BioWare: Mac version of Star Wars: The Old Republic is something it's 'looking at next'

BioWare co-founders Ray Muzyka and Greg Zeschuk are quite dedicated to their fans. At least that's a recurring theme for them when talking about their company's moves in new directions, to which both repeatedly referred during a recent interview in midtown Manhattan. "We know there's a big Mac audience of BioWare fans ... we know that's an important and large audience. And we want to serve that audience," Muzyka told me when asked about a potential Mac version of the his company's latest major release, Star Wars: The Old Republic.

"I'd say 'not yet,'" Zeschuk assured me when I told him that, as a BioWare fan, I'm unable to play The Old Republic on my less than two-year-old MacBook. Though Muzyka was quick to remind me that I can technically play the game on a Windows partition, he also admitted that it wasn't an ideal situation. "We've done a lot of Mac ports before of our games. We haven't announced any details yet for The Old Republic, but we know that's an important and large audience."

Neither would offer a strict timetable on the Mac version, but Zeschuk did note, "That's definitely one of the things we're looking at next. We want to get this launch under our belt and everything stabilized and happy, and then we'll look at other platforms, and that's obviously one of the first ones."

Reader Comments (75)

@emperorzeroxx

I dunno ... I wonder if it's a coincidence that by far the most successful MMO runs both PC and Mac. It's the first MMO I played and the only one I played for years because it was the only thing I could play on my Mac. Just as for many years the only computer games I played were the Baldur's Gate games and The Sims. I finally relented and bought a gaming PC laptop, but I want to chuck it out the window regularly with all of the updating and crashes and popups and other complications. I just don't like the Windows OS very much. It's a matter of personal taste. Wish I could play games on the OS I prefer, but such is life. Hopefully with cloud technology eventually everyone can play on any computer seamlessly.

@(Unverified) umm... check that first article you just posted again: "In the U.S. specifically, Apple saw 25.6 percent growth in sales, compared to PC growth of 4 percent." Perhaps, that was what he was referring to?

I have a Mac and I play a lot of video games and I have no intention of buying a PC. This news makes me happy.

@mguniverse If you have an intel Mac (all mac in the past 4 or 5 years are) you can just use Bootcamp and have a dual boot of OsX/Windows. I know there were people running SWTOR in the beta this way.

Yikes, lots of ignorant comments.. I thought pc users were a little less naive these days.

On topic, this is the only thing keeping me from diving into swtor. I'll only add a windows partition to my machines for GW2. Sorry, Bioware but here's to the future!

@(Unverified)

I thought Mac users were a little less arrogant ...

The anti mac comments in this thread are so hilariously ignorant.

Why be annoyed at Bioware opening their game up to more players? I say hooray for any computer/console/whatever they decide to port their game too. The more the merrier. And its a back burner project anyways so its not like it will be happening tomorrow.

@madcartoonist they arn't annoyed at bio ware they are annoyed at mac users not getting that Macs arn't gaming machines. By the way that was a design element from get go. Macs had exclusive games that all failed because Mac owners weren't gamers. There is the fact that macs are always full of old tech.

@ndessell

I guess I still don't fully get it. I spend zero time thinking about what other people use vs. what I use. Be it what car I drive, what console I play on, what computer I use, what mouth wash I prefer, etc.

It doesn't really matter if macs are built for gamers or not anyways. If there is an audience, even a small one, and Bioware wants to open the doors to them I would think everyone would be happy about it instead of mocking. It is not like everyone that runs a Windows operating system is running some gaming power house.

@madcartoonist

Agree completely. It always weirds me out that whenever there's an article about Apple something, people go out of their way to insult not just the product but anyone who would use the product. I have never in my life cared if people wanted to use a PC or Linux system. Yay, good for them, let's all use what we like best. The more people a product is available to, the more successful it will be. *shrug*

@madcartoonist

Anyone who thinks Mac users are the smug ones should spend a day reading the comments on a Mac related Joystiq post.

