Mac FAQ - potentially...

[resin]

I notice there is an increase in Mac posts on this site; here and elsewhere, it seems like the trend is moving more and more towards Mac gaming. This pleases me. Therefore, I would love to try to compile some basic and not-so-basic information in one place. Perhaps this thread? For my own part, I am a longtime Mac and PC user and am comfortable with either. I was impatient when TS2 came out and got it for my wife's PC. Now, I'm on the verge of getting Pets and wonder if I shouldn't just get the whole set again for Mac. I have one of my extremely rare disposable income moments right now, but even so, that's some money regardless.

So...

1) What are the general disadvantages of running the game on a Mac?
My understanding is that one cannot edit custom content. Also, SimPE will not work. However, if you partition your drive and install Windows, then you can do all of this on the PC side. Is this correct?

Also, are there Mac-specific bugs? Do all Awesome hacks work?
Are patches compatible?

2) What are the general advantages?
Do graphics run more smoothly?
Are load times faster?
Are some bugs avoided or hacks unneccesary?

3) What specs will allow the game to run with full detail and movies?
The minimum specs are easily available from Aspyr. However, what are the minimum specs for the full graphics?
For example, I use a 2GHz G5 iMac PowerPC with 1.5GB RAM. I use the standard built-in ATI Radeon 9600 graphics card with 128 MB VRAM. If I switch, will I finally see fingers? not to mention movies?

4) Are there any miscellaneous specific issues that someone getting this game for Mac should know?


Thanks for any responses both to these questions in general and mine specifically!

[Venusy]

I don't know if this would be useful to anyone, but apparently this is a Mac package editor/Clean Installer.

[Ayslhyn]

1. Disadvantages.

We wait longer for the release of new EP's. arguably this used to be an advantage because by the time re-coding was complete Aspyr had eliminated most known bugs.
Since the advent of IntelMacs and the Rosetta re-coding that no longer holds true. We get the EP's bugs and all.

The stuff-packs are not available to mac-users. Apparently excluded from the EA-Aspyr agreement these are not re-coded due to some sort of copyright dispute.

I do not know of any mac-specific bugs. From my own observations though macs tend to glitch on skins.

Only patches released by Aspyr are of any use to the mac.

2. Advantages

All I can really say here is that macs crash very rarely and cannot pick up viruses from downloading. It is arguable that the graphics are any better, load times faster or bugs rarer. Generally macs share the same bugs as the PC but are less likely to have fatal errors from them.

3, Specs.

Dunno. I personally use a 1.8 GHz Power PC G5 with 4 GB  DDR SD-RAM and an ATI Radeon 9800 Pro graphics card. This shows every little detail but this machine always did even before I added RAM and upgraded the card. I cannot say where the graphics cutoff points are.

4. Issues.

Apart from the later release dates I can think of no specific mac-related issues.

Hope this was helpful.

[seelindarun]

I cannot answer all your questions as I've never played TS2 on a PC, but I'll take a stab at some of them from a personal experience perspective, so consider that your mileage may vary. 

1) Not only do you have to play SimPE blind, but you'll also lack CleanInstaller and Homecrafter.  You do get Bodyshop, however.  If you're willing to install a Windows partition then you can avoid all of this, but then you can play your PC version of TS2 there, also!  Why not try that first and see if the game is snappy enough before investing in the Mac native version?

There are some Mac-specific bugs I've heard of, but most of the problems I've had relate to the inability to change video cards or drivers.  Mainly I've seen a growing number of graphical issues as successive EPs have outgrown the video card.

All Awesome hacks work, but not every Maxis patch is issued.  In the past, there was a greater lag in the Mac versions of the game and I'm fairly certain that some patches were incorporated into the port.  I've had to apply fewer patches and have never had some of the more egregious bugs reported by early adopters of Uni, NL, and OFB.

Pets for Mac came out very shortly after PC, and in this case I did apply all the MATY fixes and my experience with this EP has been similar to everyone else's.

