Apple’s Worldwide Developer Conference – aka WWDC – is upon us once more, and the 2025 edition looks like it could ring in some big changes for Apple. The rumor mill says that there are major redesigns planned for iOS on the iPhone, as well as iPadOS, macOS, WatchOS for the Apple Watch, and even tvOS for the Apple TV streaming box. Lots of people will be hoping for news on Apple Intelligence too (although I wouldn’t hold my breath on that if I were you).
But, in the words of the immortal Spice Girls – I’ll tell you what I want, what I really, really want – and that’s more games for the Mac. I am that rare breed of creature known as the Mac Gamer. It’s a small, select group, mainly consisting of me and Whoopi Goldberg, but it’s growing all the time and after decades of completely ignoring games on the Mac it looks as though Apple is finally showing some interest.
Game On
Apple has never liked games. John Carmack, one of the creators of Doom and Quake at id Software, once said that Apple co-founder Steve Jobs “didn’t think very highly of games”, and Jobs’ attitude meant that Apple effectively ignored gaming on the Mac for decades (“I never took it personally,” said Carmack).
That state of affairs didn’t really change until WWDC in 2023. After making headlines with the debut of the Vision Pro headset, Apple very quietly released a new software tool called the Game Porting ToolKit (GPT) that was designed specifically to help developers produce Mac versions of their PC games.
This seemed to mark a real change in Apple’s attitude towards games, and the launch of GPT did help to bring a few AAA titles to Mac for the first time, including Assassin’s Creed Shadows, Control, Death Stranding, and multiple Resident Evil games. But the fact remains that most A-List PC games never get released on the Mac at all, so here’s my wishlist for the Mac games scene at WWDC in 2025.
More Powerful Hardware
Even the best Macbooks and Macs have often been mocked for lacking the power to play games with modern 3D graphics – in fact, Macs couldn’t even handle ray-tracing until Apple introduced its M3 processors about 18 months ago.
Even now, many Mac games still require very expensive, top-of-the-range Mac models in order to run at high graphical settings. There are some pretty good gaming PCs available for less than £1000/$1000, and Apple needs to bring real gaming power to more Mac models in order to create a larger audience for new Mac games.
In Apple’s defense, though, there’s no denying that the best gaming laptops can get pretty expensive – and many people need a single lightweight system for work as well as gaming, not a desktop-replacement powerhouse machine that can’t last more than two hours away from a wall outlet. So the potential is there; Apple just needs to step up.
The Mac operating system (aka macOS) relies on a piece of Apple software called Metal to handle 3D graphics in games. In contrast, PC games generally rely on Microsoft’s DirectX graphics software instead, and converting – or ‘porting’ – DirectX games to run on Macs is a huge technical challenge for game developers.
That’s where the Game Porting Toolkit comes in, as it is specifically designed to help with this conversion process. Apple did introduce GPT 2.0 at WWDC in 2024, so releasing another update at this year’s WWDC would reaffirm Apple’s commitment to gaming. Apple could also simply buy Codeweavers, the developer of the open-source CrossOver software that GPT is partly based on (codeweavers.com). The CrossOver team has enormous experience in getting Windows games to run on Macs, and that could help Apple to smooth the path onto the Mac for many PC-based games developers.
Open Up The App Store
At the moment, many Mac games are only available via Apple’s own Mac App Store. Even if you’ve already bought Control: Ultimate Edition on Steam or the Epic Games Store then you’ll find that you still have to buy the Mac version separately on the Mac App Store – so you’re effectively paying twice for a game that you already own. Games on the Mac App Store also tend to be more expensive than on Steam or Epic – where the PC version of Control: Ultimate Edition is currently on sale at a bargain price.
This applies to lots of other Mac games too, so Apple really needs to allow developers more freedom to sell their Mac games outside the Mac App Store. Unfortunately, Apple’s long-running legal battle with Epic over selling Fortnite on the App Store suggests that this is pretty unlikely. However, games such as Baldur’s Gate 3 and Hades 2 do allow you to buy the game once on Steam and then download either Mac or PC versions as required, so that’s something I’d like to see from more games in the future.
Revamp Apple Arcade
Apple makes billions of dollars from its subscription services, and Apple Arcade was meant to provide an Apple alternative to gaming services such as Microsoft’s Game Pass for Xbox and PC. But while Game Pass tempts players with newly-released hit titles such as Oblivion Remastered and Clair Obscur: Expedition 33, Apple Arcade is full of aging mobile games like Angry Birds that were originally designed for the iPhone or iPad.
The selection of Mac games is seriously underwhelming, so Apple needs to work with game developers to bring some heavyweight A-list titles to Apple Arcade. Mac users know that Apple often makes splashy announcements at WWDC about forthcoming games for the Mac, but it needs to continue that commitment for the other 51 weeks of the year if it really wants the Mac to be taken seriously as a gaming platform. Zigazig ah!
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