[whynotminot]

They’ve always been good enough for gaming. The problem has just been whether or not publishers would bother releasing the games. It’s unfortunate that Apple can’t seem to really build enough momentum here to become a gaming destination.

[jsheard]

Apple's aggressive deprecation policies haven't done them any favors when it comes to games, they expect software to be updated to their latest ISAs and APIs in perpetuity but games are rarely supported forever. In many cases the developers don't even exist anymore. A lot of native Mac game ports got wiped out by 32bit being EOL'ed, and it'll probably happen again when they inevitably phase out Rosetta 2 and OpenGL support.

[crazygringo]

It has always baffled me why Apple doesn't take gaming seriously. It's another revenue stream, it would sell more Macs. It's profit.

Is it just some weird cultural thing? Or is there some kind of genuine technical reason for it, like it would involve some kind of tradeoffs around security or limiting architecture changes or something?

Especially with the M-series chips, it feels like they had the opportunity to make a major gaming push and bring publishers on board... but just nothing, at least with AAA games. They're content with cartoony content in Apple Arcade solely on mobile.

[have_faith]

I always assumed it was the nature of the gaming workload on the hardware for why they don't ever promote it. AAA games pegging the CPU/GPU at near max for long periods of time goes against what they optimise their machines for. I just think they don't want to promote that sort of stress on the system. On top Apple taking themselves very seriously and seeing gaming as below them.

[Cthulhu_]

Apple has one of the, if not the biggest gaming platforms in existence (the iphone and ipad), but everyone seems to have a blind spot for that and disregards it. Sure, the Mac isn't a big gaming platform for them because their systems are mostly used professionally (assumption), but there too, the Mac represents only 1/10th of the sales they get from the iPhone, and that's only on the hardware.

Mac gaming is a nice-to-have; it's possible, there's tools, there's Steam for Mac there's toolkits to port PC games to Mac, there's a games category in the Mac app store, but it isn't a major point in their marketing / development.

But don't claim that Apple doesn't take gaming seriously, gaming for them it's a market worth tens of billions, they're embroiled in a huge lawsuit with Epic about it, etc. Finally, AAA games get ported to mobile as well and once again earn hundreds of millions in revenue (e.g. CoD mobile).

[sunshowers]

The iPhone gaming market is abusive and predatory, essentially a mass exploit on human psychology. Certainly not something to be proud of.

[goosedragons]

I feel like for myself at least, mobile gaming is more akin to casino gaming than video gaming. Sure, iOS has loads of gaming revenue but the games just ain't fun and are centred way too heavily on getting microtransactions out of people.

[whynotminot]

If you look at things like Game Porting Toolkit, Apple actually is investing resources here.

It just feels like they came along so late to really trying that it’s going to be a minute for things to actually happen.

I would love to buy the new Mac Mini and sit it under my TV as a mini console. But it just feels like we’re not quite there yet for that purpose, even though the horse power is there.

[philistine]

Apple owns the second largest gaming platform by users and games, and first by profit: iPhone.

In terms of gaming that's only on PC and consoles, I didn't understand Apple's blazé attitude until I discovered this eye-opening fact: there are around 300 million people who are PC and console gamers, and that number is NOT growing. It's stagnant.

Turns out Apple is uninterested by a stagnant market, and dedicates all its gaming effort where growth is: mobile.

[nottorp]

> Is it just some weird cultural thing?

I think so. I think no one in apple management has ever played computer games for fun so they simply do not understand what customers would want.

[ceejayoz]

> It has always baffled me why Apple doesn't take gaming seriously.

They aren't really the ones that have to.

[crazygringo]

But they are. They need to subsidize porting AAA games to solve the chicken-and-egg problem.

Gaming platforms don't just arise organically. They require partnership between platform and publishers, organized by the platform and with financial investment by the platform.

[talldayo]

> They need to subsidize porting AAA games to solve the chicken-and-egg problem.

glances at the Steam Machine

And how long do they have to fail at that before trying a new approach?

[fastball]

Apple does take gaming seriously. They've built out comprehensive Graphics APIs and things like the GPTK to make migrating games to Apple's ecosystem actually not too bad for developers. The problem is that a lot of game devs just target Windows because every "serious" gamer has a windows PC. It's a chicken-and-egg problem that results from Apple always having a serious minority share of the desktop market. So historically Apple has focused on the segments of the market that they can more easily break into.

[ffsm8]

They do take gaming seriously, that's likely the bulk of their AppStore revenue after all.

They just don't care about desktop gaming, which is somewhat understandable. While the m-series chips have a GPU, it's about as performant for games as a dedicated GPU from 10-14 years ago (It only needs a fraction of the electricity though, but very few desktop gamers care about that).

The games you can play have to run at silly low resolution (fullHD at most) and rarely even reach 60fps.

[matwood]

> They do take gaming seriously

They do take gambling seriously.

[yalogin]

I think they will get there in time. They like to focus on things and not spread themselves thin. They always wanted to get the gaming market share but AI is taking all their time now.

[rswail]

Given that a Mac mini with an M4 is basically the same size and shape as an Apple TV, they could make a new Apple TV that was a gaming console as well.

Why is the Apple TV only focused on passive entertainment?

[ceejayoz]

Apple TV is a gaming console.

https://www.apple.com/apple-arcade/

[macintux]

I'm not sure how many chances they'll get to persuade developers that this time they really mean it. It sounds like Apple Arcade is a flop.

[samatman]

Is this one of those cases where "flop" means "this product would have a billion dollar market cap if it was a company, but since it's Apple, it's a flop".

It is isn't it.

https://forums.appleinsider.com/discussion/234969/apple-arca...

[goosedragons]

No they haven't. For years the best you could get was "meh" to terrible GPUs at high price points. Like $2000+ was where getting a discrete GPU began. The M series stuff finally allows the entry level to have decent GPUs but they have less storage out of the box than a $300 Xbox Series S. Apple's priorities just don't align well with gamers. They prioritize resolution over refresh rate and response time, make mice unusable for basically any FPS made in the past 20 years and way overcharge for storage and RAM.