2) Apart from what I wrote above, I don't think I can claim other advantages for running TS2 on a mac.  Performance is very difficult to compare, since a PC with similar hardware specs running Windows isn't necessarily an equal platform to a mac running OS X.  However, since macs come in far fewer configurations you can be fairly confident that if you get one around the same time as any given EP, your system will be up to snuff.

At the end of the day, you get a mac for its overall computing advantages, and not as the ultimate gaming platform. 

3) The mac you have will be ample if your current PC doesn't show fingers.    Our oldest mac is a trusty little G5 Powerbook with less horsepower, less RAM, and a lower vid card (1.5GHz, 1.2GB, NVidia Go5200 64Mb).  It still runs TS2 with all the EPs like a champ.  It shows fingers and movies.  It can take max graphics settings, but it does lag with lots of reflections on a large lot with more than 6 playable sims.

[moniquinin]

This is GREAT!  I will support any sort of Mac faq and will help as much as possible compiling useful info, and maybe not so useful info

I run TS2 with all expansions on my Powerbook 1.5 GHz G4 with 1.25 GB DDR SDRAM.  My video card is the one that came with it- ATI Radeon 9700.  I run it on the best graphics setting, but I do turn off reflections and it slows a bit if there are several sims on the lot.  I tihnk that the worst issue is the lack of Clean Installer, and no, that woohoo thing that was linked above has been defunct for months.

I can tell you that I got TS2 only a few months ago (didn't think it would interest me since I'm more of a NWN person) and I really did no research about all the bugs and the mods until after playing for a few weeks, during which, I never really experienced any of the great big bugs posted here and elsewhere that apparently are endemic in the PC version.  Most, if not all, of the issues I've had have been of my doing.  It's true that not every Maxis patch is issued, but I'm wondering if it's because they're not necessary.

The problem you will find with Pets is that all custom content has/had to be updated for the EP and there are updaters available, but only for PC.  Since modders quckly came up with these user-end updaters, I've found that a lot of the creaters aren't bothering to update their stuff because I am guessing they're assuming that anyone who wants to use it can go through the trouble.  A lot of these creators really don't keep us mac people in mind.  What happens with this non updated stuff is that your sim pets will not be able to interact with the objects (destroy furniture, take baths).

The only other issue I've encountered is that some floor and wall tiles don't work because again, for them to work for mac they have to have a precise resolution (or something, not sure exactly) but this is not true for PC so if the creators weren't careful, they won't show up in the game correctly.

If I think of anything else, I will let you know.

[Hegelian]

It seems like the trend is moving more and more towards Mac gaming.

This would be a misconception.

What you get:

*A closed system of proprietary hardware and software, with the price premium one would expect from that circumstance.
*A limited selection of software. Much of what is available is ports of software developed for other platforms.
*A programming team that eventually ended up with an OS programming manual that filled 24 binders, before the company finally bailed and licensed FreeBSD Unix in order to be able to ship a working product.
*A warm and fuzzy feeling from being part of a community snookered by very clever marketing by a company as red in tooth and claw as any in either Silicon Valley or Redmond, one that treats its customers as the enemy.
*A big dose of Smug.

All I can really say here is that macs crash very rarely. . . .

Sorry, but this is a myth. Your own Mac may not crash, but many Macs do crash, and often. Does Apple still refuse to put a reset button on their machines? I grew mighty weary of crawling under my desk to unplug a locked-up Mac in order to reset it, back when I was forced to use one. Of course, once back in my chair I had the pleasure of reading Apple's snotty message about the machine not being shut down properly. Well, duh—it crashed!

For a little perspective, read this, by someone with many years of Mac programming experience. It's a little old now, but still pertinent:

In the Beginning was the Command Line

BTW, my WinXP machine virtually never crashes, and it's been more than three years since I installed the OS. 

Think Belligerent

the Month of Apple Bugs

[dizzy]

*A closed system of proprietary hardware and software, with the price premium one would expect from that circumstance.

And it Just Works (tm). 

[Hegelian]

*A closed system of proprietary hardware and software, with the price premium one would expect from that circumstance.

And it Just Works (tm). 

For Steve Jobs, anyway.   

