Mac users to Play The World!

[Brad Oliver]

Originally posted by DiamondzAndGunz Ok, so, after all is said and done, any idea of what exactly was meant by "soon?" Perhaps a slightly more specific timeframe?

It's pretty close to done now. There are a handful of bugs to kill, then it needs to get approved. Your guess is as good as mine as to how long that will take.

 

[Minmaster]

cool brad, does this mean the vanilla civ will be at 1.29 when ptw is released?

 

[ejday]

Originally posted by Brad Oliver
There are a handful of bugs to kill, then it needs to get approved. Your guess is as good as mine as to how long that will take.

A handful. Well, with those big beetles from the jungle, that could be one bug. Three or four bugs if you go with the average urban combat cockroach. 20-30 bugs if you're talking about the average woodpile earwigs...

Sorry, just wasting time until the next update.

 

[Beamup]

Originally posted by Brad Oliver
then it needs to get approved. Your guess is as good as mine as to how long that will take.

I hear about this "get approved" step frequently, but I've never understood what it means. I know it's what happens after the code is written, debugged, and tested, but what exactly is involved? Who exactly is approving it, what is it they need to approve, and why? I naively would've thought that once the beta test confirms that it's working as intended without bugs, that would be the end of it, but it doesn't sound like it.

Just curious (and interested in how things work, whether they're my field or not).

 

[Brad Oliver]

Originally posted by Beamup
Who exactly is approving it, what is it they need to approve, and why?

It varies from game to game. Obviously the first line is the Mac publisher, but they typically have been tracking the game all throughout beta, so that's no big deal. Usually it also means that it goes back to the original PC developer and possibly the original PC publisher. They both dig around in their basement for a Mac, install the software and satisfy themselves that it works. In some cases, there are other parties involved - EA games have to have every last thing inspected by EA legal, NASCAR has to get approved by literally every driver represented in the game. Wolfenstein has to get the thumbs up from Activision, id, Grey Matter and Nerve - unfortunately for it, one of those 4 companies is very, very, very slow to approve. In some cases, the PC publisher has to approve the copy and artwork that goes in the Mac press release and website.

But to bring this back to the editor, I'm not entirely sure who does what with it after we're done. I suspect in this case, MacSoft will make sure that the final copy doesn't self-destruct and probably just post it.

Brad

 

[Beamup]

Thanks for explaining that - I always wondered what was going on and why it sometimes took a day and sometimes months (a la RTCW, as you mention)!

 

[jicépé]

Great :santa: :santa:

 

[Babble-on]

I am so happy that I am going to cry and hug my monitor!

I can't wait to play Spain, or to beat Spain. Queen Isabella seems so smug that I want to piss her off and see her angry mug as I demolish her empire. heheheh. And I am of Spanish decent too!

A hearty thanks to all those involved with the Mac-PTW lobby!

 

[MinutiaeMan]

I recently had a very interesting thought about the multiplayer aspects of "Play The World" for the Mac.

Shouldn't it be possible to integrate Apple's Rendezvous technology into the game to ensure stable Mac-to-Mac play connections? It's quite simple and obvious once you think about it!

Of course, this won't help with the Mac-to-Windoze connections (if this is even possible?). It's still an interesting idea...

 

[Brad Oliver]

Originally posted by MinutiaeMan Shouldn't it be possible to integrate Apple's Rendezvous technology into the game to ensure stable Mac-to-Mac play connections? It's quite simple and obvious once you think about it!

Rendezvous is a discovery protocol - it allows an equipped Mac to automatically detect other rendezvous stuff on your network. This would be useful for detecting other users on your LAN you want to play, but doesn't have too much of an impact beyond that. For games that use stuff like MSN Gaming Zone and GameSpy on the PC, we substitute GameRanger on the Mac. It's a pretty good way to organize net games outside of your LAN. i.e. the internet. If Mac PTW comes to pass, I'll take a look at integrating Rendezvous, but I don't expect that it'll improve the netplay experience for most users. Actually, I'm working on a Galactic Battlegrounds patch now, so I may use it as a guinea pig for Rendezvous to see how well it works there.

 

[ejday]

Verrrrry Interesting...

Originally posted by Brad Oliver
If Mac PTW comes to pass...

IF I were a betting man, I'd take this as the signal that -- despite announcements and reassurances -- contract negotiations for PTW are still unresolved. Considering the recent and disappointing news about the Neverwinter Nights toolset port (or lack thereof), this isn't surprising.

