Mac gamers to enter the Dragon Age on Dec. 21

by Randy Nelson on Dec 14th 2009 6:20PM

It's a much-better-than-usual day to be a Mac gamer: EA and Transgaming have announced that they're bringing BioWare's downright fabulous Dragon Age: Origins to OS X on December 21. The game will be released via "popular online digital retailers" including GameTree, Direct2Drive, GamersGate, GameTap and Best Buy as a download only (sorry, packaging-philes).

Two versions of the game will be offered up: Standard and Digital Deluxe. Both will include the Stone Prisoner add-on content and Blood Armor, while the later grows that list with the Warden's Keep expansion, wallpapers and in-game items. They'll run $49.95 and $64.95, respectively.

Source

Tags: bioware, cider, dragon-age-origins, ea, Electronic-Arts, release-date, Transgaming

Reader Comments (68)

Can someone help me with dragon age for PC. I'm in a college building, so my internet is just a jack in the wall. Anyway, when I run dragon age, it says I'm not connected to the internet, which is never accurate since its always connected. Tried troubleshooting just about everything, the game refuses to let me log into my online profile to redeem my DLC or upload my character. No firewalls, no blocked programs, and there's no router to tinker with.

Who's your ISP?

No clue. I tried typing in the isp gateway and it asked for a password and user name, so i assume i cannot change anything since its all networked into the building..

I've been told to open certain ports but yeah.. all i know is they have allowed dragon age and all of its related stuff, (launcher, updater ect) to be exceptions for my firewall. don't get why its still saying i'm offline and not connected to the internet.

I play this on my Macbook 2ghz with the 9400m under Bootcamp. It runs pretty good on medium settings. I wish I would have known about this because I would have waited. Anyway this is great news for mac gamers!

I play with boot camp too. I...wouldn't have waited. I wanted it waaay too bad. I also like having all my digital games from Steam.

But yay this is awesome!

It's a cider "port." It would have run the same or worse if you bought this version. Tramsgaming needs to die.

Likewise with Transgaming and the dying, yada yada.

Yeah... I probably wouldn't have waited! haha I'm just talking. I beat the game on Saturday and the first thing I wanted to do was start again. I just felt like I made all the wrong choices.

But I'm too busy (with other games) at the moment so I'll play it again in the summer.

They'd sell a lot more copies on Linux.

Errrrrrr....
http://static.arstechnica.com/ars_os_share_1009.png
Pie chart time.

>implying mac owners play games

I do.

Want to fight about it?

There ARE mac users who play games. The part that amazes is me is that the developer actually decided to support the platform. Macs alone are less than 10% of the personal computing market, and only a small portion of those users are probably interested in playing games (or else they wouldn't have bought a mac) Plus, those that are interested could have installed bootcamp and had the game months ago. As far as possible install base, Mac gamine is at the bottom of the food chain. After all three consoles the PC market is the smallest, and then the Mac gaming community is just a tiny fraction of that. It's awesome that a developer would take the time to support such a small fraction of the community even though the vast majority of their money is going to come from elsewhere.

Do Mac owners abhor Windows so much that they refuse to BootCamp it and install PC versions of games? They just got Bioshock this year when they could have gotten it two years ago!

I think the saddest part of these kinds of comments is that they think Mac owners are dumb enough to not only enjoy gaming, but also not capable of building/buying a Windows Box, running Boot Camp, or providing a home for multiple game consoles.

I game, it's just rare that I'll actually play a game on my Macs. I'm not so naive to think we are still living in 1993... Journeyman Project ftw!

I have no problem with Windows, I just prefer Macs. I'm not saying that this is the same for everyone, but I've noticed a lot more hostility towards Macs from Windows users than the other way around.

Have you visited Engadget? The Mac trolls are just as loud as the Windows trolls. Otherwise, it probably has to do with the fact that there are more windows users (thus more trolls).

Console gamers make fun of PC gamers for being "niche" and "irrelevant" as PC gamers do to Mac gamers for being "niche" and "irrelevant" such as Mac gamers do to N-Gage gamers for being "niche" and "irrelevant".

Those poor Texas Instruments Graphing Calculator owners, having to be the butt of N-Gage aficionado's jokes.

But the thing is if you want to spend alot of money on something, which you will be spending upwards of a grand on a mac. And you have an interest in gaming and are going to be buying games why buy a Mac? None of the Macbooks have great specs for gaming at all. Mac's are great for some stuff, but gaming is not one of them.

would pc mods are work with the mac version of the game?

Most likely. You should check out the package contents of Cider-based Mac game apps, it's practically a Windows directory. That's all Cider games are, they even allow you to adjust Direct-X settings in the games... They really are that lazy and half-assed.

I agree. ; )

Pay double for the computer, get a closed-sourced version of Unix, hardly see any games.

What's the point again? I hope it's not that 'viruses' crap. If you're doing serious video editing, I can see it, but...

Final Cut Pro. And shiny aluminium.

I've got a netbook made of shiny, anodized aluminum, so that doesn't count.

Final Cut Pro is one of the only reasons, I'll give you that.

I love Macs. I love every single thing about them, and like I said previously, it's the Windows users who seem to be hostile.

I won't judge you for it, Darth.