[Ayslhyn]

There is no manner of need for that hostility. All I could, and honestly DID say was that I had never known my mac (or any of the three others in da house) to crash.
None of them ever have. I do beleive that the UNIX-based OS IS inherently more stable than any DOS-based OS.

It is true that the mac OS IS a closed system. No-one would argue that. But it is a fine OS.

What point in arguing? Both platforms have their advantages and disadvantages. Be tolerant and let a mac FAQ develop.

[J. M. Pescado]

*A closed system of proprietary hardware and software, with the price premium one would expect from that circumstance.

Macs apparently run on standard Intel platforms now and OSX is supposedly open source.

*A warm and fuzzy feeling from being part of a community snookered by very clever marketing by a company as red in tooth and claw as any in either Silicon Valley or Redmond, one that treats its customers as the enemy.

I dunno, Microsoft's treatment of its customers as its enemy has hit an all new high. Apple is certainly not good, but at the moment it increasingly looks like the lesser of two evils, and frankly if they were smart, they'd play on that.

[Ayslhyn]

OSX open source? My butt. It is every bit as closed as Vista. Apple might be using UNIX as the code language , Intel or not but I challenge you to run OS Tiger on a PC.

[J. M. Pescado]

In that case, the source must have been stolen, which amounts to the same thing.

[Simsample]

I use Mac and PC, and like both!
From what I understand, a disadvantage of the Mac version of The Sims2 is that Antialiasing is not supported, no matter which graphics card you have. The Woohoo project also seems to be unsupported now, unfortunately- but there is a DBPF reader available:
http://homepage.mac.com/petergould/DBPF/index.html
There is a good Mac forum on TSR where Mac users can get a lot of information, and some of the Mac users from there also visit the Mac Help forum on MTS2. I seem to be the main person to moderate on there and unfortunately, not having TS2 on Mac, I'm not very knowledgeable in this field- so any facts and tips collected here would be a great resource!

[Ayslhyn]

Yup let us concentrate on that. Macs are no better or no worse than PC's .Just different.
A FAQ is a good idea.

[Hegelian]

There is no manner of need for that hostility. All I could, and honestly DID say was that I had never known my mac (or any of the three others in da house) to crash. None of them ever have.

Sorry! Perhaps I'm just finding the current Apple ad campaign especially repugnant and insulting, even by Apple's usual low standards in that regard.

However, you did state categorically that "macs crash very rarely." Perhaps better to say that "some Macs crash rarely."   

Otherwise, I don't think I said anything that isn't true.

*A closed system of proprietary hardware and software, with the price premium one would expect from that circumstance.

Macs apparently run on standard Intel platforms now and OSX is supposedly open source.

Apple has switched its CPU sourcing to Intel because IBM couldn't (or was unwilling to) reliably deliver PowerPC chips in the relatively small quantities Apple was buying. To the best of my knowledge, Mac OS will not run on a non-Apple, Intel-based computer.

OS X is sort of open source, after a fashion:

"Major components of Mac OS X, including the UNIX-based core, are made available under Apple's Open Source license, allowing developers and students to view source code, learn from it and submit suggestions and modifications."
http://www.apple.com/opensource/

Note that it says nothing about actually using it. 

In that case, the source must have been stolen, which amounts to the same thing.

When Apple could not complete a follow-up to System 7.5 in-house (the ill-fated Copland), it bought Steve Jobs's NeXT and its NeXTSTEP operating system (this in 1996). With Jobs back on board, further extensions of System 7.x were renamed System 8. The effort to incorporate NeXTSTEP into a Mac OS was codenamed Rhapsody, which was never publicly released (it was merged into Apple's open-source Unix-like Darwin OS). In the end, Apple combined elements of the OpenStep API from NeXT with chunks of FreeBSD Unix from UC-Berkeley (development of BSD ceased around 1995). A version of BSD that did not contain proprietary AT&T Unix code (developed by Bell Labs) was released in 1994, so it is pretty much available for anyone to use (apparently, Microsoft has adapted BSD code for its TCP/IP implementation).

Anyway, back to the TS2 FAQ for Mac users. . . .

