New Mac client playtest
Observant Capsuleers,
As part of the ongoing technical investment in setting EVE up for a thriving third decade, the work of making a native EVE client for macOS continues at full speed.
After much progress following an earlier playtest, your insight and feedback is needed to make sure Mac users get the best EVE experience possible. With that in mind, a new public playtest of the native Mac version will run from 11-16 August. The playtest – to which all Mac and Windows pilots are invited – takes place on the Singularity test server and there will also be a special masstest taking place on 12 August. Details on how to join the playtest, the masstest, and how to provide feedback are detailed below.
The Mac version of EVE has been engineered to take advantage of Apple’s powerful graphics processing framework Metal, enabling an authentic New Eden experience on the platform.
This round of playtesting is intended to further refine EVE’s native Mac offering – particularly in the following areas:
- Graphics – A significant number of graphical issues identified in the last playtest have been fixed. However, those contributing to the new playtest are encouraged to report any graphical shortcomings they spot, including assets being rendered incorrectly, black screens, and UI problems.
- Crashes – In the previous playtest the focus to crashes was exclusively on Intel x64-based systems. Due to now having a native Apple Silicon client, the new playtest will include complete coverage of crash reporting on macOS.
- Performance – Several improvements to performance have been made following the last playtest. This time the dev team are keen to hear of any situations where performance is noticeably poor compared to running the game through the Wine client.
- Audio – Playtesting pilots are encouraged to report any missing sounds, music, or garbled audio they come across.
- Input – To optimize EVE for Macs, there has been a careful rewrite of how the game handles mouse and trackpad input. The dev team is now trying to trace a rare issue with ‘stuck keys’ in the client. Please report this issue if you find it.
- Launcher - A seamless launcher experience is vital in growing the EVE community by offering a Mac version. As such, playtesting pilots are encouraged to report any launcher issues that caused friction or stopped them from playing.
How to join
To join the playtest and masstest, you must be running the latest version of the EVE Online launcher. Both macOS and Windows users will be able to join. The more players that join in, the better the data gathered which will inform the future of EVE. Please read the rules for Singularity before you join, as these are different from those that guide users on the main server, Tranquility.
There is also an FAQ on Singularity that is recommend reading for playtesters, especially if you experience login problems.
What is the ‘masstest’?
As part of this playtest, a masstest will begin on the Singularity test server on 12 August at 17:00 UTC. The test will cover several areas: client performance and stability, server performance and stability, comparing Windows and native Mac client netcode, and time-dilation testing. For this test as many simultaneous pilots as possible are needed to maximize its potential. So, if you can make it, please do!
Supported Systems
It is recommended that playtesters run the latest non-beta version of macOS where possible. The client needs a minimum macOS version of 10.14.6, and will work on everything above. For Intel-based systems, your Mac must have a minimum of 4GB of RAM and dual-core CPU @2Ghz. This test will support all configurations of M1 ARM-based systems natively in this release, without the use of Rosetta2 for the client. The launcher currently requires Rosetta2. There is no change for players using Windows against EVE’s system requirements.
Leaving feedback
Please leave any feedback based on your playtest experience at the special forum page for Mac client playtest feedback.
A final note
The native Mac client is not yet a finished product, meaning the latest playtest version may experience a range of performance and stability issues. That, of course, is the very point of this playtest - highlighting and countering such issues will assure that as EVE and its player community grows, quality is maintained and improved. The final public release date of the native Mac Client has not been confirmed, but the results from this new playtest will help inform possible dates for an official launch.
Other than that, get ready to explore the Mac version of New Eden! And thank you sincerely to all previous and future playtesters. You are the future of EVE Online.
