Cider (The way mac users are playing PC Games)

[Wilkey]

TransGaming's Mac portability engine, Cider, gets Apple users to the core of gaming.

Traditionally, Mac users have been forced to wait months, if not years, for a handful of top tier titles to be redeveloped and then republished on the Mac. Cider eliminates the typical arduous, expensive, and lengthy development process and allows game developers and publishers to extend their gaming franchises to the explosively growing Mac market - cost effectively, efficiently, and with a quicker time-to-market. Born from the same technology foundation as TransGaming's sensation, Cedega, Cider empowers game developers and publishers to release Mac editions of their titles with little effort. Cider is so effective that publishers can deploy Mac and Windows versions of their titles simultaneously, even for games already in development. With Cider, entire catalogs of games can be easily brought to rapidly growing Intel Mac market with an audience starving for games.

How Cider Works
Cider is a sophisticated portability engine that allows Windows games to be run on Intel Macs without any modifications to the original game source code. Cider works by directly loading a Windows program into memory on an Intel-Mac and linking it to an optimized version of the Win32 APIs. Games are "wrapped" with the Cider engine and they simply run on the Mac. This means developers have only one code base to maintain while enjoying the flexibility of targeting multiple platforms and, therefore, multiple revenue streams. Cider powered games use the same copy protection, lobbies, game matching and connectivity as the original Windows game. All this means less effort and lower costs. Cider is targeted to game developers and publishers.

The Intel-Mac Explosion

Why should developers and publishers consider the Mac market? In the last quarter alone, Apple shipped over 1.5 million Macs, generating the most profitable quarter in Apple's history. Apple's financial results represent growth of 36%, more than three times the industry growth rate with analysts forecasting an installed base in excess of 12 million Intel Macs by the end of 2007. A poll of Mac purchasers conducted by Apple shows that nearly 50% of buyers are new to Mac which implies that more and more Windows users are switching to Mac. With only a small collection of games available historically, the Mac gaming market today has been a void that Cider is now filling.

Cider is a prepackaged technology, which several leading publishers use to enable their game titles on Mac. You don't download Cider as a consumer, but can go to GameTree Online to buy Mac games (some leverage Cider) or go to an Apple Store (or Mac games retailer) to pick up great games like Command & Conquer and Spore that use the Cider technology.

TransGaming Inc.

What this means, is that I can play Rome Total War and C & C 3 games on my mac. Also if you look on mac torrenting sites you can find any game you want, and if your lucky even the files needed to port your own games.

[iaretehfunny?]

What about Warhammer?

[Wilkey]

I am not really sure about Warhammer, I don't know just cause it is an mmorpg, but almost every game will work with Cider, so I am assuming warhammer will, but again I am not sure.