Steam naar de Mac

Nadat Valve gisteren heeft aangekondigd dat Portal 2 naast Windows ook naar de Mac komt, werd er ook bekend gemaakt dat het hele steam platform op de mac zal verschijnen. Het zal beginnen met games van Valve als Left 4 Dead 2, de Half-Life saga, Team Fortress 2, en het populaire Counter-Strike. Valve heeft echter ook een engine gebouwd voor developers die het gemakkelijker maakt om Windows games over te zetten naar de Mac, zonder dat er sprake van kwaliteitsverlies is.

“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. 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.”

Ook is het nu zo dat als je een steam game al gekocht hebt voor je Windows computer, je automatisch recht hebt op de Mac versie van de game.

“Our Steam partners, who are delivering over a thousand games to 25 million Steam clients, are very excited about adding support for the Mac. 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.”