Feb 28, 2020  First introduced on Mac in 2014, Total War: Empire is the fifth installment in the Total War series, which, as a whole, comes recommended. The turn-based strategy game was released for Windows in 2009. Before purchasing the game, just check the Mac App Store for compatibility with your Mac, since some older machines aren't supported. Dec 27, 2018  The best strategy games for Mac have always been excellent, but in recent years, they got even better. Whether you’re into fast-paced real-time strategy (RTS), complex turn-based games or more casual alternatives for your MacBook, this list has something for everyone. Strategy games 2016 mac.

• Metal Api Games Machine

MoltenVK is a runtime library that maps Vulkan to Apple's Metal graphics framework on iOS and macOS. With MoltenVK, you get the performance benefits and added debugging and performance tuning capabilities of the Metal framework on iOS and macOS, without having to rewrite your app that already uses Vulkan. Sep 14, 2016 I have seen an app called 'Metal Test' but it detected my graphics card from the SMBIOS, (MacBook Pro 12,1 13-inch with Broadwell) which has Iris 6100 graphics as what shows up. List of macOS games that use the Metal API for comparison. I'm making a list of games that make use of the Metal API for checking game performance (Metal on Mac vs DirectX on Windows). For those who don't know that Metal is, essentially it's a way to access the GPU at a lower-level with lower overhead than, say, OpenGL. Metal is an object-oriented API that can be invoked using the Swift or Objective-C programming languages. Full-blown control of the Metal framework (as well as the related MetalKit framework) is accessible via the Metal Unified Graphics and Compute Language. According to Apple promotional materials: 'Metal is a C based. Sep 14, 2016  Mac Metal now has initial Shader Model 5 support enabled by default. This exposes all the available features of Metal on Mac OS X 10.11.6 that are applicable to Unreal Engine 4. Implements the RHI thread & parallel translation features to.

Accelerating graphics and much more.

Metal provides near-direct access to the graphics processing unit (GPU), enabling you to maximize the graphics and compute potential of your apps on iOS, macOS, and tvOS. Building on an approachable, low-overhead architecture with precompiled GPU shaders, fine-grained resource control, and multithreading support, Metal further evolves support for GPU-driven command creation, simplifies working with the array of Metal-capable GPUs, and lets you tap into Pro power of Mac Pro and Pro Display XDR.

What’s New in Metal

GPU-driven Compute Encoding
Moving beyond just rendering passes, Metal in iOS 13 and tvOS 13 empowers the GPU to construct its own compute commands with Indirect Compute Encoding. Now complete scenes using advanced culling and tessellation techniques can be built and scheduled with little or no CPU interaction.

Improved Raytracing Acceleration
Metal Performance Shaders (MPS) speed raytracing operations even more by moving the bounded volume hierarchy construction to the GPU. MPS also provide new, optimized de-noising filters in an essential collection of highly-optimized compute and graphics shaders.

Metal for Pro Apps
Professional content-creation apps can take advantage of outstanding enhancements in Metal on macOS Catalina. Metal Peer Groups make it easy to rapidly share data between multiple GPUs in Mac Pro without transferring through main memory. And enhancements to CAMetalLayer give you access to the High Dynamic Range capabilities of Pro Display XDR.

Simpler GPU Families
Developing with Metal is even easier with the dramatically simplified GPU Families. Three well-considered groupings allow you to easily target functionality that's common across all Metal-enabled GPUs, access unique capabilities of Apple-designed GPUs, and better harness supported third-party GPUs on macOS.

Metal Memory Debugger
The Metal Memory Debugger gives fine-grained insight into how much memory Metal objects and rendering resources consume at runtime. It also analyzes how your resources are configured and suggests improvements, so you can deeply optimize your game or app to take full advantage of Metal.

Metal-enabled iOS Simulator
The Simulator now uses Metal to speed up the development of iOS apps that either use Metal directly or rely on Metal-based system frameworks. This is perfect for smoothly transitioning from OpenGL ES to Metal.

• Documentation

  Browse the latest documentation including API reference and articles.

• Sample Code

  Get sample code to see how Metal APIs are implemented.

• Videos

  Learn how to take advantage of the latest advancements in Metal.