"Insert comment that makes fun or degrades Mac users here"

Hey guyz I just wanted to join the bandwagon. I mean all the other ten year olds who have probably never used a Mac are making fun of them too!

Very happy to see this. I have a PC gaming rig at home, but I travel each week and I only have a macbook pro. I have been playing swtor on the macbook pro with bootcamp, but with the game taking so much hard drive space, my windows partition hard drive is pretty much full.

Didn't WoW launch with Mac compatibility? I think Blizz does that with all their games, though I imagine it gives them more good press than it does good sales.
The people saying that Macs aren't computers or can't run games are being hyperbolic but they aren't completely off base. There is a reason even major video game releases don't have Mac versions.
They are able to run Angry Birds though. That's something.

@Furdinand : yes, situation was a bit different back then, though. At that time, Intel-based Macs did not yet exist and thus there was no easy solution for Mac owners to play PC games. Hence, Mac support in WoW enabled them to tap a whole new market.

Nowadays, the business case is a lot weaker, since some/many/all Mac owners that are also keen gamers will just dual-boot into Windows on their Mac for their gaming fix.

Most Macs don't have a GPU capable of running SWTOR.

Of the current range the iMacs will run it. The 15" and upwards powerbooks will as well.

From "last season" I think it is only any iMacs with the Radeon 4850 and even they will struggle.

I don't have all the specs for every Mac revision over the last few years but really anything over 18months will be unable to run SWTOR and also won't be upgradeable.

@(Unverified)

I'm sorry I don't have the exact specs, but I was surprised that my sister was able to run SWTOR on her imac with boot camp and Windows XP. Her computer is a couple of years old, probably more (it was the first round of imacs that had bootcamp). I highly doubt she has maxed graphics or anything but it seems to be playable. I haven't seen what it actually looks like as I live in a separate house but I'll have to go see it out of curiosity.

@(Unverified)
Yes, there are macs older than 18 months that can run SWTOR just fine.

I use a MacBook Pro with Boot Camp to run Windows 7, SWTOR and Age of Conan. I can run AoC just fine on my Mac, so for all of the naysayers, I say nay to you.

That said, WoW works great on the Mac, as does Fallen Earth. It can be done, and there is a market there. Remember, its about the next 5-10 years and long term customers for SWTOR. Where will PCs be in 10 years?

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BioWare: Mac version of Star Wars: The Old Republic is something it's 'looking at next'

Reader Comments (75)

Posted: Jan 2nd 2012 3:36PM (Unverified) said

Posted: Jan 3rd 2012 8:13PM (Unverified) said

Posted: Jan 2nd 2012 1:30PM mguniverse said

Posted: Jan 2nd 2012 1:35PM Stellar25 said

Posted: Jan 2nd 2012 1:34PM (Unverified) said

Posted: Jan 3rd 2012 7:47AM (Unverified) said

Posted: Jan 2nd 2012 1:55PM yomachaser said

Posted: Jan 2nd 2012 1:55PM madcartoonist said

Posted: Jan 2nd 2012 2:21PM ndessell said

Posted: Jan 2nd 2012 2:44PM madcartoonist said

Posted: Jan 2nd 2012 3:40PM (Unverified) said

Posted: Jan 3rd 2012 6:58PM dogmaticatheist said

Posted: Jan 2nd 2012 2:33PM (Unverified) said

Posted: Jan 2nd 2012 2:37PM (Unverified) said

Posted: Jan 2nd 2012 2:43PM Furdinand said

Posted: Jan 2nd 2012 8:36PM (Unverified) said

Posted: Jan 2nd 2012 2:43PM (Unverified) said

Posted: Jan 2nd 2012 2:50PM madcartoonist said

Posted: Jan 2nd 2012 4:17PM archer75 said

Posted: Jan 2nd 2012 3:06PM Nibbana said

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