Blizzard 'Overwatch' installer may herald macOS version coming soon

An executable which appears destined for a macOS version of shooter "Overwatch" has been discovered — but after completing an install process, the binary delivered appears to be for Windows.

Users on Reddit manipulating link download flags have discovered what appears to be a legitimate installer front-end to install the game from Blizzard's Battle.net. Initial AppleInsider testing shows that the installer is properly signed by Blizzard — but the delivered binary is useless to macOS players.

When triggered, the download package delivers 8.75 GB of data, and does pop up in the Blizzard Battle.net game launcher.

Blizzard has not announced "Overwatch" for macOS. Vice President Jeff Kaplan said in May that the company is "open-minded" about delivering the game to the Mac, but there were no plans at the time to do so.

The company has Mac versions of "World of Warcraft," "Hearthstone," "Heroes of the Storm," and older titles like "StarCraft," "StarCraft 2" and assorted "Warcraft" titles.

A Blizzard representative said that the company has "nothing to announce at this time," according to Polygon.

"Overwatch" can be played in Parallels Desktop 12, and received some optimizations in 2016 for the title.

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14 Comments

macxpress

said about 6 years ago

I know its not a Blizzard game, but I'd rather have pubg for macOS. I got sick of playing Overwatch in about 2 months. I've tried playing pubg on beta of NVIDIA Now for macOS and it works okay, but there is a bit of lag.

hexclock

said about 6 years ago

What application are you using to evaluate the executable?

ksec

said about 6 years ago

Apple will just need a small team to help a few middleware engine optimized for Mac and Metal 2 API. There already have this for iOS but not for Mac, and there are finite amount of Middleware now for games compares to years ago when everyone are making their own Engine.

And have decent GPU for Mac from Top to Bottom. No more silly Intel iGPU

And that's it. You just need a to make a platform they could use and they will come. The numbers from the recent quarter report just shows that there are more Mac users then ever.

cloudmobile

said about 6 years ago

ksec said:

Apple will just need a small team to help a few middleware engine optimized for Mac and Metal 2 API. There already have this for iOS but not for Mac, and there are finite amount of Middleware now for games compares to years ago when everyone are making their own Engine.

And have decent GPU for Mac from Top to Bottom. No more silly Intel iGPU
.
And that's it. You just need a to make a platform they could use and they will come. The numbers from the recent quarter report just shows that there are more Mac users then ever.

Yes but only a fraction of total PC users. And when the Macs that can actually support high performance games are considered - this excludes the MacBook Air and many lower configuration MacBooks meaning you are basically talking about MacBook Pros and iMacs - then it gets much smaller.

Gamers try to get as much power for their buck as possible. They don't care about things like ecosystems, aesthetics, support, user experience, resale value etc. They aren't going to pay $1500 more for a machine with the same specs because it's Apple. They will use that $1500 on more RAM, a better graphics card and CPU etc. in a heartbeat. Apple waa the leader in video gaming for PCs in the the Roberta Williams era just like they were the leader in education but times have changed because the tech has. Look at the Steam stats. There are more gamers playing the really demanding titles on Ubuntu Linux than there are on Mac. With Ubuntu the OS is free so you can spend every last cent on hardware. You can also play many Windows games using Wine emulator and kvm. But hey gaming is a niche. Nintendo will sell fewer $250 Switches in a year than Apple will sell $1000 Phone Xs in a month. They don't need the gaming enthusiast community because they make more off games in the app store than all the companies who cater to PC gaming enthusiasts combined.

macxpress

said about 6 years ago

cloudmobile said:

ksec said:

Apple will just need a small team to help a few middleware engine optimized for Mac and Metal 2 API. There already have this for iOS but not for Mac, and there are finite amount of Middleware now for games compares to years ago when everyone are making their own Engine.

And have decent GPU for Mac from Top to Bottom. No more silly Intel iGPU
.
And that's it. You just need a to make a platform they could use and they will come. The numbers from the recent quarter report just shows that there are more Mac users then ever.

Yes but only a fraction of total PC users. And when the Macs that can actually support high performance games are considered - this excludes the MacBook Air and many lower configuration MacBooks meaning you are basically talking about MacBook Pros and iMacs - then it gets much smaller.

Gamers try to get as much power for their buck as possible. They don't care about things like ecosystems, aesthetics, support, user experience, resale value etc. They aren't going to pay $1500 more for a machine with the same specs because it's Apple. They will use that $1500 on more RAM, a better graphics card and CPU etc. in a heartbeat. Apple waa the leader in video gaming for PCs in the the Roberta Williams era just like they were the leader in education but times have changed because the tech has. Look at the Steam stats. There are more gamers playing the really demanding titles on Ubuntu Linux than there are on Mac. With Ubuntu the OS is free so you can spend every last cent on hardware. You can also play many Windows games using Wine emulator and kvm. But hey gaming is a niche. Nintendo will sell fewer $250 Switches in a year than Apple will sell $1000 Phone Xs in a month. They don't need the gaming enthusiast community because they make more off games in the app store than all the companies who cater to PC gaming enthusiasts combined.

All of this may be true...but Mac users play games too! We just shouldn't have to buy a Mac and also put together a $1500 gaming PC. They should just be making the games for the Mac to begin with.