Yet more clues from Brad Oliver
Actually, I'm working on a Galactic Battlegrounds patch now...

Again, if one was to read into this, first conclusions would be that Brad has finished the editor and handed it off to darker forces for eventual release. That's a big "if", of course, and I wouldn't expect Brad to comment.

???
For something completely different:
I'm posting this off of Apple's new "Safari" browser, and I must say: this little guy is pretty snappy. All the smilie animations stay true to their intent... so far, I am impressed.

Go download it quick, before it gets out of beta and Apple does something heinous... like charge for it.

EDIT: Oops. Found a bug. While it recognizes bullet points [that's "option-8"] in the text field, it loses it in the translation. Those question marks were originally bullet points as a seperator.

 

[Beamup]

As far as reading into things goes, one could note Brad's defense of the idea of concurrent editor release/PTW announcement and read into it that actually being the plan. Though this is still reading into things.

Also, I would point out that Mac PTW has not yet been officially announced, and I would expect that nobody involved in that (including Brad) would be allowed to make public comments confirming it before the official announcement. So Brad's comment above is not necessarily inconsistent with negotiations being complete and an announcement will be made at Macworld later this week.

 

[Brad Oliver]

Originally posted by ejday

IF I were a betting man, I'd take this as the signal that -- despite announcements and reassurances -- contract negotiations for PTW are still unresolved.

Until you see an announcement from MacSoft, it is safe to assume that the Mac port is not a sure thing. I've said this before, but perhaps not as clearly as I should have.

To put this in perspective, we've (Westlake) done code analysis and bids on several games that never saw the light of day on the Mac. Some of these break my heart, others I'm grateful got dumped or fell to another porting house (because of code complexity or stigma). Ignoring the NDA aspect of this stuff, it's dangerous for us to talk about these things until they're a Sure Thing.

Again, if one was to read into this, first conclusions would be that Brad has finished the editor and handed it off to darker forces for eventual release.

I haven't received any additional feedback that indicates I need to address anything, but then again, a number of key people are at MacWorld this week, so I'm not expecting to hear much either way until after MacWorld.

I should mention that I have to be very careful in what I say concerning releases, features etc. as I'm not in a position to make official announcements (that's MacSoft). If I hint that A will come to pass and everyone takes that as gospel when in fact B happens, no one is happy.

Brad

 

[ejday]

"Say, you're an engineer at Area 51, right?"
"Right."
"You guys work on anything over there, recently?"
"Nope."
"Didn't that new stealth fighter just come out of there?"
"Yup."
"Doesn't that mean you guys were working on it?"
"Uh... nope."

Originally posted by Brad Oliver
Until you see an announcement from MacSoft, it is safe to assume that the Mac port is not a sure thing. I've said this before, but perhaps not as clearly as I should have.

Oh, you're perfectly clear, Brad. Worry not, your NDAs are uncompromised (and we realize you're walking a fine line as our "undisclosed source"). Legal department are encouraged to holster their pens, we're taking our enthusiasm from a different source: the front of this thread:

Originally posted by gonzo_for_civ
Q: I know PtW is fundamentally a PC game (with direct X or wahtever), but is there a possibility it might come out for the Mac. Out of 4 People including me of my friends that want PtW, two of us use Macs and are not going to switch.

A: <+Jeff_Morris_FIRAXIS>I gave a source drop to the mac guys last week.

A: <+Jeff_Morris_FIRAXIS>Go Infogrames, they green-lit it.

Don't take it personally, Brad, you're still our Prince of Porting. This is like journalism: believe your source, but check the source and have more than one source.

However, considering your constant and carefully measured pessimism, we have to wonder a few things:
1.) Does Westlake have exclusive rights to accept this porting job from MacSoft and/or deny that a port can be done by anybody else if they decide to pass on it?
2.) Is Jeff Morris in a position to make such pronouncements.
3.) Was Jeff Morris mistaken or premature? (If so, I'm sure he hates it when that happens)
4.) If Infogrames says "go" (and this is assuming a top-down parent company-subsidiary hierarchy), can MacSoft say "no"?

 

[DiamondzAndGunz]

Originally posted by ejday
For something completely different:
I'm posting this off of Apple's new "Safari" browser, and I must say: this little guy is pretty snappy. All the smilie animations stay true to their intent... so far, I am impressed.

Go download it quick, before it gets out of beta and Apple does something heinous... like charge for it.

EDIT: Oops. Found a bug. While it recognizes bullet points [that's "option-8"] in the text field, it loses it in the translation. Those question marks were originally bullet points as a seperator.

