Put the wish list for porting projects HERE...

[portets43]

Heh... If only.

EA's at best a "maybe", but in light of the DRM that they threw onto Bioshock and Spore, it's more like a "No". Reality of the matter is, that it's a chicken-and-egg sort of problem with someone like EA. If you don't have the numbers present, EA's very definitely NOT interested in providing even just rights access unless you're looking to make them real money. "Real money" is ~25k or more units sold to them. If you can't pony up that sort of cash or prove to them that they'll MAKE that sort of cash, forget it.

We can't get the numbers up because of players like EA.

Players like EA won't step up to the plate because we don't represent big numbers to them.

Spore came to the mac and sims 3 is coming to the mac and iPhone. Even if it is just for money, that shows they're making progress on other platforms. And mac and iPhone/iPod touch are all opengl, right? So wouldn't that make it easier to port to Linux?

[niniendowarrior]

spore came to the mac, sims 3 is coming to mac and iphone. 1, sounds like ea is making a little progress toward more platforms.(even if it does just represent $$) and 2, those are opengl platforms. shouldn't that make it a little easier to port to linux?

EA has a deal (and commitment) to do Mac ports but that doesn't mean they'll do Linux ports. They will not shell extra dollars for a Linux port and if a porting house wants to shoulder the development, they'll ask for insane amount of dollars. So... it's unlikely we'll see it.

[Aradreth]

Spore came to the mac and sims 3 is coming to the mac and iPhone. Even if it is just for money, that shows they're making progress on other platforms. And mac and iPhone/iPod touch are all opengl, right? So wouldn't that make it easier to port to Linux?

Spore hasn't really been "ported" they just used cider to get it working under OSX.

[niniendowarrior]

Spore hasn't really been "ported" they just used cider to get it working under OSX.

That too. Although because of Cider, there is a Linux "port" of Spores Creature available on Cedega's site.

[Svartalf]

spore came to the mac, sims 3 is coming to mac and iphone. 1, sounds like ea is making a little progress toward more platforms.(even if it does just represent $$) and 2, those are opengl platforms. shouldn't that make it a little easier to port to linux?

They didn't make a port to MacOS. They just did a little bit of clean up on the Windows side of things to make it run "right" in Cider. As a result, Cedega and probably Wine/CodeWeavers will be able to run it as well. Quite frankly, I don't see that really as a plus. I doubt that you'll see an "official" or even really "unofficial" Linux version from them.

[Svartalf]

That too. Although because of Cider, there is a Linux "port" of Spores Creature available on Cedega's site.

Heh... What most people are missing is that Apple and probably Transgaming ponied up big bucks of the same caliber as what I've alluded to (Quarter mil or so...) to be able to HAVE things like Spore even show up on the Mac.

[xav1r]

...so, what are the complete requirements and costs total someone would have to pay, for publishing a game made by them, or by a 3rd party, in the iphone? This iphone seems to be taking the primelight, at least for the moment, foreshadwing all the other mobile platforms, the android included. I would imagine it's less expensive than getting a game on a major console or the desktop mac in itself, right?

[curaga]

Wouldn't the entirely different platform require not just "porting", but in fact a complete rewrite? Paying just for the license and some cover art ought to be cheaper than the code though.

[Aradreth]

To get a game on the iphone you'd need to port it to opengl and optimize the code for ARM instead of x86. You'd probably also need to redo the controls and interface (due to the smaller screen).

As for the cost I'd put money on it being largely the same as with porting it to linux/mac plus the cut apple gets from the iphone store.

[Svartalf]

...so, what are the complete requirements and costs total someone would have to pay, for publishing a game made by them, or by a 3rd party, in the iphone? This iphone seems to be taking the primelight, at least for the moment, foreshadwing all the other mobile platforms, the android included. I would imagine it's less expensive than getting a game on a major console or the desktop mac in itself, right?

Wrong. Unless EA wants it on that platform, you're going to see someone needing to pony up 6 figures for one of their titles. If they want it there, they'll give it to an internal studio.

As for moving it over, it's going to be about the same effort as making a D3D title move over to OpenGL. The iPhone uses ES 1.1, which is very much like OpenGL 1.4 without immediate mode and a few other things. If they make it happen for the PS3 or Mac itself, this will lower the bar considerably- so long as the game fits within the requirements.

The truth be known, anything that needs something like the PS3 or X-Box 360's hardware will have to be trimmed down at least a little (More probably a LOT...) to fit on the Pandora- and the iPhone is pathetically weak in comparison.