• Forums

  Ask questions and discuss Metal with Apple engineers and other developers.

By Malcolm Owen
Tuesday, June 05, 2018, 11:05 am PT (02:05 pm ET)

Apple's move to cut OpenGL after macOS 10.14 Mojave and pushing for the use of its own Metal graphics technology has come under fire from developers, expressing concerns it will impact cross-platform game development, and even causing some to declare they won't produce games for the Mac in the future.


Discovered within Apple's developer documentation for macOS 10.14 yesterday, it was revealed that OpenGL and OpenCL, APIs used in graphics-intensive apps and games as well as computational tasks, would be depreciated in the operating system. While macOS 10.14 would still support software using OpenGL and OpenCL, Apple is advising developers using OpenGL to move their applications over to Metal, promoting a move from OpenCL to Metal and Metal Performance Shaders.
While the support for OpenGL is still available, it is unknown when Apple will remove it from macOS completely, but it is not entirely unexpected. OpenGL on macOS High Sierra uses version 3.3 that was released in 2010, rather than using the more up-to-date version 4.6 released in 2017.
Indeed, Apple's lack of interest in the technology has led to OpenGL standard maintainer Kronos Group to release open source tools to allow Vulkan, a cross-platform 3D graphics API, to work on iOS and macOS. Vulkan has been usable on a number of major platforms, including Windows and Android, with the tools release in February enabling developers to continue producing games across multiple platforms, using a newer technology.
Some major game developers have already embraced Metal for their Mac products, with notable releases including 'World of Warcraft,' 'The Witness,' 'Deus Ex: Mankind Divided,' and 'Dirt Rally.'
Developers have been quick to comment about Apple's move away from OpenGL, largely centering around having to change their work from using a cross-platform API to cope with a platform-specific technology.
Vlambeer designer Rami Ismail toldPC Gamer the ultimate time of abandonment can vary between 'soon' and 'never.'
'All we know is Apple seems to have shown intent to rid itself of OpenGL in favor of its own graphics API,' Ismail said. 'The problem with Metal is very similar to the problem with DirectX: it's not cross-platform.'
Ismail went on to say 'the worst that's going to happen is old stuff will break, and our engines and libraries will grow a bit to support both Direct3D and Metal. Not having a clear guideline for future actions Apple might take in this regard isn't very good for developer confidence, I'd guess, and not having a single cross-platform graphics API is just a pain.'

Bridge Builder and Ponifex developer Alex Austin suggested the change will cause more work when attempting to port games to the Mac. He has historically developed primarily for Windows and then spent 'a couple hours' to port the same game to Mac and Linux. But he notes already facing issues with macOS's OpenGL support given he has to employ older versions on the Mac, forcing rewrites of how the games render graphics.
'I'm not going to spend any time on Metal because Macs are a pretty small percentage of the market, and really probably not worth it even now,' suggests Austin. 'I just do it because I try to support fans if I can.'
Thomas Altenburger of Flying Oak Games was more direct on Twitter, advising 'I'm sorry Mac users, but this means we will stop publishing games on Mac if it ever stop(s) shipping with the OS.' In the following thread, Altenburger notes his love for OpenGL due to its cross-compatibility, but notes that Apple's push for developers to use platform-specific technologies 'implies breaking any cross-platform pipeline' in development.
'The cost of maintaining a dedicated pipeline is clearly higher than the Mac users potential,' Altenburger adds. 'Breaking OpenGL on one single OS means that I would have to do a custom pipeline and build for that specific OS. If that OS represents 1 percent of players.. well..'
Former BioShock 2 developer and half of Minor Key Games David Lindsey Pittman highlighted that the combination of depreciated OpenGL and 32-bit apps could lead to older apps failing to run. 'That's awful for older games, and no-one is going to rebuild games from a decade ago for 64-bit/Metal,' he suggests.
Pittman also warns he would have to delist the Mac versions of his games. 'Converting to 64-bit wouldn't be too much trouble, though I haven't had time yet, but porting to Metal isn't feasible for 3 games that aren't making money on Mac anymore anyway.'
AppleInsider

Metal Api Games Machine

has reached out to Aspyr and Feral Interactive for comment on the matter.