Downloaded it, and it seems to work great. Things are, in fact, a bit faster compared to Chimera. Some things also seem to look a bit better. Just one problem that I found, nothing major, but it still bugs me a lil: The little mac "title bar" for the forum Mac OS X theme doesn't extend all the way accross the top of the frames. Looks just fine in Chimera, but when I checked it up in IE, it's the same as with Safari. Hmm, is it just me, or is it supposed to be like this?


Ahh, well, back to the topic. Since this thread was indeed started to announce that there WILL most likely be a Mac port of PTW, I hope we won't be disappointed...

And another thing. I'm not sure whether this has been asked before or not, but will it be possible to play against PC users with PTW? Assuming, of course, all the multiplayer bugs are worked out and it starts working correctly D). I'd really love to play a couple of my friends, since they recently got PTW on their PC's, and are nowhere NEAR as good as me.....

I think that's all I have to say... for now....

 

[Brad Oliver]

Originally posted by ejday


However, considering your constant and carefully measured pessimism, we have to wonder a few things:
1.) Does Westlake have exclusive rights to accept this porting job from MacSoft and/or deny that a port can be done by anybody else if they decide to pass on it?

We've placed the first bid on the project, but if MacSoft rejects that, they can certainly look for a bid from someone else. While we've had cases where the publisher has passed on our bids, I don't believe it's happened on a project where we've been familiar with the code, as typically those bids are fairly low considering a lot of the heavy lifting has already been done.

Take a look at the Neverwinter Nights port. MacSoft had contracted with Omni to do the toolset, and it looked like that was going to happen. Then it turns out that the bid Omni did on the toolset was short by *6* months, which (according to what I read on the web) blew MacSoft's budget. Unfortunately, MacSoft had announced that they were looking into doing the NWN toolset and people took this to mean that it was a Sure Thing. Could the sales hit from this affect MacSoft and their budget for other projects? I sure can't say.

/2.) Is Jeff Morris in a position to make such pronouncements.
3.) Was Jeff Morris mistaken or premature? (If so, I'm sure he hates it when that happens)

In a word, "sorta". Firaxis has had a fairly laid-back approach to their Mac ports. They let us do our thing and give us technical help, but they otherwise defer on most of the other Mac issues to MacSoft and ourselves. They tend to keep fairly informed on what happens with the Mac port, and they are quite open to receiving bug fixes that we make in the Mac code. In that respect, they seem fairly in touch with what we're doing on the Mac side, and that puts them ahead of most other PC developers that I've had to deal with.

As for #3, even if Infogrames says the Mac port can go ahead, that's no guarantee that it will. Jeff's info on this is probably as good as mine, which is not that good. I don't think he (or Firaxis in general) can influence the decision, as typically the rights for Infogrames titles are held by Infogrames. I could be wrong though.

4.) If Infogrames says "go" (and this is assuming a top-down parent company-subsidiary hierarchy), can MacSoft say "no"?

I have no idea. I'm sure that finances play a role in the decision at all the levels, so if it turned out that the cost of a Mac port wouldn't turn anywhere near a profit, they'd have to reconsider and accept a "no" from MacSoft.

Keep in min that this is mainly speculation on my part. I don't work for MacSoft and have no real insights as to their corporate structure, finances or anything else. I'm going strictly on my own common sense and what I've learned in dealing with these projects over the past few years.

 

[ejday]

Originally posted by Brad Oliver
...this is mainly speculation on my part.

But very informed speculation, so we appreciate your contributions Brad. Thank you.

Originally posted by DiamondzAndGunz
The little mac "title bar" for the forum Mac OS X theme doesn't extend all the way accross the top of the frames. Looks just fine in Chimera, but when I checked it up in IE, it's the same as with Safari. Hmm, is it just me, or is it supposed to be like this?

I didn't notice that problem but maybe I'm looking at the wrong thing. Can you take a screen grab, size it down and point it out? Or maybe set-up an OT thread in the main forum...

If it is an issue, send Apple a little report with that "bug" button in the top right corner (I've sent two already... though I do love this browser).

 

[stuey]

How much longer are we gonna wait, can I have a guestimate...
...and in the meantime are there any sites that regularly post information that involve Civ 3's baptism into the light

 

[dojoboy]

Its going to be a while. If I had to guess, I'd say 6 months to a year. MacSoft was just sold last week, so I imagine negotiations are on the back burner.

 

[stuey]

Then i'm better off forgetting about PTW for a while i playing aoc until then...
that makes me sad