I started playing elder scrolls with the console version of Oblivion. Recently, with skyrim I have really grown tired of the shackles involved with playing the console version ie. lower textures, no mods, slower rendering..etc...however I've owned Macs for the past 5 years. Because of this I can't play the "fun" version of the game. I just prefer macs to anything else so me switching to windows is out of the question. I have tried dual booting windows on my macs but on average windows runs 30% less efficient on a Mac than a non OSX machine. This caused oblivion to run like crap compared to the universal games I played....so the main question is..why has Bethesda shown no love toward macs..especially with the increase of sales in the past decade...
P.S. Mac trolls please go away. I'm looking for a constructive response

When you choose a mac you choose design and hype over everything else. Get a real computer and enjoy the game.

Seconded

I built windows machines before I switched to macs. So i know the differences firstt hand. Like I said Mac trolls don't need to reply...that comment comes from ignorance..again constructive comments please

I don't know why Bethesda doesn't develop games for Mac. I'm not Bethesda.

Don't underestimate Mac machines. I'm in the IT business myself, fixing PCs and software problems. During the years I've been working at this company, I've never had to fix a Mac.
At home I only have Mac as well for their reliability, plus the specs for my Mac Pro are totally decent: 8-Core 2x 2.4GHz Quad-Core Intel Xeon “Westmere” CPU's, 8GB RAM, ATI Radeon HD 5770 1GB GDDR5.
I'm disappointed that the game market is so weak for Mac.

+1 for Mac support. I mostly buy games for OSX (on SteamPowered and Apple Appstore).

EDIT: only recently installed Windows on Bootcamp to play Skyrim, wasting some precious 10G for that OS on my 120GB SSD.
I take OSX/Linux [un]support must be due to Elder Scroll games being DirectX based obviously.

p.s.: what is exactly a "real computer" and why am i even asking? Used to care about Giant Forum Troll's opinions, took an arrow in the knee.

Simple answer and without resorting to the unneccesary comments we've already seen *rollseyes*

It's essentially a fourth platform they'd need to do development and testing (What little of it heh)

Mac pcs/Windows pcs, there isn't much difference. But there are the obstacles of hardware (Macs tend not to be as horsepower loaded as some gaming pcs) and the OS (Extra dev time needed to code for it)


Fact is though, a solid up-to-date Mac CAN run the latest games in most cases. And since Skyrim isn't too far removed requirements wise from Oblivion or Fallout 3, then it should run. As far as I know though, the only way to do it is to use Bootcamp and install (a legit) Windows version onto it and launch through that.

Mac should concentrate more in the smart phone business because in the gaming arena they are the laughing livestock of the world.

They already have problems getting the game to get along with three different systems, adding a fourth which is an even tinier portion of the market is not a good idea.

They need a subforum for Why threads. Why?

Agreed

Mac and all apple products are way over prices for what they are. If I bought any such product I would feel as though I was getting ripped off. My PC cost about ￡1000 but to get the same spec in a mac it would have cost 50% more at least

"Mac"'s don't exist anymore (PowerPC architecture), they're Intel architecture hardware, like any other laptop, so it comes down only to the operative system now.

Yes, unfortunately the graphic card options svck, i have a MBP 2010 2,40 Mhz which comes with a Nvidia 330m 256mb, a medium end laptop offer, but anyway i've spent countless hours of fun playing games on OSX, like TF2, Starcraft 2, Doom3, Quake 4, Eve Online, Warcraft (3/Wow) and many more.

The gaming ecosystem could and should be vastly improved but i hardly doubt it's the "laughing livestock of the world".

If Bethesda won't add mac support i'm pretty sure apple will accuse (right word? google'd it..) them, like they do with everyone...there sure is some silly patent out there.

As much as I personally do not care for Macs (though I dont hate them or anything), OP just look at it from a Market Share perspective. It costs money, man-hours, resources - to develop for each additional platform. Hell sometimes you see games come out for PC / Xbox only for this reason since the PS3 itself is tough to "code" for. Im not saying MAcs are impossible to work on as far as gettinjg games to work, I have no idea, but it adds more drain on their resources - I guess after doing a cost/benefit anolysis they decided not to get Skyrim for your unix based OS. It could change though you never know. For all we know they have a pair of guys whose sole job after release is to get Skyrim working for Macs once they're done with releasing major patches and fixing major bugs for the other systems.

Also your "sales" for the Mac branded PCs might have gone up, but they've went from what, 2% of the market to now 5.5% of the market? Thats enormous growth and market penetration admittedly when broken down to a percentage, but perhaps thats not large enough to develop games for yet when considering how much extra it will cost - especially considering how much of that 5% doesn't play games, or already uses Bootcamp or simply lack the hardware to run the game on Low.

Thanks

I play Skyrim on my early 2009 Macbook Pro 17". It is not a new fast mac and it has a mobile version of the nvidia 9600 GT. It is on a fairly low res but with textures, shadows etc up pretty high and it runs very well and looks great. I use the 4GB Skyrim mod to take advantage of the RAM. I use Bootcamp running Windows 7.

Bethesda have a PC background, so that's what they develop for. It seems like market pressure has driven the devt of PS3 & xbox versions. Beth will probably never release mac versions, in fact someone asked Pete Hines on Twitter and his answer was something like "Yes you can play Skyrim on a Mac. Get Bootcamp."

Given that it's that easy, I'm inclined to agree. To me, rebooting into Windows isn't a drama. My Win 7 runs very well too btw. Are you sure you weren't trying to run vista or something? Because that has to be one of the slowest, most rubbish OSes I have ever used (and I used to support Windows ME & Win98 machines along with the comparatively good NT4 & win2000, heh).

to the 'design and hype' guy: Macs are Intel PCs. And they run a rock solid OS built on UNIX...

Who says Macs aren't for gaming??? Surely you all remember Q-Bert and Oregon Trail from grade school!

J/K I love my iMac

I believe it's mostly because of DirectX, which is tied to the Windows platform. Major titles are usually available on OSX through Cider port's (Wine) which emulates DirectX (on *NIX platforms, like Linux) but it has performance costs.

Also, i'm not exactly the right person to discuss it, but although for example ID Software usually supports OpenGL, i've read a rant from John Carmack complaining about the OpenGL API (?) lagging behind the DirectX one (in terms of features perhaps? don't remember the article fully)..

Honestly I can't remember it was 3 years ago that I tried it....with what you said I just may give it another go with skyrim
Thanks!

Here in NYC, snotty hipsters and MACS go together...Get a PC...Like Mr. IT or whatever, I too have been working with pc's since radio shack used to make them. Never had any issues with my PC's...MAC=clown...and I aint talking make up...

HAHAHAHAHAHAHA LOL!!!!!!

You MAC clowns can't have it both ways...

But you try to...

Because people who buy iStuff are hipsters and don't deserve good things.

...

Yes, I said it, and I'm not taking it back!

Oregon Trail was the best game ever. Period. They ruined it when they made it in color. I love me some green Oregon Trail.
[img]http://latimesblogs.latimes.com/photos/uncategorized/2009/02/09/oregontrail.jpg[/img]
I cry for Nichole.

To the Op, it's probably a simple matter of cost. They probably just don't feel like there's enough of a consumer base to spend the money on supporting them as of right now.

No worries! Use the 4gb patch if you have the RAM. Newest nvidia/ATI drivers are a must too.

you know that clowns are in fact respected members of the society.