Steam and Source on Mac!?

[limpport]

Wasn't sure if anyone was aware:

http://store.steampowered.com/news/3569/" onclick="window.open(this.href);return false;

Valve to Deliver Steam & Source on the Mac
March 8, 2010, 11:15 am - Valve - Press Release

Leading Gaming Service Expands to Mac Platform

Valve announced today it will bring Steam, Valve's gaming service, and Source, Valve's gaming engine, to the Mac.

Steam and Valve's library of games including Left 4 Dead 2, Team Fortress 2, Counter-Strike, Portal, and the Half-Life series will be available in April.

"As we transition from entertainment as a product to entertainment as a service, customers and developers need open, high-quality Internet clients," said Gabe Newell, President of Valve. "The Mac is a great platform for entertainment services."

"Our Steam partners, who are delivering over a thousand games to 25 million Steam clients, are very excited about adding support for the Mac," said Jason Holtman, Director of Business Development at Valve. "Steamworks for the Mac supports all of the Steamworks APIs, and we have added a new feature, called Steam Play, which allows customers who purchase the product for the Mac or Windows to play on the other platform free of charge. For example, Steam Play, in combination with the Steam Cloud, allows a gamer playing on their work PC to go home and pick up playing the same game at the same point on their home Mac. We expect most developers and publishers to take advantage of Steam Play."

"We looked at a variety of methods to get our games onto the Mac and in the end decided to go with native versions rather than emulation," said John Cook, Director of Steam Development. "The inclusion of WebKit into Steam, and of OpenGL into Source gives us a lot of flexibility in how we move these technologies forward. We are treating the Mac as a tier-1 platform so all of our future games will release simultaneously on Windows, Mac, and the Xbox 360. Updates for the Mac will be available simultaneously with the Windows updates. Furthermore, Mac and Windows players will be part of the same multiplayer universe, sharing servers, lobbies, and so forth. We fully support a heterogeneous mix of servers and clients. The first Mac Steam client will be the new generation currently in beta testing on Windows."

Portal 2 will be Valve's first simultaneous release for Mac and Windows. "Checking in code produces a PC build and Mac build at the same time, automatically, so the two platforms are perfectly in lock-step," said Josh Weier, Portal 2 Project Lead. "We're always playing a native version on the Mac right alongside the PC. This makes it very easy for us and for anyone using Source to do game development for the Mac."

Support for the Mac in Source and Steamworks is available to third parties immediately. Interested developers should contact Jason Holtman at jasonh@valvesoftware.com.

And Portal 2 will come out at the same time! Bonus!

[samjc3]

im more excited for portal 2 than mac support, personally, but thats pretty awesome.

[kibble]

Since when do people game on Macs? Can't wait for Portal 2 either!

I think it's funny how they say: "in combination with the Steam Cloud, allows a gamer playing on their work PC to go home and pick up playing the same game..."

[limpport]

Since when do people game on Macs? Can't wait for Portal 2 either!

I think it's funny how they say: "in combination with the Steam Cloud, allows a gamer playing on their work PC to go home and pick up playing the same game..."

If you got the L4D2 4-pack, make sure you give one to your boss

I wonder if you'll have to buy for a specific system, or the games will be universal. What they said about "a gamer playing on their work PC [and going] home and pick up playing the same game" makes it sound like that may be the case. Hopefully it'll be that way with already purchased games.

[Black Six]

They've already said that you only have to buy a game once. So if you already bought TF2 or some other game on Steam before, when it comes out for the Mac you'll be able to download and play it right away.

[limpport]

I've been resisting the urge to buy games that are more graphic-intensive because I don't have a Window's system that could handle them (mini-itx with crappy onboard videocard). I'm glad my Orange Box will transfer over!

[gamemasterAS]

[kibble]

BAAAAAAAAAAAHAHAHAHAHAHAHA!!!!!!!
That's a good one!

[bicostp]

What is this, 2002?! "ololol macs have no right click" is as outdated as "ololol windows ME is garbage" and "ololol linux will take over the desktop market".

[Frizo]

That's what you Mac users get
@bicostp:
Most Mac mice don't have right click buttons actually (ex. Magic Mouse or whatever they call it...) unless you are not using an official Apple mouse, right click for you!

[bicostp]

@Frizo: Macs don't ship with that godawful 1 button hockey puck thing anymore.

Two-button click
Magic Mouse functions as a two-button mouse when you enable Secondary Click in System Preferences. Left-handed users can reassign left and right click, as well.

http://www.apple.com/magicmouse/" onclick="window.open(this.href);return false;

The regular wired mouse does it too.

http://store.apple.com/us/product/MB112LL/B" onclick="window.open(this.href);return false;

[Sparkfist]

Good to hear that the overall market for software on Macs is growing. I know that most people don't use Macs for gaming and the idea of a Mac Gamer is oxymoron, but still Mac need more diverse software market and this is a major step.

As for Mac mice, Apple brand is still one button, that's evident by the one button on laptops. But yes you have a have a sweet 6-button mouse, plug that baby in! I know from experience of seeing a buy in one of my programming classes who had to plug a USB mouse into his Powerbook when he rebooted in Vista.

Now lets see if Valve will offer games for Linux. lol

-Sparkfist

[palmertech]

I want them to port the Source engine to ARM.

[nightwheel]

I want them to port the Source engine to ARM.

I actually kinda want that for real Plamer.

I also want to see the original Half Life be open sourced.

[samjc3]

I want them to port the Source engine to ARM.

I actually kinda want that for real Plamer.

I also want to see the original Half Life be open sourced.

i want that for real as well. heck, ARM is going through the roof with power/performance. pretty soon it will be as powerful as the big x86 chips, but in a mobile package.
and i was under the impression that the original half life is open source?