"Game Porting Toolkit" by Apple will allow Windows games to run on Mac, similar to Proton on Linux

Apple-Game-Porting-Toolkit-800x420.jpg

Apple just had its annual Worldwide Developers Conference (WWDC) this week, and during said conference, they announced a very interesting development aimed for gaming on Mac devices, with the introduction of their new "Game Porting Toolkit", which seems to be aimed directly to game developers wishing to bring their game natively into Apple systems.

It's been well known for decades that if you wanted to do any kind of gaming in a Personal Computer, your only option would most likely be Windows, and one of its many versions depending on which game you wanted to play in it. However, in the last couple of years, this landscape for PCs has changed dramatically, as the introduction to the public of SteamOS and Proton by Valve now allows playing even the most recent AAA titles under Linux machines, thanks to the implementation of Proton. Proton's a fork of Wine, which allows running Windows applications under Linux environments, and with Valve's fork, a lot of the configuration hurdles to run DirectX (and other things) has been streamlined and made much easier to the end-user.

In a similar way, Apple's new "Game Porting Toolkit" translation layer aims to make playing on Mac OS devices a possibility, allowing the latest DirectX12 games to run on Mac OS, by utilizing "CrossOver" (also Wine-based, similar to Proton). Apple even demonstrated the toolkit by running "The Medium" using Apple's new translation layer.

image.png

"The Medium" running on a Mac OS device through the "Game Porting Toolkit" by Apple
Aiswariya Sreenivassan said:
The new Game Porting Toolkit provides an emulation environment to run your existing unmodified Windows game and you can use it to quickly understand the graphics feature usage and performance potential of your game when running on a Mac,...

It's worth noting however, that this toolkit is aimed exclusively to gaming developers themselves to work on ports of their games. No gaming company or developer can include the toolkit when shipping their game. Consequentially, Apple would also need to constantly keep up and support updates to the toolkit as more and more titles are being released. Other games have also been able to run on MacOS, like Cyberpunk 2077 and Diablo IV, through the tinkering of Reddit users with the toolkit. Those willing to take a peek at the toolkit require an Apple Developer account to do so.

:arrow: Apple's Worldwide Developers Conference (WWDC)
:arrow: Source
 

ShadowOne333

QVID PRO QVO
OP
Editorial Team
Joined
Jan 17, 2013
Messages
12,136
Trophies
2
XP
32,663
Country
Mexico
Cool idea. Shitty execution locking it behind a dev account.

It’s just a needless paywall

That's how you know it's Apple-made.
inb4 $500 to run Windows games on Mac.

Edit: I am aware it doesn't require payment to access it, but nevertheless, it's still dev-oriented and not user-oriented.
 

maddin

New Member
Newbie
Joined
Apr 28, 2023
Messages
1
Trophies
0
Age
28
XP
105
Country
Germany
It's actually not behind a paywall. You just need your Apple ID to download and use the Game Porting Toolkit.
Source: Andrew Tsai just uploaded a video talking about it and there's also a written guide on the Apple Gaming Wiki.
 

Latiodile

Well-Known Member
Member
Joined
May 27, 2022
Messages
428
Trophies
0
Location
Ontario
XP
1,254
Country
Canada
inb4 it brings in a wave of terrible mac ports like the linux "port" of bioshock infinite where it's horrendously broken because it's an awful translation layer from windows to linux
 
  • Like
Reactions: Guacaholey

SuperSVGA

Well-Known Member
Member
Joined
Oct 26, 2013
Messages
303
Trophies
1
XP
523
Country
United States
inb4 it brings in a wave of terrible mac ports like the linux "port" of bioshock infinite where it's horrendously broken because it's an awful translation layer from windows to linux
Depends on if the developers make any fixes I guess, I've noticed Proton at least has the same graphical glitches in certain games on both Linux and Mac.
 

codezer0

Gaming keeps me sane
Member
Joined
Jul 14, 2009
Messages
3,573
Trophies
2
Location
The Magic School Bus
XP
4,498
Country
United States
Okay, but, last I checked, every build of Mac os that was aware of running on that new arm based m1 chip and onwards, basically blocked steam from even installing, much less running.

If that's not been definitely fixed, this is as empty a gesture from apple as them claiming to use USB c on their new iphones to then use some ultra cursed, proprietary take on it.
 
  • Like
Reactions: JakobAir and Vorde

The Catboy

GBAtemp Official Catboy™: Boywife
Member
Joined
Sep 13, 2009
Messages
27,799
Trophies
4
Location
Making a non-binary fuss
XP
38,760
Country
Antarctica
That's how you know it's Apple-made.
inb4 $500 to run Windows games on Mac.
It’s actually free, same with the account needed to download it. You just need to login with your Apple ID to gain access
 

Foxi4

Endless Trash
Global Moderator
Joined
Sep 13, 2009
Messages
30,818
Trophies
3
Location
Gaming Grotto
XP
29,788
Country
Poland
Okay, but, last I checked, every build of Mac os that was aware of running on that new arm based m1 chip and onwards, basically blocked steam from even installing, much less running.

If that's not been definitely fixed, this is as empty a gesture from apple as them claiming to use USB c on their new iphones to then use some ultra cursed, proprietary take on it.
I suspect Apple wants to maintain their walled garden, this is an investment on their part in an effort to expand the offering on the Apple App Store. They still don’t welcome competition on their platform.
 
  • Like
Reactions: Vorde

chrisrlink

Has a PhD in dueling
Member
Joined
Aug 27, 2009
Messages
5,543
Trophies
2
Location
duel acadamia
XP
5,704
Country
United States
and portiing kit isn't a thing (grant it rosetta 2 is being used to run ports can't we just clean room this shit without apple code and release the built from scratch engine? i'm pretty sure it'll leak sooner or llater and an open source iimplimentation wi;ll be released btw cant Solo devs use this tooo or only studios?
 

