether.

Weezer · Aug 15, 2004, 09:19 PM

So after some testing, it gets the zoom bug when the NV shaders are on, but everything else works fine. If you use FSAA with the NV shaders, things go to hell. It looks so much better with the NV shaders on, it's a damn shame...

Angus_D · Aug 16, 2004, 04:49 AM

Originally posted by MilkmanDan:
What did you expect from Microsoft?

Microsoft did not make Halo.

Randman · Aug 16, 2004, 06:00 AM

Originally posted by Angus_D:
Microsoft did not make Halo.

By proxy, they did.

The iMac Man · Aug 16, 2004, 11:32 AM

Originally posted by Angus_D:
Microsoft did not make Halo.

Well, they can at least take credit for ruining it....

-iMac

Krypton · Aug 16, 2004, 12:01 PM

Originally posted by The iMac Man:
Well, they can at least take credit for ruining it....

-iMac

Hehe

Weezer · Aug 16, 2004, 12:17 PM

Response from MacSoft:

The problem lies in OS X and Nvidia drivers not working together. Apple
is aware of the issue and had informed us that they were addressing it.
We had hoped that the latest OS X update 10.3.5 would have fixed this
but it appears that it has not. We are still waiting for Apple to
address the problem.

--
James Wroblewski
MacSoft Games Support

The iMac Man · Aug 16, 2004, 06:12 PM

That's a cop out....

If I made a product that obviously doesn't work with current video drivers, regardless of who's fault it is, I would be working on changing my product so it works with the drivers currently available.

For some reason, I just don't really see Apple caring too much about releasing an OS update just to fix a problem in the way Halo uses Nvidia's graphic drivers. MacSoft is the one making money off the product, THEY are the ones who should fix it.

This just goes to show once again, MacSoft doesn't care about it's customers.

Also, something I was just thinking about, I have seen Aspyr employees very active in the Mac gaming community, out in forums, asking and answering questions. Yet, as far as I recall, I have seen no one from MacSoft making any attempt to answer questions, or ask anyone what they think of current/upcoming products, etc.

They are also the company that started the ridiculous rumour that Mac users pirate games so much that the Mac gaming industry is in trouble.... and they based this on Halo... a game carrying the Microsoft emblem, with no demo, and very poor performance on anything but the highest end Macs.... uhhhh, no wonder people pirated that game!

-iMac

a2daj · Aug 16, 2004, 08:45 PM

If Westlake could have worked around the driver issues, they probably would have by now. 10.3.3 fixed the issues, 10.3.4 broke things all over again. If Apple broke it, they should fix it.

Mac gaming is always in a precarious position. And piracy IS a big issue. Each pirated copy affects the Mac industry more than individual pirated copy in the PC world.

The iMac Man · Aug 16, 2004, 10:20 PM

Originally posted by a2daj:
Mac gaming is always in a precarious position. And piracy IS a big issue. Each pirated copy affects the Mac industry more than individual pirated copy in the PC world.

I agree completely! I'm just saying that Halo is a bad example to use...

a2daj · Aug 17, 2004, 01:50 AM

I disagree. Halo is just as good an example as any. It's also a good example to show the types of excuses people try and come up with to rationalize piracy and that there's no good reason to pirate a game, ever.

Randman · Aug 17, 2004, 04:06 AM

As much as I'd like to support gaming on the Mac as much as possible, I left Halo to the XBox. And Halo2 when it ships.