[amjoie]

The main Mac disadvantage is that the downloads folder must be kept in check. The Mac will not allow for thousands and thousands of downloads, which is why I play on the PC. It isn't the graphics card, or speed, but something about the way the Mac handles opening the game.

So, you have to set up a "sparse" game with only the best and shiniest objects/clothes. Which may not be all bad, depending on how you play.

One glitch my daughter found was that her custom hoods would not keep their name. Miight have been just her game, though. I told her to reinstall. Haven't heard if that fixed it.

Mac bashing is "out of date," and increasingly out of favor.   shrug

Vista bashing is all the rage, though ....   

[resin]

Thank you all SO much for all of the great information so far! Some of it I had seen elsewhere, but it's incredibly useful to have it in one place (I think so, at any rate).

It does indeed sound like my slightly older iMac G5 will have no trouble whatsoever, so I might make that expensive switch soon.

Just one thing to keep in mind as we continue:

The idea here is to try to compile as much pertinent Mac TS2 info as possible into one thread. Therefore, please try not to get into a Mac vs. PC war here; I believe there may be one or two other threads somewhere on the internet where people fight over this issue. 
Take it somewhere else, please, so that it doesn't clutter things up in this specific thread. (I mean that with all kindness)

[resin]

The main Mac disadvantage is that the downloads folder must be kept in check. The Mac will not allow for thousands and thousands of downloads, which is why I play on the PC. It isn't the graphics card, or speed, but something about the way the Mac handles opening the game.

So, you have to set up a "sparse" game with only the best and shiniest objects/clothes. Which may not be all bad, depending on how you play.

By downloads, do you mean custom content or does that include hacks as well? I assume just CC.
For the MacFAQ, that could definitely be seen as a disadvantage.
(For me, I only use hacks and don't care about CC. However, I definitely don't want a limit to how many hacks I can use.)

Does anyone know a way around this? This seems like there would be an easy fix.

[Simsample]

It is an actual limit to the number of files that any one application can use. It can be changed as described here:
http://forums.thesimsresource.com/showthread.php?t=309256

[amjoie]

It's a "total number of files" issue. That would include floors, walls, hacks, clothes, objects. Anything you add to the game. Eventually, you hit critical mass, and the game won't open. If, at that point, you delete a certain number of files (any files) the game opens just fine. So making every file count is what matters. Start with the stuff you can't live without, and go from there.

My daughter gets around the problem by having separate hoods, each with its own download folder (which she swaps out, depending on mood). So, she has an oriental hood, a Victorian hood, a Castle hood, etc. Each can have its own compliment of custom objects/walls/floors/clothes. She has a subfolder with the stuff that must be in each downloads folder, like mods and certain "must have" objectst that she uses universally. That way, when she updates the subfolder, she can easily copy/replace it in her other downloads folders.

I have actually been working on doing something similar for my PC game so that I can speed up my start time and optimize gameplay -- not to  mention actually being able to find something I am looking for in the game. I don't want to give up most of my objects, but I generally only play certain types of houses for a few weeks and then switch to other types of houses for variety, anyway. So I don't think having multiple downloads folders that I swap out would much affect my gameplay.

What I have been doing is building houses and decorating them in different styles, just to see what objects I actually use, rather than keep them around as eye candy or because I can't bear to part with them. It helps narrow down the really useful stuff from the merely "pretty" stuff.

I don't want to curb my download fun, because I really enjoy "shopping" for stuff. But, truly, there is a finite limit to what you can actually use in the game. So solutions like this may be the best way to go. It does tend to make a person get organized instead of living in the midst of Sim download folder chaos. Never a bad thing. LOL

[sudaki]

I'll also mention that I'm running on a Mac, and I've had up to 3GB of downloads before without hitting the limit.  This may be low for some people, but it isn't as though you're only allowed three. 

My main "advantage" to running on Mac is just that it happens to be the computer I have and the OS I was running when TS2 came out.  And that's just a matter of personal preference.  I was tired of general Mac vs. Windows debates a decade ago, and I don't think they're really all that  useful to Sims players, or anyone.

