Apple any good for game dev?

[joellol]

Hello people!

Next school year i will start studying Game Engineering. I've asked some people if a 2017 MacBook Pro 13,3" with a i5 processor wil do the trick.

This one;
https://www.apple.com/nl/shop/buy-ma...A&step=config#

It may be in Dutch but the specs speak for itself.

Or will a 2015 model be better? (Apple official clearance). With an i7 processor.

This one;
https://www.apple.com/shop/product/F...retina-display

Or should i skip all that and go for a windows PC? If so, any advice would be welcome.

Now mind you, i'm a starting student so IMO best of the best wont be needed.

Much love,

Joël.


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[x9751]

My first experience with a Mac was when I started working for the company I am currently at. I was always a windows boy and never really thought Mac's where worth the money. My opinion hasn't really changed since then and I still think Macs are expensive.

My work mac is a 13in with and i5 and 16 gigs of RAM. I ended up buying one for myself because I liked the system and I could afford it. I got the 15in with an i7 and 16 gigs of RAM. My Mac at home obviously runs better because of the i7 but that is to be expected. I'm not sure if you have ever used a Mac or not but I find that the memory managment is kinda poor. When I close all of my active apps on my work Mac I have like 10 gigs of RAM left. So 6 gigs just gone and I as the user am not using it. I still think the OS is good.

Now I don't do game development but I have looked into it a bit. I tried to run programs like Unity and Unreal Engine. Unity ran best with out much lag at all, but both programs used up a lot of resources. Your links are dead for me so I can't look at them so I'll just put out that if you really wanted to I'd suggest getting more RAM than me. The i7 is going to be better than the i5 but it's really up to you, again your links are dead so I can't check prices. I personally went with the i7 for my home Mac so I'm going to suggest that one. If it is a issue of "it's an older model" then know that the 2015 model is the one I have and it's really nice. My boss has the newest model and it doesn't really seem to function "faster" or "better" but I don't exactly use it all the time.

Now if you wanted to go with a windows computer you will spend less and get something just as powerful as these Mac's. As far as the Apple fanboys saying "Windows sucks Mac is better" eh that depends on a lot of things but since I am a computer person I have never had issues with either of them.
My desktop for gaming is a Windows and it runs perfectly. It's my personal opinion that Windows 10 runs pretty smooth. Sure all the tracking stuff on it has people scared but Google and Facebook already track you way more than Windows does. Windows just had the balls to be open about it and not try to sugar coat it with "this will make all your dreams come true". If you are going to do 3d game development I'd suggest getting a computer with a good graphics card for the obvious.

Again these are all just my own personal opinions about the subject.

 

[NoBrain]

Now if you wanted to go with a windows computer you will spend less and get something [STRIKE]just as powerful[/STRIKE] significantly more powerful than these Mac's.

Fixed that for you.

I would highly recommend going for a Windows gaming laptop with the highest possible specs you can get for your money. Macbooks are nothing but a social media machine that can do some light web or software development work. Plus this laptop you purchase can double up as your daily machine.

Go for a good gaming laptop and you will be set. MSI, Asus and Acer are usually pretty good, I'm an MSI fanboy but their products are excellent. If you want something more sleek and low profile that's comparable to the Macbook Pro in design you can go for a Razer Blade but bear in mind that their support isn't the best, their products are on average low quality for a high price and you will be paying a lot more for the specs you want/need.

As a bare minimum I would say go for an Intel i7 or AMD Ryzen 5 CPU, 16GB RAM, 1TB HDD or a 500GB SSD, and definitely a dedicated GPU that's a 960M or better. I have linked some good ones from Amazon UK below (I used UK because that's where I'm from but you'll have to find it where you plan to purchase from). You could also go for an Intel i5 but that's pushing your luck as you will get better multi-tasking and rendering performance from an Intel i7 or an AMD Ryzen 5.

https://www.amazon.co.uk/MSI-Leopar...=1501713279&sr=8-1&keywords=msi+gaming+laptop
https://www.amazon.co.uk/ASUS-G752V...13834&sr=8-1&keywords=Asus+gaming+laptop+16GB
https://www.amazon.co.uk/Acer-Preda...1501713964&sr=8-2&keywords=acer+gaming+laptop

Dunno what your budget is but since you mentioned Macbook I am assuming it's quite large. Alternatively, if you would like a Desktop build rather than a Laptop I can throw together a list of parts I would recommend that can do some decent game development work (obviously depends on the budget).

 

[fallenfate]

Go Windows. Easier for you to run with, while learning game programming, you DON'T need to learn a new OS. The OS itself doesn't improve anything programming-wise that I've ever noticed, and the hardware doesn't offer any benefits over a Windows machine. Stick with what you're comfortable using, save money and develop off a Windows desktop machine. Macs have nice screens and that's pretty much all the praise I can round up.

What are you developing for, PC/MAC or mobile devices? Just interested as I'm developing a game at the moment too, haha.

 

[joellol]

Go Windows. Easier for you to run with, while learning game programming, you DON'T need to learn a new OS. The OS itself doesn't improve anything programming-wise that I've ever noticed, and the hardware doesn't offer any benefits over a Windows machine. Stick with what you're comfortable using, save money and develop off a Windows desktop machine. Macs have nice screens and that's pretty much all the praise I can round up.

What are you developing for, PC/MAC or mobile devices? Just interested as I'm developing a game at the moment too, haha.

Well, my study will have me programming in OS or windows either way. And at the moment i'm not making anything. Thanks for your response though. And good luck with your project!


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[fallenfate]

@joellol So you're going to make mobile games for iOS and Android? There are ways to code for both in either OS, depending on the games and languages you code in. There are IDEs for either OS and cross-platform ways to handle it such as wrappers, so either way picking Windows won't affect Mac OS development too much, as long as you have an emulator set up. And then you keep the flexibility of Windows .

 

[joellol]

@joellol So you're going to make mobile games for iOS and Android? There are ways to code for both in either OS, depending on the games and languages you code in. There are IDEs for either OS and cross-platform ways to handle it such as wrappers, so either way picking Windows won't affect Mac OS development too much, as long as you have an emulator set up. And then you keep the flexibility of Windows .

I ended up buying a Windows laptop. A Asus ROG Strix

with these specs:
Processor Intel(R) Core(TM) i7-7700HQ CPU @ 2.80GHz

Video Card NVIDIA GeForce GTX 1050

Video Card #2 Intel(R) HD Graphics 630

RAM 16 GB

Operating System Microsoft Windows 10 (build 15063), 64-bit

Realized that this was a much better choise for my budget. Thank you all for the tips!

 

[Biesmen]

You did right. I've got a mac book (technically two, one for my work which I got from my work and one private) and I've got a high specs Windows Machine. I am developing mobile games (Unity 3D) on my Windows machine for my hobby. It renders and compiles much faster due to the powerful hardware you can place in the machine. I do compile my games on my MacBook because you cannot compile iOS games on a Windows machine (unless you have a macintosh, hackintosh, w/e).

If you do not do web design/development (with tools such as composer), audio-related-software (music making, recording, etc), etc, or have a huge amount of spare money.. I wouldn't advise you to purchase a macbook.

There are also Apple Desktops, but these are really not affordable and a huge waste of your money. And yes, I am an apple fanboy!

 

[NoBrain]

If you do not do web design/development (with tools such as composer)

It struggles with that too

 

[ricky88]

In my opinion Apples are overrated.
Price is so high that we can buy sth two times cheaper in the same parameters,
You should remember that if you will study a technical direction, you
will have to download professional programms, which won't work on apples