Steam IS coming to OS X

It's official!

Valve Software today officially announced that it is bringing its Steam game distribution platform, as well as its own library of games, to Mac OS X next month.

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."

Valve also confirmed reports that it will offer its forthcoming Portal 2 game as a simultaneous release for Mac and 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."

Also included in the announcement is the addition of a new "Steam Play" feature for Steam, allowing purchasers of either the Mac or PC versions of Valve's games to play on the other system free of charge. Third-party game developers distributing through Steam are also widely expected to take advantage of the feature.

Valve leaked a series of teaser images hinting at its move to the Mac platform last week.
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Excellent news :)

source

 
Valve also confirmed all titles will be native versions rather than emulation and Mac will be treated "as a tier-1 platform so all of our future games will release simultaneously on Windows, Mac, and the Xbox 360." Furthermore: "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.
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Wow, good on Valve for that one. God knows what Apple did to sweet talk them into that but who cares, great news in my book, especially if it suggests apple will put some decent hardware into the newer boxes.
 
JonB said:
That's pretty awesome actually, they seem to have every box on the wishlist checked. Setting a good example.
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I know!!! :D

Everything that you wanted valve to possibly to they did and more! Big pat on the back for them. I want to know what happened behind the curtains though. There is more to this story than meets the eye. I think Apple have had some proper talks about steam coming to Mac now. Is it just a coincidence that the next snow leopard update improves on the OpenGL certification? Maybe the Valve games will be SL 10.6.3+ only?
 
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Could be, it'll be interesting to see how good the source engine is on OSX, it could potentially be very quick indeed if they really do rewrite it from scratch for the platform...that's really the last wish for it in my view...
 
I wonder if the rise of FPS gaming on Mac will force Apple to provide a toggle for their pronounced mouse acceleration.

A lot of gamers are fussy about having *zero* acceleration, never mind mild vs. pronounced.
 
Very pleased they've done this. Now get third parties onboard and we're sorted.

I already own the entire Valve collection, so all I need is a suitably powerful Mac :D
 
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wush said:
I wonder if the rise of FPS gaming on Mac will force Apple to provide a toggle for their pronounced mouse acceleration.

A lot of gamers are fussy about having *zero* acceleration, never mind mild vs. pronounced.
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That just made me think. FPS gaming... using a Magic/Mighty/Apple Mouse... Oh dear :p
 
I'd be very excited if my MacBook was anywhere near powerful enough to run Source games with all the bells and whistles. Still, can't hurt to install Steam purely for the original Half-Life and Steam Friends. :)
 
This is excellent news!

At the moment I had a shabby PC I built from crap just to play games, all of which are from Steam. Albeit MW2 as the exception as that wont be supported.

I play a lot of L4D (not got L4D2), Day of Defeat: Source and a few others.

Having said all that codeweavers Crossover Games has been around for a while, I bought a license sometime ago. Installs and plays a lot of games well, some not so well but as means its good software.
 
I have a free copy of HL2 to give away pal, deffo get portal too only played it a few days ago it is awesome.

The current lineup unless I'm mistaken is:

Half Life 1 (Source?)
Half Life Blue Shift (Source?)
Half Life 2
Half Life 2 - Episode 1
Half Life 2 - Episode 2
Portal 1
Portal 2 (Coming Soon)
Left 4 Dead 1
Left 4 Dead 2
Counter Strike Source
Day of Defeat Source
Team Fortress 1
Team Fortress 2

Certainly a good lineup for people who have never really played the series, and spin off games. I completed Episode 2 last week, makes me wanna start again with the original half life, they have redone it in Source too.

Exciting stuff :cool:
 
I never thought I'd be playing games on the Mac, but this is actually awesome.

Stupid question, but I own most of the Half Life's on CD for PC, can I use the serial number from that on Steam to download it or doesn't it work like that?
 
Justin said:
I never thought I'd be playing games on the Mac, but this is actually awesome.

Stupid question, but I own most of the Half Life's on CD for PC, can I use the serial number from that on Steam to download it or doesn't it work like that?
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Yup, add the serial number and all games associated with the key will show up. So if you had the limited edition version, with the expansions and Counter Strike they will be added to your account as well.
 
mr.sly said:
Yup, add the serial number and all games associated with the key will show up. So if you had the limited edition version, with the expansions and Counter Strike they will be added to your account as well.
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Once this is done you wont need to do it again, when I do a reinstall all my games are still listed and can be simply downloaded again after from Steam instead of searching for cd/dvds.
 
will footy manager be included in this ? i bought it on steam then moved to mac and havent been able to play it. if i had bought the retail one i could have played :(
 
It'd be quite fun to see Apple put real effort into tackling the "durrrr macs can't play games" trolls and turn it into a platform that devs will make more OS X versions of games for alongside windows/console versions.

They might start putting proper graphics cards in them as well if that happened :p
 
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