RHOPKINS13

Geek
Member
Joined
Jan 31, 2009
Messages
1,351
Trophies
2
XP
2,599
Country
United States
Apple garbage. Why split the community even more? Wine already runs on Mac, seems to me that more effort should be put into making Proton run on Mac. Otherwise I highly doubt that this "Game Porting Toolkit" will ever see the amount of progress Proton has.
 

eyeliner

Has an itch needing to be scratched.
Member
Joined
Feb 17, 2006
Messages
2,879
Trophies
2
Age
44
XP
5,467
Country
Portugal
So.... They took something free and used it? And also made it free?
What kind of Apple Computing Corp is this?
 
  • Like
Reactions: Vorde

ShadowOne333

QVID PRO QVO
OP
Editorial Team
Joined
Jan 17, 2013
Messages
12,136
Trophies
2
XP
32,663
Country
Mexico
Apple garbage. Why split the community even more? Wine already runs on Mac, seems to me that more effort should be put into making Proton run on Mac. Otherwise I highly doubt that this "Game Porting Toolkit" will ever see the amount of progress Proton has.

It'd be interesting to see if their "toolkit" just flatout gives worse performance than Proton ported to Mac.
 

Foxi4

Endless Trash
Global Moderator
Joined
Sep 13, 2009
Messages
30,818
Trophies
3
Location
Gaming Grotto
XP
29,788
Country
Poland
It'd be interesting to see if their "toolkit" just flatout gives worse performance than Proton ported to Mac.
Does Proton work cross-architecture? From what I understand, the porting kit allows for x86 applications to be ported (with relative ease) to Apple’s implementation of ARM, that’s the selling point here.
 

Site & Scene News

Popular threads in this forum

General chit-chat
Help Users
  • K3Nv2 @ K3Nv2:
    Bigonya uses his wiener to mod 360s
    +1
  • Xdqwerty @ Xdqwerty:
    Going to the water park, see ya
  • BigOnYa @ BigOnYa:
    You should update the 360 to newest dash before RGHing it yes. But not a big deal if you don't, you can install new dash/avatar updates after. It's just easier to do it auto online before, instead manual offline after.
  • BigOnYa @ BigOnYa:
    Have fun @Xdqwerty. If you see a chocolate candy bar floating in the water, don't eat it!
  • AncientBoi @ AncientBoi:
    :O:ohnoes: Y didn't U Tell ME that ALSO? @BigOnYa :ohnoes: 🤢🤮
    +1
  • BigOnYa @ BigOnYa:
    Does it taste like... chicken?
    +1
  • S @ salazarcosplay:
    @BigOnYa I wanted to ask you about your experience with seeing south park. Most of the people a bit younger like my younger brother and cousins that are a few younger than me that saw kids found south park funny because of the curse words, kids at school, that seemed like liking the show on a very basic level.

    I could not quite have a in depth discussion of the show.

    How was it for you? As an adult. What did you find the most interesting part about it. Did you relate to the parents of the kids and their situations. Was it satires, the commentary on society. The references on celebrities' and pop culture.
    +1
  • BigOnYa @ BigOnYa:
    I remember seeing the very first episode back in the day, and have watched every episode since. I used to set my VCR to record them even, shows how long ago.
  • BigOnYa @ BigOnYa:
    I just like any comedies really, and cartoons have always been a favorite of mine. Family guy, American Dad, Futurama, Cleveland Show, Simpsons - I like them all.
    +1
  • BigOnYa @ BigOnYa:
    South Park is great cause they always touch on relavent issues going on today, and make something funny out of it.
    +3
  • S @ salazarcosplay:
    @BigOnYa were you always up to date on the current events and issues of the time or were there issues that you first found out thru south park
  • BigOnYa @ BigOnYa:
    Most of the time yea I knew, I watch and read the news regularly, but sometimes the Hollywood BS stuff, like concerning actors slip by me. I don't follow most Hollywood BS (example: the Kardasians)
    +2
  • S @ salazarcosplay:
    @BigOnYa there were relevant issues before south park was made, that's why i think a south park prequel/spinoff would be great. Randy and his friends in their child hood
    +1
  • BigOnYa @ BigOnYa:
    Yea, like them running in high school together, getting into stuff, and how they got hitched and had kids. And how the town of South Park was back then compared to now. That would be cool to see.
  • BakerMan @ BakerMan:
    yeah
  • The Real Jdbye @ The Real Jdbye:
    @salazarcosplay if they made a prequel, it would still be about current issues, cause it doesn't make sense to make it about stuff that happened 30 years ago that nobody cares about anymore
  • The Real Jdbye @ The Real Jdbye:
    it's too late
  • The Real Jdbye @ The Real Jdbye:
    the older south park episodes about particular issues usually age poorly since the topic is no longer relevant
  • The Real Jdbye @ The Real Jdbye:
    an exception is giant douche vs turd sandwich, that's always relevant :P
    +1
  • K3Nv2 @ K3Nv2:
    I was gone for like an hour and none of you thought to write or call pos
  • BigOnYa @ BigOnYa:
    We knew you were going to Sonic to get lunch.
  • K3Nv2 @ K3Nv2:
    Sonics fast I would've been home in 10 mins
  • BigOnYa @ BigOnYa:
    Meet and greet with AncientBoi then?
  • K3Nv2 @ K3Nv2:
    That would've gone slow he's old
    +1
    K3Nv2 @ K3Nv2: That would've gone slow he's old +1