Here's your closed-sourced version of Unix, I mean BSD.

http://darwinbuild.macosforge.org/

I've at least tried a Mac. When I was in a computer repair class, we ordered a 24" iMac. My biggest issue was the lack of a "Windows Explorer" type file navigation. But I won't begrudge you guys for liking it. Just like I let the Linux guys do their thing.

"Just like I let the Linux guys do their thing."

You let us and them do their thing, how kind of you. Seriously Brad, a lot of people have been bitching about you lately, and I've never found a reason to join in until now. You always seemed like a reasonable person who didn't go apeshit-tmac on something for no reason whatsoever.

People use Macs because the love them. Most people use Windows PCs because they are used to them (the world isn't made up of RKNalikes). Oddly enough, no one here is saying stop using Windows so just stick to Engadget if you want to troll Mac uses.

"Most people use Windows PCs because they are used to them"

While that's part of the reason, I think a much larger part of the reason is because of price. You can get a windows netbook for $200-300, but the cheapest Mac laptop of any sort is $1000. You can get a cheap windows desktop for just as cheap but the mac mini is $600 and doesn't even include a screen. I know a lot of people who think OSX is very nice, but very few of them care enough to spend a lot more money on a computer that technically doesn't have features they can't get out of the cheaper option. Most people aren't enthusiasts, and don't want to spend $1000 on a computer if they can get something that performs similarly for a lot less money.

Very true Zappa. Didn't mean to make that sound like a negative either.

Believe it or not, my first computer as a kindergartener was an Apple, back before Windows really became big. Since then, its been nothing but PCs and Windows, happily. My only complaint is Windows ME, buggy piece of shit.

Well first, alot of people use their computers for something OTHER than gaming, in fact most people do, so why would I care about whether the Mac has lots of games or not if I play most of my games on consoles?

Second, you only pay twice as much if you are willing to settle for a lower powered PC. Just because the cheapest Mac is more than the cheapest PC doesn't mean the two are hardware equivalent. Apple sells computers in a much smaller range than PC makers. Apple is also making a *bleep*-ton of money that way. It's definitely not a bad buisness strategy. I don't understand why people hate on them for not making cheap PC's. If you want a cheap PC buy a cheap PC. If you want a nice PC, its not gonna be cheap. Same with a Mac.

krizoitz, I'm not hating on them for making their machines expensive. Apple is a "premium" brand, and price their hardware suitably, just like, for example, Sony.

No, the hardware is not equivalent between the $300 netbook and the $1000 macbook. My point is that it doesn't need to be. Like you said, most people don't use their computers for gaming. They use it for light web browsing, word and excel, holding pictures, and maybe the occasional movie. So why would they spend $1000 on a premium brand when the netbook with inferior hardware will work just as well?

Regardless of those examples, even when you compare a powerful PC to a powerful Mac you can ALWAYS find cheaper windows based machines by at least a couple hundred dollars. Apples strategy in marketing their computers as "premium" and charging a lot more for them is clearly a smart choice as their business is flourishing, but it's also the reason why they will never take over the majority of the market. Most people use the computer as a tool, and if a cheaper one does what they need without much hassle, they aren't going to buy a shiny one for a few hundred dollars more.

Rereading that I don't want to make it seem like I'm putting you down for paying more for a Mac. If you like their OS and their hardware (those are some damn nice cases) and it's worth the money to you then have a blast. I'm just pointing out the reasons why Windows has the majority of the market share, not necessarily saying x is better than y.

Wow, this is uber-cool on Bioware's part. Though not a Mac owner, I appreciate this effort they're putting forth.

Awesome, Bioware.

Wow I was about to Bootcamp this last week. Good thing I waited!

Maybe its because I grew up in a world where a mac was the last thing you wanted to have if you intended to game, but part of me always chuckles when I hear mac gamers.

My macbook pro has a NVIDIA GeForce 9400M. The system requirements are ATI X1600 or NVIDIA 7300 or greater. Would my laptop fulfill the graphics requirements ? I don't know much about graphics cards. Thanks for any help.

http://cyri.systemrequirementslab.com/srtest/

I am running it on a Macbook Pro with that very card, and it works fine. I have 2.4 Intel Duo and 4 GB Ram. The game is great. I'm running it on Bootcamp with windows XP. Everything is satisfactory.

Yes you will be able to run it. The 9400M GT is an alright discrete graphics card its not really meant for heavy gaming but it'll definitely get the job done. Run it with low-medium settings though if you want a good framerate.

I wonder if it'd work on a Macbook with an Intel GMA X3100... I guess that very unlikely :(

I was under the impression Mac owners don't actually USE their machines, they just parade them around trying to evangelize the masses.

a) Ars Technica is a Mac-leaning site, and their site statistics are appropriately biased in that direction. Clearly there are more fools buying Macs than people running Linux, but the split isn't 5:1.

b) A larger percentage of Linux users will buy this, and at a higher price, than Mac users.

c) The game's clearly too complicated for Mac users, as you have well demonstrated.

"c) The game's clearly too complicated for Mac users, as you have well demonstrated."

Coming from someone who can't even figure out the reply button...

PC gamers proving once again that they're elitist assholes.

I didn't realize the other fanboys were perfect in comparison to other fanboys. : 0

I just hope that BioWare and EA do the same for SW: The Old Republic when it comes out.

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Mac gamers to enter the Dragon Age on Dec. 21

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