Mac users over the world have long been accustomed to the idea that gaming is something for which this massively popular line of devices was never truly intended. While the Mac has plenty of features working in its favour, it has long since fallen well behind the rest of the pack in terms of what it is capable of doing for gamers.
Unfortunately for Apple, this represents yet another hindrance in their ongoing struggle against the changing tides of the gaming industry. From its strained relationship with the new line-up of mobile streaming services, to its ongoing, high profile legal troubles with Epic Games, it’s safe to say that the last few years have been more than a little detrimental to Apple’s reputation among gamers.
Still, that might be about the change.
The Current Lay of the Land
There are, of course, a long list of factors behind Mac’s shortfall in the world of PC gaming. First of all, Apple’s emphasis has always fallen on the software that holds a direct bearing on the user’s experience; creating this software, and pouring a great deal of resources into optimising it, means that there is less scope for reserving the raw power necessary for quality, AAA gaming titles.
As a result, Macs are generally considered too ‘weak’, for lack of a better term, to handle the demands of today’s high power games. As a result, developers rarely choose to optimise their titles for Mac.
The process is, of course, something of a vicious cycle. It is no longer an insider secret that Macs offer a poor substitute for, say, a Microsoft PC when it comes to gaming, which means that gamers – or gamers looking to play AAA titles on PC – are growing increasingly disinterested in investing their gaming fund into a Mac.
That’s not to say that Macs are falling to the wayside. Rather, that the market for ‘Mac gamers’ is too small for developers to justify the time and expensive required to optimise their titles for MacOS. People still play games on Macs. For instance, some of the most popular CA casinos are accessible via Mac browsers, and, for those titles that were never intended for Macs, users can choose to install Windows as a way of bypassing those restrictions.
Still, recent developments from Valve (known most commonly as the powerhouse behind the hugely influential games distribution platform Steam) may offer a new lifeline to Mac users everywhere.
What Changes Do Mac Users Need to Know About?
Earlier this month, Valve’s Steam Link app was made available for the first time ever on MacOS, offering a new option to gamers looking to stream titles. Now, the service is able to allow gamers to stream power-hungry titles via their local network, from a computer better able to cope with the demands of games that would otherwise pass the Mac by altogether.
While it may not be the ideal solution Mac users have been waiting for all these years – after all, you will still need to be able to play the game on another computer connected to your local network – it does open up the parameters somewhat in terms of Apple devices and games streaming.
What’s more, due to Valve’s ongoing partnership with GeForce Now, the potential for further advances in cloud streaming are on the horizon, meaning that, in spite of Apple’s rocky relationship with streaming services on iOS, MacOS – and its loyal userbase – may well be heading toward a new chapter in its gaming story.
While it may not ever be the case that the Macs of this world are ever considered a powerhouse of the gaming community – nor, even, that big name developers ever prioritise game development for mac or Valve’s cloud streaming services – those of us still braving it out on our Apple computers can look forward to some long awaited changes in the coming months.
