DailyTech - Steam Client for OS X Now Available, Valve Throws in "Portal" for Free

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Software Steam Client for OS X Now Available, Valve Throws in "Portal" for Free
Brandon Hill (Blog) - May 12, 2010 3:41 PM

41 comment(s) - last by B3an.. on May 14 at 10:52 AM

Steam finally comes to OS X

Mac gamers who want to beef up their meager gaming library can rejoice now that the much talked about Steam client is available for OS X.

"Steam has been a service exclusively for PC users since we launched it in 2004. For the first time we and our partners are bringing it to another platform," said the Valve team on the company blog. "It's been a ton of work, but the Mac is great for the same reason the PC is great - they are both open systems that let gamers and game developers be as close as possible."

There are currently 57 games available to purchase and download for gamers using the Steam client for OS X.

Gamers will be able to play purchase a game once and play it on both Windows and OS X platforms. In addition, thanks to Steam Play, a game can be started on a PC and finished on a Mac or vice versa during any part of the single-player game experience.

In celebration of the Steam client being made available for OS X, Valve is making Portal available for free until May 24. "Like we keep saying, Portal is free. Free on the Mac," Valve explains. "Free on the PC. But only until May 24th. So you only have a few days to decide if your free copy of Portal is worth the price we're currently charging."

You can download the OS X Steam client directly right here.

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Question

By Spivonious on 5/12/2010 3:58:17 PM , Rating: 2

How is Steam doing this? Do OSX users get a Windows emulator?

RE: Question

By elFarto on 5/12/2010 4:05:18 PM , Rating: 2

Nope, Valve ported the Steam and the Source engine (used by Half-Life 2, Portal and Team Fortress 2 to name a few) to OpenGL/MacOS. It's a completely native game, not emulated in any way.

Regards
elFarto

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RE: Question

By Spivonious on 5/14/2010 10:16:37 AM , Rating: 2

Oh, so it's just the Source-based games then?

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RE: Question

By UNHchabo on 5/12/2010 4:07:49 PM , Rating: 2

Valve ported the Source engine to OpenGL, allowing them to make a native executable for OSX.

My jaw dropped when I saw this announcement. I can't believe they're giving it away! :)

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RE: Question

By dani31 on 5/12/10, Rating: -1

RE: Question

By Flunk on 5/12/2010 4:59:37 PM , Rating: 2

That's quite unlikely, DirectX still has a lot of features that OpenGL lacks and the standard seems to be moving ahead faster than OpenGL. You can't catch up by running slower.

It's nice to see more games on the Mac though, even though I don't own one.

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RE: Question

By croc on 5/13/2010 1:03:55 AM , Rating: 2

"You can't catch up by running slower."

Unless you are an Australian speed skater...

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RE: Question

By freeagle on 5/13/2010 7:08:15 AM , Rating: 2

OpenGL 4.0 standard is feature-wise on par with DirectX 11, drivers supporting it are already popping up

http://www.opengl.org/discussion_boards/ubbthreads...

http://developer.nvidia.com/object/opengl_driver.h...

http://support.amd.com/us/kbarticles/Pages/Catalys...

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RE: Question

By Smilin on 5/12/2010 6:05:42 PM , Rating: 3

Nothanks. I'll take the dictatorship.

It's a great API, easy to develop for and widely supported. It's done a great deal for gaming both for software developers and card manufacturers.

I don't mind a king as long as the land lives in peace and prosperity.

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RE: Question

By Gul Westfale on 5/12/2010 9:52:01 PM , Rating: 2

now valve just needs to wait for macs with graphics cards that can actually play games developed after 2004...

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RE: Question

By damianrobertjones on 5/13/2010 3:27:43 AM , Rating: 2

How is it a dictatorship? How is ensuring that all pc game developers code for one central resource? Would you prefer the dos days or Windows 95 days when everyone was all over the place? Is anyone MAKING devs code just for Direct X on Windows and not openGL?

Can you not see the advantages of DX?

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RE: Question

By sebmel on 5/13/2010 1:42:17 PM , Rating: 2

You don't appear to understand the benefits of competition and the risks of monopolies.

If there is only one platform than the owner of that platform can get lazy and overprice.

You are right that competition causes more work but that work forces the tech industry to align it's direction more with the interests of customers as it competes for them.

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RE: Question

By Spivonious on 5/14/2010 10:15:41 AM , Rating: 2

DirectX is completely free to develop with and distribute.

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RE: Question

By callmeroy on 5/13/2010 1:47:24 PM , Rating: 2

i missed the memo why is DirectX evil again?

On a more serious note, i've never had issues with Direct X - to be honest I kind of like it.

As a pretty frequent gamer I've never had problems with Direct X...of course I liked OpenGL as well... :)

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RE: Question

By MeesterNid on 5/12/2010 4:46:59 PM , Rating: 2

It's only free till May 24-th...Portal that is.

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RE: Question

By SaltBoy on 5/12/2010 4:15:01 PM , Rating: 5

I'm so GLaD OSx is getting Steam!

