Apple, Mac, Silicon, M1, macOS - Native Support for the next 10 years

[Sebazy]

That will be more reliant on the Crossover Wine wrapper they use being fully native by then rather than the game client itself though.

[Shibi]

That will be more reliant on the Crossover Wine wrapper they use being fully native by then rather than the game client itself though.

They discuss that on this blog post by the president of Codeweaver: https://www.codeweavers.com/blog/jra...-apple-silicon

[Saccharin]

I'd like to see a native macOS client in the future. Blizzard have a great macOS client for World of Warcraft that runs great on pretty much all M1-based systems, there's no reason why FFXIV can't be the same

I think it's more a question of can't rather than won't. Blizzard has made quite a few native Mac titles in the past. I can't think of a single native Mac title developed by Square - they likely don't have any Mac/Metal developers on hand.

WoW's had mac support since launch. However newer titles like Overwatch don't have a Mac client.

I'm sure SE will update the wrapper to support whatever changes are needed.

[sharknado]

WoW's had mac support since launch. However newer titles like Overwatch don't have a Mac client.

I'm sure SE will update the wrapper to support whatever changes are needed.

The point was they release native ARM M1 version of WoW client pretty much few days after it went live. Some time thereafter they even released native Windows ARM version of the client.They do have regression here and there but they are quite quick to develop things and even from time to time they kill support for older hardware. For SL they even experimented with Ray Tracing.

FF14 on the other hand is still DX11 on Windows while native macOS (or Linux) version does not exist. Just some monstrosity via compatibility libraries. To have a true native client it would take quite a bit of work and it would be big enough to definitely be mentioned on the first live letter discussing next 10 years of the game and so on.

And SE few days after Gabe gave them a big free advert by playing FF14 on the Steam Deck migrated Steam players to their launcher that uses old MSHTML that proton/wine does not support. So they broke "out of the box" Steam Deck experience... and not like Linux users were alarming about it way before...

So no, as of now it's unlikely anything will change.

[IshAle]

Really looking forward to when they add the update. The latest operating system update 12.3 has broken the game for me. Even if they just do a wrapper update to silicon would be a good step forward.

It's been a fair bit of time since the M1 was released - I think they should make up their mind if they still want Mac users purchasing the game or if they want to drop support altogether.

[pigzig]

mac gamers rise up

[_machina_]

Well, WWDC 2022 just came and we saw Metal 3 and how Capcom will release Resident Evil on Mac.
I hope more and more companies will adopt these. I truly believe where Apple is going with the Apple Silicon is where the future is: efficiency and performance.

Soon, more and more people will have Mac just like they have iPhone/iPad. Hopefully more game companies, especially Square Enix with FF14 or FF16 would come native to Mac.

Please, Yoshi-P!
Better start somewhere. Maybe in FF16?

[RobertCharbrow]

I truly believe where Apple is going with the Apple Silicon is where the future is: efficiency and performance.

Totally agree! Not only do the silicon chips blow PC chips out of the water in efficiency and performance, but also *simplicity*. The WWDC keynote about Metal 3 kept highlighting 'exceptional gaming performance across all silicon platforms'. Apple seems to envision a gaming future where games just *work*, not lists of hardware requirements and constant graphics card updates and I think that sounds pretty darn nice.

[KarstenS]

A truly native client to allow the game to run on iOS would be an interesting proposition but I just can't see it happening.

Since Square Enix charges extra for the Mac license, you should be able to expect such an adaptation.

It should be clear to everyone since M2 at the latest: Apple is not going back.

[Sebazy]

Since Square Enix charges extra for the Mac license, you should be able to expect such an adaptation.

It should be clear to everyone since M2 at the latest: Apple is not going back.

Honestly, with iPads being as powerful as they are now, it kind of makes me think that SE are missing a trick at this stage. If they can optimise the game enough to run on recent base model iPads and potentially even iPhones, that's a wildly huge market right there for the taking and FFXIV's overall accessibility, ease of play and casual focus is perfect for it.

Even the subscription model doesn't seem to be a problem, OS Runescape appears to manage just fine.

I still don't think it's going to happen, but I'd absolutely love to be proved wrong on this one++