A general FAQ for Mac Sim players might be a thing of value, though.  Additionally, I have an old version of WooHoo (the one that was posted at MTS2 before it got yanked) I'd be willing to upload or send to anyone who wants one, if it's no longer available at the maker's site.  I heard there were problems with the "backup" function or something, but it seems to work fine just to install .Sims2Pack files, or look at .packages to figure out what they are.

[Marhis]

Also:

- It seems there's a bug in the Mac OfB (hence probabily by Aspyr, not Maxis): when you resurrect someone, the call for lua script "patch all relationships" is somehow borked, and in debug mode will pop up an error. After this, the game will remain in "save disallowed", forcing you to exit the game without saving (and with force quit, too).

- BodyShop settings to tweak, in Mac, are NOT in the usual TSData/CSConfig/ etc. folder, but inside the BodyShop application itself (in Mac OS, applications are folders with .app extension). To edit, you have to ctrl-clic on BodyShop, select "Show Package Content" and then open Contents/Resources/Config/Graphics Rules.sgr with a text editor.

- Default settings for BodyShop are wrong. You have to change them, for being able to export texture bigger than 512x512 pixels, and with better resolution. On MTS2 there are a couple of threads in which is explained how (now is offline for maintenance, I can't give direct link).

- On Mac is easier to change screen resolution for the game, and to run the game in window mode. Hold down command (apple) key while double-click to fire up the game, and a settings-chooser window will open up. This works for BodyShop, too (you can select 1024x768 instead of 800x600).

[sudaki]

- It seems there's a bug in the Mac OfB (hence probabily by Aspyr, not Maxis): when you resurrect someone...

Just checking for my own peace of mind -- am I wrong in thinking this is fixed in Pets? (I got Pets and OFB at the same time, and have never experienced this bug)

- Default settings for BodyShop are wrong. You have to change them, for being able to export texture bigger than 512x512 pixels, and with better resolution. On MTS2 there are a couple of threads in which is explained how (now is offline for maintenance, I can't give direct link).

Is this the bug wherein BodyShop exported all texture files in a Project at half-size (256 instead of 512)? Again, I could be wrong, but I *think* this is fixed in Pets -- at least, I haven't had to resize all my .bmps since.
I still had to tweak my config file to get BodyShop to import anything without making it disgustingly blurry, though.

- On Mac is easier to change screen resolution for the game, and to run the game in window mode. Hold down command (apple) key while double-click to fire up the game, and a settings-chooser window will open up. This works for BodyShop, too (you can select 1024x768 instead of 800x600).

On the other hand, the Mac version doesn't include a way to switch between windowed and full-screen mode on the fly (unless this, too, was fixed in Pets and I didn't notice!), or to switch to another application while in full-screen mode (command-tab is disabled  ).

[Simsbaby]

On the other hand, the Mac version doesn't include a way to switch between windowed and full-screen mode on the fly (unless this, too, was fixed in Pets and I didn't notice!), or to switch to another application while in full-screen mode (command-tab is disabled  ).

As far as I have seen, there is no way to switch between windowed mode and full screen mode on Mac or Windows, but you can hide TS2 on mac by pressing Apple H, or something like that. 

[Marhis]

am I wrong in thinking this is fixed in Pets? (I got Pets and OFB at the same time, and have never experienced this bug)

Yes, it affects (it seems) OfB only, and not Pets (Uni+NL = ok, Uni+NL+OfB=argh, Uni+NL+Ofb+Pets=ok).

On the other hand, the Mac version doesn't include a way to switch between windowed and full-screen mode on the fly (unless this, too, was fixed in Pets and I didn't notice!), or to switch to another application while in full-screen mode (command-tab is disabled  ).

Yes, as simbaby says, command(apple)-H hides and freeze the game and returns to finder (and other applications). Also, I would add, you can even have 2 games running at the same time on different accounts, for testing purposes, and switch between them on the fly in seconds, with no or very less problems with memory; at least, with 1.5 Gb RAM I run a base game on one account and a full game (with all my EPs and custom content) on another, and switch back and forth smoothly.