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RE: Question

By Proxes on 5/12/2010 4:18:16 PM , Rating: 1

Yeah pretty sweet. Mac users get another chat client since they don't have any games they can play.

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RE: Question

By Etsp on 5/12/2010 4:29:38 PM , Rating: 2

I see what you did there...

Porting Source to OpenGL...For Steam, this was a triumph.

Hopefully, someone will get this version running on Linux soon.

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RE: Question

By SaltBoy on 5/12/2010 4:32:24 PM , Rating: 2

The cake is a lie!

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RE: Question

By ClownPuncher on 5/12/2010 4:35:35 PM , Rating: 2

There was even going to be a party for you. A big party, that all of your friends were invited to. I invited your best friend the Companion Cube. Of course, he couldn't come, because you murdered him. All your other friends couldn't come either, because you don't have any other friends, because of how unlikable you are. It says so right here in your personnel file; 'Unlikable. Liked by no one. A bitter unlikable loner whose passing shall not be mourned.' SHALL NOT BE MOURNED. That's exactly what it says. Very formal. Very official. It also says you were adopted. So that's funny too

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OMG PORTAL!!

By MrPerez on 5/12/2010 6:39:00 PM , Rating: 2

I Swear the first fanboi that starts to brag about this game or any other game thats like 10 years old that comes to the mac will get mushroom'ed stamped right in the forehead!

RE: OMG PORTAL!!

By yxalitis on 5/12/2010 7:34:13 PM , Rating: 2

Dude, the SOURCE ENGINE itself has been ported, that means ALL SOURCE GAMES are now able to be played on a MAC, so, yes MAC owners DO have something to brag about!

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RE: OMG PORTAL!!

By GabeAthouse on 5/12/2010 8:49:31 PM , Rating: 2

As of this moment, Portal is the only game listed of the Steam games that I own that is available for mac. All the other Source games say that they're "not available on your current platform". And when I tried to download Portal the Steam servers are too busy. They're probably rolling out support slowly..

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RE: OMG PORTAL!!

By mydogfarted on 5/13/2010 10:21:53 AM , Rating: 2

I was able to get it very late last night. The menus work fine. I get a blank screen when game play starts. The Mac support on Steam is almost non-existent. I suggest grabbing it while it is free and then waiting for a patch.

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RE: OMG PORTAL!!

By B3an on 5/14/2010 10:52:05 AM , Rating: 2

But i thought Macs "just worked" ?

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Have fun with 1 button....

By themaster08 on 5/13/2010 4:29:41 AM , Rating: 4

Bring 'em out!

RE: Have fun with 1 button....

By mydogfarted on 5/13/2010 10:18:27 AM , Rating: 2

Right, because 2 button functionality hasn't been available on Apple's mice for several years now. Not to mention OS X has had support for generic USB 2 button mice since the beginning. My Razor gaming mice have worked just fine with my Macs.

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RE: Have fun with 1 button....

By themaster08 on 5/13/2010 11:28:00 AM , Rating: 2

Man, it's a joke. Stop crying.

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RE: Have fun with 1 button....

By themaster08 on 5/13/2010 11:34:04 AM , Rating: 2

To add to my comment, I welcome our Mac counterparts. A bigger gaming community for us, the better :)

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Come on, Valve!

By LordanSS on 5/12/2010 6:01:43 PM , Rating: 5

Where the fug is my Episode 3?

Episodic content my a......

RE: Come on, Valve!

By Akrovah on 5/12/2010 7:23:59 PM , Rating: 2

Exactly. I mean it's cool and all that they want to expand thier audience and give the Mac users some love, but have they ever heard of finishing what they started?

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I'm sue the Mac gamers will be pleased.

By rs1 on 5/12/2010 5:58:01 PM , Rating: 5

...all 10 of them.

I may have taken it out of context

By Cappadocious on 5/12/2010 5:03:10 PM , Rating: 2

But I still had a small chuckle...

quote:
"It's been a ton of work, but the Mac is great for the same reason the PC is great - they are both open systems

RE: I may have taken it out of context

By icanhascpu on 5/12/2010 6:31:10 PM , Rating: 2

Relatively speaking, Windows 7 and OSX have the same amount of "openess" in this context.

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I <3 Valve

By yxalitis on 5/12/2010 7:49:18 PM , Rating: 2

You see, THIS is how you become a great gaming company, put the effort in, and support as wide a player base as you can, great stuff Valve, great stuff.

Oh, and if ANYONE dares complain about Portal being given away, 'cos THEY had to pay for it, well, sh!t, get a life and STFU

RE: I <3 Valve

By jimbojimbo on 5/13/2010 2:01:22 PM , Rating: 2

Well, I kind of played it for free but it's such a damn good game I bought the Orange box and it was worth every penny.

What's with people complaining about old games on the Mac? Portal came out some time late 2007 or even later so no, it's not 10 years old.

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I'm imagine these games are fully remappable?

By Esquire on 5/12/2010 4:29:51 PM , Rating: 2

I got a petition going for consoles to have remapping... but I'll give steam a try.
http://www.joystickdivision.com/2010/05/quadripleg...

Quadriplegic gamer